The status of the Supreme Khans of Merv according to the materials of the «Collection of geographical, topographic and statistical materials on Asia»

In 1884, Merv was joined to the Russian Empire. The joining of Merv was one of the final stages in the annexation of Central Asia as a whole and its integration into the Russian Empire. This process is reflected in an extensive historiography, among which there are works close to the topic of this article. In this regard, the question arises about the preparation of the accession of the Merv. This issue is reflected in the «Collection of geographical, topographic and statistical materials on Asia». The purpose of the research in this article is the status of the Merv Khans in the publications of the «Collection of geographical, topographic and statistical materials on Asia» for 1883. It is interesting in this regard that a special consideration of the issue of the Merv Khans was undertaken by the engineer, and later by the diplomat and N.V. Charykov's successor P.M. Lessar on the eve of the annexation of Merv. At the same time, P.M. Lessar did not question the status of the khans in other territories of Central Asia. The question of the status of the Merv Khans was not abstract and theoretical but had important practical significance. Due to the need to establish order in Merv, it was necessary to understand whether it was possible to resolve this issue without joining Merv by reaching an agreement with the Khan of Merv. In any case, P.M. Lessar believed that the accession of Merv was inevitable. Having raised questions at the beginning of the article about whether the Merv supreme khans have real authority and whether they are able to guarantee compliance with agreements with the Russian administration on the organization of life of the local population, which excluded robbery and other antisocial phenomena, he formulated a conclusion, only negative answers are possible to all these questions. P.M. Lessar, who studied the issue of the organization of power in Merv, concluded that the status of the supreme khan was nominal there and identified factors that hindered the organization of a systemic order in principle.