Fergana Valley

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Fergana Vay (Uzbek: Farg‘ona vodiysi, Kyrgyz: Фергана өрөөнү,
Tajik: водии Фaрғонa, Russian: Ферганская долина,
Persian: وادی فرغانه
Ferghana Valley UZB.JPG
Fields in the Ferghana Valley, west of Ferghana city, Uzbekistan
Country Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan
River Syr Darya river (Naryn and Kara Darya)
Length 300 km (186 mi), E
Area 22,000 km2 (8,494 sq mi)
Population 14,000,000 (2014)
Density 636 / km2 (1,647 / sq mi)
Fergana valley (highlighted), post-1991 national territories color-coded.

The Fergana Valley (also known as Farghana Valley, Uzbek: Farg‘ona vodiysi, Kyrgyz: Фергана өрөөнү [ferʁana œrœːny], Tajik: водии Фaрғонa, Russian: Ферганская долина, Persian: وادی فرغانه‎) is a region in Central Asia spread across eastern Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. Divided into three subdivisions of the former Soviet Union, the valley is ethnically diverse, and in the early 21st century it was the scene of ethnic conflict. A large triangular valley in what is an often dry part of Central Asia, the Fergana owes its fertility to two rivers, the Naryn and the Kara Darya, which run from the east, joining near Namangan, forming the Syr Darya river. The valley's history stretches back over 2300 years, when its population was conquered by Greco-Bactrian invaders from the west. Chinese chroniclers date its towns to more than 2100 years ago, as a path between Greek, Chinese, Bactrian and Parthian civilizations. It was home to Babur, founder of the Mughal Dynasty, tying the region to modern Afghanistan and South Asia. The Russian Empire conquered the valley at the end of the 19th century, and it became part of the Soviet Union from the beginning of the 20th. Its three soviet regional states gained independence in 1991. The area remains Muslim, populated by ethnically Uzbek, Tajiks, and Kyrgyz, often intermixed and not matching modern borders. As well there historically have been substantial Russian, Kashgarians, Kipchaks, Bukharan Jews and Romani minorities. Mass cotton cultivation, introduced by the Soviets, remains central to the economy, along with a wide range of grains, fruits and vegetables. There is a long history of stock breeding, leatherwork, and a growing mining sector, including deposits of coal, iron, sulfur, gypsum, rock-salt, lacustrine salt, naphtha, and some small known oil reserves.

Geography and geology[edit]

The Fergana valley is an intermountain depression in Central Asia, between the mountain systems of the Tien-Shan in the north and the Gissar-Alai in the south. The valley is approximately 300 km long and up to 70 km wide, forming an area of 22,000 km2. Its position makes it a separate geographic zone.[1] The valley owes its fertility to two rivers, the Naryn and the Kara Darya, which unite in the valley, near Namangan, to form the Syr Darya. Numerous other tributaries of these rivers exist in the valley including the Sokh River. The streams, and their numerous mountain effluents, not only supply water for irrigation, but also bring down vast quantities of sand, which is deposited alongside their courses, more especially alongside the Syr Darya where it cuts its way through the Khujand-Ajar ridge, forming there the Karakchikum. This expanse of moving sands, covering an area of 750 mi², under the influence of south-west winds, encroaches upon the agricultural districts.

The central part of the geological depression that forms the valley is characterized by block subsidence, originally to depths estimated at 6-7 km (4 mi), largely filled with sediments that range in age as far as the Permian-Triassic boundary. Some of the sediments are marine carbonates and clays. The faults are upthrusts and overthrusts. Anticlines associated with these faults form traps for petroleum and natural gas, which has been discovered in 52 small fields.[2]


The climate of this valley is dry and warm. In March the temperature reaches 20 °C (68 °F), and then rapidly rises to 35 °C (95 °F) in June, July and August. During the five months following April precipitation is rare, but increases in frequency starting in October. Snow and frost, down to -20 °C (-4 °F) occur in December and January.


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Achaemenid Empire[edit]


Hellenistic settlement[edit]

Main article: Dayuan
Probable Greek soldier in the Sampul tapestry, woolen wall hanging, 3rd-2nd century BCE, Sampul, Urumqi Xinjiang Museum.

