Ármin Vámbéry - Travels in Central Asia

[Transcriber's note]

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DERVISHES AT BOKHARA.

I was born in Hungary in 1832, in the small town of Duna Szerdahely, situated on one of the largest islands in the Danube. Impelled by a particular inclination to linguistic science, I had in early youth occupied myself with several languages of Europe and Asia. The various stores of Oriental and Western literature were in the first instance the object of my eager study. At a later period I began to interest myself in the reciprocal relations of the languages themselves; and here it is not surprising if I, in applying the proverb 'nosce teipsum,' directed my principal attention to the affinities and to the origin of my own mother-tongue.

That the Hungarian language belongs to the stock called Altaic is well known, but whether it is to be referred to the Finnish or the Tartaric branch is a question that still awaits decision. This enquiry, interesting [Footnote 1] to us Hungarians both in a scientific and {viii} a national point of view, was the principal and the moving cause of my journey to the East. I was desirous of ascertaining, by the practical study of the living languages, the positive degree of affinity which had at once struck me as existing between the Hungarian and the Turco-Tartaric dialects when contemplating them by the feeble light which theory supplied. I went first to Constantinople. Several years' residence in Turkish houses, and frequent visits to Islamite schools and libraries, soon transformed me into a Turk--nay, into an Efendi. The progress of my linguistic researches impelled me further towards the remote East; and when I proposed to carry out my views by actually undertaking a journey to Central Asia, I found it advisable to retain this character of Efendi, and to visit the East as an Oriental.

[Footnote 1: The opinion consequently that we Hungarians go to Asia to seek there those of our race who were left behind, is erroneous. Such an object, the carrying out of which, both from ethnographical as well as philological reasons, would be an impossibility, would render a man amenable to the charge of gross ignorance. We are desirous of knowing the etymological construction of our language, and therefore seek exact information from cognate idioms.]

The foregoing observations will explain the object which I proposed to myself in my wanderings from the Bosphorus to Samarcand. Geological or astronomical researches were out of my province, and had even become an impossibility from my assumption of the character of a Dervish. My attention was for the most part directed to the races inhabiting Central Asia, of whose social and political relations, character, usages, and customs I have striven, however imperfectly, to give a sketch in the following {ix} pages. Although, as far as circumstances and my previous avocations permitted, I allowed nothing that concerned geography and statistics to escape me, still I must regard the results of my philological researches as the principal fruits of my journey. These I am desirous, after maturer preparation, to lay before the scientific world. These researches, and not the facts recorded in the present pages, must ever be regarded by me as the real reward of a journey in which I wandered about for months and months with only a few rags as my covering, without necessary food, and in constant peril of perishing by a death of cruelty, if not of torture. I may be reproached with too much limiting my views, but where a certain object is proposed we should not lose sight of the principle, 'non omnia possumus omnes.'

A stranger on the field to which the publication of this narrative has introduced me, I feel my task doubly difficult in a land like England, where literature is so rich in books of travels. My design was to record plainly and simply what I heard and saw, whilst the impression still remained fresh on my mind. I doubt much whether I have succeeded, and beg the kind indulgence of the public. Readers and critics may find many errors, and the light that I may throw upon particular points may be accounted too small a compensation for the hardships I actually encountered; but I entreat them not to forget that I return from a country where to hear is regarded as impudence, to ask as crime, and to take notes as a deadly sin. {x}

So much for the grounds and purposes of my journey. With respect to the arrangement of these pages, in order that there may be no interruption, I have divided the book into two parts; the first containing the description of my journey from Teheran to Samarcand and back, the second devoted to notices concerning the geography, statistics, politics, and social relations of Central Asia. I hope that both will prove of equal interest to the reader; for whilst on the one hand I pursued routes hitherto untrodden by any European, my notices relate to subjects hitherto scarcely, if at all, touched on by writers upon Central Asia. And now let me perform the more pleasing task of expressing my warm acknowledgments to all those whose kind reception of me when I arrived in London has been a great furtherance and encouragement to the publication of the following narrative. Before all let me mention the names of SIR JUSTIN and LADY SHEIL. In their house I found English open-heartedness associated with Oriental hospitality; their kindness will never be forgotten by me. Nor are my obligations less to the Nestor of geological science, the President of the Royal Geographical Society, SIR RODERICK MURCHISON; to that great Oriental scholar, VISCOUNT STRANGFORD; and to MR. LAYARD, M.P., Under-Secretary of State. In Central Asia I bestowed blessing for kindness received; here I have but words, they are sincere and come from the heart.

A. VMBRY.

London: September 28, 1864.

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