Altai Republic
For the entire centuries culture layer has been accumulating in the places where human being used to live. This is the feature we need as much as we need good infrastructure or friends, for instance. The great artist, philosopher, human history researcher and traveler Nicholas Roerich has said “If you are looking for the most beautiful place, you should be looking for the oldest one”. And he has actually found one of these places his soul was longing for in the Altay Mountains.
The fifth territory our expedition is going to cross is green and blue Altai, always being watched by local old spirits. Our path is lying by the Chuysky Road, through the chain of the settlements that form most of the populated places in Altai. The road was built in the era of the USSR, which is the largest road in the republic and also one of the most picturesque in the entire continent. Several of the settlements to cross are monuments of Scythian culture, the other ones are exceptional geological formations, but definitely all of them are mix of ecologically clean nature with the presence of original culture.
Hunter Chokul – chief character of one of the Altai legends – has thrown a piece of gold in the 325 meters deep Lake Teletskoje and has prayed his spirits for the wealth of his land. What he asked for were not the golden treasures, but the treasures his country has always owned – its lands, its forests and its waters. And his wish has come true. The land of Altai is still barely cultivated and its entire history has not affected its geography much. By now Altai Republic is economically and socially unique zone: it has proclaimed itself an object for the economic and ecologic experiment. As the result, all the country is being preserved as the natural complex and the historic monument. Fancy museum of fresh air, where the presence of the ancient human life can still be sensed? And, by the way, not only ancient: paganism is still popular in Altai. Each of the biggest families has its spirit, embodied in a rock or a tree or an animal. Nowadays, most of the spirits take a prayer and a ribbon for enough of attention and respect: these ribbons can be seen here and there on the trees, left by the natives.
By geographical location, Altai is the centre of Eurasia, which was the main cause for it to become the point of different ethnic groups to meet. The Scythian tribe Pazyryk inhabited this territory in the 8th to 3rd Century BC. It was them who brought animal decorations to the folk art and koumiss (filly’s milk) and tolkan (creamed barley meal) to the menu. Two ages later, when in 552nd old Turks established their first kaganate, Altai became the motherland of all the Turkic nations. This is where the original Turkic language began. By now, this language has already formed the entire family called Altaic languages, including such as Turkish and Azeri. More than 95 millions of people use this language family, of which only 40,000 are speaking Altaic. Total number of inhabitants in the republic is 203,9 thousands, population density – 2,2 per km², level of urbanization – 25,9%.
The biggest point of Siberia, Mount Belukha (4506 meters high), and Aktru Glacier will slip along the track of our trip. Also Katun, the biggest river of Altai Republic and also a female personage of several Altay legends (“katun” in Altaic means “a woman”), will escort us for a while. A little bit away from the route will stay Gorno-Altaysk, the capital of the Republic. It lies 3,641 km away from Moscow and 100 km from the nearest railway station Biysk. Gorno-Altaysk was established in 1830 as a settlement named Ulala, and only in 1928 it gained the city status. Its former name is Oirot-Tura (meaning, “the city of oirots”). The root “oirot” comes from the name of the legendary national hero Ursul-Oirot, and it has been applied to the entire ethnos for a while: until 1948 the republic used to go by the name of Oirot Autonomous Area. After that, it was renamed to Altai. However, “Altai” people are not really happy with this common name: some of them consider themselves Telengits, some - Oirots and some – Altaikizi. All of them are still looking for their ethnically and historically proper name.
Elizabete Neimiseva for enduroadventure.lv