They say,
an individual has no right to refer himself/herself to representatives
of this or that people if he/she doesn't know its history and
culture. To be just, one should recognize the severity of these
words. Beyond doubts, the statement is too categorical. If to
take Central Asian peoples, even their tenth is hardly imaginable
to have the knowledge, which would respond to this standard.
Being guided with this criterion we had not to consider Tajiks
being Tajiks and Uzbeks being Uzbeks. Simply people should be
knowledgeable for their ancestors, their mentality, potentialities,
outlook; their awareness wouldn't bring any harm to civilization.
However, the historic truth is often concealed, or merely the
elements of lie are added to it. It is done usually by the representatives
of those peoples who try to justify their considerably later
emergence on this or that territory. But when lie springs up
it entails mistrust. Though when we speak about the peoples
who initiated the development of human civilization the deserts
of Aryan peoples can' the consigned to doubts as their origin
is traced back to ancient times. It is common knowledge, proved
scientifically long ago, that Tajiks are one of the ancientest
branches of the Aryan people. The distinguished scientists of
the world published no few productions on that score. We think,
it would be interesting for our readers to be acquainted with
the point of view belonging to the renowned Tajik scholar, academician
of Tajikistan Republic Academy of Sciences Numon Negmatov.
The Permanent Macrocivilization
of Aryana IS 8000 Years Old
The world scientific and intellectual public
at large, especially that part which is privy to historiography,
general ethnology, culturology and philosophy, is agitated
by the scientific discoveries of the greatest importance revealed
centuries ago yet; here refer: Avesta Gata, Videvdata, Yashta,
Vispered, Vedas, Bundahishn, Mahabharata, Denkart, Hvadaynamak
and other ancient Iranian and Indian monuments; ancient Persian
and Aramcan inscriptions written on rocks and diverse scribed
artifacts of Behisutun, Suz, Persepol, Nakshirustam, Paykuli;
tasr Askhoka's edicts and other written testimonies - Sanskrit,
Pehlevian, Armenian, Sughdian, Khorezmian - pointing to Ahuramazda's
Zoroastrian monotheistic religion, his prophet Zardusht (Zoroastra),
their country Aryana with the people called Aryans; and finally
- relic Farses, those of Zoroatrians in the mountains of Iran
and India. And Europe of the antique classic period left a
great number of ancient Greek and Latin evidences about Aryana,
Aryans, their ethnical, linguistic and cultural derivatives
pertaining to Middle Asia and the Middle East of the ancientest
time.
This general ancient humanitarian problem of world importance
attracted hundreds of prominent scientists privy to the abovementioned
branches of knowledge; thousand of intellectual amateurs from
all the continents being interested in the phenomena as well.
There were written hundreds of serious scientific books, articles
and notes, thousands of amateurish publications titled more
sensationally; but everyone wishing sincerely to make his/her
modest contribution into this super confused scientific theme.
In the course of centuries there formed a series of the hugest
scientific problems on localization of "Aryana"
land, chronology and stages of formation related to Aryan
ethnos, its language and culture, monotheistic religion of
Zoroastrism and prior early spiritual polytheism, personality
of Zardusht, Ahurmazda's doctrine, creator (Zardusht) or creators
of the principal canon of Zoroastrism in "Avesta"
and other concomitant compositions; upon the whole, the problem
in question encompassed, in general, the Zoroastrian ideology
of Aryans pursuing the goal of creation of universal ethnology
and civilization of Aryans.
And now the world started to count off the first decade of
the XXI-th century. The will of destiny granted freedom and
independence to Tajikistan, Tajiks elected the head of the
state, the leader of the nation. The name of this man is Emomali
Rahmonov, he originates from the grassroots, being a representative
of the people-laborer engaged in agriculture; this people,
peacemaker by its nature, is a bearer of the banner of "Book
Cult", it was not lucky in the course of 900 years in
the second millennia of our era. This people being the embodiment
of enlightenment was finding itself under the ferocious power
of those who "cultivated a sword" - Tiurcs, Chinghizids,
Kypchaks; it survived massacre and genocide in different historic
epochs, loss of lands, cities and towns; its wives and daughters
were driven away to slavery; the rich and cultivated land
with the highest permanent (incessant) macro civilization
aged about 8000 years was taken away from the Tajik nation.
Emomali Rahmonov entitled to be at the head of his people
at the beginning of the new historic epoch seeks for the reasons
of development and decay, victories and defeats, happiness
and tragedies in the peripetias of our ancient history and
contemporaneity, leaning on these grounds he created the fundamental
production in two volumes - "Tajiks in the Mirror of
History. From Aryans to Samanids" (London-Dushanbe, 2000,
2002). In this book president Rahmonov starts his deep contemplations
with raising the problem being to the following effect: "Who
are we? What are our roots? Where did we originate from? Who
were our initial ancestors? What lands did they come from?
Within what boundaries did they live? Where is the inception
of the history of civilization and statehood of Tajiks? What
are the chronological points of all these processes? What
is the historic contribution of our nation into the conception
and further evolution of the joint civilization of Aryans?
