Pamir Sentence Examples
He appears to have ascended from Kabul to the plateau of the Pamir, and thence onwards by Yarkand, Khotan and Aksu.
High plateaus like that of Pamir (the " Roof of the World ") and Armenia, and lofty mountain chains like the snow-clad Caucasus, the Alai, the Tian-shan, the Sayan Mountains, exist only on the outskirts of the empire.
To General the west of Kashgar the central depression is limited by physio- the meridional range of Sarikol and the great elevation graphs* of the Pamir, of which the Sarikol is the eastern face.
Shelving gradually upward from the low flats of Siberia the general continental level rises to a great central waterparting, or divide, which stretches from the Black Sea through the Elburz and the Hindu Kush to the Tian-shan mountains in the Pamir region, and hence to Bering Strait on the extreme north-east.
The Pamir highlands between the base of the Tian-shan mountains and the eastern buttresses of the Hindu Kush unite these two great divides, enclosing the Gobi depression on the west; and they would again be united on the east but for the transverse valley of the Amur, which parts the Khingan mountains from the Yablonoi system to the east of Lake Baikal.
From the western end of the Yablonoi range, on the 115th meridian, a mountainous belt extends along a somewhat irregular line to the extremity of Pamir, known under various names Mongolia.
The astronomical observatory at Tashkent is adopted for the initial starting-point of the trans-Caspian triangulation of Russia; the triangulation ranks as second-class only, and now extends to the Pamir frontier beyond Osh.
The great central depression of the continent which reaches from the foot of the Pamir plateau on the west through the Tarim desert to Lop Nor and the Gobi has yielded up many interesting Chinese secrets.
Where the Oxus river takes its great bend to the north from Ishkashim, the breadth of the Afghan territory intervening between that river and the main water-divide of the Hindu Kush is not more than 10 or 12 m.; and east of the Pamir extension of Afghanistan, where the Beyik Pass crosses the Sarikol range and drops into the Taghdumbash Pamir, there is but the narrow width of the Karachukar valley between the Sarikol and the Murtagh.
The Alai range of the Pamir, continued by the Kokshaltau range and the Khan-tengri group of the Tian-shan, and the Sailughem range of the Altai, which is continued in the unnamed border-range of West Sayan (between the Bei-kem and the Us), belong to this category.
AdvertisementSkirting round the head of the Tagdumbash Pamir, it finally merges into the Pamir boundary, and turns westwards, following the course of the Oxus, to the junction of that river and the Khanabad (Kunduz).
Now, however, the Darwaz extension northwards is exchanged for the Russian Pamir extension westwards,.
It may be said to spring from the head of the Taghdumbash Pamir, where it unites with the great meridional system of Sarikol stretching northwards, and the yet more impressive mountain barrier of Murtagh, the northern base of which separates China from the semi-independent territory of Kanjut.
The Wakhjir pass, crossing the head of the Taghdumbash Pamir into the sources of the river Hunza, almost marks the trijunction of the three great chains of mountains.
From a little ice-bound lake called Gaz Kul, or Karambar, which lies on the crest of the Hindu Kush near its northern origin at the head of the Taghdumbash Pamir, two very important river systems (those of Chitral and Hunza) are believed to originate.
AdvertisementOn the east the Pamir highlands are fenced off from the East Turkestan lowlands by the double border-ridge of Sarik-kol (the Sarik-kol range and the Murtagh or Kashgar range), which has its eastern foot down in the Tarim basin (4000-4500 ft.) and its western up on the Pamirs at 10,500 to 13,000 ft.
The final survey of the Pamir region (wherein the heads of all the chief tributaries of the river lay hidden), by the Pamir boundary commission of 1895 established the following topographical facts in connexion with this question.
The elevated mountain chain which is now called the Nicolas range, which divides the Great from the Little Pamir, is a region of vast glaciers and snow-fields, from which the lakes lying immediately north and south derive the greater part of their water-supply.
