Southwest ceremonial complex of Burana buildings
In 1972 and 1974, protective work was conducted at the Burana settlement by the Institute of History of the Kyrgyz SSR. The construction zone for the irrigation network and the development of new land for the "Alchal" collective farm included part of the hills, including the remnants of a medieval estate in the southeastern sector of the settlement. A specially formed group from the Burana detachment of the Kyrgyz archaeological expedition conducted excavations on a hill measuring 70X80 m. The ruins are located 2.8 km from the central quadrangle, near the first ring of the long rampart and parallel to it.
By the time of the excavations, most of the estate's buildings had been damaged, but traces of a house were clearly visible in the southern corner of the courtyard, along with an entrance from the southeast. The highest part was the northwest residential section of the estate, where twenty rooms of various purposes and an inner courtyard were uncovered, dividing the layout of the rooms into two halves — ceremonial and utility. Two periods of habitation of the house were identified, with reconstructions and repairs of the building occurring during the 11th-12th centuries. Judging by the nature of the construction debris, the building was single-story.
The southwest ceremonial complex included ten rooms located on both sides of a wide corridor measuring 28 m in length and 4 m in width. One end of the corridor led to a courtyard with stone-paved paths. The thick walls (1.6—2.3 m wide and up to 4 m high) and narrow long rooms suggest vaulted ceilings. The corner openings in the rooms were adorned with pointed arches. The floors of some of the rooms were laid with burnt format bricks measuring 25 cm on each side and 4.5 cm thick; the walls were plastered and whitewashed with alabaster.
The northeastern utility section of the estate included 11 small rooms and storerooms. Here, they were arranged around an iwan hall that opened into an inner courtyard. The inner surfaces of the walls were decorated with carved ganch plaster, patterned panel masonry, and the floor was laid with burnt bricks. A large accumulation of wood, patches of reed decay, and thin walls (sometimes less than a meter) indicate a flat wooden-frame ceiling in this part of the building.
The outer walls have a combined masonry of beaten clay and raw brick, characteristic of architecture in Central Asia since ancient times. The buildings did not have a foundation. The estate's fence was made of beaten clay with a large admixture of gravel — a characteristic soil of the settlement's mainland; the wall width in the masonry is 1.2 m. Overall, the residential part of the estate covered 1550 sq. m and belonged to a large feudal lord.
The first period of habitation of the house is associated with the installation of smoke heating through kanas — channels running along the walls in the form of hollow sufs. Such a heating system was recorded by A. N. Bernshtein in the residential part of the Buddhist monastery of the 9th-10th centuries at the Ak-Beshim settlement, where narrow channels were laid in the central wide wall and under the floor. The presence of similar heating systems is known for medieval residential architecture in Semirechye, Khorezm, and Kazakhstan. Kanes were also widely used in ancient Mongolian cities in the 12th century.
The main part of the finds in all the rooms consists of clay dishes characteristic of the 11th-12th centuries. The beginning of the 11th century dates the estate and a silver dirham of the Bukhara mint found on the floor of one of the rooms from the year 413 AH (1022-23), minted during the reign of Abu Mansur Muhammad Arslan-khan (ibn Ali).
The excavated house in the estate is among the monuments of medieval monumental residential architecture in Central Asia. It resembles a castle of the agricultural aristocracy of the early medieval period. It is still surrounded by adobe walls and various utility buildings, but elements of the castle such as the stylobate, loophole, and multi-story structure have already been lost. Among all the estates excavated to date at the settlements of Kyrgyzstan, the Burana building is the most monumental. It undoubtedly belonged to a large feudal landowner, who apparently had privately owned cultivated lands within the city walls. This peculiarity of the Chuy settlements allowed researchers to consider them "agrarianized." Extensive areas of the city, spanning several dozen square kilometers, were occupied by estate buildings and cultivated land and were enclosed by a long rampart.
Work of the Issyk-Kul Detachment of the KAÉ Institute of History
Familiarity with the topography of the Burana settlement allowed us to record in the sections of the irrigation ditches and river individual outputs of slag and craft products, in particular, urban copperware, the products of which in the form of kumgans and narrow-necked jugs were exported to the Tokmak city historical and local history museum. The copper workshop was located on the right bank of the Burana River, in the southeastern sector of the settlement, not far from the central ruins, and has now been eroded. In the floodplain of the river and in the summer-drying riverbed, coins, millstones, and grain grinders, ceramics, glass, metal products, and jewelry are found in large quantities.
