Among Zoroastrian burial items, there is a camel-shaped zoomorphic OSTADON lying there. It was found…
In the 10th – 11th centuries, glass vessels were available to virtually all strata of the population of Mavarannahr and were material embodiments of the idea of social equality.
In the Samanid period glassware became part of everyday life even in rural areas. In small towns or large settlements, such as Chilek and Kuldortepa near Samarkand, significant collections of glass items have been found. The fragility of the finest glass items was compensated by the volumes of production and their low price.
Glassware, as an imported and expensive commodity, was available only to the aristocratic elite, which formed a relatively small portion of the society. The rest of the population used only glass beads, which, in general, were produced in the Middle East and were in demand on the routes of the Great Silk Road. Such beads were the most popular among the people of the forest zone of Eurasia. The Sogdians, the main intermediaries in the international caravan trade, also acquired them.
Before the Arab conquest (8th century), the presence of its own glassmaking in Mavarannahr is not confirmed by factual material. The wide distribution of glass in the Central Asian interfluve and attempts to make it are recorded only from the moment it began to be used in the Islamic world. The earliest traces of this production were found in one of the country houses at Penjikent. They give reason to believe that in the 8th century glassblowing was also practiced in the capital city of Samarkand, which became the main center of this kind of applied art in the 9th – 10th centuries.
You can learn more about the topic in the book-album "Collection of the State Hermitage Mavarannakhr Art 8th – 15th centuries" (XV volume) from the series "Cultural Legacy of Uzbekistan in the World Collections".
The main sponsor of the project is the oilfield services company Eriell-Group.
