A Brief Review of Kazakhstani and Russian Historiography on the Initial Stages of Central and South Asian Interaction
Yelena I. Rudenko,
Doctorate in History, Senior Research Fellow,
Central and South Asia Department,
R.B. Suleimenov Institute of Oriental Studies (Almaty, Kazakhstan)
According to quite a great number of researchers, the history of relationship between South and Central Asia is as ancient as the history of evolution of their own civilizations – hence, it is impossible to establish any exact (or even close to probable one) date for the beginning of interaction between South and Central Asia, since all available written, archaeological and other evidences, both direct and indirect, reflect not an origination, but only a certain period in such interaction, when interregional migrations over these territories had already become regular and intense. With the continual acquisition of new reliable information about the more and more ancient periods in the history of Central and South Asian regions, the starting stages of their relations move back all the earlier. On the basis of only reliable (not mythologized) data, the beginning of civilized interaction of these two regions can be dated back to the time of existence of the Harappan civilization in India and the first major sites of settlement in Central Asia. At present, it is deemed conventional to look for signs of this initial interaction in the contacts of representatives of the Indus (Harappan) civilization with population of the territory of modern Turkmenistan and also possibly with Andronovo culture settlements in the territory of modern Kazakhstan [Bongard-Levin 1980, p. 13; World History 1956, p. 690]. Active temporary trade contacts of residents of ancient settlements and state entities of Central and South Asia are evidenced by numerous findings of import-export goods; at the same time, it is necessary to distinguish between pure imported products and local ones which reflected various kinds of imprint of interregional mutual influence.
Moreover, the ancient Indians had been also involved in commercial expansion: thus, in the Amudarya, for example, there was discovered a Harappian “colony” – the ancient settlement of Shortugai A (2200-2000 BC) [Il’in, Diakonov 1989, p. 165]. And already in the III millennium BC the southern regions of Central Asia begin to play their intermediary role in the land trade of Indus cities with the state formations of the Middle East and later China.
During the III-II millennium BC, there has begun the exchange and assimilation of the primary scientific ideas, technologies and cultural-social values between the geographically adjacent regions of Central and South Asia. Such the trade-economic contacts and exchange in technical and cultural achievements related to them contributed to the overall development of both regions. Thus, the architecture of many large settlements of the south-western part of Central Asia, which arose mainly after the heyday of the huge centers of the Indus civilization, resembles the architecture of the latter.
A well-known fact is that at the excavations in Harappa, there were found busts of Mongoloid type people. These busts should most likely be attributed to the representatives of the Tibet-Burmese ethno-racial group from the north-east areas of India itself, but it is not fully ruled out that population of the Indus civilization due to migratory contacts was also familiar with Mongoloids from the more remote regions of Central Asia. Moreover, according to some assumptions, the population of India and of southern regions of Central Asia, being Dravidian, was somehow kindred in linguistic and even racial terms (although it is hardly possible to consider as valid the attempts to identify the Dravidians – inhabitants of the Indus civilization with the “Proto-Proto-Turks” as, for instance, Kazakh researcher M. Barmankulov insists upon [Barmankulov, pp. 22-23, 167-177]).
If the decline of the Indus civilization only partially and yet without sufficient evidences is associated with the arrival of Aryan tribes to South Asia, then the Aryans may be deemed indeed “responsible” for the extinction of urban centers in the territory of Turkmenistan. Regarding this fact, Russian researchers support an opinion of Indian scholar R. Sankrityayana who notes that the very first contacts of the Aryans with the Dravidians occurred not in the lower reaches of the Indus, but in the region of Khorezm, which testifies to the obvious migratory presence of the first Proto-Indians (as Aryans) or ethnic groups related to them in the Central Asian region.
According to the assumption of some Russian, Indian and Western researchers who do not believe in the theory of India as Aryan’s homeland, the Aryan tribes began their movement southward from Central Asia. Some Kazakh scientists even talk about the Aryan tribes’ homeland in northern and western Kazakhstan, in particular, along the eastern shore of the Caspian Sea, just as some Kyrgyz researchers look for their origins on the shores of Issyk-Kul Lake. In this case, there is obvious unification and even muddle of Aryans and Andronovs (representatives of the Andronovo culture which covered the territory of Kazakhstan among others) and, moreover, of Aryans and Scythians (Sakas). According to the most common hypotheses on penetration of Aryans into India, such an assumption of their Central Asian origin can only be seen as partially true. Nevertheless, be the homeland of the Vedic Aryans and the whole proto-Indo-European community located somewhere in the circumpolar regions of Karelia and Scandinavia (the “Arctic theory of Somagiri” by B.G. Tilak), or in Western, Central, Eastern and Southern Europe, or in the steppes of southern Russia, in any case the western (Trans-Caucasian) and eastern coasts of the Caspian Sea should be deemed as one of the most important geographical corridors of migrations of various waves of Aryan tribes towards India.
