States in North-Western Central Asia
The fifth to the first centuries BC saw a gradual process of social change amongst the tribes of Central Asia, with the intensification of farming economies developing hand-in-hand with the settlement of tribes into sedentary communities. The Aral and Syr Darya region of northern Central Asia was a point at which sedentary southern cultures met nomadic northern tribes, and as such, has been a melting pot of technological developments, in irrigation, agriculture, mining and manufacture.