Margiana in the Bronze Age

Although the early history of oases began to attract the attention of specialists at the beginning of this century, ¹ and subsequently, investigations and partial excavations were conducted in this region, ² detailed investigations of Bronze Age sites began only with the work of IuTAKE, ³ parts of which were published in the form of a monograph. ⁴ Nevertheless, until 1972 no more than five or six settlements of the Bronze Age were known to be situated in the ancient deltaic basin of the Murghab River; for this reason a special Archeological Expedition to Margiana was created to conduct a complete investigation of the entire region. Beginning its work in 1974, a special section of the Institute of History, Academy of Sciences, Turkmenistan SSR, was initiated to investigate the lower Murghab and elucidate the earlier unknown Kelleli, Taip, Adam Basan, and Adzhi-kui oases. ⁵