Where humans originated and what
their dispersal patterns were has always fascinated me. Over a series of posts
I want to examine where the oldest evidence is found.
This is usually in the form of
lithic tools. The two oldest being Oldowan and Acheulean. Today a short post on
the Republic of Turkmenistan and some of its earliest lithic materials.
Turkmenistan, geographical
position in central Asia and the Lower Palaeolithic sites of Krasnovodsk Plateau and Kopetdag mountains. Figure
adapted from Mapsland (2020) and Wikipedia (2020).
Before I look at the evidence for
Lower Palaeolithic man in Turkmenistan I’ll give you a potted history of Turkmenistan.
If you’re not into history and want to skip this section, just scroll.. and
scroll..
History of Turkmenistan [Adapted from Avantour (2020)]
Apart from the evidence for the
Acheulian in Turkmenistan, the remnants of Neolithic settlements used by
hunters/fishers are known from the Dzhebel grottos in the west of the country
on the Caspian coast.
Southern Turkmenistan has some of
the earliest sites indicating agriculture and cattle husbandry in Central Asia
with Dzheitun village near Ashgabat (the capital) being one of the most ancient
agricultural settlements (6,000 BC).
Ancient civilizations developed
and prospered on the territory of modern Turkmenistan. In 1000 BC the states of
Margiana, Parthia, Midia occupied various parts of the country. They were
conquered by Persians in the 6th century BC and were a part of Persian Empire
(Akhmenid Dynasty) which was in turn conquered by Alexander the Great in the
4th century BC. After Alexander's empire collapsed the territories passed to
his heirs – the Seleucid Dynasty.
In the 7th – 8th centuries
AD the territory of Turkmenistan was taken by the Arabs who introduced Islam.
In the 9th - 10th centuries Turkmen lands was a part of Takhirid, Samanid
states, in the 11th - 13th centuries it was a part of Seljuk empire. In the
13th century the country was conquered by Mongolian armies led by Genghis Khan
who annexed the territory of Turkmenistan to his great empire.
By the beginning of the 16th
century the northern Turkmen nations spread all over the east coast of the
Caspian Sea, the Mangyshlak Peninsula, Ustyurt and the Balkhany, northwest
suburbs of Khorezm oasis, Lake Sarykamysh shores and the Kara Kum Desert. They
also conquered the lands and oases of south Turkmenistan. During that period
the majority of Turkmen nations were semi-nomadic combining agriculture on
irrigated lands with cattle breeding. There were both cattlemen and farmers in
each clan. Agriculture was a prerogative of poorer clan members.
In the 17th-19th centuries the
territory of Turkmenistan were claimed by the Persian shah, Khiva khan and the Bukhara
emir. As a result, Turkmen nations were divided among those three states (Iran,
Khiva and Bukhara). The majority of Turkmenistani territory was under the
control of the Iranian shah Nadir. He suppressed Turkmen resistance severely by
killing and enslaving its people and confiscating cattle and property. In 1747
Nadir shah was killed, his state collapsed and Turkmen tribes which had
temporarily left to the north came back to south Turkmenistan.
During the same period Lake
Sarykamysh, on the shores of which Turkmen tribes lived, started to dry up
gradually. So they were forced to move south to the Kopet Dagh area and
therefrom southeast to the valleys of the Murghab and the Amu Darya. From the
beginning of the 17th century the nomads' camps of northern Turkmen and the
city of Khoresm were subject to attacks by the Kalmyks who had come from the
east in search of unoccupied lands.
At the end of the 17th century
some Turkmen tribes exhausted by the attacks of Kalmyks and warriors of Khiva
khan, moved to the northern Caucasus and took Russian citizenship. Before
entering the Russian Empire the Turkmen had occupied the entire territory of
today's Turkmenistan as well as some areas of modern Iran and Afghanistan. Some
of them lived in Ustyurt and Mangyshlak together with the Kazakh nomads. Like
in the late Middle Ages Turkmen consisted of numerous tribes which in their
turn were subject to multistage subdivision system. The largest tribes were
tekes, yomuts, ersaris, saryks, salyrys, goklens, chovdurs. Up to the 1880’s
patriarchal slavery had existed. All Turkmens were divided into
"thoroughbreds", slaves and concubines. Except for these basic
categories there were also arrivals from other tribes and descendants of
subdued Iranian-speaking population. All those social categories except for
"thoroughbreds" were not considered as valued members of a society.
In 1869 on the east coast of the
Caspian Sea the Russians founded the port of Krasnovodsk, and by the middle of
1880 the surrounding territory became a part of the Russian Empire. In 1881 the
Russian brutally suppressed the subsequent Turkmen revolt culminating in their
notorious taking of the Turkmen Geok-Tele fortress. 20,000 men, women and
children died in the fighting or the pursuit of the fleeing. The Russian
general Skobelev was relieved of his command due to the wanton civilian
casualties.
As a part of the Russian Empire
Turkmenistan began to be involved in the Russian capitalism economic system
which was more progressive in comparison with archaic social order of Turkmen
tribes. By 1885, the remainder of the country had been subdued by the Russians.
