Kyrgyz

“ A country of incredible natural beauty and proud nomadic traditions, Kyrgyzstan became part of the Russian empire in 1864. In the Czarist and Soviet periods, Russian managers and technicians were sent to Kyrgyzstan and have recently made up more than one-fifth of the population. Many Russians have been returning home since Kyrgyzstan gained its independence in 1991 when the USSR collapsed. Privatization of state-owned enterprises, expansion of democracy and political freedoms, and inter-ethnic relations are current issues. ”

“ A Proclamation
1. Pursuant to sections 501 and 502 of the Trade Act of 1974, as amended (19 U.S.C. 2461 and 2462) ("Trade Act") , and having due regard for the eligibility criteria set forth therein, I have determined that it is appropriate to designate Kyrgyzstan as a beneficiary developing country for purposes of the Generalized System of Preferences ("GSP") . ”

“ The Kirghiz of the southern parts migrate in winter to the better sheltered parts of the province of Syr-darya, while in the summer some 30,000 kibitkas (felt tents) of nomads come from the neighbouring provinces to graze their cattle on the grassy steppes of Turgai. Salt is obtained from the lakes. There are a few oil-works, tanneries and flour-mills, and the Kirghiz are active in the making of carpets and felt goods. Education is a little more advanced than in the other steppe provinces ”

“ Here the Russians first met them in the 17th century, and by the aid of the Kazaks exterminated all those east of the Irtish, driving the rest farther west and south-westwards. Most of them took refuge with their kinsmen, the Kara-Kirghiz nomad highlanders, whose homes, at least since the 13th century, have been the Ala-tau range, the Issyk-kul basin, the Tekes, Chu and Talass river valleys, the Tian-shan range, the uplands draining both to the Tarim and to the Jaxartes and Oxus, including Khokand, Karateghin and Shignan southwards to the Pamir table-land, visited by them in summer. ”

“ The Kara-Kirghiz are governed by the “manaps,” or tribal rulers, who enjoy almost unlimited authority, and may even sell or kill their subjects. In religious matters they differ little from the Kazaks, whose practices are described below. Although generally recognizing Russian sovereignty since 1864, they pay no taxes.
The Kazaks.—Though not unknown to them, the term Kirghiz is never used by the steppe nomads, who always call themselves simply Kazaks, commonly interpreted as riders. ”

“ The great nomadic tribe of the Kirghiz, or Kara Kirghiz, as the Russians call them, to distinguish them from the Kirghiz of the various hordes who, by the way, are not true Kirghiz at all, has at all times played a fitful, yet important part in the histories of Khokand, Jungaria, and Eastern Turkestan. Preserving their independence in the inaccessible region lying west of Lake Issik Kul, and along the Kizil Yart plateau and range, this tribe has always been a source of trouble to its neighbours, whosoever they might be. ”

“ At the stations in Baraba the post-master is seldom found at home, the domestic part of the establishment being generally left in charge of women, and the posting-department in that of the senior yemschik. The women in the steppe, we were informed, are mostly Kirghis, called by the Russians by the generic name of Tartars. The Kirghis women are physically superior to Russian women of the same class,—cleaner, better dressed, and handsomer. They have, in many instances, blue eyes and fair complexions, in [299] marked contrast to the Kalmuks and Mongols. ”

“ The Kirghese, who occupy the region immediately south of the Altai Mountains, and are still found on the southern confines of the Baraba Steppe, are broken into many independent tribes; they are nomadic in their habits, wandering from place to place in search of pasturage for their immense flocks and herds. In winter they frequent the valleys among the outlying hills of the Altai Mountains, and in summer descend upon the plains. Many of the tribes live altogether on the plains, and their range covers many thousands of square miles. ”

“ But this does not tell the whole story of the Russian advance in Asia. South of the Kirghis steppes lies another great and important territory, known as Central Asia, or Turkestan. Much of this region is absolute desert, wide expanses of sand, waterless and lifeless, on which to halt is to court death. Only swift-moving troops of horsemen, or caravans carrying their own supplies, dare venture upon these arid plains. But within this realm of sand lie a number of oases whose soil is well watered and of the highest fertility. ”

