Kyrgyzstan’s History
The territory of Kyrgyzstan, like the whole of Central Asia, is one of the oldest centers of human civilization. Research by archaeologists show that primitive man has mastered here since the Stone Age. The formation of the Kyrgyz people was attended by many ethnic groups that lived in the vast expanses of southern Siberia and Central Asia. The Kyrgyz, an ethnic group known in Central Asia already in the first millennium BC, have conveyed their self-name through the centuries to the present day.
On the territory of modern Kyrgyzstan, various ancient states and civilizations existed: the ancient Hunnish state (from the end of the 3rd to the end of the 2nd century BC), Saki (until the 3rd century BC), Usuni (in V-III centuries BC), the Davan state (Pargana).
In the V century, the history of Kyrgyzstan is characterized by a transition to a sedentary lifestyle among the nomads who inhabited northern Kyrgyzstan.
The first evidence of written sources about the Kyrgyz tribes inhabiting the Tien Shan dates back to the 10th century. By the tenth century, the Great Kyrgyz Khanate swept southern Siberia, Mongolia, Baikal, the upper Irtysh, part of Kashgar, Issyk-Kul and Talas. The heyday of the Kyrgyz state was not only a period of conquest, but also a trade exchange with the Chinese, Tibetans, peoples of Southern Siberia, Central and Central Asia. It was during this period that the Kyrgyz, after defeating the Uigur Kaganate, first entered the territory of the Tien Shan. However, by the end of the 10th century, only southern Siberia, Altai, and southwestern Mongolia remained under the rule of the Kyrgyz.
In the XI-XII centuries. their possessions were reduced to Altai and Sayan. Meanwhile, parts of Kyrgyz tribes scattered across a vast space took an active part in the events rich in the history of Central Asia. They managed to maintain their ethnic independence and become the core of the attraction of other ethnic groups. The final stage of ethnogenesis is associated with the Mongol, Oyrot (Kalmak), Naiman and other Central Asian peoples. Until the 18th century, the Yenisei Kyrgyz were ruled by (sometimes nominal) Golden Horde, and then Oirot, Dzungarian khans. All this time there was a relocation to the Tien Shan. Already in the 16th century, the ethnogenesis of the Kyrgyz people was completed here.
In 1863, Northern Kyrgyzstan was annexed to the Russian Empire, and in 1876 – Southern. After the victory of the October Revolution, the Kyrgyz, together with all the peoples of the former tsarist Russia, became part of the Soviet Republic. In 1918, Kyrgyzstan was part of the Turkestan ASSR. According to the national-state demarcation of the Soviet republics of Central Asia, on October 14, 1924, the Kara-Kyrgyz Autonomous Region was formed (May 25, 1925 – the Kirghiz Autonomous Region) as part of the RSFSR, on February 1, 1926 it was transformed into the Kyrgyz Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic, and on December 5, 1936 – into the Kyrgyz Autonomous Republic.
The Kyrgyz people gained national independence and national sovereignty peacefully after the collapse of the USSR, and here the history of Kyrgyzstan came into independence. In October 1990, at a session of the Supreme Council of the Republic, a decision was made to rename the Kyrgyz SSR to the Republic of Kyrgyzstan. On December 15, 1990, the Supreme Council adopted the Declaration of Sovereignty of the Republic, and on August 31, 1991, the Declaration of Independence of Kyrgyzstan.
On May 5, 1993, the first Constitution of the Kyrgyz Republic as an independent sovereign state was adopted.
On May 10, 1993, Kyrgyzstan introduced its own national currency, the som.
