The Amu Darya is a major river in Central Asia and Afghanistan. Rising in the Pamir Mountains, north of the Hindu Kush, the Amu Darya is formed by the confluence of the Vakhsh and Panj rivers, in the Tigrovaya Balka Nature Reserve on the border between Afghanistan and Tajikistan, and flows from there north-westwards into the southern remnants of the Aral Sea. In its upper course, the river forms part of Afghanistan's northern border with Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, and Turkmenistan. In ancient history, the river was regarded as the boundary of Greater Iran with "Turan", which roughly corresponded to present-day Central Asia. The Amu Darya has a flow of about 70 cubic kilometres per year on average.
Tajikistan is nestled between Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan to the north and west, China to the east, and Afghanistan to the south. Mountains cover 93 percent of Tajikistan's surface area. The two principal ranges, the Pamir Mountains and the Alay Mountains, give rise to many glacier-fed streams and rivers, which have been used to irrigate farmlands since ancient times. Central Asia's other major mountain range, the Tian Shan, skirts northern Tajikistan. Mountainous terrain separates Tajikistan's two population centers, which are in the lowlands of the southern and northern sections of the country. Especially in areas of intensive agricultural and industrial activity, the Soviet Union's natural resource utilization policies left independent Tajikistan with a legacy of environmental problems.
The Syr Darya, historically known as the Jaxartes, is a river in Central Asia. The name, which is Persian, literally means Syr Sea or Syr River. It originates in the Tian Shan Mountains in Kyrgyzstan and eastern Uzbekistan and flows for 2,256.25 kilometres (1,401.97 mi) west and north-west through Uzbekistan and southern Kazakhstan to the northern remnants of the Aral Sea. It is the northern and eastern of the two main rivers in the endorheic basin of the Aral Sea, the other being the Amu Darya (Jayhun).
The Bactria–Margiana Archaeological Complex (BMAC) is the modern archaeological designation for a particular Middle Bronze Age civilization of southern Central Asia also known as the Oxus Civilization. The civilization's urban phase or Integration Era, was dated in 2010 by Sandro Salvatori to c. 2400–1950 BC, but a different view is held by Nadezhda A. Duvoba and Bertille Lyonnet, c. 2250–1700 BC.
Termez is the capital of Surxondaryo Region in southern Uzbekistan. Administratively, it is a district-level city. Its population is 182,800 (2021). It is notable as the site of Alexander the Great's city Alexandria on the Oxus, as a center of early Buddhism, as a site of Muslim pilgrimage, and as a base of Soviet Union military operations in Afghanistan, accessible via the nearby Hairatan border crossing.
Zorkul is a lake in the Pamir Mountains that runs along the border between Afghanistan and Tajikistan.
The Vakhsh, also known as the Surkhob, in north-central Tajikistan, and the Kyzyl-Suu, in Kyrgyzstan, is a Central Asian river, and one of the main rivers of Tajikistan. It is a tributary of the Amu Darya river.
The National Museum of Tajikistan is a museum in Dushanbe, the capital city of Tajikistan.
The Tajikistan–Afghanistan Friendship Bridge connects the two banks of Darvaz region across the Panj River separating Tajikistan and Afghanistan, at the town of Qal'ai Khumb. It was opened on 6 July 2004.
The Oxus treasure is a collection of about 180 surviving pieces of metalwork in gold and silver, most relatively small, and around 200 coins, from the Achaemenid Persian period which were found by the Oxus river about 1877–1880. The exact place and date of the find remain unclear, but is often proposed as being near Kobadiyan. It is likely that many other pieces from the hoard were melted down for bullion; early reports suggest there were originally some 1500 coins, and mention types of metalwork that are not among the surviving pieces. The metalwork is believed to date from the sixth to fourth centuries BC, but the coins show a greater range, with some of those believed to belong to the treasure coming from around 200 BC. The most likely origin for the treasure is that it belonged to a temple, where votive offerings were deposited over a long period. How it came to be deposited is unknown.
The Amu Darya sturgeon or false shovelnose sturgeon is a critically endangered species of fish in the family Acipenseridae. It is found in Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and perhaps Afghanistan. It inhabits quite shallow flowing waters that are turbid and muddy.
The Uzboy was a distributary of the Amu Darya which flowed through the northwestern part of the Karakum Desert of Turkmenistan until the 17th century, when it abruptly dried up, eliminating the agricultural population that had thrived along its banks..
Takht-i Sangin is an archaeological site located near the confluence of the Vakhsh and Panj rivers, the source of the Amu Darya, in southern Tajikistan. During the Hellenistic period it was a city in the Greco-Bactrian kingdom with a large temple dedicated to the Oxus, which remained in use in the following Kushan period, until the third century AD. The site may have been the source of the Oxus Treasure.
Felis chaus chaus is the nominate subspecies of the jungle cat.
Saksanokhur (Саксанохур) is the modern name of a Hellenistic settlement of the Greco-Bactrian and Kushan kingdoms, located at the village of Shaftolubogh near Farkhor on a plateau of arable land near the meeting of the Kyzylsu and Panj rivers, in the south of present-day Tajikistan.
The Greco-Bactrian Kingdom or simply Greco-Bactria was a Hellenistic-era Greek state, and along with the Indo-Greek Kingdom, the easternmost part of the Hellenistic world in Central Asia and the Indian Subcontinent. It was founded in 256 BC by the Seleucid satrap Diodotus I Soter and lasted until its fall c. 120 BC with some cities still controlled by Greek kings as Hermaeus Soter in what is today Kabul. It was ruled by the Diodotid dynasty and the rival Euthydemid dynasty.
Sangtuda is a village and jamoat in Tajikistan. It is located in Danghara District in Khatlon Region. The jamoat has a total population of 12,686 (2015).
Kampir Tepe is an archaeological site located within the Surxondaryo Region of Uzbekistan, near the village Shoʻrob, northwest of the city of Termez. It is thought to be the lost city of Alexandria on the Oxus described by Ptolemy, though the Amu Darya river has now changed its course. The Telegraph newspaper describes Kampir Tepe as “the Pompeii of Central Asia.”
Torbulok is an archaeological site located in a foothill zone 50 km northwest of the Kyzylsu river valley and 20 km southeast of Danghara in the south of present-day Tajikistan. The site lies at the foot of the Čaltau mountain range. It was the site of a small sanctuary during the Hellenistic period, when the area was part of the Greco-Bactrian kingdom.