“ I have often, in my wanderings, fallen upon particular encampments of Kirghis, and whenever I wished to acquire information as to their number, they laughed at me, and said, 'Count first the sand in the desert, and then you may number the Kirghis.' There is the same impossibility in defining their frontiers. We know only that they inhabit the Great Desert that lies between Siberia, China, Turkestan, and the Caspian Sea ”

“ The inhabitants of Chinese Turkestan are divided by the anthropologist into four distinct groups. The first consists of the Sarikoli and Pakhpo mountaineers, who are pure Aryans. The second is a desert group including the mass of the inhabitants of the country, the basis of this population being Aryan with some Uighur admixture, more especially at Aksu in the north. The third group is formed of the Kirghiz, the Dulanis and the inhabitants of Aksu; the fourth consists of the Chinese and Mongols, whose differentiation from the Kirghiz is to be noted. ”

“ Kirghiz (50%) and Sarts (9.8%) are the main elements of the population, with Uzbegs (4.3%) , and a few Jews, Tajiks, Tatars, Persians and Hindus. The predominant occupations of the Sarts, Uzbegs, Tajiks and settled Kirghiz are agriculture and gardening, but the Kirghiz lead chiefly a nomadic pastoral life. Manufactures are represented by cotton mills, tanneries and distilleries; but a great variety of petty industries are practised in the towns and villages.
Syr-darya is divided into six districts, the chief towns of which are Tashkent, Aulie-ata, Kazalinsk, Perovsk, Chimkent and Amu-darya. ”

“ Russia, China, Khokand, {369} Bokhara, and Khiva, exercise dominion over the Kirghis only so long as the taxing officers, whom they send, sojourn amongst those nomads. The Kirghis regard the whole procedure as a razzia on a gigantic scale, and they are grateful to find that those who commit it are content to receive merely a percentage or some tax that is tantamount. The revolutions that have taken place in the world for hundreds, nay, perhaps thousands of years, have wrought very little influence upon the Kirghis ”

“ The people of the towns have long forgotten their old skill and eager- ness in the chase ; and M. de Ujfalvy's remarks apply exclusively to the Kirghiz, the Kipchaks, the Aryan people of Trans-Oxiania, and the Turcomans. Of these, perhaps, the Kirghiz are the most skilled hunters, and this can be explained by the fact that they hold that mountainous and wild country which stretches from the Jaxartes to Lake Balkash and Semiretchinsk. ”

“ Kiachta and Maimaichin stand on the edge of a Mongolian steppe seven or eight miles wide. Very little snow falls there and that little does not long remain. Wheeled carriages are in use the entire year. The elevation is about twenty-five hundred feet above sea level.
There was formerly a custom house at Troitskosavsk, where the duties on tea were collected. After the occupation of the Amoor the government opened all the country east of Lake Baikal to free trade. The custom house was removed to Irkutsk, where all duties are now arranged. ”

“ The adjacent land will be worth countless millions of roubles to a Government which has not had to pay a single copeck for it. On for many hundreds of versts rolls the train through the pasture lands of the splendid Kirghiz race. The Kirghiz are by far the finest of the Tartars. They are a purely pastoral people, frugal, cleanly, and hospitable, living mainly on meats, and milk and cheese, the products of their herds. Both for pasture and for the culture of cereals, the vast territory between the Obi and the Yenisei will be unrivalled in the whole world. Kurgan is the capital. ”

“ As a whole, the Kirghiz population may be assumed to number about 1,250,000 souls. They are of Turco-Tartaric origin; and, according to Max Müller, Southern Siberia was their mother country. Nominally, they own the supremacy of the Great White Czar on the one side, and of the Chinese Emperor on the other; but their nomadic habits secure their virtual independence. Each tribe is governed by its sultan or chief. Quarrels and blood feuds between the different tribes are of constant occurrence. ”

“ This tradition evidently rests on a poor pun, but it proves that the Kirghiz regard themselves as a branch of the Kazaks, or “Cossacks,” as we write the word. They furthermore believe that the same Prince had thirty sons, Utuz Ughul, whose descendants inhabit [Pg 241] the Alai and the country between it and the Ili province. In Chinese Turkestan the principal Kirghiz tribes inhabiting the uplands between Kashgar and the Taghdumbash Pamir are the Naiman, the Kapchak and the Tait. The Kirghiz are all Moslems of the Sunni sect. ”

