Brief overview of the history of formation of the medieval collection of Central Asian archaeological monuments in the State Historical Museum

The Department of Archaeology of the State Historical Museum includes an extensive collection of archaeology items from Central Asia. The Central Asian collections in the Department of Archaeology are divided according to historical periods: the Stone and Bronze Age, the Early Iron Age, and Early Middle Ages and the medieval archaeology. The article provides an overview of the collections of medieval archaeology acquired throughout the 19th–20th centuries from individuals (historians, museum workers, local historians, etc.), archaeologists, scientific organizations and societies. Today, archaeology items dated between 5th century BC and 1500s–1600s are available for researchers. The geography of the discovered items covers the territories of modern Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, Iran, Kazakhstan and Tajikistan. This publication is intended to demonstrate the ways of forming the largest medieval collections in the museum, since the studying the history of museum funds formation does not only constitute an integral part of the history of science, but also lays the foundation for publication of museum collections that have long been unknown to science. The degree of exploration varies from collection to collection. Particular archaeology items have previously been studied by researchers, but most of the collection still requires introduction into scholarly discourse. One of the most remarkable features of the collection is its scale. It leads to an extraordinary interest in the history of the formation of the fund. A number of prominent persons contributed to this collection. They were collectors A.P. Bakhrushin and P.I. Shchukin, archaeologists D.D. Bukinich, M.V. Voevodsky, A.I. Terenozhkin and S.P. Tolstov. The work was based on an analysis of the main inventory book of the Historical Museum, lists of the collections and archeological items of the Central Asian fund of the medieval archaeology unit at the department of archaeology.