The Role of the Yaγnob Valley in the Political and Economical History of the Sogdian Upper Zarafšān

This article outlines the role of the Yaγnob Valley in the historical framework of the Sogdian tradition, a subject which has never been seriously considered and discussed. The Yaγnobis, isolated as they appeared in their remote homeland, have been usually treated as a living fossil of a lost culture, and, thus, mainly studied for their ethno-linguistic diversity, while the origin and genesis of their presence in this mountain district have not been considered wortho of a proper investigation. Contrariwise, we think that the Yaghnobi's ethnogenesis deserves to be deeply evaluated from the historical point of view in the context of the Sogdian background. In the present study we offer some results obtained after the completion of the third Expedition in the Yaγnob and Matčā Valleys (August 2009) held by the University of Bologna (Department of Cultural Heritage). Our investigations will show that the scenario, in which we can now frame the Yaγnob area, has finally assumed a more precise dimension, and I feel to be in condition to propose some new considerations about the whole district and its history. Ours conclusions will demonstrate that, although the Yaghnobi area was a remote and extremely peripheral district with respect to the main political and administrative Sogdian centres, its system, through its paths towards Matčā and Parγar and a sort of integrated system of fortifications, was not excluded from the winds and the storms of history.