What wedge writings say

An archaeologist and historian from Shymkent Alexander N. Podushkin searches for artefacts capable of throwing light on one of the lest known pages of the Kazakhstani history - the ancient state of Kangju - for more than ten years.

The first written records about Kangui, located inbetween Syrdaria and Amudaria rivers, can be met in chronicles of a Chinese traveller and diplomat Zhang Qian. In 138 BC, an emperor Wudi sent an embassy headed by Zhang Qian to Central Asia. The main purpose of the ambassadors was to conclude a military alliance with the Usunys tribe (yuechi) against the Huns.

However, Zhang Qian did not limit himself to sole military tasks, but tries to get acquaintance with the biggest possible number of peoples and countries, located on the way of his mission. That is why the journey lasted for 13 years, which was actually normal for those times.

Nevertheless, the information about Kangju in the Chinese chronicles is quite poor, although it was one of the earliest states, located on the territory of Kazakhstan (2 century BC- 4 century AC).

Even separate archaeological excavations in South Kazakhstan carried out in the 1930-40s here already then revealed a former presence of a powerful cultural and archaeological layer in the valley of Arys, Badam, and Syrdaria rivers in Otrar district, which could be matched in time with Kangju state. Afterwards results of systematic and complex archaeological expeditions headed by Nikolai P. and Alexander N. Podushkins (1960-2004) allowed to establish fixed archaeological systems of cultural traditions of the ancient peoples that lived in South Kazakhstan.

A further search for artefacts allowed historians to establish the so called Arys archaeological culture. It was based, according to a firm conviction of Alexander Podushkin, on the ancient state of Kangju.

Today scientists say that Kangui state was polyethnic, consisting of four chief peoples - late Saks, the Huns, Asian Sarmatians and Kangjus themselves. Two lifestyles - nomadic and sedentary coexisted there. What's interesting is that archaeologists get much more artefacts related with nomadic cattle-breeders, rather than those related with the sedentary population. Burials of noble and rich nomads, even after being plundered yet in ancient times, nevertheless provide significant archaeological material, allowing to make judgements on the lifestyle of ancient nomads. It is much more complicated with artefacts concerning ancient city and village dwellers. Mainly because to get the results, more large scale and laborious archaeological excavations are needed.

This is why the fragments of ancient writings found in Kultobe district become especially relevant.

The first two fragments of the so called Kultobe writings were discovered in the 60-s, when Kultobe site was excavated in Ordabasy district of South Kazakhstan region. In 2002 a third fragment with writings was discovered by an archaeological expedition headed by Alexander Podushkin, PhD in history.

The paleolinguistic material, or, to put it simpler, the discovered fragments of writings (dated by approximately 2 century BC- 4 century AC), are written on bricks of clay characteristic for Ordabasy. It allows scientists to suggest that the found texts were not predestined for transportations, but were meant simply for archiving information. It means that these writings were not brought here from some other area, but were produced and used exactly on the territory of Kultobe. Consequently, 1.5-2 thousand years ago there already was a centre with its own developed writing on the territory of South Kazakhstan.

- I would especially mark, - Alexander Podushkin says, - judging from the massiveness of plates, on which the writings were made, that we deal with a text meant for archiving. Moreover, if we study the fragments attentively, we can note that some of them are cut virtually along the line, dividing the letters by halves. Of course, it may be suggested that the fragment was damaged by time. But another explanation is quite possible.

- The point is that we have studied this writing technique quite well, - Alexander Podushkin continues. - It seems that a very big single plate was produced first, at which the whole text was written. Then, to keep the writing, the plate had to be baked. That is why the plate was cut into small pieces. Possibly, a master was not afraid of cutting the letters, because after baking the fragments were gathered into a single whole again. And the whole letter was fixed, say, on the wall or on the floor in a library or in a temple. Such writing of texts on mosaic plates is well-known. Taking into consideration the fact that all the three fragments of the Kultobe writing were found in one place, that they are all alike, one can suggest that in the future we will discover more fragments of the writing in Kultobe, - A. Podushkin says.

And now the main thing - the same Chinese chronicles say that Kangju had a written code of laws. Of course, it is quite early to assert that the fragments of writings found in Kultobe are fragments of the royal law. But, on the other hand - it is difficult to imagine that such massive plates, doubtlessly a part of a bigger archive, could belong to a private, even if very rich or noble, individual.

Despite obvious prospects of the search and, doubtlessly, a huge social and scientific value of the Kultobe findings, they did not find a place in the state programme of cultural heritage studies.

Apart from a few scientists, who appreciated and acknowledged the Kultobe writing, official bureaucrats from history and archaeology simply ignore the discovered artefacts.