Study of the defensive structures of Otrar

The study of the Otrar defensive structures, begun in 1975, continued. In a section on the north-eastern slope of the central hillock of the settlement, two fortress walls of the settlement were found at different times. The earlier one was made of mud brick (36-40х22-24х10 cm). In this section, its inner and outer faces are destroyed; the surviving part has a thickness of about 10 m. The destruction of the fortress wall is associated with the conquest of the city by the troops of Genghis Khan.

A later wall more than 4 m thick was traced in a section about 140 m long, from the northeastern corner of the settlement to the site of the supposed gates of the city. The wall is made of mud bricks (38х20х20 cm), laid on edge with a slope, alternating with rows of bricks laid flat. The facade is covered with clay coating; the wall has been preserved to a height of up to 4 m. In a significant area, repair masonry made of adobe laid flat, protruding 60–80 cm beyond the original line of the wall, was traced. Towers did not found in the open area. The base of the wall is not horizontal but, as it were, covers the garbage layers under the wall like a shell. The difference in the bases of the outer and inner faces is about 2 m (the outer face is lower). The wall was built not earlier than the end of the 13th century.

Initially, houses inside the city were attached directly to this wall, but already in the 14th century, after the fire that destroyed these buildings, the buildings were built so that a passage about 1.5 m wide remains along the city wall. Later, when cultural layers of several centuries grew near the wall and it was largely destroyed, the hillside on which the city was located, was artificially made very steep, and a narrow (up to 2 m) ditch was dug at its base. In these works on the investigated area, the facade of the pre-Mongolian defensive wall was destroyed. Ceramics were found in the lower layers of the filling of the mentioned ditch, making it possible to date these works to the end of the 16th-17th centuries.