Travels in Central Asia Part 31

(2) Next to the ozbegs come the Tadjiks, who, although they may not const.i.tute a more numerous, still form a more compact population here than in the Khanat of Bokhara, and, as is nowhere else the case, people entire villages and towns. Accordingly, the city of Khodjend, the villages Velekendaz and Kisakuz (near Khodjend) are exclusively inhabited by this primitive Persian race, and the important cities of Namengan, [Footnote 132] Endigan, and Mergolan, are said to have belonged to them more than four hundred years ago.

[Footnote 132: These three words respectively signify (1)Nemengan (originally Nemek kohn), salt mine; (2) Endekgan, from Endek, small; and (3) Murghinan, hen and bread. These etymologies I learnt from my friends; perhaps they are not to be received as absolutely correct, but their Persian origin is unquestionable.]

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As far as their national character is concerned, the Tadjiks of Khokand are not much better than those of the same race in Bokhara.

The sole circ.u.mstance I find noticeable is that their language, both in its grammatical forms and its vocabulary, is purer than that of the other Tadjiks. This is particularly the case in Khodjend, the inhabitants of which make use of a dialect that has retained many of the forms of expression observable in the writings of the oldest Persian poet Rudeki, by birth a Bokhariot. In the other cities of Khokand, particularly in those on the Chinese frontiers, Tadjiks are rarely met with. (3) Kasaks form the majority in the Khanat. They lead a nomad life in the mountainous districts between the lake of Tchaganak and Tashkend, and pay to their prince the same amount of tribute as they do in Khiva to the Khan. Amongst the Kirghis of Khokand some are in affluent circ.u.mstances, possessing in Hazreti Turkestan, or in other places, houses, which, however, they do not themselves inhabit. In other respects, in spite of their superiority in number, the Kirghis have, owing to their want of bravery, little influence in the Khanat. (4) Kirghis--or the Kirghis properly so called, a tribe of the great Kasak horde--live in the southern part of the Khanat between Khokand and Sarik Kol, and from their warlike qualities are always made use of by the different factions to carry out their revolutionary projects. Their tents are said to be fifty thousand in number, consequently they are about as numerous as the Tekke Turkomans. (5) The Kiptchak are, in my opinion, the primitive original Turkish race. Amongst all the branches of this great family, spread from Komul to as far as the Adriatic Sea, the Kiptchaks have remained most faithful in {383} physiognomy and character, language and customs, to their ancestral type. The name, the etymology of which has been clouded with fables by Rashideddin Tabibi, has little interest for the reader. There is said to have been formerly a mighty nation bearing the same designation, and the Kiptchaks of the present day, although counting only from five to six thousand tents, pretend that Deshti Kiptchak, [Footnote 133] as Turkestan is named in the doc.u.ments of Oriental history, was conquered, and peopled by their ancestors. Notwithstanding their small numbers, the Kiptchaks continue to exercise, even at the present day, the greatest influence upon political affairs in Khokand. They nominate the Khans, and sometimes even dethrone them; and often five hundred of their hors.e.m.e.n have taken possession of a city, without the Khan daring to resist them. I have not been able to detect, in the Turkish that they speak, a single Persian or Arabic word, and their dialect may be regarded as the best point of transition from the Mongolian language to that of the Djagatai. The same remark may be made respecting the type of their physiognomy as of their language; for these stand in a similar relation to those of the other races of Central Asia. In their slanting eyes, beardless chins, and prominent cheekbones, they resemble the Mongols, and are for the most part of small stature, but extraordinary agility. In bravery they stand, as was remarked before, superior to all nations of Central Asia, and form, incontestably, the truest specimen remaining to us of the immense hordes that revolutionised all Asia.

[Footnote 133: Deshti Kiptchak as far as the frontiers of Bolgar (in Russia?) is the denomination most in use.]

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With respect to its divisions, the Khanat of Khokand falls into different districts, designated here, too, only by the names of the most remarkable cities. Its capital is Khokand, [Footnote 134] or Kokhandi Latif ('enchanting Khokand'), as it is termed by the natives.

It lies in a beautiful valley, and is in circ.u.mference six times as large as Khiva, three times as Bokhara, and four times as Teheran. The southern portion of the city, in which the Khan has his palace, was not, until recently, surrounded by a wall. The northern part is open.

