News

Wednesday 13 October 2021

The Conference "Oriental Epigraphic Readings in Memory of D.D. Vasiliev"

 
The Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences hosted the First International Scientific Conference "Oriental Epigraphic Readings in Memory of D.D. Vasiliev" on October the 11th-13th.

The event was organized by the Department of Oriental History of the Institute of Oriental Studies. The conference was timed to coincide with the 75th anniversary of D.D. Vasiliev. He was the outstanding Russian turkologist, science organizer, and prominent specialist in Turkic runic epigraphy. The conference was also dedicated to the 75th anniversary of the journal "Epigraphy of the East" (V. Naumkin, Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences, is the editor-in-chief).

The conference was attended by more than eighty speakers from Russia, India, Turkey, Georgia, and the Netherlands. They presented reports and presentations on a wide range of theoretical and textological issues of epigraphic studies of the Ancient East, Egypt, Mesoamerica, Siberia and Mongolia, Crimea, the Caucasus, Turkic runes, epigraphic heritage of India and China.

The first volume of "Selected Works" by D.D. Vasiliev (executive editors V.Naumkin and D.Vasiliev) was published by the opening of the conference. The journal included rare articles in Russian, English, German, French, and Turkish languages as well as an original brochure that was dedicated to the 75th anniversary of the journal “Epigraphy of the East”.

These people made speeches at the conference:
Alikber Alikberov, Director of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences,
Boris Bazarov, Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Scientific Director of the Institute of Mongolian Studies, Buddhology and Tibetology of the Russian Academy of Sciences, 
Nikolai Kradin, Director of the Institute for the History of Archeology and Ethnography of the Peoples of the Far East of the Russian Academy of Science, Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, 
Irina Popova, Director of the Institute of Oriental Manuscripts of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, 
Natalia Romanova, Deputy Director of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, 
Alexander Vasiliev, Chairman of the Council of Young Scientists of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Director of the International Russian-Turkish Center of the Russian State Humanitarian University, 
and Dinara Dubrovskaya, Head of the Department of Oriental History of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

At the plenary session, the following reports were heard. They aroused great interest:

- Ilya Zaitsev "Dmitry Vasiliev, as I Remember Him"

- Eleonora Kormysheva "Memories of Dmitry Vasiliev"

- Alikber Alikberov "On the methods of Dating Arabographic Epigraphic Texts in the Caucasus"

- Alexander Vasilyev "A New Method of Digital Drawing of Runic Inscriptions"

- Chingiz Aiylmaz "On the Identity, Sageness, and Inscriptions of Bilge Tonyukuk"

- Alexander Stolyarov "Three Quarters of a Century of the Magazine" Epigraphy of the East"

- Mikhail Bukharin "Monuments of Ancient Epigraphy from South Arabia"

- Murtazali Gadzhiev "Arabic Epigraphy of Derbent/Bab al-Abwab: Discoveries of the 21st century (to the 300th Anniversary of Derbent Epigraphy Study)"

The conference was held in several sections: 

1."From Finds to Discoveries: Theory and Practice of Epigraphic Research", 

2."Türkic and Mongolian Epigraphy",

3."Epigraphy of the Caucasus and Crimea",

4."Epigraphy of Ancient Egypt and Mesoamerica",

5."Epigraphy of South and East Asia".

As a result of the conference, a resolution was unanimously adopted. The resolution called for further efforts unification of epigraphists and setting the date for the next International Oriental Epigraphic Readings for 2023.