Post by SinghSong on Jun 28, 2021 13:14:13 GMT
In antiquity, the Amu-Darya River, aka as the 'Oxus River', flowed into the Caspian Sea via the Uzboy River distributary, up until the 9th century AD, and then again between 1220 and 1575, approximately; with a major branch of the river splitting off from the Oxus delta, and rather than flowing north into the Aral Sea, flowing west into the fresh-water Sarykamysh Lake. This was then drained south-westwards by the Uzboy River, which flowed out into the Caspian Sea at Krasnovodsk Bay through the Bala-Ishem salt marshes; with the historical Uzboy River effectively connecting the Caspian Sea and Aral Sea with one another in much the same manner that the Detroit River connects Lake Huron and Lake Erie (with the Sarygamysh Lake, in spite of being less than half the volume that it was then, still having more the 3x the surface area and c.20x the volume of Lake St.Clair). All geographers, from the ancient Greeks to the early Arabs, reporting that the Oxus flowed into the Caspian- up until the 9th century, when this apparently dried up. With this not-so-coincidentally coinciding with the building of a dam near the ancient city of Old Ürgenç, aka as 'Djordjania', in what's now northern Turkmenistan, along the banks of the Oxus river tributary which led to the Sarykamysh Lake.
Founded as early as the 5th century BC (and now believed to be the likeliest candidate for the capital city of the ancient Dahaens, who were famed as mounted archers, and heavily recruited by Alexander the Great for his invasion of India), this was one of the largest cities and most important trading centres in Central Asia; previously the western-most major entrepot on the Northern Silk Road which connected China with the Roman Empire, with the Tang Dynasty's fleetingly brief claims of suzerainty over the city and the wider region under its control (from the conquest of the Western Turkic Khaganate in 657, until the rebellion against the puppet Qaghans appointed to rule over them by the Tang Emperor which began in 662) having formed the basis for the assertions that the Caspian Sea formed the western limits of the historical Chinese Empire, which persist to this day. Regarding its locally cultivated expertise though, Ürgenç was world-renowned as one of the historical world's foremost centers of craftsmanship, engineering, construction and architecture; with the knowledge and skills of this ancient school of architecture having spread across the Islamic World throughout the centuries, recognizable in the structures and decorations of many buildings from the Timur period, both within Turkmenistan, and in regions such as Uzbekistan, Afghanistan, Transcaucasia, Turkey, Iran, Pakistan and India. And after having been captured by the Arabs in 712CE, at some time in the 9th century, they employed their civil engineering expertise to construct a dam just east of the town, along with a network of canals.
This enabled the region of 'Khwarazm', or the classical 'Chorasmia', to flourish as a well irrigated and rich agricultural region, surrounded on all sides by steppe land and desert, in geographic isolation from other areas of civilization, having blocked off the flow of the Oxus into the Caspian Sea, with the city itself becoming the founding capital of the Khwarazmian Empire. But this also forced many settlements further downstream to be permanently abandoned, as the Uzboy River dried up, with agricultural irrigation and flows of trade drying up with it, and Ürgenç becoming the western-most terminus of the Northern Silk Road, rather than its nexus point as it had previously been. This dam, though, was destroyed by the Mongols in order to flood and ransack the city in 1220, during Genghis Khan's conquest of the Khwarazmian Empire, in what is considered to be one of the bloodiest massacres in human history. Unobstructed once more, the Uzboy River began to flow again, reaching the Caspian Sea once more from about the turn of the 14th century onwards. And despite the devastating effects of the Mongol invasion, the restoration of the Uzboy River, along with the flows of renewed trade which came with it, allowed the city to be revived and regain its previous status- with 14th-century Berber traveller Ibn Battuta describing Urgench as "the largest, greatest, most beautiful and most important city of the Turks. It has fine bazaars and broad streets, a great number of buildings and abundance of commodities".
But after a series of revolts by its rulers, under the Sufid Dynasty, against the Timurid Empire, Timur razed Urgench to the ground and massacred its population, destroyed the city's irrigation system, and had barley planted over the ground where the city had once stood, leaving only one mosque standing. And in around 1575, the east branch of the Oxus cut through some hills, causing the main current to shift to the Aral Sea, with a new dam rebuilt near the old site of the city to retain the remaining water and to deny it to the Turkomans who were in the habit of raiding the Oxus delta. This not only blocked the Uzboy, but caused the Sarikamish to slowly dry up too; bringing an end to the civilization which had thrived in the Chorasmia region for millennia, and forcing the survivors of the previously agricultural population to become nomadic desert dwellers.
