Tours to museums of Nukus.

"Culture is what remains when you forget everything that you have been taught"

 Emmanuelle Mounier.

Museums of Nukus.

The Republican Museum of Local Lore of Karakalpakstan is located in the central part of the city, at 9 Garesizlik Street, at the corner of Sabir Kamalov and Pushkin Streets, in the northwestern part of the Friendship of Nations Boulevard in the city of Nukus.
The Republican Museum of Local Lore under the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Karakalpakstan was founded in 1929 with only a dozen exhibits. At present, the museum fund has more than 56 thousand exhibits, among which there are valuable and rare ones, for example, a stuffed animal of the last Turanian tiger, now extinct.
In total, the museum has 21 halls, all of them are divided by subject matter: nature, archeology, ethnography and modern history of the region. The local history museum consists of three departments - nature, archeology and ethnography and the department of modern history.
The latter presents an exposition dedicated to the achievements of Karakalpakstan over the years of independence. The department of nature begins with showing the landscapes of the Ustyurt plateau, Kyzylkum and the Aral Sea basin to the diar.
The flora and fauna of Karakalpakstan is represented by the diarama of the Badaytugay reserve. In the halls of ethnography, the national clothes of the Karakalpak people are widely exhibited. The exposition of women's clothing and jewelry is especially rich: saukele, kok-koylek, zhegde, monshak and other attributes of women's clothing of the XVIIIth - XIXth centuries.
There are also kitchen utensils and other household items of that time, yurt accessories. The visitor is especially impressed by the skill of our needlewomen, who create truly masterpieces of applied art. One of the most unique exhibits of the museum is a capital found in 1966 in the Sulganuizdag mountains.
It is a lying with bent legs, framing an abacus, an animal with the heads of bearded husbands, of which only one has survived. The face is impassive, with protruding pupilless eyes, regular features and a pointed beard; above the forehead there is a flat headdress and a bandage, from which the horns of a ram curve to the cheeks.
The capital recalls images of ancient Eastern art - from the Sphinx of Ancient Egypt to the bulls of Achaemenid Iran borrowed from the myrtle of Assyro-Babylonian mythology. Similar capitals first appear in Iran since the time of Darius in the form of two fused lions, bulls, griffins, and they are known in Persopol, Nakhshi-Rustem.
In this regard, it is appropriate to recall the cuneiform inscription about the construction of the Achaemenid palace in Susa (Vth - IVth centuries BC) where the stone "akhshaina" was delivered from Khorezm, that is, from the Sultanuizdag mountains.
The small capital dates back to the same time. A bronze cast vessel is kept in the archaeological collection of the museum. It was found by the worker of the hydrogeological prospecting party A. Taubaev in the sands between the ancient settlements of Burly and Toprak kala in the Ellik kala region of the Republic of Karakalpakstan.
This bronze vessel of the VIth - Vth centuries. BC. intended for cult purposes, has a spherical shape and stands on three, widely spaced legs, similar to those of animals. The handle of the boiler is shaped like a horse.
In such cauldrons, only in large sizes, the meat of sacrificial animals was usually cooked during various religious holidays. The Massagets, according to Herodotus, who lived in the lower reaches of the Amu Darya, sacrifice horses to the sun, believing that the meaning of this sacrifice is that the fastest god needs the fastest creature in the world.
The most striking is the exposition of folk applied art - haikel, inside which is an amulet against the evil eye. Such was worn by women of childbearing age and the more loved the wife was, the richer the haikel was.
Tumars with carnelian eyes, or sonorous ongirmonshak. Look at the dresses and robes embroidered by women, how the Karakalpak ornament is multifaceted, these are kok koylek and zhegde, these are shay kalta and shynykap, these are woven kergi and karshyn carpets, korzhun and accessories of the yurt ak baskur, kyzyl chickens and various carpets.
The Department of Folk and Applied Arts is a living tree of crafts, planted by the golden hands of embroiderers. Wonderful fantasies embodied in embroidery are original and have no analogues. Pleasing to the eye made by the museum staff V. Baibakova, Z. Akimova, M. Aimurzaeva and others. souvenir handbags, wallets, cases for glasses, amulets, which with admiration and trembling in their souls are acquired by the guests of the museum in memory of the region.
The Karakalpaks were also famous for wood carving - a confirmation of this - chic doors for a yurt, chests, darvoz, ayvan pillars. Our contemporaries do not lag behind them. Overwhelmingly admiring the art and handicrafts of the people and infected with them - the unique beauty, brightness and peculiar national color of colors in the museum, its masters are born - embroiderers, woodcarvers, painters, sculptors, masters of making musical instruments and taxodermists - manufacturers of stuffed animals.
For example, one of such masters Khozhanazarov Arzybek with his musical instruments exhibited at the International Exhibition of Craftsmen in London and was highly appreciated. Especially attracted the attention of the violin made by him, which is the prototype of the great Stradivarius violin.
The sculptural works of the artist A. Seytimbetov, the theme of which is very close to the people, are exhibited throughout the entire exposition and arouse great interest among museum visitors. The stuffed birds made by B. Omarov find a central place in the dioramas of the department of nature, which is the favorite place of the younger generation.
The collection of the Karakalpak Museum of Local Lore is widely known far beyond the borders of our republic.

