SOCIO-ECONOMIC LIFE OF THE NOMADIC POPULATION OF THE ARAL SEA REGION IN THE EARLY IRON AGE

Аннотация

The lower basins and channels of the Amu Darya featured extensive areas of tugai forests, reed beds, and fertile pastures, which created highly favorable conditions for the development of livestock farming. This propitious environment of the ancient Khorezm oasis attracted nomadic pastoralists to settle in the region from the earliest periods. Written sources and archaeological data indicate that fundamental changes occurred in the Khorezm oasis in the 6th century BCE, and that these processes were unrelated to the Early Iron Age Amirobod and Quyisoy cultures. In the 9th–8th centuries BCE, the Amirobod culture was widespread in the Akchadarya Delta regions of the Amu Darya, and researchers suggest that the population which created this culture were originally pastoralists who had inhabited the Volga-Ural interfluve.