Stories of Individual Traders and Other Russian People about Osh
Documentary sources from the time of Kyrgyzstan's dependence on the feudal despotic Kokand Khanate, both Kokand and Russian, contain very few factual and reliable details for describing the city of Osh, as well as other settlements in Eastern Fergana. However, from the sparse accounts of individual traders and other Russian people — "involuntary travelers," like F. Efremov, notes sent to Kokand by representatives of the Russian authorities, domestic and foreign travelers, a general picture emerges about the state of the city of Osh in the first three-quarters of the 19th century. Some details become clearer: its approximate size, notable topographical features, the general character of construction, the occupations of the residents, certain urban events during the history of the khanate, etc.
In the mid-18th century, Osh was more of a temporary encampment than a permanent dwelling for Kyrgyz nomadic feudal lords. Eastern sources directly state that the Kyrgyz "spend the winter in the city of Osh, ... engage in agriculture and graze livestock in summer pastures." At that time, the city was evidently not well fortified, and there were no defensive walls (sources, in any case, do not report them). However, archaeological surveys of the surroundings of the city suggest that, at least on its southwestern outskirts, facing the Alai — the most "restless" area of the Kokand Khanate, some fortress stood.
Narrative sources mention the fortress of Mady, located just one farsakh from Osh. In 1275 AH (1858/59), another fortress was built near Osh in the Langar area. These fortresses took the first blows from the rebels against the khan's oppression. Osh itself changed hands with struggle. The citadel, which was located in the center of the city, was not adapted for long-term defense; for example, when Kyrgyz rebels reached the village of Aravan in the 1870s and attacked the Osh citadel, the khan's governor immediately fled the city.
The first Russian traveler to visit Osh in the 1770s was the non-commissioned officer Philip Efremov. A "traveler by force," an escapee from captivity, he naturally pays special attention to the distance between cities. From Osh to Margilan, F. Efremov noted, it was a 3-day journey, and from Osh to Kashgar — 13 days. F. Efremov also notes the independence of the Kyrgyz from the Kokand Khanate, but the city itself, according to the author, was already "subject to him."
Siberian Cossack Maximov, who saw "Kyrgyz and Kipchaks grazing near Osh" on his way to Kashgar in the early 19th century, reported on the pilgrimage of Muslims to the shrine of Takht-i-Suleiman.
Kokand ambassadors who were in Turkey in 1832-1833 named 12 large cities, numerous towns, and villages as part of the Kokand Khanate. One of them was undoubtedly the city of Osh, which served as the administrative center of the vilayet. In narrative sources, Osh was sometimes also referred to as Takht-i-Suleiman — named after the mountain rising on the western outskirts of the city. The "holy" mountain attracted pilgrims from various Muslim countries, making the city known as one of the religious centers of Fergana. Here, from the late Middle Ages, ancient mosques have survived, Islam was further spread by the efforts of the Kokand clergy, and madrasas were built, dozens, if not hundreds, of mosques. One of the most famous was the madrasa of Alymbek (which we will discuss in more detail below). Pilgrimage heightened Muslim fanaticism. Medieval religious obscurantism did not contribute to social and cultural progress.
Osh was a Kyrgyz city both territorially and ethnically
In terms of area, in the first third of the 19th century, Osh was a small town, smaller than Margilan and much smaller than Tashkent, approaching the size of the city of Aksu in Eastern Turkestan. However, compared to the territory of the city in previous centuries, it did expand during this period. One sign of this was the absence of an external wall surrounding the early medieval city.
Another characteristic feature of the city's topography was its division into two parts by the rapidly flowing mountain river Ak-Bura, over which a bridge was built. Most of the city was located on the left bank under Suleiman Mountain, surrounded by "an old, small, poor town," and well-known to all who arrived in Osh was the Trading Square, where distant merchant caravans stopped. On the opposite side of the river, less populated, there were few houses, they stood sparsely, and thus the streets along the caravan road seemed more spacious here. The residential buildings were almost entirely made of adobe, low, with flat roofs of Eastern type (sakhli or mazanaki). However, in Andijan and Bukhara, similar houses looked somewhat better externally. Generally, according to foreigners who visited Osh, there was "little good construction" there.
