Online Encyclopedia

side of this valley the Alla-dagh (Aladagh) and the Binalund border-ranges (9000 to 11,000 ft.) fringe the edge of the Khorasan plateau. Descending towards the See also:

STEPPE (from the Russ. stepi, a waste)

steppe with steep stony slopes, the mountain barrier of the Kopet-dagh rises to heights of 6000–9000 ft. to the east of Kyzyl-arvat, while the passes which See also:

lead from the See also:

TURKOMAN

Turkoman deserts to the valleys of Khorasan are seldom as See also:

low as 3500, and usually rise to 5000, 6000 and even 8500 ft., and in most cases are very difficult. It is pierced by only one wide opening, that between the Great and Little Balkans, through which the See also:

sea, which once covered the steppe, maintained connexion with the Caspian. While the Alla-dagh and Binalund border-ranges are chiefly composed of crystalline rocks and metamorphic slates, overlain by Devonian deposits, a series of more recent formations—Upper and See also:

LOWER

Lower Cretaceous and See also:

MIOCENE

Miocene crops out in the outer wall of the Kopet-dagh. Here again we find that the mountains of Asia which stretch towards the north-west continued to be uplifted at a geologically recent See also:

EPOCH (Gr. E7roxij, holding in suspense, a pause, from E1rxav, to hold up, to stop)

epoch. Quarternary deposits have an extensive development on its slopes, and its foothills are bordered by a See also:

GIRDLE (O. Eng. gyrdel, from gyrdan, to gird; cf. Ger. Gurtel, Dutch gordel, from giirten and gorden; "gird" and its doublet " girth " together with the other Teutonic cognates have been referred by some to the root ghar—to seize, enclose, seen in Gr. )(s

girdle of See also:

LOESS (Ger. Loss)

loess. The loess See also:

TERRACE (Fr. terrace, terrasse, from It. terraccia, terrazzo, Lat. terra, earth)

terrace, called Atok (" mountain See also:

BASE

base "), to to 20 M. in width, is very fertile; but it will produce nothing without See also:

IRRIGATION (Lat. in, and rigare, to water or wet)

irrigation, and the streams flowing from the Kopet-dagh are few and. scanty. The winds which impinge upon the See also:

NORTHERN

northern slope of the mountains have been deprived of all their moisture in See also:

CROSSING

crossing the Kara-kumthe See also:

Black Sands of the Turkoman See also:

DESERT

desert; and even such See also:

RAIN (O.E. regn; the word is common to Teutonic languages, cf. Ger. Regen, Swed. and Dan. regn; it has been connected with Lat. rigare, to wet, Gr. 13pixeav)

rain as falls on the Kopet-dagh (IOj in. at Kyzyl-arvat) too often reaches the See also:

SOIL

soil in the shape of See also:

LIGHT

light showers which do not penetrate it, so that the See also:

AVERAGE

average relative humidity is only 56 as compared with 62 at even so dry a See also:

PLACE (through Fr. from Lat. platea, street; Gr. IrAar6s, wide)

place as Krasnovodsk. Still, at those places where the mountain streams run closer to one another, as at Geok-tepe, Askhabad, Lutfabad and Kaaka, the villages are more populous, and the houses are surrounded by gardens, every square yard and every See also:

tree of which is nourished by irrigation. North of this narrow See also:

STRIP

strip of irrigated See also:

LAND

land begins the desert—the Kara-See also:

kum—which extends from the mountains of Khorasan to Lake Aral and the plateau of Ust-Urt, and from the Caspian to the Amu-darya, interrupted only by the oases of Mery and Tejon. But the terrible shifting sands, blown into barkhans, or elongated hills, sometimes 50 and 6o ft. in height, are accumulated chiefly in the west, where the See also:

COUNTRY (from the Mid. Eng. contre or contrie, and O. Fr. cuntree; Late Lat. contrata, showing the derivation from contra, opposite, over against, thus the tract of land which fronts the sight, cf. Ger. Gegend, neighbourhood)

country has more recently emerged from the sea. Farther east the barkhans are more See also:

STABLE

stable.