Subsequent research at Burana was carried out by the Burana archaeological group of the Issyk-Kul detachment of the KAÉ Institute of History. In 1975 and 1976, the settlement was surveyed in archaeological and topographical terms. As a result, four more estates were plotted within the first ring of long walls, separate sections of ramparts were recorded, and lifting materials were collected.
The remains of the estates — tortkules are located 1.6—3 km from the central ruins. In plan, they are rectangular, with side dimensions of 30X38, 50X60, 30X70, 40X50 m. Test pits and small excavations revealed a cultural layer up to 4 m thick and material characteristic of the 10th-12th centuries.
Young researchers made a new section of the western wall of the central quadrangle, which clarified its width in the masonry at the base to 7.5 m; the wall narrows towards the top. The section of the outer adobe wall at the excavation site on the southern side of the city showed its thickness to be 4.3 m with a preserved height of 2.3 m. Comparing the data from the wall sections by P. N. Kozhemyako (see above), it can be assumed that the thickness of the city wall varied in different locations.
Near the southern wall of the central quadrangle, the Burana group in 1975-1976 uncovered the remains of an adobe structure over an area of 320 sq. m, with the upper construction horizon yielding ceramic material from the 10th-14th centuries. The walls of the building were preserved to a height of 0.5 m. A significant find was a gold coin, identified by M. N. Fedorov as a mint of the Khorezmshah Tekesh. Among the lifting materials, excavators found fragments of Sogdian dishes (noted for the first time for the settlement and can be considered a random fact. — V. G.), bronze items, and a dirham minted in the name of Arslan-khan Suleiman ibn Yusuf (424-447/1032-1056) in Kuz-Orda, i.e., Balasagun.
In the first issue of the "Bulletin of the Academy of Sciences of the Kazakh SSR" for 1976, K. M. Baipakov published a brief report summarizing information about the ancient cities of Suab and Balasagun. Taking into account the new data from the excavations at Burana, he allows for the localization of Suab at the ruins of Ak-Beshim, and Balasagun at the site of Burana. Expanding on the suggestion made by J. Kloson about the identification of Suab with Ak-Beshim, K. M. Baipakov believes that the capital city Suab was also called Ordu, and later became known as Shuy, Shu, Urdu; Balasagun, according to the author, was known until the 10th century as Beklig or Semekna.
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The following year, the Burana group conducted excavations at an emergency site 100 m southwest of the shahristan. In plan, it was a round mound measuring 32X46 m with a height of 2.5 m. Three construction horizons were uncovered over an area of 140 sq. m, with the lower layer saturated with non-irrigated ceramics from the 10th to early 11th centuries, animal bones, and ash pits; the middle layer represented the remains of an adobe structure with dishes and bricks from the 11th-12th centuries; the upper layers were partially preserved in the form of a stone foundation of a structure made of burnt bricks, with sides measuring 25 and 50 cm and a thickness of 5-5.5 cm, with hearth spots and pits. Here, dishes from the 13th-14th centuries were discovered.
In 1978, there are only brief reports in the press about the work at Burana, stating that the clearing of the interior of the fourth mausoleum was continued. This refers to the remains of buildings noted by M. E. Masson near the northwest corner of the shahristan. He suggested that a medieval caravanserai was located here. Excavations at the site continued the following year (data on them has not yet been published), but the purpose of the building has not been clarified.
Burana complex: a military-defensive structure or a summer residence of one of the Karakhanid rulers?
In January 1977, V. D. Goryacheva defended her candidate dissertation, one chapter of which is dedicated to the study of the Burana archaeological-architectural complex from the mid-19th century to 1972, with a brief history of its study and the introduction of new archaeological-topographical data. The dissertation addresses issues of the development of the medieval city, the localization of Balasagun; it is supplemented with new data on the previously proposed scheme of the city's development. The main results of this research are prepared for publication in the form of a popular scientific essay based on the dissertation.
