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Document Details :

Title: Khorezm's Dark Age in the 3rd to 6th Centuries CE
Author(s): BRITE, Elizabeth Baker
Journal: Iranica Antiqua
Volume: 56    Date: 2021   
Pages: 189-209
DOI: 10.2143/IA.56.0.3290275

Abstract :
This paper gathers information on a period of region-wide settlement abandonments in the 3rd-6th centuries CE in Khorezm. Soviet archaeologists characterized this period as a dark age, and sought explanations for culture change based largely in processes of migration. More recent evidence from environmental studies of the Aral Sea littoral suggests that changes in the local ecology and climate may have played a substantial role. The existing evidence is reviewed, and a case is made for further attention to the diversity and heterogeneity of cultural responses to environmental change within the Khorezmian deltas.

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