The Parable of the Sunken City

THE SUNKEN CITY

Human memory is fickle; it holds only separate remarkable milestones of a people's life, interspersed with fantastic scenes from mythology, echoing with history.

Turning to the past of Issyk-Kul, one cannot help but recall a characteristic parable by the famous medieval geographer Muhammad Kazvini:

“...Once I was walking through the streets of a very ancient and remarkably populous city,” the gray-haired sage recounted, and I asked a resident I met:
— How long has this city existed?
— Indeed, this is a very ancient city, — he replied, — but we do not know how long it has been here, and our ancestors knew nothing about it; at least they could not tell us anything about it.

Five hundred years later, I passed through the same place again and noticed not the slightest trace of the city that had once been here. I asked a peasant who was mowing grass on the site of the former capital:
— How long has it been destroyed?
— What a strange question I hear from you, old man, — he replied. — This land has never been different from what you see it now.
— But wasn’t there once a large and wealthy city here? — I said.
— Never, — he replied, — there have been no cities here, at least we have not seen them, and our fathers never spoke to us about this.

Five hundred years later, I returned to this place again and found a sea here. At a short distance from the shore stood scattered poor and unremarkable fishing huts. Seeing a crowd of fishermen on the shore spreading their nets, I approached them and asked:
— How long has this land been covered with water?
— Why ask us about this, — they said, — this place has always been the same sea as it is now.

Another five centuries later, I came here again and found a huge flourishing city. This one was even more populous and richer, with more luxurious buildings than the one I had seen the first time. And when I inquired about the time of its origin, the residents, with undisguised pride and self-satisfaction, replied: “The beginning of our city is lost in deep antiquity, for we ourselves not only do not know how long it has existed, but our ancestors, just like us, knew nothing about it at all.”

This parable fits the history of the Pre-Issyk-Kul region perfectly. Whose graves are scattered across the Issyk-Kul basin? What settlements existed in ancient times along the shores of the lake? Why does the mountain sea occasionally wash ashore clay shards, broken bricks of unusual shapes, and metal objects, like the huge copper cauldron that local Kyrgyz sent as a curiosity to the Khan of Kokand? Why, on calm days, do curious observers sometimes glimpse through the thickness of the crystal water half-ruined walls, remnants of houses, or outlines of towers, licked by the waves?

The "boom" of Issyk-Kul can be called the surge of interest in the lake that has flared up in recent years. Issyk-Kul is becoming an attractive resort area, and thousands of vacationers bask on its golden beaches every summer.

Myths and Legends