Saraichik ( Saraishyk, Saraijuk), ancient settlement
Located 50 km from Atyrau, on the right bank of the Zhaiyk River. The area is more than 100 hectares.
The ruins of the ancient settlement of Saraichik have been known for a long time, and they were described many times by amateurs of antiquity, especially by the members of the Orenburg Archive Committee, whose notes contained only a description of the appearance of the ruins and the material collected from the surface. The history of the ancient settlement began in the second half of the 16th century, when the settlement was examined by P.N. Rychkov and P.S. Pallas, and A.E. Alekseyev in 1861 cleaned and studied the interior of several crypts. The first archeological excavations were carried out in 1937 by N. Arzyutov. In 1950 he was visited by S.P. Tolstov, who headed the Khorezm Archaeological and Ethnographic Expedition. The same year the beginning of excavations of the West Kazakhstan archeological expedition under the direction of A. Kh. Margulan with participation of G.I. Patsevich is dated. Later on the settlement was carried out by Guryevskiy group of the Srednevolzhskaya archeological expedition, which was attended by V.K. Afanasiev, L.L. Galkin and V.V. Plakhov. Large-scale stationary archeological excavations on the ancient settlement of Saraichik managed to begin only in 1996 under the leadership of Z. Samashev, the head of the department of the Institute of Archeology named after A.Kh. Margulan . From 2004 to 2009, the site was studied within the framework of the Cultural Heritage Programme. In 2017, after an eight-year hiatus in the settlement, research continued, including a certain amount of work to strengthen the riverbank. In the future, it is planned to create an open-air museum complex and include the monument in the register of tourist routes.
According to written sources, Saraichik was founded in the XIII century to manage the districts of Zhoshy Khanate. Palaces and administrative buildings were built in the city, around which quarters of free residents, merchants and craftsmen were built. The city was situated on the border of Europe and Asia, where the caravan route from Europe and the capital of the Golden Horde Sarai on the Volga River to the cities of Khorezm, Iran, India and China lay. Convenient geographical location allowed the city to become a large political, cultural, trade and handicraft centre.
In the course of archeological researches fragmentary dwellings of XI-XII centuries, cut by the subsequent constructions and some fragments of stucco black clay vessels of Kipchak (?) appearance were found. Probably, at that time there was a small town here, which is mentioned by the Ottoman chronicler Khadzhi Khalif, who reported that at the mouth of the river Yaik (Zhanku) there is a town called S.van.dzh (or S.vai.kh), which used to be the capital of the Cumans, and then was rebuilt and populated with Nogais, whose "khans" now live there [quoted from: Trepavlov, 2002, p. 226].
The analysis of the received material allows to allocate four periods in a life of an ancient settlement. The first period was from the middle of the XIII century until the beginning of the reign of the khan of Uzbek, i.e. until 1312. The earliest coin found in the lower layers of the settlement is the dirkhem of Khan Mengu-Timur (1266-1282), minted in the city of Ukek on the Volga River. By the end of the XIII century dirkhems, found in Saraychik, belonged to the Toktagu khan (1291-1313) . Construction of the city was carried out according to a single plan. The architecture of houses and interior decoration intertwined traditions of the Lower Volga, Khorezm and Syrdarya cities. Houses were built of raw bricks and had 2-4 rooms of 4x5 m each. In the living quarters along the walls there was a sufa bed, which was heated by horizontal chimney channels. The walls were plastered with clay and whitewashed. Sufas were covered with felt carpets, the fragments of which were found during the cleaning of the premises. The space around the city was being developed. In the settlements near the river channels there were sowing fields, gardens and vegetable gardens, irrigated with the help of water wheel installations. Fragments of red clay jugs and water wheel vessels can be found in these areas.
The second chronological stage of the city's life began in the second quarter of the XIV century and fell on the time of the greatest stability and prosperity of the empire under the Uzbek khan. Saraichik flourished under his rule. The old buildings were broken down and new houses were built with the old urban layout, but the streets and squares became wide. At that time, multi-room linearly planned houses were built under the same roof as the outbuildings. Internal walls-partitions were often made of frame, walls and soups were plastered and whitewashed, decorated with carpets and cues. Remains of baths were found on the site of the ancient settlement near the river bluff. They consisted of several multifunctional rooms, the raw walls of which were lined with decorative tiles and waterproof plaster. The floors were laid with baked bricks and heated from below. At this time, both public and manor houses, intended for a small circle of people, are being spread. The economic activity of the townspeople at this time was largely expressed in the production of various goods for the city and the steppe. The main share was accounted for by the products of pottery workshops. In the south-western part of the hill fort in 1998, a site was excavated where a pottery workshop was supposedly located. Remains of single-chamber pottery stoves were found in the settlement. They were buried and had pre-flooding sites for industrial purposes, which were usually located on the western side. In addition to the pottery, there were also brick kilns, one of which was investigated in 1950 by the A. Kh. Margulan`s expedition.