The number of inhabitants and houses is proportionately small. The latter are surrounded by large orchards, so that one often requires a quarter of an hour to pa.s.s by ten or fifteen houses. As for the architecture, the Khokandi is in the habit of admitting the superiority of that of Bokhara; and from this circ.u.mstance one may easily form an idea of the architectural beauty of the city. Only four mosques are of stone, as is also a small portion of the extensive bazaar. In this they expose for sale, at low prices, exclusively Russian merchandise, and the native silk and woollen manufactures; besides which tasty articles in leather, saddles, whips, and equipments for riding, made in the capital, enjoy a high repute.

[Footnote 134: The word Khokand is said to be derived from Khob-kend, 'beautiful place' or 'village.']

After Khokand, Tashkend deserves to be mentioned. It is the first commercial town in the Khanat, and, as I heard on all sides, is at present the residence of many affluent merchants, having extensive trading relations with Orenburg and Kizildjar (Petropavlosk).

Tashkend, which has the transit trade between Bokhara, Khokand, and Chinese Tartary, is one of the most {385} important cities of Central Asia; and at the same time the object towards which Russia is quietly striving, and from which her most advanced frontier (Kale Rehim) is within a few days' journey. Once in possession of Tashkend, a place important also in a military point of view, Russia would find little difficulty in possessing herself of the Khanats of Bokhara and Khokand, for what might prove difficult for the Russian bayonet would be facilitated by intestine discord, the flames of which the Court of St. Petersburg never ceases to foment between the two Khanats.

After Tashkend the following are the most remarkable places: Khodjend, that has about 3,000 houses, many manufactories for Aladja (a sort of cotton stuff), eighteen Medresse, and twice that number of mosques; Mergolan, a large city, the princ.i.p.al city of Khokandi learning and the present residence of the Khodja Buzurk, chief of the order of the Makhdum Aazam. This dignitary refused his blessing to the present Emir of Bokhara on his triumphant entry into the city, and the latter did not venture, nor was he in fact able in any way to punish him.

Endidjan, where the best Atresz (heavy substantial silks) in the Khanat are manufactured; Namengan, about which the Kiptchaks are located. The following also deserve mentioning:--Hazreti Turkestana with the grave there, in high repute, of Khodj Ahmed Jaszavi, the author of a book (Meshreb) [Footnote 135] upon morals and religion, which is even at the present day a favourite work both amongst the nomads and the settlers in Khokand; {386} Shehri Menzil and Djust, where the famous knives are manufactured which, after those of Hissar, fetch the highest price in Turkestan; Shehrikhan, a place where the best silk is produced; and Oosh, on the eastern frontier of the Khanat, called Takhti Suleiman, Suleiman's throne, which is visited yearly by a great number of pilgrims; the place of pilgrimage itself consists of a hill in the city of Oosh where, amidst the ruins of an old edifice built of large square stones and ornamented by columns, the visitor is first shown, not only a throne hewn out of marble, but the place where Adam, the first prophet (according to the teachings of Islam), tilled the ground. The latter fable was introduced very _apropos_, as the inventor wished to accustom the nomads to agriculture through the medium of their religion.

[Footnote 135: I was able to bring back with me to Europe a copy of this very original book written in Turkish, which I hope to publish with a translation.]

Anyhow, Oosh is not without interest to our antiquarians.

The ruins themselves, and particularly the columns, as they were described to me, lead to the suspicion of a Grecian origin; and if we were searching for the most eastern colony founded by Alexander, we might readily suppose Oosh to be the very spot where the daring Macedonian marked by some monument the most easterly frontier of his gigantic empire. [Footnote 136]

[Footnote 136: Appian mentions (De Rebus Syriacis, lvii.) many cities founded by the Greeks and by Seleucus, amongst others one [Greek text], of which Pliny (vi. 16) seems to speak when he says: 'Ultra Sogdiana, oppidum Tarada, et in ultimis eorum finibus Alexandria ab Alexandro magno conditum.' That point or its vicinity seems to have marked the extreme limit of progress on that side of all the great conquerors of cla.s.sical antiquity; for there, says Pliny, were altars placed by Hercules, Bacchus, Cyrus, Semiramis, and Alexander: 'Finis omnium eorum ductus ab illa parte terrarum, includente flumine Jaxarte, quod Scythae Silin vocant.' And indeed with respect to the city 'Alexandreschata' Arrian (_Exped. Alexand_.

