Lands of Asia layouts (Eng) 26.11.21

part i | civilisations
decorated with an ornamental band in relief. The Suyurgans relied mainly on hunting
and fishing and later on farming and cattle breeding. Suyurgan culture can be traced
back genetically to the Kelteminara culture, although it also has some links with the
Anau culture of southern Turkmenistan.
The most important sites are Kamyshly, Janbas-6 and Kaundy-1 in the Turtkul
district.
Suyurgan culture in Khorezm was followed by the late-Bronze-Age Amirabad
culture of the early 1st millennium BC. This culture relied on irrigated farming, and
settlements were located by the side of fairly large canals. The semi-dugout houses
with a frame construction had a central hearth and several storage pits. Bronze
objects such as sickles, arrowheads, needles and awls were common. Stone moulds
for casting arrowheads have also been found. Vessels were flat-bottomed and made
of clay mixed with chamotte and crushed stone. Their outer surfaces were often
burnished and occasionally decorated with an ornamental band along the neck.
There is evidence of a well-developed network of irrigation channels, including main
canals several kilometres long and small ditches. The Amirabad culture can be traced
back genetically to the late phase of Suyurgan culture.
The most important site is the settlement of Yakke-Parsan-2 in Turtkul district.
The late-Bronze-Age Chust culture settled in the Ferghana Valley between the
end of the 2nd and the beginning of the 1st millennium BC. Chust tribes relied
on farming, cattle breeding, and the crafts of metalworking and pottery. The sites
included both unfortified and fortified settlements, surrounded with bypass channel
walls of clay and mud brick, and with a citadel erected on natural hills (such as the
Dalverzin settlement). Wood and reed frame-houses were partly dug into the ground,
but the settlements also had clay dwellings above ground. Bronze objects (daggers,
arrowheads, horse bits, knives, sickles, awls, needles and jewellery) and stone objects
(mortars and pestles, grinding stones and whetstones), as well as objects made of
bone and horn, weaving tools and casting moulds were widely used. Crude kitchen
utensils and delicate eating utensils of various kinds were made by hand using
cloth templates. Ceremonial dishes were decorated with red slip, burnishing and
ornamentation in black paint. There is evidence of several types of burials: individual
burials with the dead laid on one side in a contracted position, as well as on their
backs, collective burials, disarticulated corpses, and burial in vessels.
Burials were made within the territories of the settlements. Chust culture belongs
to the group of painted pottery cultures that were widespread in Central Asia during
the Late Bronze and Early Iron Age.
The most important sites are the settlements of Chust and Dalverzin in the
Namangan region.
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