The third chronological period of a city life reflects the events in Khanate connected with civil strife between groups of aristocracy in struggle for a throne. Saraichik at this time was under the influence of Ak Orda's khans, which included the lands of the descendants of Zhoshy, Ordu-Edzhen and Sheiban from the river Zhaiyk to the West Siberian lowland. In the 1370s, judging by the coins, large public buildings were erected in the city. One of them, the construction of a palace type, was studied in 1997-2000. The "khan's" building, which was based on its architectural layout, was erected for honored guests, merchants, pilgrims and travelers. Previously the buildings that were located on this place were planned and packed. The building had 25 rooms. The portal part had a wide stepped ascent with an arch entrance, where on the corners towers were raised, the portal was faced with a masonry of burnt bricks and decorated with white alabaster decor in the form of relief panels. In front of the entrance there was a square. Presumably, the building was erected by a descendant of Zhoshy - Uruskhan. In due course symmetrical lateral wings were attached to the building, and the rear part was increased at the expense of numerous attached premises, and the number of rooms reached forty. In many of the outbuildings the remains of the tashnau were found from khoums dug into the floors and covered with concave limestone discs. Household premises of different orientation, including a fumatory for fish, grain storage pits with the remnants of millet, have been identified. A section of the main street paved with brick has been cleared from the western side of the "khan".
The fourth stage in the life of the city falls on the XV-XVI centuries. During this period, the population is concentrated in the southern part of the city. The political center of the Horde was located on its main territory - in the steppes between Zhaiyk and Volga. Saraichik became the capital of nogais. Saraichik of the Nogai period was situated in the triangle formed by the Zhaiyk riverbed and its channel Sorochinka. From all sides it was protected by fortress walls. Remains of fortifications remained until the middle of the XIX century. In 1824, historian and ethnographer A. I. Levshin drew attention to the main entrance to the fortress, marked by two triangular bastions. The fortress had a rectangular shape. The houses erected at that time were multi-roomed. The size of the houses was about 20×12 m. The rooms were heated with internal kangs from tandoor fireboxes. This is a traditional heating system, existing since the XIII century. Here, along with ceramic and other products were found coins of both local and Central Asian minting, as well as Crimean silver dirhams. In addition to residential houses, a number of technical stoves were found in the south-eastern part of the settlement, which are not related to the firing of bricks and ceramic vessels. No furnace supplies for firing the products were also found. The stoves were made in the form of wells with a depth of 1.5 m made of raw bricks. The walls preserved a strong kindling. Deep pre-flood pits were made for the furnace holes. So far, no analogies of production have been found in such furnaces.
The quarters of the city left by its inhabitants were later turned into a necropolis and became a holy place. Many burials were arranged in the abandoned districts of the city. In their localization there is a regularity in the location of burials in certain parts of the settlement, which is associated with different traditions of burials in different clans, and also indicates the multinational composition of the population. Among the burial rites, the korkhan burials, which are performed in crypts, are distinguished. So far, researchers have managed to identify about six species of korkhan. They make it possible to trace the relationship between the city and the steppe, between Islam and traditional pre-Islamic beliefs, as well as between social strata of the population.
The importance of Saraichik was emphasized by the existence here of the pantheon of Golden Horde khans, burials of famous people and Muslim preachers. According to Abulghazi Bahadur Khan, the famous Khan of the Golden Horde Mengu-Timur (1266-1280) is buried in Saraichik. He was the first to mint coins in his name in the Golden Horde. In Saraichik there passed an investiture procedure of accession of Zhanibek (1341-1357), Berdibek (1357-1359) and other representatives of Djuchids to the Khan's throne of the Golden Horde. One of the most prominent Kazakh khans Kasym (1511-1524) made Saraichik his capital. It is known that under the rule of Kasym khan the territory of the Kazakh state reached the limit of modern Kazakhstan with the population of more than one million people. Later, under Kasym's successors, Saraichik was temporarily lost and re-introduced into the Kazakh khanate in 1568 under Khaknazar khan. In Saraichik were buried several khans of the Golden Horde and other historical figures, among them Mengu-Timur (1266-1281), Toktai (1280-1312), Zhanibek (1341-1357), Berdibek (1357-1359), the head of Tokhtamysh (1380-1406); several Nogai princes and murzahs, as well as the Kazakh khan Kasim (1511-1524).
After the collapse of the Golden Horde from 1391 Saraichik became the center of the Mangyt Yurt, which was finally formed into an independent state - the Nogai Horde by the 40s of the XVI century. Saraichik and in the last period of its existence remained the burial place of the elite of Desht-i Kypchak. There was a tomb of all Nogai rulers and elite here. According to some historians, one of the founders of the Kazakh khanate Zhanibek was buried in Saraichik, according to others, there was a mix-up of the Golden Horde khan and the Kazakh khan of the same name, and in fact Zhanibek - the ruler of the Golden Horde - rests in Saraichik. In the Nogai legend about Tokhtamysh and Yedig about Saraychik it is said literally - "khandardi koigan Sarayshyk, khan suyegi kyie dep", i.e. " Saraichik, where khans are buried, and bones of khans are reserved " [quoted from: Bartold, 1966].
Along with Nogai nobles and Kazakh khans, there are also seids in the necropolis who are considered descendants of Muhammad from a particularly revered group of clergy. They left a bright trace in the culture of Nogais and Kazakhs.