So then, here's an alternate history scenario worth pondering: what if the original 'Djordjanian Dam' were never created- and as a result, the historical Uzboy River had never died or dried out?
IOTL, the first Russian military expedition into Central Asia, kicking off 'The Great Game', was launched immediately after Peter the Great heard about the story (or rather, spun a heavily altered tale, by a Turkmen traveller, that it had been diverted by the Khivans to the Aral Sea in order to extract golden sand from the river waters), and that it would be possible to destroy the dam and send the Oxus into its old channel, thereby making a waterway from Moscow down the Volga and up the Oxus into the heart of Asia; with these plans later developing into the proposed (but never built) Main Turkmen Canal, which was later abandoned in favor of Stalin's far larger-scale and more ambitious 'Great Plan For the Transformation of Nature' instead. Looking back at the timeline of major events in the Caspian and Aral Sea basins, in the years, decades and centuries which followed on from the construction of the 'Djordanian Dam', which cut off the Uzboy River for the next four centuries or so (along with the westernmost riverine route of the Northern Silk Road)- the drying up of the Uzboy river, thanks to the original dam's construction, appears to have taken place only a few years prior to the first breakthroughs of the Varangian (Viking) traders and merchants of the Keivan Rus' into the Muslim areas adjacent to the Caspian Sea, via the Volga Trade Route. And only around half a century prior to the first large-scale Varangian raids along the shores of the Caspian Sea, overwhelmingly directed against the Abbasids in the south.
If the Djordanian Dam had never been built, and the Uzboy River which connected the Caspian and Aral Seas via the Amu Darya/Oxus River had been allowed to continue to flow freely, along with the flow of trade and wealth down this primary historical branch of the Northern Silk Road, then couldn't the Varangian traders and/or raiders of Keivan Rus' have been equally, or even more, likely to turn their attentions eastwards instead- perhaps even attempting to settle permanently in the region (as they attempted to in Azerbaijan IOTL, only to be forced to withdraw after an outbreak of dysentry- due in no small part to the scarcity of fresh water)? After their destruction and conquest of Khazaria, if the Keivan Rus' still emerge successful over them as they did IOTL, what would stop the Volga Trade Route from merging fully with the Northern Silk Road, and simply becoming the north-westernmost branch of it? And how great do you feel that the long-term cultural and geopolitical repercussions of effectively extending the Northern Silk Road, at such an early juncture, all the way up to Sweden, could be ITTL?
Founded as early as the 5th century BC (and now believed to be the likeliest candidate for the capital city of the ancient Dahaens, who were famed as mounted archers, and heavily recruited by Alexander the Great for his invasion of India), this was one of the largest cities and most important trading centres in Central Asia; previously the western-most major entrepot on the Northern Silk Road which connected China with the Roman Empire, with the Tang Dynasty's fleetingly brief claims of suzerainty over the city and the wider region under its control (from the conquest of the Western Turkic Khaganate in 657, until the rebellion against the puppet Qaghans appointed to rule over them by the Tang Emperor which began in 662) having formed the basis for the assertions that the Caspian Sea formed the western limits of the historical Chinese Empire, which persist to this day. Regarding its locally cultivated expertise though, Ürgenç was world-renowned as one of the historical world's foremost centers of craftsmanship, engineering, construction and architecture; with the knowledge and skills of this ancient school of architecture having spread across the Islamic World throughout the centuries, recognizable in the structures and decorations of many buildings from the Timur period, both within Turkmenistan, and in regions such as Uzbekistan, Afghanistan, Transcaucasia, Turkey, Iran, Pakistan and India. And after having been captured by the Arabs in 712CE, at some time in the 9th century, they employed their civil engineering expertise to construct a dam just east of the town, along with a network of canals.
