Rare historical documents from Central Asia — including materials related to Uzbekistan dating from the 19th and 20th centuries — have been found preserved in the Prussian Privy State Archives (GStA PK) in Berlin, Uzbekistan's national news agency has reported.
The archive, established in 1598, holds roughly 35,000 linear meters of historical documents — an estimated 1.5 to 2 million bound volumes, or 300 to 350 million pages. While the bulk of the collection is in German, it also includes sources in Ottoman Turkish, Russian, and Persian written in Arabic script.
Research has uncovered significant correspondence and official reports by Karl Hermann von Thile, state secretary at the Prussian Kingdom's Foreign Ministry, documenting the political developments and diplomatic relations surrounding Turkestan in 1865.
The archive also holds special reports written by Georg Cleinow, a confidential adviser to the Weimar Republic government, during his 1928–1929 travels through Uzbekistan. These offer an in-depth analysis of the geopolitical significance of the Turk-Sib railway's construction, the settlement of nomadic herding communities, national-territorial delimitation, and land and water reforms of the period.
Another valuable find in the archive concerns the fate of Vali Kayum Khan, a student from Tashkent sent to study in Germany in 1922. Documents preserved in the personal collection of Weimar-era Culture Minister Carl Heinrich Becker — including a 1933 letter written by Dr. Walter Becker — describe Kayum Khan's dire financial circumstances after the Nazis came to power and include an appeal for assistance on his behalf. The letter has been described as an important primary source showing that German academic circles were not indifferent to the fate of students from Turkestan.
The find follows earlier discoveries in Uzbekistan, including a cave with wall paintings and inscriptions dated to roughly 2 million years ago in the Sokh district of Fergana province, and the remains of an 8th-century ruler's palace uncovered in Samarkand.
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