Chingiz Aitmatov

Mel Dadswell (University of Exeter)
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The Kirghiz Soviet author Chingiz Torekulovich Aitmatov was born on the 12th of December 1928 in the

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(village) of Sheker in the Talass valley of north-western Kirghizia. The Kirghiz, for all their pre-Soviet history a nomadic people, had had a very complex and still disputed ethnogenesis. Even in the mid-nineteenth century explorers and ethnographers were confabulating them with other nationalities. Many Kirghiz apparently migrated from South-Western Siberia, where they had inhabited the valleys of the upper Yenisey, Irtysh and Sayan, to the Altai mountains, where they mixed with local tribes, subsequently making their way south under Tatar pressure to the northern shore of lake Issyk Kul. This “history” is preserved in the

Manas

, the orally transmitted national epic of the…

2933 words

Citation: Dadswell, Mel. "Chingiz Aitmatov". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 25 January 2006 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=11675, accessed 19 March 2024.]

11675 Chingiz Aitmatov 1 Historical context notes are intended to give basic and preliminary information on a topic. In some cases they will be expanded into longer entries as the Literary Encyclopedia evolves.

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