Through dense fog hiding the far past, thanks to scientific searches of scholars, many phenomena and events of ancient history and culture of Middle Asian Dvurech’e, a huge geographic area spreading over both banks of the great rivers, Amu D
Through dense fog hiding the far past, thanks to scientific searches of scholars, many phenomena and events of ancient history and culture of Middle Asian Dvurech’e, a huge geographic area spreading over both banks of the great rivers, Amu Darya and Syr Darya, have obtained clearer contours. Now the most part of this area is a part of the Republic of Uzbekistan. History of Middle Asian Dvurech’e with all its regularity and specific features make a core of the history of Uzbekistan, for the modern state is a direct successor of that territory with its history where this state formed, and we know a lot of evidences for this all over the world.
Independently from commonality of historical and cultural processes in Middle Asian Dvurech’e, already in far ancient time, probably, at the end of the 2nd – beginning of the 1st millennia B.C. some civilizations – the Bactrian (southern), Sogdian (central), Khorezmian (northern) and Fergano – Chach (eastern) – entered into the period of their formation.
Each of them had features of stadial character of historical and cultural progress, local regularities and peculiarities of development and life duration, which were caused by extremely complicated processes in the genesis of culture, ethnogenesis and factors of formation of early states. They were agricultural – irrigation civilizations, and therefore, urban by their intrinsic essence, for a city was inseparable element of their being at every stage of development – from embryonic proto-urban forms to the most advanced agglomerations like Alexandria, Balkh, Merv and Samarkand.
Cattle-breeding, both domestic and nomadic, had the great importance but didn’t form their basic essence. States, which raised on foundations of these civilizations and were one of the forms of their being, developed simultaneously with them giving up stability and duration to their existence, and in some periods – commonality in politics, economy and culture.
If the written language can be considered as the most important sign of developed forms of a state, it would be correct to say that civilization is raising simultaneously with state, for the written language also is one of the most important but not basic components of civilization. But if civilization, and first of all historical, is most likely a stadial phenomenon that is typical of all stage-chronological periods of human society development beginning with the Stone Age, the state and state system make secondary phenomena, which are derivative from civilization and appear in the definite stage of social development, namely in the Bronze Age when in civilizations of Mesopotamia, Eastern Mediterranean and low Nil appeared the earliest embryonic forms of the state system, so-called cities – states, or nomes. A great role in the formation of historical civilizations belongs to autochthon ethnos, which formed a definite type of civilization.
But not less importance in this process belongs to ethnic migrations because of definite geographical, political, military and demographic factors beginning with the Stone Age when started the exchange by the cultural values. By its essence all the ethnic history of humankind is the history of migrations of peoples from one environment towards another, from one geographic zone to another and their mixture. During the process of long migration the historical civilizations, at first spontaneously and then permanently, changed each other along with assimilation of substrate ethnos and cross-breeding of autochthonic population, what finally resulted in genesis of new ethnic and linguistic communities, which I called migratiometeo-ethnic communities reserving, however, their autochthonic ground.
Civilization, as a permanent and comprehensive form of society being, was inherent for all peoples in all periods of their history, at the same time, having stage-chronological, ethnic and hierarchic differences. Civilizations having reached the highest position in hierarchic stair (so called civilizations of the first rate) have priority and advanced forms of existence and achievements, which had become a result of a long process of historical progress. In particular, such civilizations are presented by cities, which concentrated political, economic, cultural and other values determining, in many respects, a course of development of advanced civilizations. That is in order both for ancient time and modern period. At the same time, the definite type of cities correlates with the definite type of state. The last one, as a specific form of political system, takes its origin in city, the first stage of which formation turned to state. They are so-called city-states, or otherwise nomes how usually they are called in science (following to the example of Ancient Egypt, which history found good reflection in written sources). Nomes consisted of a dominant center surrounded by country neighborhood and controlling over some part of irrigation system or river course. 