[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/hallazgo-rusia-atlantis-ciudad-sumergida-I2AVA3NSVZBEJPF7AXTLGGZWOU.avif?w=990″]<\/p>\n
\n\tRussian and Kyrgyz scientists are exploring the ruins of the medieval trading center of Turu-Aygyr, submerged in the waters of Lake Issyk-Kul in Kyrgyzstan for centuries. Their findings were first reported by the Russian Geographical Society (RGS) last November, when it launched a joint archeological mission with the Institute of Archaeology of the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS) and the National Academy of Sciences of the Kyrgyz Republic to study the drowned city.<\/p>\n
\n\tAn important stop on the Silk Road between China and the West, which flourished between the 1st century BCE\u00a0and the 14th to 15th centuries CE, Turu-Aygyr was destroyed by an earthquake at the beginning of the 15th century and subsequently disappeared under the lake\u2019s surface. According to researcher Valery Kolchenko, head of the Kyrgyz contingent, while the city may have already been abandoned by then, the region\u2019s population changed drastically following the earthquake, with medieval settlers being replaced by nomads.<\/p>\n
\n\tFrom the 10th to the 13th centuries, the Issyk-Kul Lake area was under the control of\u00a0the Karakhanids, a Turkic dynasty, said Maksim Menshikov, a researcher at RAS and head of the mission. \u201cPeople here practiced various religions: pagan Tengrianism, Buddhism, Nestorian Christianity,\u201d he said in a statement. \u201cIslam was primarily the religion of\u00a0the nobility and the population involved in\u00a0active economic activity.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tThe team is working on four main sites between three and 13 feet deep near the northwest shore of the lake. Their discoveries have included, in one area, the remains of buildings made of baked bricks and a millstone, as well as a decorated architectural element indicating that the complex also contained a gathering place like a mosque, a bathhouse, or a madrasa, a school for the study of Islam. In addition, the scientists found the ruins of stone-and-wood structures; they hope that through analyzing samples of the wood, they can determine an exact date for the earthquake that destroyed Turu-Aygyr.<\/p>\n
\n\tAt a second site, the researchers have discovered a Muslim necropolis in which the dead have all been buried lying on their right sides with their faces and bodies oriented toward Mecca, in accordance with Islamic tradition. Islam only became widespread in Central Asia in the 13th century, and the burial ground is likely of that period. The remains of two people have been disinterred and will be studied for clues as to how the population of Turu-Aygyr lived at the time.<\/p>\n
\n\tIn parallel with the team\u2019s fieldwork, archaeologists are studying contemporaneous Chinese descriptions of the the region, Menshikov added. \u00a0While they did not control it, the Chinese considered it a zone of interest, and this is reflected in Chinese chronicles, especially those written during the Tang dynasty (618\u2013907 AD). \u201cThis gives us\u00a0hope,\u201d Menshikov said, \u201cto\u00a0correlate historical materials with the results of\u00a0our archaeological excavations.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tAt a third area in the lake, researchers found medieval ceramics, and at a fourth site they have spotted the remains of rounded and rectangular structures. The team hopes to further explore both in future excavation seasons.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
[analyse_source url=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/art-news\/news\/russian-and-kyrgyz-scientists-explore-drowned-medieval-city-1234788527\/”]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/hallazgo-rusia-atlantis-ciudad-sumergida-I2AVA3NSVZBEJPF7AXTLGGZWOU.avif?w=990″] Russian and Kyrgyz scientists are exploring the ruins of the medieval trading center of Turu-Aygyr, submerged in the waters of Lake Issyk-Kul in Kyrgyzstan for centuries. Their findings were first reported by the Russian Geographical Society (RGS) last November, when it launched a joint archeological mission with the Institute of Archaeology of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,226],"class_list":["post-1979475","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-artnews-com","tag-crawlmanager"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1979475","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1979475"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1979475\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1979475"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1979475"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1979475"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}