The initial stage in the life of Balasagun is apparently associated with the capital of the Turkic kagans in Semirechye — Ordu. We (V. G.) also agree with previous researchers who identify Ak-Beshim with Suab. From the mid-10th century, the city began to decline, and the population moved closer to the mountains, upstream along the Burana River, whose riverbed at the confluence with the Chu River had long formed a deep, now dry ravine, crossing the Ak-Beshim settlement. A new city was formed just 5-6 km away, near the Shamsi gorge (or Zambi — according to Mahmud Kashgari). The distance between the two settlements is so small that by the end of the 19th century, they were perceived as the ruins of one large city. In terms of topographical structure, Ak-Beshim corresponds to cities of the Mavera al-Nahr type of the early Middle Ages, with the original form of settlement being a shahristan with a citadel. Burana lacks both traditional manifestations of a castle — citadel and densely built shahristan. Among the settlements in the Chuy Valley, Burana is a unique monument.
Although L. R. Kyzlasov at one time denied the possibility of relocating the old city of Ak-Beshim to the territory of Burana due to its small size and the absence of ceramics from the 13th-14th centuries, subsequent research at both settlements has allowed this opinion to be refuted. The enormous size of Burana is evidenced by many researchers (V. P. Rovnyagin, V. D. Gorodetsky, M. E. Masson, P. N. Kozhemyako) and topographical observations of recent years; the 10th century is not the final date for the life of Ak-Beshim, as part of the settlement functioned until the 12th century, and possibly later, as reported by M. E. Masson.
The Burana ruins, on the other hand, provide material from the 10th-14th centuries and relate to the last period of the existence of settlements in the Chuy Valley. Thus, it can be assumed that for two centuries both cities coexisted, but gradually one fell silent while the other flourished. Such a phenomenon of migration of large medieval cities is well known for cities in Central Asia: Samarkand, Tashkent, Merv, Kesh, and others.
How do the data from archaeological-topographical observations align with the information from written sources?
It is quite interesting that almost all medieval authors mention the capital of the Karakhanid state under the name Balasagun only from the 10th century. Before this, in Arabic and Persian sources (in particular, by Ibn Khordadbeh and Qudama), there is mention of the "city of the Turgesh (Turkic) kagan" located 4 farsakhs from the large settlement of Saryg on the road from Taraz to Issyk-Kul. Alongside this designation of the Turkic residence in the Chuy Valley, al-Muqaddasi mentions Ordu, which also had the meaning of "the khan's residence." It is logical to assume that here the semantic meaning of the capital city is conveyed as a proper name.
Equally contentious are the judgments about the city and the toponym "Suab" (according to V. F. Minor's conjecture, corresponds to "Chuab," i.e., "river/water Chu," where "su" is the Arabic transcription of the local "Chu"). Some sources refer to it as the capital of the Turkic khakans and the Karluk yabgu. The earliest mention of the city on the Chu River comes from the Buddhist pilgrim Xuanzang, who traveled through the Chuy Valley in 629 AD to the shrines of India. He places the city in the upper reaches of the river, if one travels 500 li in a northwestern direction from the Transparent Lake (Issyk-Kul. — V. G.). "Suiye Shuy — a gathering place for merchants from all neighboring countries." Suab (like Balasagun), according to V. V. Bartold, should have been located near Tokmak.
One cannot agree with A. N. Bernshtein, who considered it possible to compare Suab with the Novorossiysk settlements. Historical-topographical studies of the Chuy Valley conducted in recent years by Kyrgyz archaeologists in connection with the compilation of an archaeological map of the republic indicate that there are no developed early medieval settlements (which could be considered a city) east of modern Tokmak. The Novorossiysk settlements are located deep in the narrow valley of the Chon-Kemin River, 25 km from where it merges with the Chu River and away from the international trade route. The test pits and excavations laid here by P. N. Kozhemyako reflected a weak cultural layer from the 11th-12th centuries, so it is not possible to speak of life at this settlement at an earlier time, and it should be considered a military-defensive structure or a summer residence of one of the Karakhanid rulers.
Historians' disputes
It should be noted that the information about the "capital of the Turkic kagan," Suab, and Ordu is very contradictory. In some authors, these cities are presented as different capitals of Turkic rulers in the Chuy Valley, while in others, one city is implied. The location of Suab is also vaguely indicated: in some sources — on the left bank of the Chu River, in others — on the right (or northern). Therefore, it is possible that the "capital of the Turkic khakan" was referred to by different (and contemporaneous) authors as both Suab and Ordu.
