What is Central Asia?

A consensus on what are the boundaries of Central Asia has eluded geographers for centuries. L.I. Miroshnikov, associated with the Institute of Oriental Studies at the Academy of Science of the UUSR in Moscow at the time of his assessment in 1992 for UNESCO, reviewed the history of the use of the term “Central Asia” in scientific literature. (1) He wrote:

The use of the term “Central Asia” in scientific literature has a long history of its own. First it was used simply as a synonym of the terms “High Asia,” “la Haute Tartarie” or “l’Asie interieure” and some others, widely used in European literature on Asian history and geography or in travel stories—to denote the central regions of the continent with no references to the geographical boundaries of the area concerned. (2-3)

Map of Asia. Source: http://www.travelnotes.org/Asia/images/asia2.gif; accessed October 25, 2009.

Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859), a German geographer, naturalist, and explorer in the first half of the nineteenth century first attempted to define the boundaries of Central Asia, asserts Miroshinikov. Indeed, Russia sponsored his mad-dash trip between May and November 1829 across the Russian empire from the Neva to the Yenesei (a distance of 9,614 miles) in only 25 weeks. In his resulting work titled Asie centrale, published in Paris in 1832 and still available in the French language through the University of Michigan Library (4), he proposed “to include in Asia a vast area lying between 5 degrees North (i.e., 49.5 degrees North) and 5 degrees South (i.e., 39.5 degrees South) of latitude 44.5 degrees North of the equator, which he considered to be the middle parallel of the entire Asian mainland.” Miroshinikov suggested Humboldt regarded the plateau of Ustyurt and Greater Khingan Mountains as the eastern and western limits of Central Asia. The Ustyurt Plateau is in Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan, between the Aral Sea and the Caspian Sea. (5) The Greater Khingan Mountains are in Inner Mongolia in northeastern China. (6)  

Alexander von Humboldt. Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f3/AvHumboldt.jpg; accessed October 25, 2009.

Not all scholars agreed with Humboldt’s boundaries for Central Asia; indeed, many rejected the “very method used by him in defining these boundaries. Nicolay Khanykoff, Russian orientalist and explorer of Central Asia, was the first to state that the method used by Humboldt did not fulfill the requirements of geography and that in defining boundaries of Central Asia one should be guided by common physical features.” (7) “Furthermore, he suggested that the absence of flow of water into the open sea might be considered as a good criterium [sic] for establishing the boundaries of Central Asia. His own view of Central Asia was therefore broader than that proposed by Humboldt. More specifically, Khanykoff included into the area the entire region of eastern Iran and Afghanistan, lying beyond the southern limit of Humboldt’s Central Asia.” (8) How did he know that the Soviet empire would try to realize this vision?

Baron Ferdinand von Richthofen. Source:  http://www.awi.de/typo3temp/pics/d1c7811b5d.jpg; accessed October 25, 2009.

Another German geographer, Ferdinand von Richthofen (1833-1905), subsequently examined “all definitions of Central Asia and, considering them unsatisfactory, proposed one of his own,” said Miroshnikov. “Richthofen divided Asia into two types of natural region, “central” and “peripheral,” differing from each other by their physical character and geological origin.” He also recognized the existence of so-called “transitional regions,” that is, the “areas either losing their ‘central’ features or ‘going to be central.’” By Central Asia, he meant “all the regions of Inner Asia characterized by their hydrographical system (i.e., having no flow of water to the open sea). The boundaries proposed were to the Altai mountains in the north, Tibet in the south, the Pamirs in the west and the Khinghan mountain range in the east.” (9)

Next came Professor Ivan Mushketov (1850-1902), the famous Russian geologist, traveler, and tectonist who discussed the boundaries of Central Asia in his acclaimed work Turkestan Vol. 1. (1886). (10) “He acknowledged Richthofen’s contribution and stated that this term ‘became more precise than it had ever been before.’ He also stated, however, that the German geographer had no sufficient grounds for narrowing the meaning of the term.” Mushketov concluded that “the eastern and western part of Inner Asia have so much in common in their geological origin and natural features that to relate one of them to the category of ‘central’ and the other to ‘peripheral’ (or even ‘transitional’), as had been done by Richthofen, did not have much sense,” explained Miroshnikov. (9)

Ivan Mushketov. Source: http://images.google.com/images?q=Ivan%20Mushketov&rls=com.microsoft:*:IE-SearchBox&oe=UTF-8&sourceid=ie7&rlz=1I7ADBF&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&hl=en&tab=wi; accessed October 25, 2009.