In 329 BCE, Alexander the Great founded a Greek settlement with the city of Alexandria Eschate "The Furthest", in the southwestern part of the Ferghana valley, on the southern bank of the river Syr Darya (ancient Jaxartes), at the location of the modern city of Khujand, in the state of Tajikistan. It was later ruled by Seleucids before secession of Bactria.



The Fergana area, called Dayuan by the Chinese, remained an integral part of the Greco-Bactrian Kingdom until after the time of Demetrius I of Bactria (c. 120 BCE), when confronted with invasions by the Yuezhi from the east and the Sakas Scythians from the south. After 155 BCE, the Yuezhi were pushed into Fergana by neighbors from the north and east. The Yuezhi invaded urban civilization of the Dayuan in Ferghana, eventually settling on the northern bank of the Oxus, in the region of Transoxiana, in modern-day Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, just north of the Hellenistic Greco-Bactrian kingdom. The Greek city of Alexandria on the Oxus was apparently burnt to the ground by the Yuezhi around 145 BCE.[6] Pushed by these twin forces, the Greco-Bactrian kingdom reoriented itself around lands in what is now Afghanistan, while the new invaders were partially assimilated into the Hellenistic culture left in Ferghana valley.

Interaction with China[edit]

In the history of the Han Dynasty, based on the travels of Zhang Qian about 126 BCE, the region of Ferghana is presented as the country of the Dayuan (Ta-Yuan), possibly descendants of the Greeks colonists (Da Yuan might be a transliteration of "Great Ionians"). Dayuan was renowned for its Heavenly Horses which the Chinese tried to obtain with little success until they waged war against them in 104 BCE.


Agricultural activities of the Dayuan reported by Zhang Qian included growing of grain and grapes (for wine).[7] The area of Ferghana was thus the theater of the first major interaction between an urbanized culture speaking Indo-European languages and the Chinese civilization, which led to the opening up the Silk Road from the 1st century BCE.

Bactrian rule[edit]

Ancient cities of Bactria. Ferghana, to the top right, formed a periphery to these less powerful cities and states.

Fergana, on the route to the Chinese Tarim Basin from the west, remained at the boundaries of a number of classical era empires. The Kushan Empire formed from the same Yuezhi who had conquered the Hellenistic Fergana. The Kushan spread out in the 1st century CE from Yuezhi confederation in the territories of ancient Bactria on either side of the middle course of the Oxus River or Amu Darya in what is now northern Afghanistan, and southern Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.[8] The Kushan conquered most of what is now northern India and Pakistan, driving east through Fergana into the Tarim Basin against the Chinese. Kushan power also consolidated long distance trade, linking Central Asia to both Han Dynasty China and the Roman Empire in Europe. The Kushans ruled the area as part of their larger empire until the 3rd century CE, when the Zoroastrian Persian Sassanid Empire invaded Kushan territory from the southwest. Fergana remained under shifting local and Transoxian rulers thereafter. For periods in the 4th and 5th centuries, the Sassanid Empire directly controlled Transoxiana and Fergana, led by the conquests of Shapur II and Khosrau I against the Kushans and the Hephthalite Empire. Sassanid rule of Fergana was interrupted by Hepthalites and was ended by Gokturks in mid of 6th century. Gokturks ruled it until first quarter of 8th century except Chinese rule between 659 and 681.

Islamic influence[edit]

During the 8th century, Ferghana was the location of fierce rivalry between the Tang Dynasty of China and the expansion of Muslim power, leading to the Battle of Talas in 751, which marked the victory of Islam and the disengagement of China from Central Asia. Two antecedent battles in 715 and 717 had seen the Chinese to prevail over Arab forces.[9] A series of Arab, Persian, and later Turkic Muslim rulers reigned over the Fergana.

The tomb of Ali at Shakhimardan.

Samanid, Karakhanid and Khwarezmid rules[edit]

Main article: Samanid Empire

The Samanid Empire, rising from the Arab Muslim conquest of Persia, pushed into what was then called Greater Khorasan, including Transoxiana and the Fergana Valley from the West. In 819 CE, Ahmad ibn Asad—son of Asad ibn Saman—was granted authority over the city of Fergana by Caliph Al-Ma'mun's governor of Khorasan, Ghassan ibn 'Abbad, as a reward for his support against the rebel Rafi' ibn Laith. Following the death of his brother Nuh, who ruled in Samarkand, Ahmad and another brother Yahya were given rule over the city by Abdallah, the governor of Khurasan. By the time of Ahmad's death in 864 or 865, he was the ruler of most of Transoxiana, Bukhara and Khwarazm. Samarkand and Fergana went to his son, Nasr I of Samanid, leading to a series of Samanid Dynasty Muslim rulers of the valley. .[10] During demise of Samanids in 10th century, Fergana Valley was conquered by Karakhanids. Eastern part of Fergana later was under suzerenaity of Karakhitays. Karakhanid rule lasted till 1212, when Khwarezmshahs conquered western part of it.