Thus, R. Sankrityayana, tracing the path of the early Aryan wave to the territory of South Asia in time and space perspective, relocates the “Indo-Slavs” from Eastern Europe through the Volga region (VI-IV millennium BC), Central Asia – in particular, along the riverbed of the Amu Darya, the Fergana Valley and the Pamir (3000-2500 BC) to the north-western regions of India. At that, the researcher notes that on their way the Aryans met horse breeders in the northern regions of Central Asia and farmers in the south ones [Sankrityayana, pp. 7-10, 13, 25, 39, 47]. Here, however, it should be clarified that, following the Indian tradition, R. Sankrityayana pushes the arrival of the Aryans into the territory of India far back in ancient times. If we take into account the most common assumptions that the early period of Andronovo culture dates back to the 18th century BC and the beginning of penetration of the Aryans into India dates from the mid-end of the II millennium BC, then the latter could most likely pass through the territory of Kazakhstan at the turn of the III-II millennium BC.
In the course of their southward migrations, Aryans indeed used to stop and even partially settle on the territory of Central Asia, constituting an important part in Andronov and later Scythian (Saka-Sarmatian) ethnic formations that spread from the Black Sea and Southern Siberia to Afghanistan. It is well-known that various Scythian tribes lived in the vast territory of the Eurasian forest-steppe zone, and the direction of their settlement had been in line with the direction of Aryans’ movement to the South.
It is also known that in the initial period of its existence, the Andronovo community in Kazakhstan was considerably influenced by the Timber-grave culture of the Volga region [Baipakov 1993a, p. 19]. The reason for this, most likely, was the gradual movement of the Aryan tribes, especially since the Aryans’ archaeological culture exactly at the period of their arrival to India is called the Timber-grave-Andronov one. Another evidence of continuity of vary-stage elements of the Late Aryan wave is seen in the apparent similarity of material and spiritual cultures of the Alakul (Southern Transurals, middle of the II millennium BC), Tazabagyar (Khorezm, 13-11 centuries BC) and Bishkent (Southern Tajikistan, turn of the II-I millennium BC) [Guseva 1977, pp. 47-50].
Therefore, referring to the period of pre-Aryan and Aryan migrations, one should not even talk about the contacts of representatives of Central and South Asia, but rather about the presence of the same ethno-religious (and hence economic, cultural, etc.) elements in the territory of both regions. Actually, there are too mane evidences of commonality of these elements.
Firstly, the economic structure: predominately cattle-, mainly horse-breeding, combined with active deforestation respectively by Andronovs in the northern and central parts of Kazakhstan – to use wood for smelting, and by Aryans in northern India – in order to clear ground for agriculture which they had gradually gone over to.
Secondly, the strata organization of society: partitioning of population into Brahmins-priests, Kshatriyas-warriors, of which chiefs and kings were elected, and ordinary freemen among the Indian Aryans, Andronovs and Scythians (Sakas). At that, in nomadic Kazakhstan this stratum did not achieve its fully distinctive division into farmers, artisans and traders, as it happened in the southern regions of Central Asia and especially in India, which may be due to the fact that such a broad stratification was not necessary for the socio-economic development of the nomadic society [Ganzha 1991, p. 147].
Thirdly, the religious beliefs: deities with the same names, functions and even canons of representation – Mitra, Yama, Varuna, Anahita and – more distantly – Indra, Surya and Agni. Thus, often the images of gods of Andronov-Saka period similar to the supreme gods of Hinduism have many hands, so that, for example, many-armed Andronov-Scythian god on the bull may be related to Rudra-Shiva; there are also found the images of the Sun with spears as well as snake-haired deities of the Andronov period that have direct parallels with the canonical image of Hindu god Murugan, particularly, in South India [Rysbaeva, p. 30-31].
Fourthly, the cosmogonal and environmental attitudes: a three-tiered quadrangular cosmological world with gods-guardians of the four cardinal points; a deification of almost the same animals, especially wild beasts and birds of prey, and later – domestic cattle. Notably, in particular, is that the worship of mother-cow in Hinduism is associated with the presence among early Aryans of the bull cult similar to the aurochs cult in Central Asia.
Fifthly, the ritual practice: cremation of the dead, including use of red ocher as a symbol of fire; sati – compulsory and later voluntary widows’ self-immolation (or another type of suicide); similar seasonal ceremonial, for example, the king ploughs the first furrow in the beginning of the growing season; creation of gods statues, including movable ones, of tree in nomadic conditions and of stone in the conditions of settlement; reverent attitude towards fire-side; drinking intoxicating liquors – koumiss and araq (fermented mare’s milk), and subsequently haoma-soma that with the lapse of time in both regions began to pursue religious goals as well, etc.