This enabled the region of 'Khwarazm', or the classical 'Chorasmia', to flourish as a well irrigated and rich agricultural region, surrounded on all sides by steppe land and desert, in geographic isolation from other areas of civilization, having blocked off the flow of the Oxus into the Caspian Sea, with the city itself becoming the founding capital of the Khwarazmian Empire. But this also forced many settlements further downstream to be permanently abandoned, as the Uzboy River dried up, with agricultural irrigation and flows of trade drying up with it, and Ürgenç becoming the western-most terminus of the Northern Silk Road, rather than its nexus point as it had previously been. This dam, though, was destroyed by the Mongols in order to flood and ransack the city in 1220, during Genghis Khan's conquest of the Khwarazmian Empire, in what is considered to be one of the bloodiest massacres in human history. Unobstructed once more, the Uzboy River began to flow again, reaching the Caspian Sea once more from about the turn of the 14th century onwards. And despite the devastating effects of the Mongol invasion, the restoration of the Uzboy River, along with the flows of renewed trade which came with it, allowed the city to be revived and regain its previous status- with 14th-century Berber traveller Ibn Battuta describing Urgench as "the largest, greatest, most beautiful and most important city of the Turks. It has fine bazaars and broad streets, a great number of buildings and abundance of commodities".
But after a series of revolts by its rulers, under the Sufid Dynasty, against the Timurid Empire, Timur razed Urgench to the ground and massacred its population, destroyed the city's irrigation system, and had barley planted over the ground where the city had once stood, leaving only one mosque standing. And in around 1575, the east branch of the Oxus cut through some hills, causing the main current to shift to the Aral Sea, with a new dam rebuilt near the old site of the city to retain the remaining water and to deny it to the Turkomans who were in the habit of raiding the Oxus delta. This not only blocked the Uzboy, but caused the Sarikamish to slowly dry up too; bringing an end to the civilization which had thrived in the Chorasmia region for millennia, and forcing the survivors of the previously agricultural population to become nomadic desert dwellers.
So then, here's an alternate history scenario worth pondering: what if the original 'Djordjanian Dam' were never created- and as a result, the historical Uzboy River had never died or dried out?
IOTL, the first Russian military expedition into Central Asia, kicking off 'The Great Game', was launched immediately after Peter the Great heard about the story (or rather, spun a heavily altered tale, by a Turkmen traveller, that it had been diverted by the Khivans to the Aral Sea in order to extract golden sand from the river waters), and that it would be possible to destroy the dam and send the Oxus into its old channel, thereby making a waterway from Moscow down the Volga and up the Oxus into the heart of Asia; with these plans later developing into the proposed (but never built) Main Turkmen Canal, which was later abandoned in favor of Stalin's far larger-scale and more ambitious 'Great Plan For the Transformation of Nature' instead. Looking back at the timeline of major events in the Caspian and Aral Sea basins, in the years, decades and centuries which followed on from the construction of the 'Djordanian Dam', which cut off the Uzboy River for the next four centuries or so (along with the westernmost riverine route of the Northern Silk Road)- the drying up of the Uzboy river, thanks to the original dam's construction, appears to have taken place only a few years prior to the first breakthroughs of the Varangian (Viking) traders and merchants of the Keivan Rus' into the Muslim areas adjacent to the Caspian Sea, via the Volga Trade Route. And only around half a century prior to the first large-scale Varangian raids along the shores of the Caspian Sea, overwhelmingly directed against the Abbasids in the south.
If the Djordanian Dam had never been built, and the Uzboy River which connected the Caspian and Aral Seas via the Amu Darya/Oxus River had been allowed to continue to flow freely, along with the flow of trade and wealth down this primary historical branch of the Northern Silk Road, then couldn't the Varangian traders and/or raiders of Keivan Rus' have been equally, or even more, likely to turn their attentions eastwards instead- perhaps even attempting to settle permanently in the region (as they attempted to in Azerbaijan IOTL, only to be forced to withdraw after an outbreak of dysentry- due in no small part to the scarcity of fresh water)? After their destruction and conquest of Khazaria, if the Keivan Rus' still emerge successful over them as they did IOTL, what would stop the Volga Trade Route from merging fully with the Northern Silk Road, and simply becoming the north-westernmost branch of it? And how great do you feel that the long-term cultural and geopolitical repercussions of effectively extending the Northern Silk Road, at such an early juncture, all the way up to Sweden, could be ITTL?