Mongol-Turkic rule[edit]

A portrait of Babur, the Turco-Mongol founder of Mughal dynasty, he was a native of Andijan in Ferghana Valley.

Mongol ruler Genghis Khan invaded Transoxiana and Fergana in 1219 during his conquest of Khwarazm. Before his death in 1227, he assigned the lands of Western Central Asia to his second son Chagatai, and this region became known as the Chagatai Khanate. But it was not long before Transoxian Turkic leaders ruled the area, along with most of central Asia as fiefs from the Golden Horde of the Mongol Empire. The Fergana became part of a larger Turco-Mongol empire. This Mongolian nomadic confederation known as Barlas, were remnants of the original Mongol army of Genghis Khan.[11][12] After the Mongol conquest of Central Asia, the Barlas settled in Turkistan (which then became also known as Moghulistan - "Land of Mongols") and intermingled to a considerable degree with the local Turkic and Turkic-speaking population, so that at the time of Timur's reign the Barlas had become thoroughly Turkicized in terms of language and habits. Additionally, by adopting Islam, the Central Asian Turks and Mongols also adopted the Persian literary and high culture[13] which had dominated Central Asia since the early days of Islamic influence. Persian literature was instrumental in the assimilation of the Timurid elite to the Perso-Islamic courtly culture.[14]


Located on the Northern Silk Road, the Ferghana played a significant part in the flowering of medieval Central Asian Islam. Its most famous son is Babur, heir to Timur and famous conqueror and founder of the Mughal dynasty in South Asia. Islamic proselytizers from the Ferghana valley such as al-Firghani الفرغاني, al-Andijani الأندجاني, al-Namangani النمنگاني, al-Khojandi الخوجندي spread Islam into parts of present-day Russia, China, and South Asia.[15]

The Fergana valley was ruled by a series of Muslim states in the medieval period. For much of this period local and southwestern rulers divided the valley into a series of small states. From the 16th century, the Shaybanid Dynasty of the Khanate of Bukhara ruled Fergana, replaced by the Janid Dynasty of Bukhara in 1599. In 1709 Shaybanid emir Shahrukh of the Minglar Uzbeks declared independence from the Khanate of Bukhara, establishing a state in the eastern part of the Fergana Valley. He built a citadel to be his capital in the small town of Kokand. As the Khanate of Kokand, Kokand was capital of a territory stretching over modern eastern Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, southern Kazakhstan and whole of Kyrgyzstan.

Russian Empire[edit]

Khan's Palace, Kokand.


Not all the inhabitants of the area were happy with this state of affairs. In 1898 Muhammed Ali Khalfa proclaimed a jihad against the Russians. However after about twenty Russians had been killed, Khalfa was captured and executed. When the 1905 Revolution spread across the Russian Empire, some Jadids were active in the Ferghana Valley. When the Tsarist regime extended the military draft to include Muslims, this led to a revolt which was far more widespread than that of 1898, and which was not entirely suppressed by the time of the Russian Revolution.[16]

The Soviet and post-Soviet periods[edit]

