Events
Ethnography and tradition
In spring 2004 first efforts to collect memories, traditions and stories of Sarmishsai was initiated by professor Knut Helskog, University of Tromsø ( Norway), Dr. Anne-Sophie Hygen, adviser (Riksantikvaren – Directorate for Cultural Heritage, Oslo, Norway), and Dr. Muhiddin Khujanazarov, coordinator of the collaborative Uzbek-Norwegian project, which is mostly dedicated to investigation, conservation and sustainable management of the Cultural and Natural Heritage of the archaeological Complex “Sarmish” (Navoi region, Republic of Uzbekistan).
Informants were Muhamadiev’s family from the village of Ijond, which is located ca. 8 km south of Sarmish towards Novoi. Oston –bobo Muhamadiev and his wife (Zulfiya) telling stories about Sarmishsay. (Photo). He remembers his first 10 childhood years in Sarmishsai Gorge, where he lived together with his parents, sisters and brothers. Their village was situated on the territory of Sarmishtepe 1 (the medieval fortification in the southern part of Sarmishsai). The name of his village was Chambar tepa, in Uzbek meaning “round thin rim/border”. About 100 families lived there at the time. They belonged to different ancient Uzbek tribes such as bakhrin, khuja, djaloir and takchi. All of them lived together in good relation. Usually, marriage was allowed only within the tribe. Mutual marriages between tribes were very rare.
Their activities were for the most part connected with cattle breeding and livestock, although cattle never was kept on the territory of Sarmishsai canyon itself, as today. Open pastures for livestock grazing were distributed on depressions between mountains ranges. Randomly distributed along the Sarmishsai River there were 18 functioning water mills in 1940. A few of them were concentrated between petroglyph groups 9-10, where some remains have been proved. Local people used them to make flour from wheat. In the beginning they didn’t cultivate wheat in the Sarmishsai Valley. Bread was made from different grasses such as corn, djugara, tarih mixed together. To make flour from these grains they used a manual mill called tygirmon or epgychok. They made bread every 2-3 days because it was difficult to get big quantities of flour. The quality of such flour was not very good and the bread got a semi-liquid consistence completely different from the bread local people make today. They started to cultivate wheat later – winter and boghara species – and to make flour they used water mills, which were mainly concentrated within the limit of 5-6 km along the Sarmishsai Gorge.
Hidyr Mozor is, according to memory, located near petroglyph Group 10. It is a cemetery with mogilniki (graves) where small children only were buried. Oston-bobo Muhamaddiev does not remember anything about the settlements in the upper part of Sarmishsai.
Between petroglyph Group 13 and Chambor Kurgan – his kichlak – there was a garden with fruit trees and some wild species like Platanum (plane tree, Chinara in Uzbek), Ulmus densa (elm tree), Salix spp., Populus spp. and others, owned by the Emir of Bukhara who liked to take rest in Sarmishsai Gorge. We can find a few of these old trees even today. In this same area a special swimming pool was constructed that functioned for a long time, and which people still today call “the bathroom of the Emir”. (Photo Remains of “king’s bathroom” in Sarmishsay).
On the territory of Sarmishsai Gorge there are many “holy stones”, which local people for generations used in sacrificial ceremonies – killing of goats and sheep – for successful hunting and quick recovery from diseases, such as respiratory disturbances and skin inflammation, which were usual, or other diseases. For example, near petroglyph groups 4 and 2 there are some stones called kukyutal tosh, where they brought the sick children and adults. Before the treatment ceremony they prayed special prayers. After prayers the sick person drank water from the cup-shaped cavity made especially in those stones. Water came from underground or from some natural small springs. This treatment made people healthy.
As to the place Khumdon, he didn’t remember exactly where that was, but he had heard that in Sarmishsai Gorge there were a few places where local people processed and made ceramics. Devona Camar is near petroglyph Group 4. This was a dwelling for wanderers and travelers.
Near their village Chambor Kurgan there was a miraculously constructed mosque, where people from surrounding areas gathered for praying. This mosque was constructed as a wooden frame house of the traditional Asian type, but under the wood columns they used special artificially treated marble as support. One such stone from that time is now kept at the Sarmishsai museum at the territory of the Children’s Camp “Gorniy”. The inner walls of this mosque, Oston-bobo Muhamadiev told us, were decorated by gypsum mixed with different construction material.
About the petroglyphs he knew only very little. There was a belief, however, especially connected to the central part of Sarmishsai with the largest concentration of petroglyphs (groups 6, 7, 8, 9): the part where the landscape between narrow “entrances” in the south and north widens. The children were told never to go there. They believed that the petroglyphs were made by God or the devil (bad spirit) and it was not allowed to touch them. If they went there and touched the rocks, sickness and unlucky life would occur within the family. Everybody seems to have obeyed these prohibitions and never visited the rock art in the area.
The settlement of Sarmishsai Valley as we find it today dates to after 1940. In 1945, all the families in Sarmishsai except two were forced by the Soviet regime to move to the surrounding free lands. The main purpose was cultivation and production of cotton.
At first they settled the Vaush piedmont lowlands, which is situated about 7,5 –8,5 km south of Sarmishsai Gorge.