Postcard from Bishkek

As we approach the Presidential election, there is a lot of attention being paid to the possibility of a North-South split in the country.  There has also been a considerable amount of speculation on the role of clans in traditional Kyrgyz Society.  

Although the general opinion is that clans play an important role in Kyrgyz politics, not everyone agrees and one scholar says, “I don’t believe in clans. As a mechanism, clans do not work in politics. It’s a myth which it is convenient to use in order to divide and rule. The reality is that a completely different set of issues are in play in politics.  Who could have predicted, for example, that Kurmanbek Bakiev, a not very popular politician, from a clan that had never occupied a prominent position, would become president in 2005?“ 

Traditionally the Kyrgyz stem from Forty Tribes.  As in the West, citing numbers (like forty) can imply an exactitude which they don’t really merit, and some numbers have mystical qualities. The number forty occurs frequently throughout Kyrgyz folklore: Manas, the legendary hero, was accompanied by forty companions; newborn babies kept at home and are shown to family and friends only after forty days; the family gather to remember newly deceased relatives forty days after death; and the Kyrgyz trace the origin of the forty tribes to a legend forty girls (“Kirk kyz” in Kyrgyz). 

There are several versions of this legend … but perhaps the most picturesque has the daughters from several clans ending a war by dressing alike and asking their warring fathers, husbands, and brothers to tell them apart. When they fail to do so, the girls point out that they all one people and should not be fighting amongst themselves.

Another version tells of forty girls who survived a raid by their enemies who then protected by a lone yellow dog on the banks of a deserted river. A third version has the forty girls meeting a band of thirty youths in the mountains of the Ferghana valley.

Yet another version has the girls transformed into stone to avoid the incorrect, improper attention of inspectors of a local warlord – and their spirits watched over the people. 

It is not clear whether the number forty is meant to be taken literally,  or simply as a synonym for “many” or “numerous”.  Some scholars, for example, even suggest that there were some 80 different tribes in the country  In the North of the country there are a small number of large tribes – the most important being the Solto, Syjak, Sary Bagysh and the Bagysh.  In the South, however, there are a large number of small tribes.. 

 

Even if much of traditional Kyrgyz culture was based on clans and tribes – that did not mean that there weren’t conflicts.

Much of Kyrgyz tradition was based on protecting the prosperity and future of the clan, and the tribe.  This might lead to conflicts over grazing rights, the theft of livestock – which was one of the things which marked the wealth of a clan. In the cause of protecting their own position, various tribes might conclude alliances with outside groups – which were not always welcomed by other tribes. For example, the Northern Kyrgyz invited the aid of the Russian Empire to help free them from the yoke of the Kokand Khanate – whereas those in the South were distinctly less keen. Indeed, the supremacy of Kokand over the Northern Sayaks had been achieved earlier with the assistance of some the Southern tribes. In turn the Sayak, Sarybagysh and Bagu tribes in their turn helped the new leaders to conquer the Issyk Kul region.

In 1853 there was a particularly bloody civil war between the Bugu and Sarybagysh tribes, for supremacy amongst the Kyrgyz. The Russian explorer Pyotor Semyenov, (Tienshansky) recalled a visit to “field of the dead”", (one of the sites of the fighting): ”The impression that the field made on me was much stronger than the morgue at San-Bernard”.

The Bugu clan provided the first administrators during the early days of the Soviet period – but their power and influence waned following the Stalinist purges of the 1930s and the Sarybagysh came to the fore. They continued to provide most of the political leadership of the country upto and including the Akaev era.

During the early days of independence there appeared to be an informal power sharing alliance which helped maintain stability – but this seemed to come to an end with the Aksu events of 2002.

 

Sometimes it does indeed seem as if the country is divided on geographical lines – North versus South – but this is probably too simplistic a view.  However, although not officially recognized as an issue, tribal rivalries can still sometimes be observed in Kyrgyz society today, but mainly on an informal level.

 

 

 

 

Tags: For_the_Record, History, Kyrgyzstan