1. iv. c. i. 3, and c. iv. 10), agrees with Pliny, telling us that this great hero intended it as a barrier against the people on the further bank of the river, and colonised it with Macedonian veterans, Greek mercenaries, and such of the adjacent barbarians as were so disposed. This city was built on the banks of the Jaxartes, and most consider it to be the modern Khodjend. What if Oosh should have been the spot where stood the columns of Alexander (_Curtius_, vii. 6)? And yet the supposition that Alexander firmly possessed himself of any land beyond the Jaxartes is hardly consistent with the account of Arrian. Curtius (1. vii. 9) describes the remains of the altars of Bacchus as 'monuments consisting of stones arranged at numerous intervals, and eight lofty trees with their stems covered with ivy.']

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With respect to the political position of the Khanat of Khokand, its independence dates as far back as that of Bokhara and Khiva. The present reigning family pretends to descend in a direct line from Djenghis Khan, which is very improbable, as his family was dethroned by Timour; and after Baber, the last descendant of Timour in Khokand, the Shebani, as well as other chieftains from the races Kiptchak and Kirghis, seized alternately the reins of government. The family at present on the throne, or perhaps, I should rather say, now disputing its claim to it with Bokhara, is of Kiptchak origin, and has only been 80 years at the head of affairs. The inst.i.tutions in Khokand bear very slight traces of Arabian or Persian elements, and the Yaszao Djenghis (code of Djenghis) is the legal authority which they follow. Here also a singular ceremonial deserves notice. The Khan at his coronation is raised in the air upon a white felt, and shoots arrows to the north, south, east, and west. [Footnote 137]

[Footnote 137: It is singular that this custom exists even in the present day at the coronation of kings in Hungary. The king on the Hill of Coronation, on horseback, and invested with all the insignia of royalty, is required to brandish his sword respectively to the four points of the compa.s.s.]

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A.

THE WAR BETWEEN BOKHARA AND KHOKAND IN THE TIME OF THE EMIR NASRULLAH.

The animosity between Khokand and Bokhara is of ancient date. After the Shebani family began to take the head of affairs in Turkestan, Khokand, with the exception of some cities still held by the Kiptchaks, was incorporated into the Khanat of Bokhara. It tore itself away again afterwards, and during its independence attached itself to its neighbours, Kashgar, Yarkend, and Khoten, then also still independent; but after these latter States had been themselves incorporated by the Emperor of China into his dominions, Khokand, as its enemies to the east seemed too powerful, thought itself bound to recommence its differences with Bokhara, and the war that was going on during our stay in Central Asia was only a continuation of the struggle that Mehemmed Ali, Khan of Khokand, and his rival the Emir Nasrullah, had begun.

Mehemmed Ali Khan is termed by the Khokandi their greatest monarch in recent times. Whilst this prince, by extending the frontiers and by advancing internal prosperity, had on the one hand contributed much to lend a certain splendour to his Khanat, yet on the other he had in the same degree stimulated the envious cupidity of the wicked Emir Nasrullah. {389} But what most displeased the latter was that the Khan should have formed a friendly alliance with Khiva, the princ.i.p.al enemy of Bokhara, and should have given a friendly reception to the Emir's own uncle and rival, who had fled to Khokand for safety. Others also a.s.sign as an additional cause the hospitality they had shown to Captain Conolly; but in any case abundant ground of dissension existed, and a rupture was regarded as inevitable.

In 1839, Mehemmed Ali, having defeated the Russians at Shehidan, [Footnote 138] considered a contest with the Emir as near at hand; and, himself preferring to be the a.s.sailant, marched towards the frontiers of Bokhara in the vicinity of Oratepe, and was already threatening Dj.i.z.zak and Samarcand, when the Emir, after vainly trying intrigues, marched against him with a superior force of ozbeg hors.e.m.e.n and 300 of the newly-formed militia (Serbaz), under the conduct of their chief and organiser Abdul-Samed Khan. Upon this Mehemmed Ali held it prudent to retreat. Nasrullah laid siege to Oratepe, which, after three months, he took; but his treatment of the inhabitants made them his bitterest enemies: and scarcely had he returned to Bokhara, when, having a secret understanding with Mehemmed Ali, they fell upon the Bokhariot garrison and ma.s.sacred all, soldiers as well as officers.

[Footnote 138: According to the account of this affair given by the Khokandi, a strong detachment of Cossacks, after having gone round Hazreti Turkestan from the right bank of the Jaxartes, had advanced towards Tashkend, and on their march were surprised and dispersed by the Khokandi with great loss.]

