Through deserts and oases of central Asia

by Ella Sykes; Sir Percy Sykes

There is another point of view from which the detached oases have affected the history of the region. They have never possessed enough resources to support a powerful army; but, owing to their isolation and proximity to the mountains, they were doomed to become the prey of every powerful force which swept down from the undefended frontier and took the cultivated areas in detail. The inhabitants have at no time displayed military virtues, and are to-day singularly unwarlike.

Of the rivers of the province, the Yarkand, known in its upper reaches as the Zarafshan, and lower down as the Tarim, is the most important. It frequently changes its course, and is perhaps responsible for the proverb, “A river, like a king, obeys no law.” Its chief tributaries are the Ak Su from the north and the Khotan River from the south. The Kizil Su or “Red River,” which flows through Kashgar, was also in past times a tributary of the Yarkand River, but it now fails to reach the main stream, for its water falls into the Lalmoi marsh below Maralbashi. Other rivers do not even approach the Zarafshan, but lose their waters in the sands.

It is a far cry from Egypt to Chinese Turkestan, but they are alike in this, that both countries depend absolutely and entirely on rivers for their life. As in Egypt, so in the basin of Chinese Turkestan, there is no rainfall which counts; everything therefore depends on a full river. The snowfall on the ranges affects the volume of water, which on the whole is decreasing. “The Land of Withering Rivers” is the appropriate title of a chapter dealing with this question in Huntington’s The Pulse of Asia. Apart from this, a cold summer in the Pamirs, such as occurred in 1915, may hinder the melting of the snows to such an extent that very little water reaches Maralbashi, below Kashgar, during the entire summer; and even in the Kashgar Oasis there was in that year a distinct deficiency of irrigation water.

The climate of Chinese Turkestan is intensely continental. The province is surrounded, as we have seen, by some of the highest ranges in the world; we therefore find extremes of heat and cold. Kashgar, where alone meteorological observations are taken, lies at an altitude of 4277 feet, and it might be thought that in consequence of this altitude, together with a latitude which is that of Central Spain, and the proximity of snow-covered ranges, the summer would be short and cool. Yet, mainly owing to the almost total absence of rainfall, the three summer months have a mean maximum of 90° with a mean minimum of 62°. On the other hand, the three winter months have a mean maximum of 38° with a mean minimum of 17°, but it is to be noted that, owing to the dryness, the cold is not severely felt. The scanty rainfall of only 3·34 inches is distributed over the whole year and is irregular. During the spring and summer of 1915 no rain fell in Kashgar beyond a few showers which were too light to record, but in the mountains the falls of snow and rain were frequent, especially in June.

The Kashgar Oasis certainly merits the epithet of “windy” during the spring. The storms blowing mainly from the west, or from the Takla Makan, are generally accompanied by clouds of dust which envelop the Oasis in a haze, and so prevalent is this condition that there are, as already mentioned, only one hundred clear days in the year. This disagreeable phenomenon was noted by Mirza Haidar, who, in the early part of the sixteenth century, wrote: “But Kashgar has also many defects. For example, although the climate is very healthy, there are continual storms of dust and sand, and violent winds charged with black dust.”[6]

The population of Chinese Turkestan is estimated at about one million and a half. It is almost entirely confined to the oases, chief of which are Kashgar with 300,000, Yangi Shahr with 200,000, Yarkand with 200,000, and Aksu and Khotan each with 190,000 inhabitants. The population may also be grouped into two main classes as “settled” and “nomadic,” with a small semi-nomadic division. The nomads, together with the semi-nomads, do not aggregate more than 125,000 in all. They inhabit the cold highlands, moving about in summer and winter alike as their flocks exhaust the grazing, which is rich in summer and scanty at other seasons. The Kirghiz, who are the leading nomads, estimated to number 50,000, implicitly believe that their ancestor was a Kazak Prince, Saghyon Khan by name. According to the legend, his forty daughters were walking by a river one day when they remarked foam covering its surface. From curiosity they all dipped their fingers into the water, and thereby became pregnant, and the Kirghiz claim to be the descendants of these “Forty Maidens” or Kirk Kiz. 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 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 Dulanis, whom we met in the Merket Oasis below Yarkand, are another tribe of importance in the province. Their origin is called in question, but they are akin to the Kirghiz, although they differ in appearance owing to their sedentary life in a forest-covered country. Their name is said to have been given them by a Khoja monarch, who termed them his dulan or “two shoulders.” They live in miserable shanties made of wood and are poor cultivators, relying more on their flocks than on the produce of their land.

The semi-nomads include the Taghliks or “Highlanders,” who herd the flocks belonging to the sedentary population. They spend the summer in the mountains, but occupy huts or caves in the foot-hills during the winter; these “Highlanders” are all Sunni Moslems. On the other hand, the Mongols of Karashahr, who in numbers are about equal to the Kirghiz, are all Buddhists.

In addition to the tribes already mentioned, there is a strong colony of five thousand families of Tunganis, mainly immigrants from Central China, Kansu and Shensi. As Sunni Mohamedans converted in the early days of Islam they were hostile to the Chinese, and have rebelled more than once; but during the recent Revolution they changed their policy and supported the local authorities. In consequence they are now being given posts in the government, and at the time of my visit the commander of the troops at Khotan was a Tungani.

To conclude this enumeration, the Tajiks, who are Aryans from Farghana, numbering 13,000, the Chinese 6000, the Indians 5000 and the Abdalis 1000, make up the population of Chinese Turkestan. The Abdalis claim kinship with the Abdalis of Khorasan or Herat, now the Durranis. They are locally believed to be the descendants of Yezid, the slayer of the Imam Husayn at Kerbela, and until the time of Yakub Beg’s rule are said to have acted a play in which the Shias are reviled. Grenard,[7] who studied this mysterious people, came to the conclusion that they were the descendants of a Persian Shia colony, but Stein, whose authority is superior, believes that they are Gipsies.