In the colophon of a Manichaean manuscript from the 8th-9th centuries, "The Sacred Book of Two Foundations," Ordukent is mentioned among the cities of Semirechye where there were Manichaean communities. This is the earliest mention of a city — a residence in the form of "Ordu." For the second half of the 10th century, al-Muqaddasi names Ordu small and notes its fortress wall, citadel, and moat filled with water. Here, he also writes about Balasagun, calling it large and abundant. Mahmud Kashgari, who "measured every inch of... all the settlements and steppes of the Turks," referred to Balasagun as "Kemi-ordu" — "small residence" in contrast to the capital Ordukent-Kashgar. "Ordu — a city near Balasagun. And Balasagun is also called Kuz-Ordu," wrote Mahmud Kashgari in his famous "Dictionary of Turkic Dialects." Here, he also provides another name for Balasagun — Kuz-Ulush. A contemporary of Mahmud Kashgari and a native of Balasagun, the author of the first Turkic poem "Blessed Knowledge" ("Kutadgu Bilig"), Yusuf Balasaguni, unfortunately, does not provide any information about his hometown but also refers to it as Kuz-Ordu. Apparently, in this form, Balasagun was widely known in the second half of the 11th century.
During the Mongol period, the capital of the Semirechye Karakhanids and Qarakhanids was also called Karalyq, Gor-Balyk (Kuz-Balyk), which corresponds to the Turkic Kuz-Ordu. In the Far Eastern historical chronicles of the 12th-14th centuries, the city of Balasagun is known under the names Khosun-Ordu Gusyeludo, Khusi vaerdo, which translates as "Strong city" or "City of Guzes." Many researchers have analyzed the meanings of these city names. The variety of interpretations is explained differently. N. I. Umnyakov and X. Khasanov, for example, consider the oldest name of the city of Balasagun to be "Beklig" or "Beklilig," mentioned in the works of "Hudud al-Alam" (10th century) and Gardizi (11th century).
V. V. Bartold believed that the city was named after the material from which the buildings were erected ("balyk" in ancient Turkic means "clay"); S. P. Tolstov sees in this word a Mongolian form balgasun from the Turkic balyg meaning "city." N. Mahmudov explains the toponym Balasagun as a shortened form of two words — "balik" with the final "k" dropped and "sagkun," meaning "sitting on the right hand." Both terms, in his opinion, are of pre-Turkic origin. Thus, the name of the city can be defined as "city of the bek," "city of the khan." K. M. Baipakov in the aforementioned article writes that this oikonym is complex and was understood as "the city of Sagun-Segun" according to the hereditary title "sengun," which was held by the ruler of Beklig (a large settlement in the land of the Turgish) and the highest-ranking officials of the Qidan.
It is evident that Kuz-Ordu (Balasagun) and Ordu (the residence of the Turkic kagans) were not one city, but were located so close that they were perceived (or named) in the times of Mahmud Kashgari (the 70s of the 11th century) as one city. After the 11th century, the city of Ordu is no longer mentioned in written sources; however, all these toponyms have remained in the memory of the people, in its heroic epic.
What can ancient coins tell us?
In the works of V. V. Bartold, there is a detailed summary of historical information about the eastern capital of the Karakhanids and Qidan up to the 16th century. However, some additional information about the city can be gleaned from the works of Soviet and foreign Orientalists in connection with the discovery and translation of new extracts from medieval historical sources, as well as monuments of local epigraphy and numismatic finds. Below are some of them. For example, such data is found in the "Geography" of Mahmud ibn Wali (1634-1(341): "Balasagun — one of the cities of the Turkestan region, known [by the name] Mogolistan. Before the Mongol invasion, it had a purely Muslim population. Many scholars emerged from it. Mustawfi says: [Balasagun] is a vast and pleasant country; from the sixth-seventh climates. Its climate is very cold. Some chronicles report that the width of its fortress wall was two and a half [gaza]. [Balasagun] had forty congregational mosques and two hundred weekday mosques, twenty khanqahs, and ten madrasahs.
The people of Balasagun are Sunnis and from the community of Hanafis. And in the city, the sciences of fiqh and hadith were more widespread than other knowledge.
