The ancient settlement Afrosiab.    History of archeological site Afrosiab

To the south, beyond the Siab River, there are gloomy yellow-grey hillocks of Afrosiab, full of mysteries. Unraveling of them would shed light on the past of the Central Asian peoples.

Afrosiab is the name of the mythological king of Turan who is a heroic character of the poem "Shakh-name" by the great poet Firdousiy. Today Afrosiab is a great number of lifeless hillocks adjoining Samarkand in the north. But long time ago Afrosiab was the place where the life of the ancient Samarkand people was in full swing. That is why Afrosiab interests scientists so much.

Archeological excavations of Afrosiab began at the end of the 19^th century after Central Asia had been annexed to Russia. The excavations were conducted by Major Borzenkov in 1874 and Lieutenant Colonel Krestovskiy in 1883.

Subsequent excavations conducted under the guidance of the competent historians and archeologists N.I. Veselovskiy, V.V. Bartold, V.L. Vyatkin, M.E. Masson, A.I. Terenozhkina, and the latest excavations by Professor V.A. Shishkin and Academician Y. Gulyamov proved what was said in old historical works that long before the Christian Era Samarkand had been one of the biggest trade and cultural centres of Central Asia.

It is proved now that the Afrosiab settlement in the type of a town existed more than 2000 years ago. The town, was encircled by strong defense walls, had a citadel, a mosque, houses and workshops of artisans. The territory was crossed by many straight paved streets and divided into blocks, or "guzars". Ramified system of channels and reservoirs supplied the population with water.

The barrow opened in 1965 in the centre of Afrosiab turned out to be amazingly rich in archeological finds. Since then the new, especially fruitful, period of researching in the ancient Samarkand began. The finds were beyond the scientists'expectations. The excavated buildings made of adobe, wall paintings in many colours, inscriptions in Sogdian, untensils, glassware including tiny glasses and inkpots were a revelation of the rich and original culture of the ancient town. Thus the veil of the mysteries was lifted. The buildings found were dated the 6^th-7^th centuries AD. The walls of the buildings were decorated with paintings made with glue paints on a clay surface. The unique finds prove the high level of the original arts developed in the ancient Samarkand. The Samarkand artists of the first centuries possessed consummate skills. The viewer is delighted with combination of colours remained bright and rich, with delicate thoroughly worked out details, expressively depicted faces and figures. The stability and fastness of the paints is amazing.

The newly found works of art by the ancient Samarkand masters have taken up their honourable place in the history of arts of the Oriental peoples.