On the land of ancient irrigation in the lower resources of the Syr Darya

Over the past three years, the Syr Darya detachment of Khorezm expedition of the Institute of Ethnography of the USSR Academy of Sciences with geomorphologists of the Institute of Geography of the USSR Academy of Sciences has participated in research related to the project to transfer part of the flow of Siberian rivers to the basins of the Syr Darya and Amudarya. The purpose of the research is to study ancient irrigation lands and draw up an archaeological and geomorphological picture of the projected canal zone. The routes covered the southern part of the enormous ancient delta of the Syr Darya. The dry channels of the Inkardarya and Zhanadarya pass, and to the north along the Kuvandarya and Eskidaryalyk (Pra-Kuvandarya). These four systems of ancient delta channels of the left bank of the Syr Darya formed gradually during the Late Pleistocene and Holocene, moving from south to north, then fading, then flooding again. The oldest traces of human habitation here date back to the Late Neolithic. Sites of this period were found in meridional lowlands among massifs of ridge sands.

The most significant group of sites, Kosmol 1-6, was found west of the Kuvandarya on a high sandy ridge forming the shore of a lake-like depression. The camps are located at some distance from each other for 6 km, occupying small hollows of blowing on the top of the ridge near modern cattle pens. The Kosmola 1 site yielded abundant material. Here, 80 quartzite items, a dozen knife-shaped flint plates, vessel rims, and numerous fragments of walls, including those ornamented with notches, were found. Materials from sites from the Kosmol tract and the areas of Aipari and Talas have much in common with the finds at the late Kelteminar sites of the Zhalpak tract on the lower Inkardarya.

The Dzhety-asar tract forms a single array of takyrs with a bizarre network of ancient delta channels, canals, and the ruins of large fortified settlements - "asars" extends east of the Kuvandarya riverbed to the Eskidaryalyk riverbed. The latter is preserved in the form of gently sloping ramparts with traces of canals of the Asar period in the central part. Along with branched irrigation systems on river waters at that time, there were systems based on artificially flooded oxbows and deepened sections of dying channels. Studies have revealed a rather complex picture of the gradual death of lower delta channels in the Dzhety-asar tract. This is evidenced by the repeated reconstruction of irrigation systems and the transformation of deep sections of channels into reservoirs.

There is reason to believe that the very desolation of the western part of the oasis, especially around Tompak-asar (which, according to the excavations of L. M. Levina, occurred in the 2nd-3rd centuries AD), was caused by the processes of silting and dying off of river channels.

In 1946, S.P. Tolstov, during aerial surveillance to the northwest of the Dzhety-asar tract, discovered a fortress called Alyb on the bed of the Eskidaryalyk. The route of 1973 established that this is a fortress with well-preserved walls up to 6 m high, close in layout to a square one, with walls 57х57х56х54 m long. It was built of mud-brick (48х10, 38х8 cm). Entrance to the fort from the south. It is surrounded by dry riverbeds. Finds of ceramics of the Asar type indicate that the fortress functioned in the 1st millennium and. a.

The remains of irrigation systems of the Asar period are also found in the significantly lower reaches of the Kuvandarya. However, late medieval monuments (mazars and cemeteries) abandoned Kazakh and Karakalpak settlements of the 17th-18th centuries prevail here small irrigation facilities. Several old estuary-type irrigation systems have been studied in the Kuvandarya. So, we managed to trace the water path for 15 km from the river. Water was supplied through a series of lowlands connected by short ditches. After about 5 km, the central canal began, which ran in the lower part of the runoff, along with the inter-ridge depression, repeating all the bizarre bends of the relief, gradually descending towards two large inter-ridge valleys, where the flat surface retained the ridges of small ditch fields from distributors and sprinklers and traces of yurts.