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As soon as the intelligence of this event was conveyed to Nasrullah, he in the greatest haste, and in still greater anger, called together all his forces and marched against Oratepe. Mehemmed Ali again retreated, and was accompanied by a great part of the inhabitants who feared the incensed Emir; but this time escape was impossible: his enemy followed him step by step until he could retreat no further. In the battle which then took place at Khodjend, he was defeated, and the city became the prize of the conqueror. The Khan again retreated, but, finding himself still pursued and even his capital menaced, he sent a flag of truce to his victorious enemy. A peace was concluded at Kohne Badem, by which Mehemmed Ali bound himself to cede Khodjend with many other places. That such conditions were little calculated to lead to a sincere reconciliation is easily intelligible. The malicious Emir, intending still further to offend his vanquished enemy, named as governor of the conquered province the brother and rival of Mehemmed Ali, who had previously fled to Bokhara. But nevertheless he was here wrong in his calculation. The mother of the two Khokandi princes reconciled them, and before the Emir had got wind of what had occurred, Khodjend and the other cities united themselves again with Khokand, and he had now to measure himself with two enemies instead of one.

The fury of the Bokhariot tyrant knew no bounds, nor is it difficult to understand that his thirst for revenge would prompt him to make extraordinary armaments. In addition to his ordinary army, consisting of 30,000 hors.e.m.e.n and 1,000 Serbaz, he took into his pay 10,000 Turkomans of the Tekke and Salor tribes, and hurrying with forced marches towards {391} Khokand, he took Mehemmed Ali so by surprise that he was even obliged to fly from his own capital, but, overtaken and made prisoner near Mergolan, he was, with his brother and two sons, executed ten days afterwards in his own capital. [Footnote 139]After him most of his immediate partisans fell by the hands of the executioners, and their property was confiscated. The Emir returned to Bokhara laden with booty, having first left Ibrahim Bi, a Mervi by birth, with a garrison of 2,000 soldiers in the conquered city.

[Footnote 139: To excuse this act of shame, Nasrullah spread the report that Mehemmed Ali had married his own mother, and had consequently been punished by death.]

Three months had scarcely elapsed when the Kiptchaks, who had until now observed a neutrality, weary of the Bokhariots, took the city, made its garrison prisoners, and set on the throne Shir Ali Khan, son of Mehemmed Ali. [Footnote 140] In order to prevent being a second time surprised as before, the Khokandi now conceived the idea of surrounding a portion of the city, where the residence of the Khan was, with a wall; the plan {392} was soon carried out by the forced labour of the prisoners of war, who had formed part of the Emir's garrison. It was to be antic.i.p.ated that the Emir would seek his revenge; no one, therefore, was surprised to see soon after this occurrence 15,000 Bokhariots, under the conduct of a Khokandi pretender to the throne, an old _protege_ of Nasrullah, make their appearance before Khokand. But even on the march Musselman Kul (so he was named) appeared to have reconciled himself with his countrymen; the gates of the city were soon opened to him; and although Nasrullah had sent him hither with the promise of making him Khan, his first step was to turn his arms against that prince, and, joining with his countrymen, to put to flight the Bokhariots who had escorted him thither.

[Footnote 140: The genealogy of the reigning house in Khokand, beginning with Mehemmed Ali, is as follows:--]

Mehemmed Ali (1841).

Shir Ali --------------------------------- (a) By first Wife. (b) By second Wife.

Mollah Khan. ---------------------------------- Sofi Beg. Sarimsak. Sultan Murad. Khudayar.

Shah Murad. Several young children.

The Emir, although now four times overreached, still would not give way, but again sent an army under the command of Shahrukh Khan, who already held the rank of commander-in-chief. [Footnote 141] But the latter did not advance beyond Oratepe, for the news that the Emir had fallen sick at Samarcand, and had subsequently returned to Bokhara, put an end to the whole campaign. A few days after the illness had attacked the prince, the world was freed by his death of one of the greatest of tyrants.

[Footnote 141: The infamous Abdul Samed Khan, the murderer of Conolly, Stoddart, and Naselli, had in the meantime been overtaken by a righteous punishment. The Emir, who had sent him to Shehri-Sebz, was at last convinced of his treason, and, not being able to reach him by forcible means, sought to employ artifice to get possession of his person. Abdul Samed evaded his fate a long time, but finally fell into the snare laid for him, and, aware of the presence of the executioner in the ante-room, he rent up his belly with his own poniard, to irritate by his death a master so like himself in character.]

