The fortress "Janbas-Kala" (4th century BC)

Janbas-Kala belongs to the period from the fourth century BC to the first AD and lies in Karakalpakstan, near the village of Kukcha. The fortress, 200 by 170 metres, covered the south-eastern frontier of ancient Khorezm.

What sets it apart from other Khorezmian forts is what it lacks: there are no corner towers and none along the walls. Defence rested on loopholes arranged in threes — one straight, two angled in opposite directions. On the two-tier ten-metre wall alone there are about four hundred of them, staggered, so that the defenders could loose a plunging volley of arrows at the attackers all at once.

The town survived until the first century AD. Nomads then took it, breaching the wall with a ram, and it was never rebuilt. What remains are the massive walls, well preserved in the Kyzylkum sands — and they show clearly how the whole shooting system was arranged.