On 24 January 2007, the regular Readings in Memory of the outstanding Russian specialist on Iran V.G. Lukonin (1932-1984) took place. For many years, Lukonin headed the Oriental Department of the State Hermitage.

Staff of the Oriental Department, as well as from the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences took part in the conference.

G.L. Semenov's report was devoted to an interpretation of the subjects of wall paintings in the Sogdii settlement of Penjikent (present-day Tadjikistan) which are linked to fables and amusing stories. Many of these depictions have parallels in various collections of tales and even among Aesop's fables. Which literary versions of the tales were widespread in this region remains an open question. The speaker offered the suggestion that the use of the subject of fables during the time of Arab rule in Central Asia (beginning in the 7th Century) is linked to the need to discretely express different frames of mind in Aesopian language.

Two reports were devoted to tents kept in the Storage Facility at Staraya Derevenya which were first published in a catalogue for the exhibition of Islamic art in Edinburgh in 2007.

A.D. Pritula's report deals with the Turkish tent, which has been dated to the second half of the 18th century. The tent belonged to an officer of the Ottoman Army and was seized by the Russian Army as a battle trophy. As archival data show, prior to entering the Stables Museum in 1842 (whence it entered the Hermitage), this tent spent time in a Russian military wagon train, i.e., it was used for the purpose for which it had been designed. The embroidery on the tent allows us to trace various tendencies in Turkish art of the 18th century: there is a coexistence of Turkish and European motifs.

The report by L.Yu. Kulakova reconstructs the layout of a tent presented by the Emir of Bukhara to Alexander III in 1893. The tent was a complicated multi-room building with awnings and an inner courtyard. Each section was decorated in an original manner with no ornamentation that repeats itself.

Vladimir Grigoryevich Lukonin
(1932-1984)