Doctor of Historical Sciences, Academician of the Academy of Sciences of Russia Professor Viktor Sarianidi presented a scientific report at the State Museum of Oriental Art in Moscow on November 16. A meeting in the lecture hall of the museum was attended by fellow scientists, his students, as well as students interested in art and history of Turkmenistan.

During his presentation, Victor Sarianidi conducted a brief excursion into the history of his archaeological work in the territory of Mary province of Turkmenistan, where the scientist has been excavating for several decades a large settlement from the Bronze Age (III-II cent. B.C.) called Gonur Depe, presumably a capital of the ancient country Margush that the scientists consider the fifth center of world civilization along with civilizations of Egypt, Mesopotamia, India and China.

The archaeologist described palace and temple complexes excavated in the Ancient Merv, citing evidence that the country Margush was probably home to the first world religion - Zoroastrianism. The participants saw a slide show of sacrificial furnaces and burials, ritual vessels, indicating to the cults of fire, water and land that the Turkmen ancestors worshiped. The photographs of excavated gold and silver ornaments, fragments of the complex mosaic prove the highest level of development of culture and arts of the country Margush.

Victor Sarianidi also presented the latest discoveries made during the spring and fall field excavations in 2009, the year of his 80th anniversary. The scientist demonstrated to his colleagues from the Institute of Archeology the slides with images of recent findings and invited them to joint the study of hitherto unknown works of masters of such a distant past.

The guests congratulated the world-renowned archaeologist on his 80th jubilee as well as on being awarded the Order "For the great love of independent Turkmenistan", which Victor Sarianidi received from Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov in October.