In 1880-1885 the Trans-Caspian
Railway was built on the territory of Turkmenistan which resulted in capital
inflow to Central Asia. A number of new cities such as Krasnovodsk, Ashkhabad
etc. emerged on the territory of Turkmenistan along with industrial
enterprises. Thus, before the revolution of 1917 the elements of capitalism started
to appear within the patriarchal - feudal system. After the revolution the
Soviet power was officially proclaimed first in the trans-Caspian area and then
and in the other cities and settlements of Turkmenistan.
In April, 1918 by the decree of
the fifth Congress of the Turkmenistan Soviets the Turkestani Independent
Soviet Socialist Republic was established. This comprised the majority of the
territory of Turkmenistan including the trans-Caspian area.
In July, 1918 the Socialist
revolutionaries and Mensheviks supported by British, assumed power. British
armies invaded the area. The Civil war and foreign intervention lasted for
about one and a half years. In July, 1919 the Red Army occupied Ashkhabad, and
in February 1920, Krasnovodsk, thus ousting British armies from Turkmenistan.
By 1924 the Turkmen Socialist Soviet
Republic was established and in 1925 the Turkmen SSR ‘voluntarily’ joined the
USSR.
It would be nearly 70 years
before any more change would come, due to a succession of isolationist presidents
for life. In 1991 after disintegration of the USSR, Turkmenistan declared its
independence and proclaimed, the former soviet puppet leader, Atayevich Niyazov first President of Turkmenistan. The president
is the Supreme commander in chief of the Armed forces of Turkmenistan and the
Chairman of Democratic Party of Turkmenistan. He has the right to appoint
ambassadors and high-ranking officials of the executive authority including
heads of the ministries and departments. He had himself declared president for
life in 1999, in other words, he assumed complete control of every aspect of
life: in effect a dictator. He was famous for his eccentric and/or despotic decrees,
cult of personality, corruption and repression of the media and population in
general. His and his family’s foreign currency deposits are truly staggering.
By the time of his death they totalled $2-$3 billion, mainly obtained through
the filching of the country’s gas and oil revenue.
Niyazoy was followed into power
upon his death in 2006 by Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedow. His record is similar to
Niyazov’s with the Obozrevatel magazine naming Berdimuhamedow the 5th of the 23
worst dictators in the world. In the Press Freedom Index (Reporters Without
Borders), Turkmenistan ranks 176 out of 178. According to international
observers, Berdimuhamedow now leads "one of the most oppressive" and
"closed" regimes in the world. Turkmenistan also leads in the number
of political prisoners from all countries of the former Soviet Union.
In a bizarre and backward decree
(2019), reminiscent of Niyazoy, Berdimuhamedow, decided to gradually end state
funding of the Academy of Sciences of Turkmenistan; it will be phased out in
three years
Unfortunately, Berdimuhamedow is
still in power.
Central Asia at the crossroads
One strand of Turkmenistan’s
story I have not really covered is its geographic importance as a conduit from
east to west. An example is the Silk Road, the great trade-route between the
West and Orient which was opened during the time of the Chinese Han Dynasty in
130 B.C.
It crossed the territory of
modern Turkmenistan with the ancient city of Merv (then the largest city in the
world with a population of 500,000) and its oasis being a major stopping off
point. Trading caravans began in Xi'an
and crossed the entirety of Central Asia up to the shores of the Black and thence
to the Mediterranean Seas. The Silk Road routes remained in use until 1453 A.D,
when the Ottoman Empire boycotted trade with China and closed the route to the
west.
As explained above, and in my
potted history of the country, Turkmenistan has always been on the central
Asian route between east and west.
But what of pre-history? How far
back does the use of this corridor, linked by oases, go? The out of Africa
migration of modern humans ca.125,000 years ago? The original migration of Homo
erectus? Perhaps even Homo habilis or Australopithecines passed this way over 2
million years ago?
What evidence of any of the above
do we actually have?
Krasnovodsk Plateau.
From Vishnyatsky (1989): “Until
recently there were no firmly identified findings of Palaeolithic handaxes
either in Turkmenia or in the south-west part of Soviet Central Asia in
general…
Such evidence appeared just now.
In 1987, a research team from the Institute of Archaeology (Leningrad) was
engaged in field reconnaissance in Western Turkmenia. During the brief
examination of the giant Palaeolithic workshop on the southern slope of
Krasnovodsk plateau, not far from Yangadja railway-station, a section with some
biface tools, with handaxes among them, came to light.”
Yangadzha Handaxes, edge of the Krasnovodsk
plateau, western Turkmenistan from Vishnyatsky (1989).
“From this section, located on
distinct hills, only bifaces, flakes and a few shapeless cores were collected;
there was no other tool. So far, the total number of bifaces is no more than
twenty, and only part of them are true handaxes: some are, perhaps,
half-finished products intended to be points or something else. However, at
least four of the bifaces are finally or almost finally prepared handaxes, some
of which, unfortunately, came to us broken. All the tools from the site are
made of local flint, available in the area.