Professor Mushketov opined that any attempt to divide the Asian continent into components must “strictly adhere to main principle based on the absence or presence of the flow of water into the open sea and also on the prevalence of aeolian [wind] or water agents in the area concerned.” He suggested dividing Asia into two parts: “Peripheral (or Outlying) and Inner (or Middle) Asia, which sharply differed from each other in their location, physical features and origin.” “By Inner Asia Mushketov meant the aggregate of ‘all the land-locked regions of Asian mainland, having no flow of water into open sea and possessing the features of Khan-Khai.’” (9)

Controversy continued despite Mushketov’s concerted effort in summarizing the century-long controversy over what constituted the boundaries of Central Asia. What did the UNESCO editors conclude were the boundaries of Central Asia as the basis for its multi-volume series on the history of Central Asia?

Miroshnikov responded that Central Asia, according to UNESCO, was synonymous with “Inner Asia,” meaning the “whole interior of Asian continent.” Furthermore, UNESCO admitted that the term “Central Asia” “may be understood in different ways” and that “any attempt to define it would remain controversial.” (11) Nevertheless, UNESCO editors could not help but get concrete on the matter. They concluded in 1992 that Central Asia covers

territories lying at present within the boundaries of Afghanistan, the western part of China, northern India, north-eastern Iran, Mongolia, Pakistan and the [five] Central Asian Republics of the USSR. (11)

An update of this definition reflecting the dissolution of the USSR in 1991 would list the names of the five former Central Asian Republics of the USSR, which are, as of this writing, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. UNESCO’s vision of Central Asia is huge.

Three interpretations of the borders of Central Asia. Source: http://www.sras.org/img/photo/central_asia_borders.png; accessed October 25, 2009.

Notes:

1. L.I. Miroshnikov: In History of Civilizations of Central Asia, Volume 1. A.H. Dani and V.M. Masson (Eds.). UNESCO Publishing, 1992, pp. 477-480.
2. Ibid, p. 477.
3. See SEMP Biot Report #661: “The Road to Oxiana” (October 23, 2009) for Robert Byron’s conceptualization of Central Asia. Available at http://www.semp.us/publications/biot_reader.php?BiotID=659.
4. Alexander von Humboldt: Asie Centrale: Recherches sur les Chaines des Montagnes et la Climatologie Comparee. V. 1. University of Michigan Library, 2009.
5. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ustyurt_Plateau; accessed October 24, 2009.
6. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greater_Khingan; accessed October 24, 2009.
7. Nicolas de Khanykoff: Memoire sur la partie meridionale de l’Asie central, Vol. 13, Paris: Imprimerie de L. Martinet, 1861. Available at http://books.google.com/books?id=9HsIAAAAMAAJ&dq=Memoire+sur+la+partie+meridionale+de+l%E2%80%99Asie+central&printsec=frontcover&source=bl&ots=9aTUSXAYXR&sig=SPFeYoG9lofLKEC3w7V6Wu3dxPk&hl=en&ei=tirjSrXWDYrKsAPloJC1Aw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CAoQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=&f=false; accessed October 24, 2009.
8. L.I. Miroshnikov: In History of Civilizations of Central Asia, Volume 1. A.H. Dani and V.M. Masson (Eds.). UNESCO Publishing, 1992, pp. 477-478.
9. Ibid, p. 478.
10. “Prof. I.V. Mushketoff.” Nature [Obit], February 27, 1902, p. 395.
11. L.I. Miroshnikov: In History of Civilizations of Central Asia, Volume 1. A.H. Dani and V.M. Masson (Eds.). UNESCO Publishing, 1992, pp. 479-480.