| Publication |
2011.
|
| Summary/Abstract |
IN THE 15TH CENTURY, Russian merchant Afanasy Nikitin driven by business interests traveled to the Arab East, Iran and India, a highly risky enterprise at that time. He went to "bring goods to the Russian land" but after three years of wandering had to admit with a great deal of bitterness: "There is no way from the Hormuz to Horasan; no way to Chagatai; no way to Baghdad; no way to Bahrain, no way to Yezd, no way to Arabia - everywhere the princes are fighting."1 This was written five centuries ago; the intrepid traveler is nearly forgotten, probably because of continued instability and the consistently failing attempts to bring peace to the region (instability was responsible for the failure of the first Russian commercial project in the Near and Middle East).
|