Bactria–Margiana Archaeological Complex

The Bactria–Margiana Archaeological Complex (or BMAC, also known as the Oxus civilization) is the modern archaeological name for a Bronze Age culture of Central Asia, dated to around 2300–1700 BCE.  It existed in present-day Turkmenistan, northern Afghanistan, northeastern Iran, southern Uzbekistan and western Tajikistan. 

 Discovery 
Its sites were discovered and named by the Soviet archaeologist Viktor Sarianidi (1976). Bactria was the Greek name for the area of Bactra (modern Balkh), in what is now northern Afghanistan.  Margiana was the Greek name for the Persian satrapy of Margu, in today's Turkmenistan.

 Excavations 
Sarianidi's excavations from the late 1970s onward found many buildings in many sites. Reports were mostly published in Soviet journals,e.g. Sarianidi, V. I. 1976. "Issledovanija pamjatnikov Dashlyiskogo Oazisa," in Drevnii Baktria, vol. 1. Moscow: Akademia Nauk. until the last years of the Soviet Union.  The findings were unknown to the Western world until Sarianidi's work was translated in the 1990s.

 References 

Category:Archaeological sites in Asia
Category:Bronze Age