After the Mongol invasion, until the customs of the Mongols did not harm it, it was well-maintained and flourishing. And from those times to the present day, it has remained in a devastated and abandoned state. A certain traveler from Kashgar, during the compilation of this book in Balkh, recounted: once the ruler of Kashgar invaded Mogolistan to judge and punish the Kalmyks. After two months, traveling from east to north, they reached some area where the roofs of high buildings — minarets, palaces, arches, madrasahs — protruded from the sand by four or five zira: their signs were visible from a distance of four farsakhs. Not far from that area, they caught up with the Kalmyks [and a battle occurred between us]. They captured many prisoners from among these infidels, and upon returning, when they reached the place where [earlier] they saw the remains of buildings, they asked the prisoners the name of this area. They said: we only know that there was a city called Balasagun here [in the past]. During the reign of some descendants of Genghis Khan, it remained under the sand, and at present, in some places, one can sometimes see rooms with all household utensils: kettles, clay cups, vessels, and vases, while carpets and (other) belongings have disappeared. In some rooms, there are also people resting. In short, this city was once one of the best cities in this region, but now it is forgotten (even its name)...". From the source, it follows that Balasagun was located in Northern Kyrgyzstan (Mogolistan) to the northwest of Kashgar, at a distance of two months' caravan journey through the passes of the Central Tianshan. This description of the city can be fully attributed to the ruins of Burana, located in a wide hollow at the foot of the Kyrgyz Ala-Too, visible on clear days from many kilometers away. And although Mahmud ibn Wali's information about the number of buildings and the merits of the city is somewhat exaggerated, it provides interesting additional material on the historical topography of the city and its surroundings.
The evidence from written sources significantly complements the data from numismatics. Archaeologically, it has been established that no other settlement in the Chuy Valley, especially beyond its borders (perhaps with the exception of the Krasnorechensk settlement), has yielded such an abundance of Turgesh coins as Ak-Beshim. Four types of Turgesh khakan coins are known, as mentioned above. A large series of Turgesh coins is currently collected at the Krasnorechensk settlement, which we identify as the second khan's residence in the eastern part of the Chuy Valley — Navekat. As a result of stationary archaeological work at the settlement from 1978 to 1983, more than two hundred coins were collected, among which V. A. Livshits, S. G. Klyashtorny, and V. N. Nastich identified previously unknown types and subtypes. New finds of Turgesh coins allow for clarifying the reading of legends and revealing some names of the rulers of the Karluks.
It is undeniable that coins were minted (less often struck) and most circulated in the market at the khakan's residence. For the Karakhanid period, scholars know of more than 50 mints in the state of ilekhans, but finds of coins indicating the mint of Balasagun are extremely rare. However, there is a wealth of coins minted in Kuz-Ordu (sometimes read as Kara-Ordu).
Kayraks at the Burana settlement
As noted above, the finds of gold coins and numerous treasures, including dinars from the 12th-13th centuries, registered at Burana in much greater quantities than at any other settlement in Semirechye, testify to the significant economic and political role of this city.
The identification of the Burana settlement with Balasagun can also be supported by local epigraphic monuments. In addition to the well-known Siro-Turkic inscriptions on Nestorian gravestones from the 13th-14th centuries, pebbles with Muslim epitaphs in Arabic were found within the central ruins as early as the late 19th century (see p. 15). To date, 12 epigraphic monuments in Arabic script are known, although half of them are late. All Burana kayraks have been studied and translated by V. N. Nastich. Two kayraks indicate dates that testify to their manufacture in the second half of the 12th century; the third kayrak, based on stylistic features of the writing, is dated by V. N. Nastich to the 13th-early 14th centuries, while the others date to the pre-Mongol period, i.e., no later than the first quarter of the 13th century.
All epitaphs on the gravestones are dedicated to representatives of the spiritual class — faqihs-lawyers, muftis, imams, preachers. The continuity in the inheritance of spiritual positions and titles is particularly emphasized. The virtues of the deceased, their righteousness, and merits before Islam are also mentioned; facts of pilgrimage of the deceased to the "holy" cities of Mecca and Medina are specifically noted.