In 1924 the new boundaries separating the Uzbek SSR and Kyrgyz SSR cut off the eastern end of the Ferghana Valley, as well as the slopes surrounding it. This was compounded in 1928 when the Tajik ASSR became a fully-fledged republic, and the area around Khujand was made a part of it. This blocked the valley's natural outlet and the routes to Samarkand and Bukhara, but none of these borders was of any great significance so long as Soviet rule lasted. The whole region was part of a single economy geared to cotton production on a massive scale, and the overarching political structures meant that crossing borders was not a problem. Since 1991 this has changed, for the worse. Uzbekistan regularly closes its borders with Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, causing immense difficulties for trade and for those who live in the region. Travellers from Khujand to Dushanbe, unable to take the route through Uzbekistan, have to cross a high mountain pass between the two cities instead, along a terrible road. Similarly communications between Bishkek and Osh pass through difficult mountainous country and are endangered by the attitude of President Islam Karimov of Uzbekistan. Ethnic tensions also flared at one stage, most notably in the town of Uzgen, near Osh, where were Uzbek-Kyrgyz riots in 1990. There has been no further ethnic violence, and things appeared to have quieted down for several years.[17] However, the valley is a religiously conservative region which was particularly hard-hit by President Karimov's secularization legislation in Uzbekistan, together with his decision to close the borders with Kyrgyzstan in 2003. This devastated the local economy by preventing the importation of cheap Chinese consumer goods. The deposition of Askar Akayev in Kyrgyzstan in April 2005, coupled with the arrest of a group of prominent local businessmen brought underlying tensions to a boil in the region around Andijan and Qorasuv during the May 2005 unrest in Uzbekistan in which hundreds of protestors were killed by troops. Violence started to pick up again in 2010 in the Kyrgyz part of the valley, heated by ethnic tensions, worsening economic conditions due to the global economic crisis, and political conflict over the ousting of Kyrgyz President Kurmanbek Bakiyev in April 2010. In June 2010, about 200 people have been reported to be killed during clashes in Osh and Jalal-Abad, and 2000 more were injured.[18] Between 100,000 and 300,000 refugees, predominantly of Uzbek ethnic origin, attempted to flee to Uzbekistan, causing a major humanitarian crisis.






Coal, iron, sulfur, gypsum, rock-salt, lacustrine salt and naphtha are all known to exist, but only the last two have ever been extracted in significant quantities. In the late 19th century there were a few small oil-wells in Ferghana, but these no longer function. In the Tsarist period the only industrial enterprises were some seventy or eighty factories engaged in cotton cleaning. Leather, saddlery, paper and cutlery were the principal products of the domestic or cottage industries. This was not greatly added to in Soviet times, when industrialisation was concentrated in the cities of Samarkand and Bukhara.


Historically the Ferghana Valley was an important staging-post on the Silk Road for goods and people traveling from China to the Middle East and Europe. After crossing the passes from Kashgar in Xinjiang, traders would have found welcome relief in the fertile abundance of Ferghana, as well as the possibility of purchasing further high-quality silk manufactured in Margilan. The most famous export from the region were the 'blood-sweating' Heavenly Horses which so captured the imagination of the Chinese during the Han dynasty, but in fact these were almost certainly bred on the Steppe, either west of Bukhara or North of Tashkent, and merely brought to Ferghana for sale. In the 19th century, not surprisingly, a considerable trade carried on with Russia; raw cotton, raw silk, tobacco, hides, sheepskins, fruit and cotton and leather goods were exported, and manufactured wares, textiles, tea and sugar were imported and in part re-exported to Kashgaria and Bokhara. The total trade of Ferghana reached an annual value of nearly £3,500,000 in 1911. Nowadays it suffers from the same depression that affects all trade that either originates in or has to pass through Uzbekistan. The only significant international export is cotton, although the Daewoo plant in Andizhan sends cars all over Uzbekistan.



Until the late 19th century Ferghana, like everywhere else in Central Asia, was dependent on the camel, horse and donkey for transport, while roads were few and bad. The Russians built a trakt or post-road linking Andijan, Kokand, Margilan and Khujand with Samarkand and Tashkent in the early 1870s. A new impulse was given to trade by the extension (1898) of the Transcaspian railway into Ferghana as far as Andijan, and by the opening of the Orenburg-Tashkent or Trans-Aral Railway in (1906).


Historical demography[edit]

The information contained in the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica is particularly interesting on this point, as it gives the full information from the 1897 census, the only one held in the Russian Empire before 1917, and helps to illuminate a situation rendered obscure by the vagaries of Soviet Nationalities policy in the 1920s and 1930s. The population numbered 1,571,243 in 1897, and of that number 707,132 were women and 286,369 were urban.

