The bukharan emirate and turkestan under russian rule in the revolutionary era: 1917-1924

1.2. Ethnicity
The Emirate of Bukhara is located in the heart of Central Asia as an ancient 
monarchy which had ruled during 1785-1920. The emirate was one of the three 
Uzbek khanates in Central Asia. It was geographically surrounded by Khivan 
Khanate in the northwest, Khanate of Kokand in the east, Afghanistan in the south, 
Kazakh steppe in the north and nomadic Turcoman tribes located in Transcaspia 
region, known as Turkmenistan today, in the southeast. The Emirate ruled the most 
important and historically and religiously valuable cities such as Samarkand and 
Bukhara. The city of Bukhara was the capital city of the Emirate. 
Inside the Emirate, the ruling ethnic class was Uzbeks and the other natives of 
the country were consisted of Tajiks, Turcoman, Kirghiz, Persians, Jews, Indians and 
Arabs. The ethnic map of the region was very changeable in the years. Many 
different ethnic communities came to the region through the wars or migration. But, 
the last and final shaping was conducted by the Turkic conquerors. The final shape 

---

9 
was given by the Turco-Mongol invaders of Genghis Khan. Iranians were the first 
inhabitants in Central Asia. Persian speaking Tajik peoples were descendants of early 
Iranians. Then the Turkic groups arrived in the region. Turcomans were the first 
arrivals as a Turkic group in the tenth century and they maintained their ethnic, 
cultural identity and nomadic life style. After Turcomans, Uzbeks were the last 
arrivals and they became the ruling group in the region
.
15
The Uzbeks were a group 
of Moslem, Turkiospeaking, nomadic tribes of mixed Turkic, Mongol, and Iranian 
origin.
16
During the Russian protectorate era in Bukhara, the ethnic composition is 
that Uzbeks were the majority by 55-60 % and living in Zarafshan, Kashka Darya 
and in the river valleys of Central Bukhara, Tajiks were the second largest group 
living in the mountainous eastern region (Eastern Bukhara) by 30%, Turcoman were 
5-10% living alongside the Amu Darya and Kelif. In addition, there were several 
thousand nomadic Kirghiz population, living in Karategin. And, other minor ethnic 
groups including Persians, Jews, and Indians also live as habitants of main towns
.
17
The Uzbeks and Turcoman were the two major Turkic communities in the region.
Although there was no ethnic identity consciousness in the emirate, Uzbeks were 
known as sedentary population. The Russians also named both Uzbeks and Tajiks 
who were sedentary and semi sedentary in Bukhara as Sarts. The nomadic population 
was known as Turcoman and they were different in terms of culture, life style, and 
linguistics. Uzbeks are the latest arrivals in the region and had the primary role of 
ruling ethnic group deriving from Timurids and Shaybanids which had ruled the 
region for a long time. “The name Uzbek thus now includes a fairly heterogeneous 
population, ranging in culture from fully sedentary merchants and craftsmen to 
15
Becker, Seymour, 
Russia’s Protectorates in Central Asia: Bukhara and Khiva, 1865–1924, 
(
London &New York: Routledge Curzon, 2005), 5. 
16
Ibid, 3. 
17
Ibid, 5. 

---

10 
seminomadic communities having a strong tribal orientation”.
18
 
The importance of 
Uzbeks as the ruling ethnicity was based on being Uzbek ethnically of the Manghit 
dynasty of the Emirate. The Uzbeks, Tajiks and nomadic Turcomans were major 
ethnic groups in the emirate. These three populations were originally orthodox 
Sunnite. In addition, there were minor ethnic groups such as Arabs, Jewish, Gypsies 
and Persians which have either different sects or different religions. 
The reason of Uzbek population’s leading role in the region was the Uzbek 
rulers for centuries. “Since the sixteenth, Bukhara had been an Uzbek kingdom, and 
the Uzbeks who were Sunnis represented the largest group in the emirate (778,000 
inhabitants in 1920 or 50.7 percent of the population).With the accession to the 
throne of the Manghits, who came from a major Uzbek tribe, the Uzbek elite became 
the mainstay of power, and struggles for power itself merged with age old tribal 
struggles”.
19
But, the Uzbek ruling elite constructed a very specific system between 
Uzbeks and non-Uzbeks in the Emirate and other two khanates (Kokand and Khiva). 
In the Uzbek khanates, for the pattern of government, Persians were chosen although 
the ruling klans were Uzbeks. It is claimed that some khans’ mothers were Persian, 
so this policy of Persian based government became a continual tradition.
20
The Tajik 
population was the second largest one after Uzbeks. Since Bukhara and Samarkand 
were the old and traditional Samanid Dynasty’s
21
cities, there were a large amount of 
18
E.Bacon, Elizabeth,