On the south a similar stream starting farther east, called Burgutai (denoting the position of a difficult and dangerous pass across the range) sweeps downwards towards Lake Chakmaktin, the lake of the Little Pamir, which is some 400 ft.
But at the foot of the mountain this stream bifurcates in the swamps which lie to the west of Chakmaktin, and part of its waters find their way eastwards into the lake, and part flow away westwards into the Ab-i-Panja, which joins the Pamir river from Lake Victoria at Kala Panja.
AdvertisementThis at any rate is the action of the Burgutai stream during certain seasons of the year, so that the glaciers and snowfields of the Nicolas range may be regarded as the chief fountain-head of at least two of the upper tributaries of the Oxus, namely, the Aksu (or Murghab) and the Pamir river, and as contributing largely to a third, the Ab-i-Panja.
The glacial origin of the Pamir valleys is everywhere apparent in their terrace formations and the erratic blocks and boulders that lie scattered about their surface.
If the Aksu (or Murghab) and the Pamir river from Lake Victoria are to be considered in the light of independent tributaries, it is probable that the Ab-i-Panja contributes as large a volume of glacial flood to the Oxus as either of them.
A road will connect Charog with the Alichur Pamir, following the general course of the Ghund stream, a road which will form a valuable link in the chain of communications between Bokhara and Sarikol.
Eighty-five miles north of Ishkashim, at Kala Wamar, the river which rises in the Little Pamir, and which is called Aksu, Murghab, or Bartang, joins the Oxus from the east.
AdvertisementThe administration of the whole of the states on the right bank of the Oxus, down to the Russian boundary line at Ichka Yar, is now in the hands of Bokhara, including Karateghin - which the Russians have transferred to it from Khokand - and Darwaz at the entrance to the Pamir highlands.
The Pamir Commission of 1895 settled its north-eastern border.
From the abutment of the Hindu Kush on the Sarikol in the Pamir regions to Landi Kotal, and throughout its eastern and southern limits, the boundary of Afghanistan touches districts which were brought under British political control with the formation of the North-West Frontier Provinces of India in 1901.
Of its other neighbors, we must here mention the Sacae, a warlike equestrian people in the mountains of the pamir plateau and northward; who are probably of Mongol origin.
From this point he directed several campaigns against the Amyrgian Sacae, on the Pamir Plateau and northwards, whom he enumerates in his list of subject races, and whose mounted archers formed a main division of the armies despatched against the Greeks.
This time, however, he crosses Pamir, of which he gives a remarkable account, and passes by Kashgar, Khotan (Kustana), and the vicinity of Lop-nor across the desert to Kwa-chow, whence he had made his venturous and lonely plunge into the waste fifteen years before.
Forsyth to Yarkand led to the first systematic geographical exploitation of the Pamir country.
Bonvalot in 1887, Littledale in 1888, Cumberland, Bower and Dauvergne, followed by Younghusband in succeeding years, extending to 1890; Dunmore in 1892 and Sven Hedin in 1894-1895, have all contributed more or less to Pamir geography; but the honours of successful inquiry in those high altitudes still fall to Lord Curzon, whose researches in 1894 led to a singularly clear and comprehensive description of Pamir geography, as well as to the best map compilation that till then had existed.
Our estimate of the extent of Pamir conformation depends much on the significance of the word Pamir.
The absence of any vegetation beyond grass or scrub is a striking feature common to both Pamir and Chang, but there the resemblance ceases, and the physical conformation of mountain and valley to the east and to the west of the upper sources of the Zarafshan is radically distinct.
The axis, or backbone, of Pamir formation is the great meridional mountain chain of Sarikol - the ancient Taurus of tradition and history - on which stands the highest peak north of the Himalaya, the Murtagh Ata (25,000 ft.).
At the foot of the Sarez Pamir stands the most advanced Russian outpost of Murghabi.
To the east of the Sarikol chain is the Taghdumbash Pamir, which claims many of the characteristics of the western Pamirs at its upper or western extremity, where the Karachukar, which drains it, is a comparatively small stream.