The history of the creation of the local history museum of Karakalpakstan in Nukus.

The first steps to create a museum in Karakalpakstan are closely related to the historical and cultural events that took place at the end of the 19th century in Central Asia, in particular Uzbekistan. In 1870, the Turkestan Department of the Society of Anthropologists, Ethnographers and Naturalists was opened in Tashkent.
Six years later, the first museum exhibition was organized. A similar exhibition was organized in the city of Turtkul, where over twenty old clay and metal household items were presented. These things were found in 1876 - 1880 on the dry bottom of Lake Istemes, located between the cities of Kyat and Kyzylkala, ancient manuscripts, coins and ethnographic materials.
Due to the political events of the early 20th century, work on the creation of the museum was temporarily suspended. In 1920, the Committee for Museum Affairs and the Protection of Historical Monuments of the Republic of Turkestan was established in Tashkent, the main focus of which was the museum business.
This accelerated the process of organizing a museum in Karakalpakstan. In 1928, the question was raised about the appointment of the city of Chimbay as the capital of Karakalpakstan, where the creation of a local history museum was planned.
In connection with the conclusion of geological scientists about the inconsistency of the geographical location of the city of Chimbay as the future capital, the question of the construction of the museum building remained open.
On May 21 of the same year, at a regular meeting of the department of regional public education, the issue of creating a museum in the region is again considered. On May 24, the head of the Regional Bureau of Local Lore, Solotsky, and the scientific secretary, Duryshkin, send a special letter to the Regional Executive Committee, emphasizing the need to collect exhibits for the future museum.
In September, the "Karakalpak Ethnographic Expedition" was organized, the head of which A. Melkov was allocated an advance in the amount of 3747 rubles to carry out work on the collection of exhibits. The members of the expedition study historical monuments, visit many auls in a number of districts of Karakalpakstan, collect a lot of exhibits.
The work of the expedition was supported by the intelligentsia of our region, which, led by Karabaev and Erbayev, send a letter to OblONO asking them to organize a museum exhibition on the basis of the materials collected by this expedition.
A similar request is received on behalf of numerous citizens, and on May 16, 1929, an exhibition was organized in the city club of Turtkul by local historians. It presented national clothes of the Karakalpaks, old manuscripts, household utensils, books, photographs of historical monuments, paintings.
Moscow students A. N. Baskakov, A. Davletov, N. V. Torchinskaya and the first local ethnographers K. Aimbetov, ethnographer from Tashkent A. Morozov took an active part in organizing this exhibition. To put the work of the museum business to the proper level, the position of the secretary of the museum was soon established under OblONO. In his report on the work of the museum from September 20, 1929 to April 1 1930, acting in this position N. V. Torchinskaya writes that great attention was then paid to the place and role of the museum of local lore in the life of the peopl
The Executive Committee, together with OblONO, adopted a special document "On the Central Regional Museum", which defined the tasks facing the museum. In those years, the museum consisted of two departments, where there were 1,022 exhibits.
In 1930 - 1931, according to the approved plan, the museum carried out work on keeping records of the available exhibits, preparing catalogs, organizing auxiliary exhibitions, protecting and preserving monuments, and creating a commission for Karakalpak folk songs at the museum.
The work plan also included the tasks of organizing the timely delivery of the collected materials to the museum by the Karakalpak ethnographic expedition, supporting the work of the museum by organizations and institutions, and a collection of Karakalpak patterns.
On February 4, 1930, N. A. Baskakov began to lead the museum, after K. Aimbetov. Thanks to their efforts, our museum becomes famous not only in Karakalpakstan, but also beyond its borders. In April 1930, our museum with 300 exhibits takes part in the Local History Exhibition held in Almaty.
In those years, the Karakalpak Museum had a rich library - 1572 photographic documents. In the department of culture and history of the museum, along with other exhibits, a fifty-volume edition of Oriental manuscripts has been preserved.
From March 18 to March 25, a scientific conference was held in St. Petersburg, which was devoted to the study of the production forces of Karakalpakstan. It discussed, among the important issues, the preparation of the project for the building of a new museum in the city of Nukus, the implementation of its exposition and the provision of qualified specialists.
The "foundation" of the state museum of local lore was laid on May 16, 1929. And this day, when the first museum exhibition was opened (in the city of Turtkul), is a new step in the cultural and educational life of the Karakalpak people, which will remain in the history of Karakalpakstan.
Geographic coordinates of the local history museum of Karakalpakstan in Nukus: N42 ° 27'44.02 "E59 ° 36'39.96"

Authority:
https://sezamtravel.uz/uzbekistan/goroda/nukus
G. Khozhaniyazov, O. Yusupov. Newspaper "Vesti Karakalpakstan", May 18, 2004 No. 40 (16884)
"Treasury of the history of the region."
A. Medetov. Newspaper "Vesti Karakalpakstan" No. 40 (16780), May 17, 2003 
Director of the Republican Museum of Local Lore, Honored Worker of Culture of the Republic of Karakalpakstan S. Nurabullaeva "The center of culture and spirituality."