We are sitting on the second floor in the bar of Sheremetyevo International Airport waiting for flight. Ahead of Afghanistan, routine archaeological expeditions, hot dust storms, shifting rainy windy storm. That landing. Until aircraft crosses the vastness of our country, in the memory field of the first rise of the Soviet-Afghan archaeological expedition. For the tenth year we go for three months on the north of Afghanistan, ancient Bactria, where excavations. On foot, on horseback, by car done many kilometers of trails. I recall the joy of the first happy discovery and the bitterness of disappointment - in short, everything that makes our work. Kabul greeted us clear October morning.
Rapidly conclude the necessary formalities, and after a few days, we leave the city Shibergan, north of the country. Heading in the same place that a decade ago, the first field season. Then our attention was drawn to the magnificent ruins of vast ancient city Emshi Tepe. Territory it was enclosed with strong defensive walls, reinforced fighting towers. The northern part has a high citadel, perhaps from the palace - the seat of local rulers. I climbed on the swollen mounds of the former citadel, it was not hard to imagine where along the straight streets once housed residential houses, shops of merchants, shops artisans. But while it all came to life only in our imagination.
Only excavation could make the necessary clarity, and soon they started. Dozens of workers, the diggers were opened daily more and more ancient premises extracting from under the collapsed walls and roofs that fragments of vessels, a broken child's toy, then accidentally rolled under the mat coin. It was these findings, and helped establish the city Emshi Tepe was built at the turn of our era. Parallel passed examinations and other monuments in the vicinity. Almost all of them represented the ancient village, once circling Emshi Tepe. Suddenly, our work was interrupted. Going from one hill to another, we entered on the grassy surface of another, it seemed no different from the neighboring hill. But what is it? Under the feet of the wreckage of dishes. It was made about 1000 years before there was Emshi-tepa! In other words, it is was the most ancient settlement of Shiberganskogo area. It occurred about three thousand years ago. It is clear that such an ancient monument, also called the local population Tilla-Tepe (Golden Hill), first became the subject of preliminary findings. Gradually, it became obvious that the hill Tilla Tepe is a ruin is not an ordinary village, and monumental building, probably a temple built in the late ii millennium bc. er. Pious parishioners erected on this spot six-meter height of the brick platform that was surrounded by her powerful defense wall with round towers. Inside the temple is divided massive wall on the two front multicolumn hall with an altar in the center one of them. Several times the temple was rebuilt and modified, until the middle of I millennium bc. er. was not burned aliens. The ashes for a while huddled a small village, but she soon deserted. In iv. bc. er. when Bactria join the armies of Alexander of Macedon, it was already quite lonely hill, with only slight dips in places designated paths past the premises, much oplyvshih and grassy
Rapidly conclude the necessary formalities, and after a few days, we leave the city Shibergan, north of the country. Heading in the same place that a decade ago, the first field season. Then our attention was drawn to the magnificent ruins of vast ancient city Emshi Tepe. Territory it was enclosed with strong defensive walls, reinforced fighting towers. The northern part has a high citadel, perhaps from the palace - the seat of local rulers. I climbed on the swollen mounds of the former citadel, it was not hard to imagine where along the straight streets once housed residential houses, shops of merchants, shops artisans. But while it all came to life only in our imagination.
Only excavation could make the necessary clarity, and soon they started. Dozens of workers, the diggers were opened daily more and more ancient premises extracting from under the collapsed walls and roofs that fragments of vessels, a broken child's toy, then accidentally rolled under the mat coin. It was these findings, and helped establish the city Emshi Tepe was built at the turn of our era. Parallel passed examinations and other monuments in the vicinity. Almost all of them represented the ancient village, once circling Emshi Tepe. Suddenly, our work was interrupted. Going from one hill to another, we entered on the grassy surface of another, it seemed no different from the neighboring hill. But what is it? Under the feet of the wreckage of dishes. It was made about 1000 years before there was Emshi-tepa! In other words, it is was the most ancient settlement of Shiberganskogo area. It occurred about three thousand years ago. It is clear that such an ancient monument, also called the local population Tilla-Tepe (Golden Hill), first became the subject of preliminary findings. Gradually, it became obvious that the hill Tilla Tepe is a ruin is not an ordinary village, and monumental building, probably a temple built in the late ii millennium bc. er. Pious parishioners erected on this spot six-meter height of the brick platform that was surrounded by her powerful defense wall with round towers. Inside the temple is divided massive wall on the two front multicolumn hall with an altar in the center one of them. Several times the temple was rebuilt and modified, until the middle of I millennium bc. er. was not burned aliens. The ashes for a while huddled a small village, but she soon deserted. In iv. bc. er. when Bactria join the armies of Alexander of Macedon, it was already quite lonely hill, with only slight dips in places designated paths past the premises, much oplyvshih and grassy
