Dastan () is an ornate form of

oral history Oral history is the collection and study of historical information from people, families, important events, or everyday life using audiotapes, videotapes, or transcriptions of planned interviews. These interviews are conducted with people who pa ...

, an epic, from

Central Asia Central Asia is a region of Asia consisting of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan. The countries as a group are also colloquially referred to as the "-stans" as all have names ending with the Persian language, Pers ...

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) and also known as Persia, is a country in West Asia. It borders Iraq to the west, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Armenia to the northwest, the Caspian Sea to the north, Turkmenistan to the nort ...

Turkey Turkey, officially the Republic of Türkiye, is a country mainly located in Anatolia in West Asia, with a relatively small part called East Thrace in Southeast Europe. It borders the Black Sea to the north; Georgia (country), Georgia, Armen ...

and

Azerbaijan Azerbaijan, officially the Republic of Azerbaijan, is a Boundaries between the continents, transcontinental and landlocked country at the boundary of West Asia and Eastern Europe. It is a part of the South Caucasus region and is bounded by ...

. A dastan is generally centered on one individual who protects his tribe or his people from an outside invader or enemy, although only occasionally can this figure be traced back to a historical person. This main character sets an example of how one should act, and the dastan becomes a teaching tool — for example the

Sufi Sufism ( or ) is a mysticism, mystic body of religious practice found within Islam which is characterized by a focus on Islamic Tazkiyah, purification, spirituality, ritualism, and Asceticism#Islam, asceticism. Practitioners of Sufism are r ...

master and Turkic poet Ahmed Yesevi said "Let the scholars hear my wisdom, treating my words like a dastan". Alongside the wisdom, each dastan is rich with cultural history of interest to scholars. During the

Russian conquest of Central Asia In the 16th century, the Tsardom of Russia embarked on a campaign to Territorial evolution of Russia, expand the Russian frontier to the east. This effort continued until the 19th century under the Russian Empire, when the Imperial Russian Army ...

, many new dastans were created to protest the Russian occupation. It is possible that they came into contact and influenced each other. According to Turkish historian Hasan Bülent Paksoy, the

Bolsheviks The Bolsheviks, led by Vladimir Lenin, were a radical Faction (political), faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) which split with the Mensheviks at the 2nd Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party, ...

tried to destroy these symbols of culture by only publishing them in insufficiently large quantities and in a distorted form "in order to weaken the heroic impact". A notable dastan is '' Korkut Ata'' of the

Oghuz Turks The Oghuz Turks ( Middle Turkic: , ) were a western Turkic people who spoke the Oghuz branch of the Turkic language family. In the 8th century, they formed a tribal confederation conventionally named the Oghuz Yabgu State in Central Asia ...

— which may have been created as early as the beginning of the 13th century. In Karakalpak and other Turkic cultures, there are two kinds of ''dastan'': the '' baqsï'' sings lyrical epics containing stories about love and adventure (which Karl Reichl compares to medieval Western romance), accompanied by the

dutar The ''dutar'' (also ''Dotara, dotar''; ; ; ; ; ; ; ) is a traditional Iranian long-necked two-stringed lute found in Iran and Central Asia. Its name comes from the Persian language, Persian word for "two strings", دوتار ''do tār'' (< � ...

; '' zhyrau'' sing heroic epics, accompanied by the

kobyz The kobyz or qobyz, also known as the kylkobyz, is an ancient Turkic bowed string instrument, spread among Kazakhs, Karakalpaks, Bashkirs, and Tatars. The Kyrgyz variant is called the ). The kobyz has two strings made of horsehair. The resonat ...

.{{cite book , last=Reichl , first=Karl , year=2007 , title=Edige: A Karakalpak Heroic Epic, as performed by Jumabay Bazarov , location=Helsinki , publisher=Academia Scientiarum Fennica , pages=17-18

References

Azerbaijani folklore Culture of Central Asia Iranian folklore Oral history Persian words and phrases Kyrgyz folklore Turkic culture Turkish folklore Uyghur music

See also

References