“ The Kirgis lived originally between the Ob and Yenisei, where Mongolic tribes settled among them. At the beginning of the seventeenth century the Russians became acquainted with the Eastern Kirgis, then living along the Yenisei. In 1606 they had become tributary to Russia, and after several wars with two neighboring tribes, they were driven more and more south-westward, till they left Siberia altogether at the beginning of the eighteenth century. They now live at Burut, in Chinese Turkestan, together with the Kirgis of the “Great Horde,” near the town of Kashgar, north as far as the Irtish. ”

“ The word Kirghiz signifies, in Turkish, a man that wanders about the fields, a nomad, and is used to denote all nations leading the pastoral life. It is also employed to designate a tribe; but they are only a subdivision of the Kazaks, to be met with in Khokand in the vicinity of Hazneti in Turkestan. ”

“ Their speech also, while purely Turkic in structure, possesses, not only many Mongolian and a few Persian and even Arabic words, but also some terms unknown to the other branches of the Mongolo-Tatar linguistic family, and which should perhaps be traced to the Kiang-Kuan, Wu-sun, Ting-ling, and other peoples of South Siberia partly absorbed by them.
The Kara-Kirghiz.—The Kara or “Black” Kirghiz, so called from the colour of their tents, are known to the Russians either as Chernyie (Black) or Dikokammenyie (Wild Stone or Rocky) Kirghiz, and are the Block Kirghiz of some English writers. ”

“ The Kara-Kirghiz, who are the less numerous division, live in Dzungaria, in the Altai, about lakes Balkash and Issyk-kul, and extend southwards to the Pamirs and the sources of the Oxus. Some of them inhabit Chinese territory. Both divisions live chiefly on the produce of their herds. ”

“ The tribes of the Kirghiz nation spread over the Asiatic steppes from the Aral river to the Ala-Tau Mountains. From time immemorial they have been divided into the Great, the Middle, and the Little Hordes. The Great Horde occupies the territory north of the Ala-Tau, extending into China and Tartary. The Middle Horde inhabits the countries lying between the Ischim, the Irtisch, Lake Balkash, and Khokand. The Little, which is by far the most numerous Horde, wanders over the undulating plains bounded by the Yamba and the Ural, over Turkistan (now under Russian rule) , and into Siberia. ”

“ Kirghiz graze the slopes of the Tian-shan. The trade is mostly in the hands of the Chinese, natives of West Turkestan (known as Andijanis from the town of Andijan) and Hindus. The total population, excluding Kulja and Dzungaria, is estimated by A. N. Kuropatkin at 1,200,000, by M. V. Pyevtsov at 2,000,000, and by Sven Hedin at 1,800,000 to 2,000,000. The last named distributes it thus—1,500,000 rural, 200,000 urban, and 100,000 shepherds. The principal towns and their populations are Yarkand, 100,000; Khotan, 40,000; Kashgar, 33,000; Ak-su, 15,000; Keriya, 12,000; and Kulja, 20,000. ”

“ Strangers who are unknown in the aul must, before greeting, answer inquiries as to their name, station, and whence they have come; but they are received and hospitably treated in any case, for the Kirghiz shows hospitality towards everyone, irrespective of station and religion, though he always prefers distinguished guests. The guest enters the yurt with the customary greeting, pulls off his shoes at the door, but of course keeps on his soft riding-boots. If he is of equal standing with his host, he sits down in the place of honour ”

“ An outbreak among the Kirghis occurs, which requires a military force to subdue. An expedition for this purpose is sent every year to the Kirghis steppe—the Russian outposts are pushed further and further south—more disturbances occur, and so the frontier is, year by year, extended, on the pretext of keeping the peace. That has been the system pursued by the Russian Government in all its aggressions in Asia. Siberia is dotted all over with old forts, which have become obsolete as the country has become quiet and settled under Russian sway. ”

“ Nor are any of them, except the wealthy Bays, accustomed to search the cities for Mollahs to exercise the functions of teachers, chaplains, and secretaries at a fixed salary, payable in sheep, horses, and camels.
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The Kirghis, even after frequent contact, must still, in the eyes of us Europeans, appear wonderful beings. We behold in them men who, whether the heat is scorching or the snow a fathom deep, move about for hours daily in search of a new spot for their purpose: men who have never heard bread even named, and who support themselves only upon milk and meat. ”