Dilnoza Duturaeva
Lecturer in Medieval History

Profile

Biography

BA, MA, and PhD (Tashkent), FRHistS

Dilnoza Duturaeva is a Lecturer in Medieval History and a member of the Centre for Medieval Studies. She graduated from Tashkent State University of Oriental Studies and received her PhD in History from the Academy of Sciences of Uzbekistan, during which she was a visiting researcher at the University of Halle-Wittenberg and the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Before joining the Department of History in January 2023, she held a three-year DFG Research Fellowship at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales in Paris and was a Senior Research Fellow at the Academy of Sciences of Uzbekistan. She also held a Humboldt Postdoctoral Fellowship at the University of Bonn and a Gerda Henkel Research Fellowship at the University of Nanjing.

Her research focuses on Asian interconnections and global trade in the pre-modern period. Her first book, Qarakhanid Roads to China: A History of Sino-Turkic Relations, reconsiders the diplomacy, trade, and geography of transcontinental networks between Central Asia and China from the 10th to 12th centuries, challenging the concept of a “Silk Road crisis” between the fall of the Tang and the rise of the Mongols. She is currently developing new projects on the history of Moghulistan and global caravan routes (14th-17th centuries), and on human-animal interactions along the Silk Roads.

Teaching

Undergraduate

An example of modules taught:

•        HIS00086C Societies & Economies in World History
•        HIS00140I Before the Mongols: Nomadic Empires of Central Eurasia, 900-1200
•        HIS00137H Animals

Postgraduate

An example of modules taught:

•        HIS00138M Trans-Asian Trade along the Silk Roads, 1000-1200

Research

Overview

Duturaeva’s research centres on the conditions and driving forces of globalisation in Eurasia, with a particular focus on trade routes and networks in the pre-modern world. Her interests lie broadly within global history from a non-European perspective, including imperial China, the history of Central Asia, transregional nomadic empires, animal history, Silk Road studies, Sino-Islamic relations, diplomacy, trade, and cross-cultural exchange.

Projects

Her first book, Qarakhanid Roads to China: A History of Sino-Turkic Relations (Leiden: Brill, 2022), examines Sino-Turkic diplomatic and cultural interactions in the pre-Mongol period. It explores trade and diplomacy during the Northern Song and Liao dynasties in China, and the Qarakhanid, Ghaznavid, and Saljuq dynasties in Central Eurasia, using Chinese and Central Asian sources together with archaeological and visual materials.

She is currently working on two projects: one investigates trans-Asian caravan routes linking Moghulistan with Ming China, Timurid/Shaybanid Central Asia, and Mughal India; the other explores human–animal relationships along the Silk Roads. Together, these projects aim to reframe global caravan networks and rehabilitate the connected history of pre-modern and early modern Central Asia, long dismissed as marginal in the Eurasian context.

Supervision

Duturaeva welcomes inquiries from prospective students interested in the history of medieval Central Asia and China, particularly those working on Silk Road studies, international relations, global trade, and connectivity.

External Activity

Memberships

• Fellow of the Royal Historical Society (2023–)
• Fellow of the National Center of Archaeology, Academy of Sciences of Uzbekistan (2021–)
• Associate Member of the Center for Turkish, Ottoman, Balkan and Central Asian Studies, EHESS, Paris (2020–)
• Member of the Steppe Sisters Network Steering Committee (2020–)
• Member of the European Society for Central Asian Studies (2009–)