Amu: endless diversity of aquatic spaces

The natural splendor of Turkmenistan has always fascinated travelers, preferring the last minute tours or long tours. The endless expanse of water, like the fantastic blue lines, uncharted country hand unknown artist, is a national treasure and wealth of Turkmenistan. The most famous representative of the river, which has become familiar not only to the residents of Turkmenistan, but also in other countries, is the Amu Darya river.

 

The friendly people of Turkmenistan will gladly accept our dear guests and treated them with national dishes, invite to the house and show the vast expanses of the famous river, which is the natural border between Turkmenistan and Afghanistan. Traveling along the river you can admire the constancy of the Turan, Kugitang elevation and so on. The slow flow of the river along the immutability Turan continues up to the Aral Sea.

 

The river banks are remembered by many historical events

 

For many centuries, the Amu Darya saw the dawn and the fall of many historical dynasties, cities and fortresses. During all this time there appeared and disappeared from the map forever different states:

  • Bactrian;
  • Sogdiana;
  • Khorezm.

 

Research many artifacts helped to establish that the river itself many times changed its name, for example, the Oxus, Oxus, Arak, and so on. A separate part of the Amu Darya in the works devoted himself Herodotus. Based on his work, we can conclude about the presence of the river more than four dozen mouths. All this leads scientists to believe that the Aral delta has been very well developed in those years. From all of the above manifolds mouths towards the Caspian Sea led only West Uzboi.

 

It is important to update and complement the pre-existing information about Alexander the Great River during his trips to Central Asia. One of the documents was able to find references to complex transition Macedonian troops across the river, which lasted more than five days. After the Great River wrote about many different authors, who called it Araks or Oxus.

 

East Asian geographers used slightly different terms and epithets when it came to the Amu Darya. For example, Ceyhun, which can be translated as «capricious» or «wild». The modern name of the river was only in the middle of the sixth century of our era. Despite the fact that this question was investigated by different groups of scientists, today there is no possibility to say that the etymology of the name has been solved correctly.

 

The scientific community tends to believe that the name of the river gave locality Amul, is located in the immediate vicinity of the town of Chardzhou. Linguistic research has helped to restore the different variants of the name of this town:

  • Amul;
  • Amue;
  • Amuy;
  • Amu.

 

At the same time, scientists have not been able to give an exact translation of the place name to this day. Thus it was possible to restore the semantics of the word «Daria» – «sea» (Persian) or «big river» (Turkmen language).

 

The history of the development of natural resources in the region

 

Proud river opens up endless coast of Turkmenistan, where thousands of tourists come every year. On the right bank is the natural border with Uzbekistan, passing along the ridge and Kugitangau Gaurdak. Here, there is low-mountain desert territory. A little further you can see the midlands with small green spaces, such as steppes, bushes and so on. Earth this part of the country rich in all kinds:

  • Underground cavities;
  • furrow;
  • funnel;
  • Failures breed.

 

Also in this part of the country is the famous cave Karlyuk Hashamoy, a total length of more than seven hundred meters away. To get here, tourists or groups of researchers are exclusively for small and very narrow path. A little further you can see the famous mountains and river Kugitang darya descending from their slopes. Unfortunately, it does not fall into the water in the Amu Darya River, becoming part of the arable field irrigation system. Every year there are a variety of cultivated crops:

  • melons;
  • horticultural;
  • Cereals.

 

An important place in the national economy and occupy themselves mountains surrounding the river. For example, there are extracted various natural resources:

  • lead;
  • Copper;
  • Coal;
  • salt;
  • Building materials;

 

Sulfur – the view natural resources presented and name mountains. It at translation on Russian language name elevations Gaurdak and Kukurt-dag means «sulfurmountain».

 

The presence in this part of the country’s rich deposits of sulfur, salt and coal contributed to the development of industrial production here:

  • Lead Mine, located in Kugitang;
  • Mining and processing complex enterprises Gaurdak;
  • Refinery;
  • Gas companies.

 

The first largest populations here were the following settlements:

  • Kerki – based in 1968;
  • Kerkichi – based in 1970.

 

These settlements soon became major hubs, for example, here lies the lively railway linking Kagan and Dushanbe. There is also motorway leading into Dushanbe. In order to accelerate the delivery of goods and people close to these cities was built and still operates ferry. Development of water delivery method of inventory accelerated the construction of the Karakum Canal.

 

After the erection of an important waterway of the region increase its economic potential:

  • Expand the area for the cultivation of cotton;
  • Expanded passenger water routes;
  • To optimize the delivery of minerals;
  • Put into operation a plant for the production of national carpets;
  • Intensified producers of fruits and vegetables that have received a convenient way to deliver goods to the consumer.

 

Each region has its own characteristics

 

Moving further along the river you can see many examples of different architectural structures, each of which has its own distinctive features. For example, a small brick building, belonging to the eleventh century AD located in the immediate vicinity of the place of last refuge Abu Ibrahim Ismail. Ethnographers tend to believe that he was the last representative of the kind of Samanids. Death, he heroically took in 1004, when the battle near the town of Zemm he bravely fought with the Arab nomads. From the ethnographic point of view, this area occupies the following Turkmen nationality:

  • Ersari;
  • Sakar;
  • Bayati;
  • Salyr;
  • Chovdur;
  • Iomuty and so on.

 

For centuries, these peoples were engaged exclusively in farming and transhumant. Geographic isolation from other ethnic groups has allowed Turkmenistan to form a unique local customs and traditions. For example, there is considerable evidence of an annual rite of purification and deepening of channels:

  • Every year lot of channels is selected to be cleaning up;
  • Above the bridge is set for the site;
  • Anyone passing the bridge extends to the tip of the shovel slice of bread to be a little bite;
  • As a thank you for the meal a person should put on a shovel a few coins;
  • All the money thus collected at the end of the day used to buy dishes for all the builders involved in cleaning up and expansion of the channel;
  • If the traveler, try a piece of bread, no money, he should personally on clean channel piece or overcome the one who gave him bread.

 

This tradition has not only established a respect for the people involved in the construction, but also allowed to actively contribute to the development of shipping arteries in the region. In addition to the old traditions come from local residents and new, for example, «evening greetings» – gutlag agshamy. In the evening, a young mother from the home made ​​genitive neighbors come to her home with all sorts of greetings and gifts.

 

Independently watch the different ethnic customs can those who bought the last minute tours to Turkmenistan or came as part of various research delegations.