It is worth mentioning that the
surface of all the artifacts from the biface complex are covered by intensive
desert patina. This feature is indicative of the relative age of our surface
finds, because no traces of desert patina were found on the Neolithic tools
made of the same flint, which are scattered in the vicinity. Obviously, such an
observation does not enable to determine precisely the age of the handaxes, but
it is evident that it should be looked for in the Pleistocene period.”
It is of note that Okladnikov
(1956) found a number of Palaeolithic artifacts, most of which he labelled
Mousterian and Upper Palaeolithic. However, he separated out two handaxes as
Acheulean.
Four views of the
Krasnovodsk Plateau. Clockwise from top left: The Krasnovodks plateau seen from
the north looking west towards the sea; Distinct hills at the edge of the Krasnovodsk
Plateau seen across the railway from the road. These hills fit the description
given by Vishnyatsky above; Rockshelters towards the seaward end of Krasnovodsk
Plateau; Kaipata Cave above the Gaip Ata cemetery. 1-3 from Сайт Красноводск
(2017), 4 from Bobkin (2020).
Kopetdag Mountains
From Vishnyatsky (1999)
"Kopetdag. This is the northern range of the Turkmen-Khorasan mountain
system, representing a natural border between Turkmenistan and Iran. Its total
length is about 500 km. This region, like many others, is still unexplored. No
more than 200 objects claimed to be Palaeolithic artifacts have been reported,
and it is highly probable that some of these are not artifacts. All of them are
surface finds collected at different times by different researchers in the
western, central, and eastern parts of the range. All Palaeolithic finds in the
Western Kopetdag are located in the valleys of the Sumbar (a tributary of the
Atrek) and Chandyr (a tributary of the Sumbar) rivers, not far from the town of
Kara-Kala. V. P. Liubin collected slightly more than 100 stone artifacts here,
which were found, as a rule, on the eroded slopes of the hills among many
natural pebbles (Liubin, 1984, pp. 28-31; Vishnyatsky, 1996, pp. 37-43). All
the objects are made from local limestone and chert. Unfortunately, there is so
far no firm geological basis for dating. On typological grounds, Liubin dated
the oldest of them as Acheulean, but this is questionable, since no bifaces
were found. On the other hand, the predominance of large pebble cores,
chopper/chopping tools, massive side-scrapers, and crude flakes allows us to
regard the Western Kopetdag as an area where pebble industries were present in
the past.”
Landscape of the Kopetdag. A karst
scenery with caves (as noted in the foreground). Lithics found so far tend to
found on valley slopes as at right middle of picture. From Padenko (2010).
Gorge leading to Kyrk-Gyz “Forty
Girls” cave. This karst chain of mountains has many caves, mostly unexcavated.
Did hominins make these caverns their home in the Lower Palaeolithic? From
Dolgaya (2017).
What then are we to make of these
lithic tools? Firstly they seem to be from two traditions: Bifacial Acheulian
and possibly earlier pebble core chopper-chopping tools. Do these two lithic
types represent two waves of human migration, presumably out of Africa? Or
perhaps they represent a synchronous migration where individual hominins
expediently used the locally available lithic material in the second case in
the form of river cobbles?
What age they are, Lower
Palaeolithic millions of years old or Middle Palaeolithic 100’s of thousands of
years old will await a well stratified and dated site found within the borders
of Turkmenistan.
References
Avantour (2020) History of Turkmenistan (XXXX) at: https://www.advantour.com/turkmenistan/history.htm
accessed 19.07.20
Bobkin, M. (2020) Kaipata Cave: Look Into The Dragon's Pupil
at: https://alpagama.org/peshera-kaypata-zrachok-drakona.html
accessed 22.07.20
Сайт Красноводск (2017) at http://krasnovodsk.net/photo/10-13-0-0-2
accessed 20.07.20
Dolgaya, G. (2017) “Turkmenistan: from the Kugitang
Mountains to the Caspian Sea.” at: http://nexttm.com/view/6237/
accessed 22.10.19
Mapsland (2020) “Detailed relief map of Turkmenistan“ at: https://www.mapsland.com/asia/turkmenistan/detailed-relief-map-of-turkmenistan
accessed 22.07.20
Okladnikov, A. P. (1956)
Drevnejshee proshloe Turkmenistana (drevnie okhotniki i sobirateli v stepyakh
ipustnyakh Turkmenistana) [The most ancient past of Turkmenistan (ancient
hunters and gatherers in the steppes and deserts of Turkmenistan)]. Trudy
Instituta istorii, arkheologii i etnografii Akademii nauk Turkmenskoj SSR I:
181-221.
Padenko, A. (2010). “Where the mountains turn to desert” at:
https://twitter.com/padenko/status/956956197550219264
accessed 22.07.20
Vishnyatsky L.B. (1989) The
Discovery of Palaeolithic Handaxes in Western Turkmenia: A Preliminary report.
Paléorient, Vol.15 No.2. pp. 95-98.
Vishnyatsky, L.B., 1999. The
Paleolithic of Central Asia. Journal of World Prehistory, 13(1), pp.69-122.
Wikipedia (2020) Turkmenistan at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkmenistan
accessed 22.07.20
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