In 1906 it was estimated at 1,796,500. Two-thirds of the total were Sarts and Uzbek. They lived mostly in the valley, while the mountain slopes above it were occupied by Kyrgyz, partly nomadic and pastoral, partly agricultural and settled. The other nations were Kashgarians, Kipchaks, Bukharan Jews and Gypsies. The governing classes were of course Russians, who constituted also the merchants and industrial working class, such as it was. But the merchants of West Turkestan were called all over Central Asia Andijanis, from the town of Andijan in Ferghana. The great mass of the population are Muslims (1,039,115 in 1897).

The divisions revealed by the 1897 census, between a largely Tajik-speaking area around Khuhand, hill-regions populated by Kyrgyz and a settled, population in the main body of the valley, roughly reflect the borders as drawn after 1924. One exception is the town of Osh, which has a majority Uzbek population but ended up in Kyrgyzstan.

The one significant element that is missing when looking at modern accounts of the region are the Sarts. This term was abolished by the Soviets as 'derogatory' after 1920, but in fact there was a clear distinction between long-settled, Persianised Turkic peoples, speaking a form of Qarluq Turkic that is very close to Uyghur, and those who called themselves Uzbeks, who were a Kipchak tribe speaking a Turkic dialect much closer to Kazakh, who arrived in the region with Shaibani Khan in the mid-16th century. That this difference existed and was felt in Ferghana is attested to in Timur Beisembiev's recent translation of the Life of Alimqul (London, 2003).

There were very few Kipchak-Uzbeks in Ferghana, although they had at various times held political power in the region. In 1924 however, Soviet policy decreed that all settled Turks in Central Asia would henceforth be known as "Uzbeks", (although the language chosen for the new Republic was not Kipchak but Qarluq) and the Ferghana Valley is now seen as an Uzbek 'heartland'.

Administrative divisions[edit]

In 1911 the province was divided into five districts, the chief towns of which were Fergana (New Marghelan), capital of the province (8,977 inhabitants in 1897), Andijan (49,682 in 1900), Kokand (86,704 in 1900), Namangan (61,906 in 1897), and Osh (37,397 in 1900); but Old Marghelan (42,855 in 1900) and Chust (13,686 in 1897) were also towns of importance.

The Valley is now divided between Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. In Tajikistan it is part of Soghd Province or vilayat, with the capital at Khujand. In Uzbekistan it is divided between the Namangan, Andijan and Fergana viloyati, while in Kyrgyzstan it contains parts of Batken, Jalal-abad and Osh oblasts, with Osh being the main town for the southern part of the country.

Cities in the Fergana Valley include:

In Uzbekistan:

In Kyrgyzstan:

In Tajikistan:

Provinces wholly or partially within the Fergana Valley[edit]

Country Province Capital Area (km²) Pop. Wholly within the Valley
Kyrgyzstan Batken Batken 17,000 469,700 No
Jalal-Abad Jalal-Abad 33,700 1,099,000 No
Osh City Osh 50 265,200 Yes
Osh Province Osh 29,200 1,199,900 No
Tajikistan Sughd Khujand 25,400 2,349,000 No
Uzbekistan Andijan Andijan 4,303 2,805,000 Yes
Fergana Fergana 7,005 3,386,000 Yes
Namangan Namangan 7,101 2,504,000 Yes
Totals: 14,000,000

Notes: 1). The bulk of the population of every province lies in the valley, despite the land area. 2). Population references for 2014 by respective national agencies. (Kirghiz)[19](Uzbek),[20](Tajikistan 2013)[21]

See also[edit]


  1. ^ grida.no: topography and hydrography of the ferghana valley.
  2. ^ "Petroleum Potential of Fergana Intermontane Basin". Web.archive.org. Retrieved 2014-03-26. 
  5. ^ Strabo, XI.XI.I
  7. ^ The Megalithic Portal and Megalith Map. "''Silk Road, North China'', C. Michael Hogan, the Megalithic Portal, ed. Andy Burnham". Megalithic.co.uk. Retrieved 2014-03-26. 
  10. ^ History of civilizations of Central Asia, Volume 3. Motilal Banarsidass, 1999 ISBN 978-81-208-1540-7 pp. 274–80
  16. ^ "Uzbekhistan". Hunmagyar. Retrieved 12 June 2013. 
  19. ^ http://citypopulation.de/Kyrgyzstan.html
  20. ^ http://citypopulation.de/Uzbekistan.html
  21. ^ http://citypopulation.de/Tajikistan.html


By Russian turcologist Vasily Bartold:


Other authors:


External links[edit]