The most historically interesting is kayrak No. 3, found during the excavations of the "fourth mausoleum" of Burana by M. Kubatbekov in 1979 (the team leader was V. P. Mokryn). Special attention is drawn to the nisba of the deceased sheikh — "al-Balasaguni," as well as the noticeable closeness of the content of this kayrak's inscription to the text of the gravestone described in "Tarikh-i Rashidi." The text of the epitaph is inscribed on an elongated pebble measuring 64 cm in length and 13-26 cm in width. The text is unframed, executed in semi-cursive suls by an experienced hand of a calligrapher: "This is the grave of the sheikh, the imam of the most glorious, the nobility of the world and faith, the pride of the disputants, the crown of the teachers, called Muhammad, son of the lawyer al-Umar al-Balasaguni, may Allah illuminate his resting place! Amen."
In the text of the epitaph on the kayrak from Munora, described by Muhammad Haidar, and in the Burana kayrak, the names of the deceased, the nisba, and a number of titles, including "faqih" — a profession more individualized than the traditional designation "sheikh" or "imam," coincide. The name Umar matches, although in Muhammad Haidar's account it is the name of the epitaph's author, while in the new kayrak it is the name of the deceased's father. It undoubtedly refers to different gravestones dedicated to different individuals. However, the mention of the nisba "al-Balasaguni" in both epitaphs speaks volumes.
The identity of Munora with Burana is indisputable; this opinion has been expressed for a long time and does not raise objections. Moreover, in the Chuy Valley (within the Kyrgyz SSR), finds of kayraks have so far only been registered at the Burana settlement. Therefore, it is undeniable that the mention in "Tarikh-i Rashidi" of the city of Munora specifically refers to the remains of this city. The presence of first-class monuments of monumental architecture at Burana supports the proposed localization of Balasagun.
The recently discovered mausoleums, along with the minaret and the non-preserved mosque, formed a single cult ensemble in the central part of the newly rebuilt city by the Karakhanids during their acceptance of Islam. Like in other capital cities (Samarkand, Uzgent, Bukhara, etc.), the monumental structures of the Burana-Balasagun ensemble were intended to glorify the power of the Karakhanid state and its feudal lords in the person of the rulers and clergy.
The Burana tombs occupy a special place in the medieval architecture of Tianshan and Semirechye, demonstrating, on one hand, the continuation of local burial traditions, and on the other hand, the high construction and decorative techniques developed among the settled population of Central Asia. This process of mutual penetration of artistic-aesthetic ideas and images is particularly evident in the external cladding of buildings, where patterned brick masonry combined with carved stucco (ganch) and architectural terracotta plays a leading role. And this once again indicates that the traditions of medieval monumental architecture of cultural centers in medieval Kyrgyzstan were closely linked with the construction practices of the Near and Middle East during the feudal era, and the ancestors of the Kyrgyz people made their unique contribution to the development of world artistic culture and history.
Conclusion
The proposed work "Burana (the history of the study of the settlement and its architectural monuments)" represents the most complete summary of information about one of the most interesting monuments of Central Asia, which does not impress with its size or the power of cultural layers, but is vividly unique among the objects of Central Asian archaeology and architecture. It is not surprising that the Burana complex of monuments has generated and continues to generate diverse opinions regarding the dating and topography of the settlement, the constructive and artistic merits of its minaret, as well as the identification of Burana with the cities of Jetysu mentioned in written historical sources.
In the process of accumulating various facts about the monument, which at times seemed to exclude each other, new hypotheses were born.
Familiarity with all types of identified material, written, folklore, archival sources, literary and ethnographic data inevitably leads to the formulation of some important, but little-developed historical problems.
For example, the genesis of urban culture in the Jetysu region, the ethnic processes occurring here in the Middle Ages, the development of ancient Turkic statehood, the political and cultural role of the Karakhanid khanate in the history of Central Asia, and other issues deserving special and in-depth study. However, they are not addressed in this work, as the authors' task was primarily to restore the history of the study and protection of Burana to the present day from the time of the first mentions of the settlement in literature, taking into account data gleaned from medieval written sources. In this work, in addition, the history of the study and protection of the monuments of material culture of Kyrgyzstan's past is briefly reflected through the example of Burana.
Writing such a work responds to the growing interest of workers in the problem of studying cultural heritage in general and Burana in particular. This phenomenon is logical, as it aligns with Lenin's directives that "only through precise knowledge of the culture created by the entire development of humanity, only through its processing can proletarian culture be built."