Large areas amidst the sands are occupied by takyrs, or flat surfaces paved with See also:

clay, which, as a See also:

RULE

rule, is hard but becomes almost impassable after heavy rains. In these takyrs the Turkomans dig ditches, draining into a See also:

KIND (O. E. ge-cynde, from the same root as is seen in " kin," supra)

kind of cistern, where the See also:

WATER

water of the See also:

SPRING (from " to spring," " to leap or jump up," " burst out," O. Eng., springau, a common Teut. word, cf. Ger. springer, possibly allied to Gr. QnrFpxecOac, to move rapidly)

spring rains can be preserved for a few months. See also:

Wells also are sunk, and the water is found in them at depths of to to 5o, or occasionally too ft. and more. All is not desert in the strict sense; in spring there is for the most See also:

PART

part a See also:

CARPET

carpet of grass. The vegetation of the Kara-kum cannot be described as poor. The typical representative of the sandy deserts of Asia, the saksaul (See also:

ANABASIS

Anabasis ammodendron), has been almost destroyed within the last See also:

HUNDRED

hundred years, and occurs only sporadically, but the See also:

BORDERS, THE

borders of the spaces covered with saline clay are brightened by forests of See also:

TAMARISK

tamarisk, which are inhabited by great See also:

numbers of the desert See also:

WARBLER

warbler (Atraphornis aralensis)—a typical inhabitant of the sands—sparrows and ground-choughs (Podoces) ; the Houbara macqueeni, though not abundant, is characteristic of the region. See also:

HARES

Hares and foxes, jackals and wolves, marmots, moles, hedgehogs and one See also:

SPECIES

species of See also:

marten live in the steppe, especially in spring. As a whole, the See also:

FAUNA

fauna is richer than might be supposed, while in the Atok it contains representatives of all the species known in Turkestan, intermingled with See also:

Persian and Himalayan species. The Uzboi.—A feature distinctive of the Turkoman desert is the very numerous shors, or elongated depressions, the lower portion of which are mostly occupied with moist See also:

sand. They are obviously the See also:

RELICS (Lat, reliquiae, the equivalent of the English " remains " in the sense of a dead body)

relics of brackish lakes, and, like the lakes of the See also:

KIRGHIZ

Kirghiz See also:

STEPPES

steppes, they often follow one another in See also:

QUICK

quick See also:

SUCCESSION (Lat. successio, from succedere, to follow after)

succession, thus closely resembling See also:

RIVER

river-beds. As the direction of th'e shors is generally from the higher terraces drained by the Amu-darya towards the lowlands of the Caspian, they were usually regarded as old beds of the Amu-darya, and were held to support the See also:

IDEA (Gr. Ibia, connected with i&eiv, to see; cf. Lat. species from specere, to look at)

idea of its once having flowed across the Turkoman desert towards what is now the Caspian Sea. It was formerly considered almost settled, not only that that river (see Oxus) flowed into the Caspian during See also:

HISTORICAL

historical times, but that after having ceased to do so in the 7th See also:

CENTURY (from Lat. centuria, a division of a hundred men)

century, its See also:

WATERS, TERRITORIAL

waters were again diverted to the Caspian about 1221.

