Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1910-07-28
OLD CITY OF KH|VA
Center of Prosperous Agricu|-
turaI Community.
UNDER RUSSIAN CONTROL
Railway in Prospect. for Transpor-
tation Of Products.
PRESENT FACILITIES LIMITED
Oasis Believed to Have Been Under
Cultivation More than 5000
Years Before Christ.
BY WILLIAM T.. CURTIS.
Special Correspondence Of The Star a

BY WILLIAM f. CURTIS.
Special Correspondence of The Star and the
Chicago Record Herald.
MERV, Turkestan, June %, 1910
khiva represents a larger outlay of
blood money than any other of the sew
eral GASES that have been conquered by
Russia in Turkestan, and it Is one of the
most important. The khiva oasis is capa
BILE of greater development than most or
the others. Already a large amount of
raw cotton is produced there, more than
in any other section of Turkestan. and j..
can be doubled without constructing a
new irrigation system, but, until better
transportation facilities are afforded, the
area planted to cotton will not be ex-
tended. Although the Anu Daria will
float considerable part of the crop to
the railway at Charjui that method is al
most as expensive as carrying 1t by camel
caravans. A railway will some time be
built. and then rapid and extended de-
velopment may be expected
Khiva is between three and four hum
dred miles from Merv. across trackless
desert, one of the drest and dreariest in
all Asia. The trip may be made on
horseback, as Burnaby, the English
newspaper correspondent, made it during
in 1872, and wrote thrilling story of his
experience; or the desert may be crossed
on the hack of a camel, but that is very
hard for people unaccustoned to such a
journey. My friend. Vladimir Fabyan
I;nesin WHO represents a Moscow cotton
factory at Tashkend, as he formerly did
in New York. rscently crossed from
Merry to khiva in seven days in a wagon
drawn, by camel, a funny looking out
fit. He didn't see a drop of water all
the way except that which he carried
with him.
Cultivated Thousands of Years Ago.
Khiva is :. thriving city, the center of
a prosperous agricultural country, and
Prof Pumpelly of Harvard, who came
here for an archaeological investigation in
behalf of the Carnegie Institution at
Washington believes that cereals were
cultivated here more than 5000 years be-
fore the Christian era, and that the do
mestication of cattle, pigs and sheep and
the breeding Of horses and camels was
common between 1900 and 5000 years
before Christ. He believes that agricui-
ture preceded pastoral pursuits by sew
eral centuries; that the original settlers
of this section of the globe had fixed
habitations and cultivated the SOIL before
their nomadic habits were involuntartly
acquired because Of the necessity Of
seeking new pastures for their increasing
herds.
Cotton was growing wild from the be-
ginning of time, but was not cultivated
until many centuries later, and American
cotton dates from the Russian occupation.
There are today in Khiva several Ameri-
can cotton gins and congresses, and two
factories for extracting the oil from cot
ton seed. The machinery was brought in
nv way of the Black and Caspian seas
and carried overland from Merv on the
backs of camels.
If you will look at the map of central
Asia you will see that Khiva is about
eaui-distant from Persia on the south
the Aral sea on the north and the Cas-
pian sea on the west; and that II is sit
uated on the west bank of the ANU
| Daria river. surrounded by deserts in
every direction except in the valley of the
ANU. 1t has always been an important
town and has always had a large trade
| in cattle horses, camels, sheep and goats,
| as we'll as the products that are derived
| from them The shipments of wool are
next in amount of those of cotton and
were formerly much larger
Ancient and Historically Great.
Khiva is very old. older than history.
and at one time was celebrated for its
colleges and the scholarship of Its priests.
The mullah In charge OF the library of
the mosque Of st. Sophia at CONSTANT