One other so-called Pamir exists to the east of Sarikol, separated therefrom by the eastern range (the Kandar) of the Sarikol, which is known as Mariom or Mariong.
But this Pamir is situated nowhere near the sources of the Zarafshan or Raskam river, which it borders, and possesses little in common with the Pamirs of the west.
The Mariom Pamir defines the western extremity of the Kuen Lun, which stretches eastwards for 250 m.
The Taghdumbash Pamir occupies a geographical position of some political significance.
This eastward extension was laid down by the Pamir Boundary Commission of 1895.
All the head of the Little Pamir, with the Wakhan valley, is consequently Afghan territory, but no military posts have been established so far.
The Mariom Pamir is Chinese.
The Wakhan glaciers under the Wakhjir water-parting, Lake Chakmaktin near the sources of the Aksu, and Lake Victoria of the Great Pamir have all been claimed as indicating the Glacial of true source of the Oxus.
The non-Russian population during the summer of 1895 could not have amounted to more than a few hundred souls - occupying a few encampments in the Little Pamir and in the Taghdumbash.
There is no ethnographical distinction to be traced between the Kirghiz of the Alichur Pamir and the Kirghiz of the Taghdumbash.
The total area of the Pamir country may be estimated as about 150 m.
There were indications that monsoon influences extended as far north at least as the Great Pamir, and a definite analogy was established between the record of barometric pressure on the Pamirs and that of the outer ranges of the Himalaya.
The distinctive animal of the Pamir plateau is the magnificent Ovis poli (conjectured to be the ancestor of the common sheep).
In the alpine tracts of the Tian-shan, on the borders of the Pamir, their horns and skulls are frequently met with, but there the place of the species is now taken by Ovis karelini.
The Himalayan bear (Ursus isabellinus) has its home on the Pamir, and the smaller Leuconyx up to the highest levels on the Tianshan.
Antelopes, Lepus lehmanni, Lagomys rutilus, various species of Arvicolae, and the Himalayan long-tailed marmot (Arctomys caudatus), the most characteristic inhabitant of the alpine meadows, are the only mammals of the Pamir proper.
Among the Lepidoptera of the Pamir there is an interesting mixture of Tian-shan with Himalayan species.
Grum-Grshimailo found on the Pamir the butterfly Colias nastes, a species characteristic of Labrador and Lapland; like the alpine plants which bear witness to a Glacial period flora in the Himalayas, this butterfly is a survival of the Glacial period fauna of the Pamir.
There is no arboreal vegetation on the Pamir, except a few willows and tamarisks along the rivers.
One portion of the Aryans emigrated and settled in what is now Wakhhan (on the Pamir plateau), the present language of which seems very old, dating anterior to the separation of the Vedic and Zend languages.
The other arm of the bifurcation, situated farther south, and beginning at the Terek-tau, is double; it consists of the Alai and Trans-Alai ranges, continued westwards in the Karateghin, Zarafshan, Hissar and Turkestan ranges, though orographically the Trans-Alai ought probably to be described as the border-ridge of the Pamir plateau.
The Trans-Alai is a true border range, the ascent to it from the Pamir plateau (13,000 ft.) on the south-east being gentle and relatively short, while both it and the Alai tower up steeply to a height of 11,000-14,000 ft.
The Pamir plateau is reached by means of the Kyzyl-art pass at an altitude of 14,015 ft.
In the elevated regions of this part of the system, between the Kokshal-tau and the Pamir plateau, the snow-line runs at a higher level than is usual elsewhere, namely at 12,500 ft.
During this period the Pamir and West Nuristan blocks of northeast Afghanistan were also accreted onto Eurasia.
This region is known as Pamir; it has all the characteristics of the highest regions of Tibet, and so far fitly receives the Russian designation of steppe; but it seems to have no special peculiarities, and the reason of its having been so long regarded as a geographical enigma is not obvious.