Authors

Roman Osharov¹;  ¹ University of Oxford, UK

Discussion

My paper examines the history of archaeological research in Turkestan, or Russian Central Asia, and so how knowledge about Central Asia and the Orient more broadly was acquired. I focus on the Turkestan Circle of Amateurs of Archaeology, one of the region’s prime scholarly organisations set up by the Russians in Turkestan. The Turkestan Circle of Amateurs of Archaeology and its members represented a significant scientific network that operated at the periphery of the Russian Empire, far away from the Orientalist establishment in St Petersburg and Moscow. In my paper, I will try to answer the following questions. How archaeological research was carried out in Turkestan? What were the contributions of the Turkestan Circle to the Russian Empire’s knowledge of Central Asia? What was the relationship between members of the Turkestan Circle and their colleagues with an interest in Central Asia in the metropole?