Mound landscape of the eastern Kugitang piedmonts. A location analysis.

Abstract

Archaeological evidence on the occurrence of kurgan mounds (i.e., stone- or earthen-made mounds of various dimensions) in the Surkhandarya province of southern Uzbekistan was until recently particularly scarce. Although these characteristic features of the archaeological landscape of Central Asia have been frequently recorded and studied in the neighbouring regions, the very southern part of Uzbekistan has been an exception in this respect. A surface survey conducted by the Czech-Uzbekistani Archaeological Expedition has recently changed this picture. More than four hundred kurgan mounds have been identified, revealing their occurrence in every river valley in the studied area (the central part of the eastern Kugitang piedmonts, covering approximately 1055 km²) surveyed so far. As a result of the three seasons of a targeted surface survey following a unified methodology, this study provides the reader with the first assessment of the kurgan mounds' occurrence in the Kugitang piedmonts. The dating of the kurgan mounds in the studied area stretches between the Early Iron Age and the Pre-Islamic Middle Ages. However, in the case of the overwhelming majority, a particular dating is uncertain, which severely impacts the chronological sensitivity of the proposed study. Although kurgans are commonly associated with sepulchral use, in the eastern Kugitang piedmonts such evidence is still missing, motivating an investigation seeking to clarify their (ritual, symbolic?) purpose. By means of location analysis, this study sheds light on the distributional patterns of kurgan mounds in relation to selected topographical variables (altitude, slope, aspect, landform, water sources, pathways) and attempts to explain the role they played for past communities that exploited the foothills.

The analysis indicates a specific choice of the location of the kurgan mounds, giving a clear preference for flat river terraces at middle altitudes, usually in the vicinity of the main pathways recorded in the Soviet period. Next to a certain preference for the proximity to water streams, this study argues for a relationship to mobility as a determinative factor for location choice. In accordance with known examples from throughout central Eurasia, the kurgan mounds in the studied area may be seen as landmarks following the persistent routes through the landscape, materializing them and probably also laying a territorial claim of local communities. Taking into account an ecological model described for central Eurasian mountains, the study attempts to contribute from the point of view of southern Uzbekistan to a better understanding of the landscape use of foothills in a longue durée perspective.