Turkestan Album

Turkestan Album (Turkestanskii Al’bom or Tуркестанский альбом) is a unique publication dedicated to the history, ethnography, geography, economy and culture of Central Asia before 1917, which contains over 1,200 rare photographs.

[3] This work is the “Archaeological Part” of the Turkestan Album, which contains a detailed visual record of the Islamic architecture of Samarkand as it appeared shortly after the Russian conquest in the 1860s.

The mid-to-late 19th century was when the Russian Empire expanded into Central Asia, annexing territories located in present-day Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, and Kyrgyzstan.

General Konstantin Petrovich von Kaufman (1818–82), the first governor-general, commissioned Turkestan Album, a visual survey of Central Asia that includes some 1,200 photographs, along with architectural plans, watercolor drawings, and maps.

Each plate contains from one to eight gold-toned albumen photographic prints, with occasional watercolor drawings, architectural plans, and battle maps.