부산대학교 도서관

Archaeological studies of Early Islamic communities in Central Asia have focused on lowland urban communities. Here, the authors report on recent geophysical survey and excavation of an Early Islamic cemetery at Tashbulak in south-eastern Uzbekistan. AMS dating places the establishment of the cemetery in the mid-eighth century AD, making it one of the earliest Islamic burial grounds documented in Central Asia. Burials at Tashbulak conform to Islamic prescriptions for grave form and body deposition. The consistency in ritual suggests the existence of a funerary community of practice, challenging narratives of Islamic conversion in peripheral areas as a process of slow diffusion and emphasising the importance of archaeological approaches for documenting the diversity of Early Islamic communities. Keywords: Uzbekistan, Early Islamic period, cemetery, burial, ritual, religious practice
Introduction Across Central Asia, archaeological studies of Early Islamic communities have focused on lowland urban contexts, framing highland and rural populations as engaged in heterodox, or even insincere, religious practices [...]