In addition to cult objects that attracted the attention of those who visited Osh during the khanate period, some other structures are mentioned. Thus, according to Timkovsky, there was a mint in the city where copper coins — pul — were minted. Other authors also report on the "urde" — the residence of the ruler of the Osh beks, or vilayet, with an office and other service, residential (including a harem) and economic premises, as well as barracks for the troops.
The khan, his close relatives, and some high-ranking court officials owned significant real estate in Osh and its surroundings — the best houses with estates, gardens, vineyards, and arable lands. In their own and state premises lived the khan's military commanders, judges (qazis), tax collectors — zyaketchis, as well as representatives of the Muslim clergy in the city.
There is plenty of evidence in 19th-century sources that Osh was indeed a Kyrgyz city, both territorially and ethnically. The author of the Kokand manuscript "Mirotul-Ftuh," for example, noted that the homeland of the Kyrgyz and Kipchaks "was located in the vicinity of Andijan and Osh." The Kyrgyz controlled the trade route leading from Kokand to Kashgar and presumably claimed duties from caravans passing through their lands. This is what A. P. Khoroshkin meant when he wrote: "All roads to Kashgar through Ush (Osh — ed.) are unsafe; they are guarded by nomads — Kipchaks." Therefore, it is not unfounded that one Central Asian observer of the 1870s called Osh "the center of the Kyrgyz-Kipchak population," which considered it "their own city" and where even Kokand khanate soldiers never permanently stationed.
National Composition of the Population of the City of Osh
The national composition of the population of the city of Osh in the 18th-19th centuries (up to 1875) was not ethnically homogeneous — in addition to the surrounding Kyrgyz, there lived Fergana Uzbeks, Tajiks (Kartegin), Uyghurs ("Kashgarli"), and to a lesser extent settled Kipchaks, among others. For more or less extended periods, traders from neighboring foreign Asian countries also stayed here. Like in other Central Asian cities, Indian moneylenders and money changers lived here.
The presence of such diverse ethnic components in the national composition of Osh's residents can be explained by the history of complex foreign political relations of the Kokand Khanate with neighboring states and peoples, the role that Osh had to play in them, the multiethnicity and mobility of the population of the khanate itself, which was often involved in feudal strife, wars with neighboring states, as well as the long-established extensive trade and economic ties of the cities of the Fergana Valley, including Osh, and finally, the contacts of its townspeople with the indigenous population of the rural area.
The class composition of the population of Osh during its subordination to the Kokand Khanate was determined by the dominance of feudal orders in the khanate and, accordingly, the feudal structure of urban life. All levers of control over the city and its population were in the hands of the military, bureaucratic, and Muslim exploiting elite. The ruling class also included wealthy merchants, who held wholesale trade in the city and trade with Eastern Turkestan, moneylenders and money changers, large bai and landowners, entrepreneurial craftsmen, caravan heads who had many pack horses, as well as owners of city caravanserais and shops in the Osh bazaar, some of which were rented out to outsiders and small local traders.
The Kokand Khanate maintained the institution of slavery until its last days, and Southern Kyrgyzstan was one of its sources of replenishment. In the preserved archive of the Kokand Khanate, there are documents that mention the calling of slave women from Osh. For example, in 1287 AH (1870/71), an order (patta) was given to one of the khan's officials to pay a certain sum to a certain Akhund-baba for the delivery of slave women (churi) from the city of Osh. Slavery was abolished only after Kyrgyzstan joined Russia.
Thus, the class composition of the population of Osh was very heterogeneous: on one side were khans, beks, datkhas, and merchants, and on the other were artisans, impoverished shepherds, hired workers, seasonal laborers, and slaves. The majority of the townspeople were poor farmers, small traders and artisans, soldiers, lower clergy, students of religious schools, laborers, water carriers, loaders, and packers in caravanserais, servants, as well as beggars, i.e., individuals from the lowest strata of urban residents who suffered from severe tax burdens and unbearable labor obligations, and the arbitrariness of feudal lords. Unfortunately, there are almost no direct testimonies about the living standards of the working people in Osh.