A Sart School in Samarkand

In a recent article, we published excerpts from the notes of the famous English traveler Annette Meakin through the Turkestan krai, in which she reflects on the differences between the Kyrgyz and the Sarts, describing in detail their traditions, customs, and way of life. However, the term ‘Sart’ remains one of the most controversial ethnonyms in Central Asia. At different times and in different places, it has completely different meanings—sometimes serving as a self-designation, and sometimes as an exonym, occasionally as a very offensive term. But one thing is more or less clear: it referred to part of the settled population of Central Asia. Therefore, the contrast between the Kyrgyz and the Sarts in Meakin's book is more about lifestyle than purely ethnic origin.

Initially, the term ‘Sart’ in medieval Turkic chronicles did not have any ethnolinguistic connotation but referred instead to merchants. The Mongols referred to Tajiks as Sarts (or Sartauls) and later extended the term to include all Muslims from the region. Over time, the name came to designate the settled population of Turkestan, both Iranian-speaking and Turkic-speaking, although in some places it referred exclusively to the Turkicized part of the settled population. It was also sometimes used pejoratively by nomads (such as the Kazakhs and Kyrgyz) to describe the settled population.

In the late nineteenth century, attempts were made in the Russian Empire to consolidate and promote the Sart identity by formalizing it through language and education: Sart schools were established, and books and newspapers were published. However, despite all efforts by Tsarist policies, the ethnic and linguistic diversity of the Sarts rendered this project unsuccessful. In the early Soviet period, during the ‘national delimitation’, it became definitively clear that the Sarts did not quite qualify for a national or ethnographic group, but rather a community defined by their way of life.