Many common elements existed in clothing (thus, on the feet of almost all statues of the Vedic Sun god Surya there are still depicted the so-called “Scythian” high boots) and in armament (characteristic “Aryan” swords and mounted chariots used by both the Aryans and Indo-Iranians of the Central Asia). There were also obvious linguistic parallels explained by the same Indo-Aryan commonality. And some of these Aryan elements – in the sphere of both spiritual and material culture – had been later inherited by the Turks of Central Asia [Rudenko 2015, pp. 201-203].
It is noteworthy that the broad region for creation of the early parts of the all-Aryan “Avesta” included Turan or Central Asia as well; however, in this literary monument the Central Asian Aryans are not mentioned. In the proper Indian literature of a later period (“Aitareya Brahmana”, “Mahabharata”, “Ramayana”, Puranas, etc.), the Central Asian region is mentioned repeatedly. According to them, the territory of Bharat-Varsa (Ancient India of the Puranic texts) extends northward to the Amu Darya (Indiam “Vamkshu”), and the Hindu mythical mountain Meru is located in the Pamir. “Bhuvanakosha” does at all include the whole of Central Asia up to the Urals and the Yenisei River into the Uttarapatha – the extreme northern part of the Indian subcontinent. Thus, the long and intensive migratory waves of the Aryans actually for a certain time combined also the outlook of the representatives of Central and South Asia.
Turning to the question of interaction of representatives of South and Central Asia during the period of existence of interregional “external” empires, it should be generally noted that the political amalgamation of southern and north-western regions of respectively Central and South Asia within the Achaemenid Empire and then the state of Alexander the Great had a definite effect upon the relations between these two regions.
Of course, it is doubtful that such a merely formal administrative and territorial inclusion in both empires of certain regions of Central and South Asia (a large part of whose population most likely did not even know about this fact or did not attach much importance to it) could either promote or impede the increase in political, trade-economic, religious, cultural and in general migratory interaction between the two regions. The relatively centralized infrastructure that existed in the Achaemenid Empire may have facilitated trade relations along some areas between India and Central Asia, while conquests by Alexander the Great rather hindered the direct contacts of the subjugated parts of Central and South Asia (however, as is known, this obstacle was short-lived).
During this period, the entire space of the two empires has endured a somewhat different development of relationship between Indians and the representatives of Central Asia – not direct contacts, but trade-economic, social and cultural-religious interaction. Both of them met in many cities-centers of trade and on various trade routes. Thus, both Indians and Scythians lived in Babylonia (from the sixth century BC), in Alexandria and other cities of the empires of the Achaemenids and Alexander of Macedon [Weinberg 1989, p. 185; Bongard-Levin et al., p. 14]. Both of them served as mercenaries in the armies of various powers and performed garrison services in various territories, especially after India was politically lost during the last Achaemenids, and Khorezm, Sogdiana and the Saka tribes out of the subjects turned into the allies of Persians. The Persian and Hellenic civilizations also acted as intermediaries in the transfer of some cultural and religious elements between Central and South Asia. Direct contacts of South and Central Asian peoples also continued within the territories of their immediate settlement.
From the middle of the 3rd century BC, the Parthian and Greco-Bactrian kingdoms which have split off from the Seleucid state became a sort of buffer zone between the regions of Central and South Asia proper. At the same time, regular military conflicts between the two kingdoms as well as free both-sided migratory flows of representatives of these two regions constantly changed the population structures and areas of the territories included in each of the abovementioned states, so that at some periods their eastern borders even overlapped.
The nobility in the Parthian and Greco-Bactrian kingdoms, including in their Indian territories, consisted of Iranians, Greeks and representatives of Central Asia per se. However, in the main, the role of these two kingdoms was reduced to the activation of cultural and religious processes.
First of all, it relates to the spread of Hellenism in the occupied territories, which led to the unification of many elements of material culture and scientific achievements within the significant areas of Central and South Asia. At the same time, the Bactrians were to some extent involved in the spread of Buddhism and early Hindu cults in southern regions of Central Asia. The Parthians and Bactrians also controlled all the branches of the newly emerged Great Silk Road on their territories and thus were active intermediaries in trade between the two regions.
Therefore, migratory contacts between representatives of Central and South Asia during the period of existence of interregional “external” empires continued both on the previous (from one region to another) and on the new (from both regions into the third one) levels, although they were mediated by extra-regional powers.
Thus, in unison with world historical science, writings by Russian and Kazakh scholars prove that the very initial contacts of Central and South Asian peoples and state entities – in certain periods deep and profound while sometimes just shallow and indirect, but in any case covering virtually all possible spheres of interaction – have laid down both spiritual and material foundations for future relations of these two regions.
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