A chain of elongated depressions, bearing a faint resemblance to old river-beds, was traced from Urgenj to the See also:

gap between the Great and the Little Balkans; this was marked on the maps as the Uzboi, or old See also:

bed of the Oxus.' The idea of again diverting the Amu into the Caspian was thus set afloat, but the investigations of Russian See also:

ENGINEERS, MILITARY

engineers, especially A. E. Hedroitz, A. M. Konshin, I. V. Mushketov, ' On the See also:

ORIGINAL

original Russian See also:

map of the Transcaspian, See also:

DRAWN

drawn immediately after the survey of the Uzboi had been completed, the Uzboi has not the continuity which is given to it on subsequent maps. P. M. Lessar and Svintsov,2 went to show that the Uzboi is no river-bed at all, and that no river has ever discharged its waters in that direction. The existence of an extensive lacustrine depression, now represented by the small Sary-kamysh lakes, was proved, and it was evident that this depression, having a length of more than 130 m., a width of 70 m., and a See also:

DEPTH

depth of 28o ft. below the See also:

PRESENT

present level of Lake Aral, would have to be filled by the Amu before its waters could advance farther to the south-west. The See also:

sill of this basin being only 28 ft. below the present level of Lake Aral, this latter could not be made to disappear, nor even be notably reduced in See also:

SIZE

size, by the Amu flowing south-west from Urgenj.

A more careful exploration of the Uzboi has shown that, while the deposits in the Sary-kamysh depression, and the Aral shells they contain, See also:

bear unmistakable testimony to the fact of the basin having once been fed by the Amu-darya, no such traces are found along the Uzboi below the Sary-kamysh depression ;$ On the contrary, shells of molluscs still inhabiting the Caspian are found in numbers all along it, and the supposed old bed has all the characteristics of a series of lakes which continued to subsist along the foothills of the Ust-Urt plateau, while the Caspian was slowly receding westwards during the See also:

POST

post-See also:

PLIOCENE (from the Gr. sr?eiov, mere, and xatvbs, recent)

Pliocene See also:

period. On rare occasions only did the waters of the Sarykamysh, when raised by inundations above the sill just mentioned, send their surplus into the Uzboi. It appears most probable that in the 16,1 century the Sary-kamysh was confounded with a gulf of the Caspian;' and this gives much plausibility to Konshin's suppositio.a caat the changes in the lower course of the Amu (which n~ geo'egist would venture to ascribe to See also:

man, if they were to mean the alternative See also:

DISCHARGE (adapted from the O. Fr. discharge, modern decharge, from a med. Lat. discargare, to unload, dis- and earn care, to load, cf. " charge ")

discharge of the Amu into the Caspian and Lake Arai) merely meant that by means of appropriate dams the Amu was made to flow in the 13th–16th centuries alternately into Lake Aral and into the Sa -kamysh. The See also:

ancient texts (of See also:

Pliny, Strube', See also:

PTOLEMY (CLAUDIUS PTOLEMAEUS)

Ptolemy) about the Jaxartes and Oxus only become intelligible when it is admitted that, since the epoch to which they relate, the outlines of the Caspian Sea and Lake Aral have undergone notable changes, commensurate with those which are supposed to have occurred in the courses of the Central Asian rivers. The See also:

DESICCATION (from the Lat. desiccare, to dry up)

desiccation of the Aral-Caspian basin proceeded with such rapidity that the shores of the Caspian cannot possibly have maintained for some twenty centuries the outlines which they exhibit at present. When studied in detail, the See also:

general configuration of the Transcaspian region leaves no doubt that both the Jaxartes and the Oxus, with its former tributaries; the Murghab and the Tejen, once flowed towards the west; but the Caspian of that See also:

time was not the sea of our days; its gulfs penetrated the Turkoman steppe, and washed the base of the Ust-Urt plateau.

End of Article: TRANSCASPIAN REGION

Additional information and Comments

There are no comments yet for this article.

» Add information or comments to this article.

Please link directly to this article:
Highlight the code below, right click, and select "copy." Then paste it into your website, email, or other HTML.

Site content, images, and layout Copyright © 2006 - Net Industries, worldwide.
Do not copy, download, transfer, or otherwise replicate the site content in whole or in part.

Links to articles and home page are always encouraged.

[back]
TRANSBAIKALIA (sometimes also known as Muria)

[next]
TRANSCAUCASIA