Is our language entitled to the right of being referred to
historic and cultural legacy? Has it preserved its national
primacy or did we borrow it from other peoples?"
These questions, just as scores of others, acquire today,
in the period of self-awareness and national independence,
a new peculiar sense. "Ruminating over them every individual
endowed with fervent mind and heart overwhelmed with love
for the Motherland is brought within the reach of his nation's
history, both far and near". (E. Sh. Rahmonov. "Tajiks
in the Mirror of History. From Aryans to Samanids". The
first book. London, 2000, p. 125).
The president of the Republic of Tajikistan Emomali Rahmonov
in his report devoted to the twelfth anniversary of the independence
of the republic suggested that 2006 should be announced the
Year of Aryan Civilization; he issued the edict from September
12, 2003 "On the Year of Aryan Civilization" to
the effect of studying and propagandizing the contribution
of Aryans into the history of world civilization, bringing
up generations in the spirit of national self-awareness, developing
generations in the spirit of national self-awareness, developing
links between peoples and cultures. The festivities on the
occasion in question are bound to be combined with the celebration
of the fifteenth anniversary of RT state independence.
Early Stage of Evolution in Regard to Civilization of Aryan
Peoples
In the "period of early archaic epoch" there went
on the most important ethnocultural process in Central Asia
concerned with the formation of the totem-speech grounds of
existence in reference to initial autochthonous communities
belonging to the variety of Homo sapiens living about 20-12
millennia ago; these were erect hominids of Neanderthal species
called in science as Homo erectus. Aboriginal early Aryan
communities gave rise to the intellectual speech background
based on the immediately surrounding environment (mostly perceptible
phenomena of nature and fauna, visible and tactile); the latters
being converted into totems, both positive and negative: light
(suns) and dark, warmth (fire) and cold, water of springs-wells
and brooks, mountains with caves, the whole number of species
pertaining to wild animals, especially those easily tamed.
Totem-speech world perception and world explanation of the
archaic Aryan period laid the foundations of the first historic
factor beset with the revolutionary cultural genesis of our
far ancestors. This date may be called as the inception of
the Aryan dawn.
The next stage of ethno-cultural genesis of early Aryans befalls
the archeological epochs of the Mesolithic and the beginning
of Neolithic Ages (XII-VI c.c. B.C.) when they acquainted
deeper and wider with their environment, bringing it under
cultivation more practically and daringly; they tamed successfully
totem animals (dogs, cows, horses, donkeys, fishes, cats,
cocks, birds, etc.); they found cereals (grain crops, beans),
root-crops, tree-berries (apricot, etc.). This stage is distinguished
with primitive-intuitive selective practice on preservation
and improvement of flora and fauna species. It was the dawn
of Aryan agriculture, husbandry and selectionism which evolved
further on into broad intellectual thinking, totemic-spiritual
speech-language wealth and food production labor; it being
actually a new revolutionary cultivation of natural environment
and renovated outlook. There arose a new historic epoch called
"Neolithic revolution" in archeology. There started
the time of civilization discoveries befalling the VI-V-th
millennia B.C. (i.e. 8-7 thousand years ago). The following
factors determined a civilization evolution of that period:
- Grinding and drilling in stone chiseling, making more comfortable
productive labor tools of aesthetically looking type: neolythic
axes, sickles, microliths and arrows;
- Invention of pottery (especially clayed kettles, food receptacles)
and their kilning, so that foodstuffs might be kept and cooked;
variety of meals (especially liquid ones) produced revolutionary
amelioration in the anatomy and physiology of human beings;
- Invention of spinning and weaving, clothes sewing which
promoted essentially man's protection from natural climate,
artistic perfection of ancient garments and their modeling;
- Artificial erection of dwelling refuges from the dangers
of wild nature and predatory animals, from cold and boiling
heat; formation of communities and settlements uniting one
or more clans.
In the epoch of the ancientest human communities the vital
civilization factors of life were: irrigative and non-irrigative
agriculture in oasis low-lying lands of river zones and on
sloping terrains of foothills; erection of simple earth dykes
on the way of high waters coming from rivers and mountains
with mudstone lavas; accumulation of waters for a vegetation
period requisite for cultivated plants - cereals coming first
(barley, wheat, beans, and etc.). The earliest practice is
registered in the basins of the Amu-Darya and Syr-Darya, the
Zarafshon and in delta zones of big and minor rivers together
with their tributaries: Murghob, Tedgen, Gerirud, Hilmend,
Surkhan-Darya, Vakhsh, Kofarnihon, the whole number of hose
nourishing the Panj; the slopes of the Kabutak (the Kopetdag),
the Hindukush and Pamirs and other mountains referring here
as well. For water retention they made loess dams of different
dimensions using boulders and brushwood. The remnants of such
erections are studied in the zones of many ancientest monuments
of the Neolithic, Eneolithic and Bronze Ages (Djeytun, Sarazm)
and etc. And in Middle Asian archeology there shaped special
scientific trends beset with the studies of the ancientest
irrigation, ecology, geography and geophysics with their peculiar
methodological researches of not only water erections but
of the most delicate artifacts (remains) of flora. The latter
is explored especially fortunately by French experts on the
objects of Sarazm and in South Panj zone of the Amu-Darya
lands.
