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This piece pertains to an ancient culture
referred to both as the
Bactria-Margiana Archaeological Complex
(BCAM) or as the Oxus
Civilisation. The Bactria-Margiana culture
spread across an area
encompassing the modern nations of
Turkmenistan, Tajikistan,
Uzbekistan and Northern Afghanistan.
Flourishing between about
2100 and 1700 BC, it was contemporary with
the European
Bronze Age, and was characterised by
monumental architecture,
social complexity and extremely distinctive
cultural artefacts that
vanish from the record a few centuries after
they first appear.
Pictographs on seals have been argued to
indicate an
independently-developed writing system.
It was one of many economic and social
entities in the vicinity,
and was a powerful country due to the
exceptional fertility and
wealth of its agricultural lands. This in turn
gave rise to a
complex and multifaceted set of societies
with specialist
craftsmen who produced luxury materials
such as this for the
ruling and aristocratic elites. Trade appears to
have been
important, as Bactrian artefacts appear all
over the Persian Gulf
as well as in the Iranian Plateau and the Indus
Valley. For this
reason, the area was fought over from deep
prehistory until the
Mediaeval period, by the armies of Asia
Minor, Greece
(Macedonia), India and the Arab States,
amongst others.
- (LO.1361)
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