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I heard from good authority that the death of the Emir Nasrullah was solely owing to a paroxysm of rage at the constant ill success that attended his campaigns against Khokand, and the unprecedented obstinacy with which the city of Sheri-Sebz [Footnote 142] resisted, for although he had taken the field thirty times against it, and had been then besieging it six months, it was all without effect. Upon this occasion his adversary was a certain Veliname, whose sister he had married to obtain by the connection a faithful va.s.sal in the brother of his wife. Now it happened that the news of the capture reached the Emir when on his deathbed; although half senseless, the tyrant ordered his rebel brother-in-law to be put to death with all his children. But as circ.u.mstances prevented him from feasting his eyes with that spectacle of blood, in the evening, a few hours before his death, he summoned to his presence his wife, the sister of Veliname; the unhappy woman, who had borne him two children, trembled, but the dying Emir was not softened--she was executed close to his couch, and the abominable tyrant breathed his last breath with his glazing eye fixed upon the gushing blood of the sister of his detested enemy.

[Footnote 142: Sheri-Sebz, previously named Kesh, is the native city of Timour, and renowned for the warlike character of its inhabitants.]

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B.

THE WAR BETWEEN BOKHARA AND KHOKAND WAGED BY THE EMIR MOZAFFAR-ED-DIN.

In the meantime affairs in Khokand had taken a different turn.

Musselman Kul had been put to death, and in his place Khudayar Khan had been raised to the 'white felt.' At his first accession, the latter showed great ardour and activity. He was engaged victoriously in several combats with the Russians, who were pressing on from the Jaxartes. Whilst he was thus occupied on the frontiers, Mollah Khan was nominated Khan in his capital; but as he had only inconsiderable forces to oppose to those of his rival, he thought it better to fly to Bokhara, and seek the aid of the Emir Mozaffar-ed-din for the recovery of his throne. This prince, immediately after the death of his father, besieged the city Sheri-Sebz, which, in spite of the vengeance of which it had already been the object, and the blood that had flowed there, was again in open revolt. He was before the walls of Tchiragtchi, a stronghold belonging to Sheri-Sebz, when the intelligence reached him that the governor of Oratepe, a native of Sheri-Sebz, had allied himself with the Khokandi, and that Mollah Khan was already marching at their head against Dj.i.z.zak.

The Emir Mozaffar-ed-din, urged on by his guest and _protege_, Khudayar Khan, could not restrain himself. He abandoned his position before Sheri-Sebz, although he was pressing it hard, and rushed at the head of 15,000 men against Khokand, whose Khan (Mollah Khan) threatened, from his acknowledged ability, to prove a formidable antagonist. Adopting the unscrupulous policy of his father, Mozaffar-ed-din caused him to be a.s.sa.s.sinated in a conspiracy which the Emir had himself set on foot. In the great confusion that ensued, he next made himself master of the capital, and then set Khudayar at the head of the government, after the legitimate heir, Shahmurad, had fled to the Kiptchaks.

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Khudayar Khan had scarcely exercised four months the royal functions so new to him, when the Kiptchak, with Shahmurad at their head, a.s.sailed, and forced him a second time to fly to Bokhara. The Emir, seeing himself so slighted and mocked at in his character as protector, hastily a.s.sembled all his forces to wreak his vengeance upon Khokand in some exemplary manner; and after having sent on before him Shahrukh Khan with 40,000 men, and Mehemmed Hasan Bey with thirty pieces of artillery, he hastened after them himself, escorted by a few hundred Tekke, with the fixed design not to return until he had reduced under his sceptre all as far as the frontiers of China.

In Khokand the firm intention of the young Emir was well known, so also was his cupidity; and he met, accordingly, with the most resolute resistance. The Ulemas p.r.o.nounced the Emir, who was invading their country, to be Kafir (an unbeliever), and preached against him the Djihad (war of religion). All flew to arms, but in vain. The Emir attached to his own dominions not only Khokand, but all the territory as far as the Chinese frontiers. The greatest resistance which he met with was from the Kiptchaks, under their chieftain Alem Kul. These were attacked by the Turkomans; and the combat that ensued must have proved highly interesting, for two of the most savage of the primitive races of Tartary stood there face to face. After the death of the Alem Kul in the battle, his wife set herself at the head of the horde. The war was continued; but at last a peace was made with the {396} Emir.