At that same time the spirituality of the ancientest community
people achieved no small progresses. High intellect, significant
outlook, rich mythological and ritual spirituality, domestic
life and material culture are reflected broadly and profoundly
in famous petroglyphic complexes carved on the rocks of Tamda,
Saymalitash, in the caves of Shahty, Asht, Caspian lands.
This initial stage of Aryans' civilization terminated by the
abovementioned factors of the "Neolithic revolution"
due to which Aryan communities united and the Aryan society
upon the whole made a transition from the appropriating economy
of hunters and pickers of ready gifts of wild nature to intellectual
cultivation of the world and production household, i.e. to
agriculture, stock-raising and paleometal - that being the
great social-economic leap in the history of mankind performed
by the Aryans of Middle Asian Aryana, in the VI-IV-th millennia
B.C. (i.e. 8-6 thousand years ago).
Ancient Aryana as the Protoland
of Aryan Peoples
At the second stage of Aryana civilization,
in the IV-III-th millennia B.C. (i.e. 5-6 thousand years ago)
the following evolutionary events take place:
- Complete crystallization of agriculture and irrigation,
settled life and labor modus vivendi, formation of oases,
settlements and early towns, their dwellings, public spiritual
administrative centers;
- Formation of the kinds of technologies of land utilization
and water usage in conformity with concrete natural climatic
conditions and environment, allotment of irrigative and non-irrigative
zones with respective tools of labor; selection of new cultivated
plants giving food;
- Amelioration and perfection of stony instruments, improvement
of their working qualities aesthetic forms especially polished
drilled axes (for fixing wooden handles), assembled sickles
on a wooden basis for fixing petty stony slabs - microliths.
Other types of tools applied in hunting and out rooting are
bettered as well;
- Intensified quest for a firmer, more convenient and universal
material which might replace inconvenient heavy stone, thus
there was found melting copper in the cinders of bon-fires
and hearths serving for cooking. But copper, not being very
solid, didn't afford to make firm tools, it was used for making
ornations for men and women, needles and other cutting objects
needed in domestic households, especially in weaving and sewing.
Further searches for metals eventuated in the discovery of
plumb and tin, whose alloy with copper gave a material of
proper solidity which was used for making tools needed in
everyday life;
- thus, Aryans achieved great theoretical and practical progresses
in ore extraction, metallurgy, casting of copper, tin, plumb
and bronze. The formation of metallurgy entailed the invention
of the whole sets of special tools for all these sorts of
human activity. So, Aryans made the recurrent great discovery
for the subsequent millennia of paleometal at the junction
of the Eneolithic and Bronze ages.
- At this stage there crystallize completely the professions
of potters, weavers, builders, ore diggers and metallurgists,
i.e. the first bloc of production requisite for the full-value-development
of society; agriculturists, irrigators, cattle-breeders having
been available already. This assembly of a rich variety of
artisans provided the creation and efflorescence of Aryana
civilization in Middle Asia in the IV-III millennia B.C.
This great leap of production and intellectual upsurge enabled
Aryans to achieve a higher standard of common material and
spiritual rise.
Migration Processes in Aryan
Peoples' Life
To the end of the stage in question there
began migration processes from the Aryan protoland to different
regions of Eurasia. In the outcome due to multiplication of
additional product, social welfare and other positive life
conditions of population in Aryan communities, early cities,
oases, settlements and the country upon the whole whose territory
included the basins of the Amu-Darya, the Syr-Darya, the Aral,
the Zarafshon, the Surkhan-Darya, the Vakhsh, the Kofarnihon,
the Panj, the Murghob, the Tedgen, the Gerirud, the Hilmend
and the Penjab.
The demographic explosion made the Aryan society start migrations,
durable, permanent, major and minor, to relatively not so
densely populated settlements or quite empty steppe, mountainous
and valley regions of Eurasia: through the northern and southern
Caucasus to the basins of the Dnepr and the Danube in the
direction of the Carpathians (Three Field Land - Luka - Vrublevetskaya
- Kukuteny archeological culture), to the Southern-Eastern
Urals (monuments of Arkaim), to the steppes between the Volga
and the Yenissey (Andron ethno-cultural community). New groups
of Aryans migrated to the Northern Indostan, ocean best of
Afghanistan and Iran, South Caspian coast, Southern Caucasus,
Asia Minar and through the Dardanelle to Frakia and the basin
of the Aegean Sea.
These migrations of Aryans from the protoland of Aryana and
other hotbeds of earlier migrations (for example E. E. Kuzmina,
distinguished researcher of Andron culture, admits a migration
of some part of population through Pamirs to India) were of
great ethno linguistic and historical-cultural importance
for entire Eurasia; the latter also initiated its new historical-civilization
stage with immense ethnical, productive and cultural heritage
having created in due time the enormous Indo-European cognate
ethno linguistic family of modern peoples and nations with
the Aryan root of historic origin continuing its life up to
nowadays.