The first section of the book is written by M. E. Masson. It covers the initial stages of the history of the study and protection of Burana, largely related to the activities of individual antiquarians and local historians, as well as the work of the Turkestan Committee for Museums and the Protection of Monuments of Antiquity, Art, and Nature (Turkomstaris, later renamed to Sredazkomstaris) until 1929.
The next stage in the history of the study of the monuments of Burana to the present day is described by V. D. Goryacheva based on archaeological-architectural research conducted by various scientific organizations in the country. In addition to field materials and authorial drawings, the work utilizes textual and illustrative archival materials from Sredazkomstaris, M. E. Masson, and B. N. Zasypkin.
In December 1976, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Kyrgyzstan and the Council of Ministers of the republic adopted a resolution on the organization of the literary-ethnographic museum "Gumbaz Manas" and an open-air museum based on the Burana archaeological-architectural complex. Measures were developed for further study of the monument, landscaping of the territory of the central ruins, and the deployment of an exhibition here.
Thus, the program of scientific research at Burana is planned for many years of large-scale excavations both in the territory of the settlement and at monuments in the vicinity. As a result, new objects of medieval architecture, production and craft complexes will be identified, the main principles of urban planning and landscaping of the city will be clarified, issues of fortification, water supply, and the features of the material and spiritual culture of the population will be studied. The prospective work plan for creating an open-air museum includes not only the uncovering of the cultural layer but also the museification of entire sections of urban planning, conservation and restoration of archaeological monuments, the creation of architectural models and graphic reconstructions of residential and public buildings, and the writing of scientific works and popular publications. Very soon, exhibitions revealing new pages of the history and culture of the region will be deployed here.
This form of work with monuments of antiquity and art was dreamed of by V. I. Lenin at the dawn of Soviet power, speaking of the monuments of the Moscow Kremlin: "We must carefully guard all antiquity not only as monuments of antiquity and art — this goes without saying — but also as monuments of the life and existence of ancient times. Excursions should come here, museums should be deployed here, and detailed explanations should be given to visitors...".
An era has passed in the development of Soviet museology and the protection of cultural heritage. Museum-reserves, open-air museums, folk museums, and large excursion-tourist bases have become widespread and tested forms of studying and promoting cultural heritage in our country. However, the growing awareness of the Soviet people places increasingly higher demands on the work with cultural-historical values, as well as on all work related to the communist education of the working people.
In the program documents of the Communist Party and the Soviet state, the task of forming a new person is defined as the most responsible, noble, and complex. This is particularly emphasized in the expanded concept of the ideological activity of the party of long-term significance put forward at the June (1983) Plenary Session of the Central Committee of the CPSU. The Plenary Session gave a powerful impetus to the improvement of mass-political and ideological-educational work in all directions. The question of the interaction between science and ideological practice, and the use of the entire information-propaganda arsenal deserves special attention.
"An important tool for fostering citizenship, Soviet patriotism, and internationalism has been and remains education through history. And it is good that in literature and art, a kind of revival of the historical theme is taking place," said K. U. Chernenko at the anniversary plenary session of the Union of Writers of the USSR (September 25, 1984). "The ability to speak about the past seriously, thoughtfully, from the positions of Marxist-Leninist worldview — that is what brings, as practice shows, success in this matter..."
The role of Soviet museums in this is significant. Their scientific-educational work is aimed at the broad masses of workers; through museums and museum collections, the achievements of science and technology, culture, and art are propagated. The monuments of history and archaeology inherited by the Soviet people from past generations are also effective centers of propaganda and agitation. "But even the brightest and most interesting propaganda, the most skillful and intelligent teaching, the most talented art will not achieve their goals if they are not filled with profound ideas closely linked to the realities of today's life and pointing the way for further movement forward."
Therefore, it is so important to continuously improve the work of the open-air museum based on the Burana archaeological-architectural complex, primarily through the deployment of extensive archaeological research and restoration work on the monument, and the creation of scientific exhibitions considering modern requirements of ideological work. The genuine exhibits of the museum-reserve are the remnants of architecture, household items, and crafts closely related to the native land. On one hand, they demonstrate the greatness of the creative people, glorify the genius of the folk architects, foster a high sense of patriotism, and on the other hand, they vividly demonstrate the unprecedented heights achieved by socialist culture. The studied and restored monuments of the "Burana" museum will forever retain their contemporary resonance.