The emergence of ornament is not an accidental phenomenon in history, but is considered one of the ancient human artistic creations. Engraving ornament is influenced by natural phenomenon but based on understanding the concepts and views that appear in people's imagination and subsequently transform into logic and symbolic image. Therefore, it becomes obvious that it was not an external influence, but ideas and concepts in the human understanding of the world, which shaped the foundation of ornament. This perception is reflected in the shapes engraved on various objects such as in earthenware.

Even thousands of years ago, during the late Stone Age, ancient people perceived the need to preserve food and consequently they started weaving baskets and then producing earthenware. From those times onward pottery developed and in the sixth millennium BCE the production of ornamented earthenware became common among Aryan people. With the so-phistication of pottery production technology in me sixtn millennium BCE, the one tier kiln, and during tie third millennium BCE the two-tier kiln were invented for firing pottery. In 7000-6000 BCE early Tajiks were making various vessels mom clay. Initially, this activity had only domes- tic significance and over the millennia turned into a kind of widespread artistic practice of the Tajik people.

The most ancient samples of Central Asian ceramic vessels were coarse and simple. Archaeologists have excavated excellent samples of ornamented vessels from Jay tun, the famous center of the first Central Asian agriculturalists. Jaytun inhabitants initially decorated vessel with ornament resembling wavy as well as horizontal and vertical sets of lines Researchers of fine art history believe that on simple ancient vessels short vertical lines symbolise rain, and horizontal and wavy lines represent water flowing down streams and rivers. Dotted concentric ornament and quadrangular decoration of various forms are the symbols of an area under cultivation. In ancient Tripolitanian ornament we can see the symbols for the sun, the stars and different trees in a single composition. This ornamentation, representing the solar system and planets, can also be seen on ceramic vessels unearthed near architectural monuments within the territories of present-day Tajikistan. The majority of ancient ornament had a symbolic meaning and did not lose its original essence, even though later these symbols were mostly used for decorating vessels.

Initially, in order to produce ceramic cutlery, earth was dug up and formed into shapes according to the type of intended pot. Another method of preparing ceramic tableware was as follows: a piece of cloth and leather was filled with soil and sand, a certain pot shape was given to it and then clay was worked around it. When the clay dried, the pot makers opened the cloth or leather and through a hole left in the pot they emptied out the soil and sand. The potter's wheel was invented in the Bronze Age and it became a male occupation. Women were mostly active in hand-made pottery. Gradually sophisticated ornament appeared on crockery.

In terms of monuments left from the Bronze Age and the distinctive features of monuments from this period, the entire Central Asian territories can be divided into three historical and cultural regions: 1) Southern Turkmenistan;

2) Khorazm and Tajikistan; 3) Uzbekistan and partially Kyrgyzstan. Tableware ornament unearthed in these regions has both common and distinctive aspects. Potters produced khum, khumcha (big and small clay jars), khurma, kuza (jugs) kosa (bowls), jom (cups), piyola (cups), lali (plates), tabaq (trays) and other ornamented tableware.

Archaeologists have found fine examples of ancient Tajik pottery from Sarazm, a monument of Tajikistan dating to the later Neolithic and the Bronze Age. Sarazm residents produced handmade pots as well as items made on the potters' wheel and painted on them different ornament using colours prepared from clay. Broken geometric ornament, broken, latticed and wavy crosses as well as vertical and horizontal lines can be seen in Sarazm-based (Panjakent District) tableware. More patterns vertical and horizontal lines can be seen in the tableware of Dashti Qozi (Panjakent District). Ornamented pots found in Qayraqqum are also attractive. Triangles with sharp comers directed downwards have been drawn in the external upper part of some of the pots. Unlike pots found in Asht graves, supplementary ornamentation can be seen in the empty spaces between sequentially drawn triangles in Qayraqqum pots. Vertical lines cross each other within the triangles and bring to mind a chessboard. Similar triangular ornament can also be seen in the tableware discovered in Oqtangi in the Shahriston district. Qayraqqum residents in the Bronze Age were originally cattle-breeders. Therefore, vegetal ornament is hardly ever seen in their tableware. The ornament on tableware belonging to the Vakhsh culture is also appealing. Tableware of the Bronze Age discovered at the Tughuzak monument has been produced using the scratch method, and the archaeologist L.T. Pyankova has called this type of earthenware ornament 'comblike'. Triangular, dotted and curvy lined ornament can be seen in the tableware of Tughuzak dating to the second millennium BCE, The pots found at the Ghelot of Kulob bears a circular, sun-like ornament its centre. A broken cross is drawn clearly in the centres of some pots dating back to the Bronze Age in the Kulob area. The broken cross is one of the most ancient ornaments, various examples of which we can find in artefacts of fine and applied arts such as decorations and architecture. Artists and craftsmen of different nations have used this type of ornament in almost all periods of time. The broken cross ornament is mostly related to the imagination of ancient people regarding the solar system. Researchers have interpreted it as the symbol of the sun and the four basic elements of life: soil, wind, water and fire.

Clay painted and ornamented pots dating to the early Iron Age have been excavated from Asht cemeteries by the archaeologist E.D. Saltovskaya. Ornament in the external upper part of these pots is drawn in the form of rhombus with netlike and dotted decoration. Triangular ornament is generally drawn around the necks of some earthenware bottles and red vertical lines are draw inside these triangles. One can see three additional wavy lines and one whirl decoration between each of the triangles. The whirl decoration is still in use and expresses an understanding of water's original significance for life. We can also observe this in modem clay painted pots in Khatlon, Badakhshon and Fayzabad. However, the symbolic meaning is not so clear for modern potters as they now use the whirl ornament only to decorate earthenware. Wavy ornament between triangles are drawn both in the vertical and horizontal positions.

The enamelling of tableware using alkali commenced sometime between 500 BCE and 500 AD. Archaeologists have found ancient enamelled tableware from Bokhtar, Khorazm and Port. In those times, turquoise and yellowish enamelled tableware of a high quality was being produced.

The use of red clay paint reached its peak during the reign of Greco-Bactrian and Kushanid Empire. Firstly, Kushanid potters drew different types of ornament around the neck of large clay jugs before firing. Numerous stamps were imprinted in the external part of large Kushanid large clay jugs (2^nd century BCE - 4^th century AD). For example, star-like stamps can be seen in Kushanid tableware from the Hisar Valley and the tradition of utilizing similar stamps continued until the 18^th-19^th centuries. In 1974, E.P. Denisov discovered a Kushanid shard in the Khoki Safed foothills of the Parkamchi village of the Danghara district. The external part of the shard displays very beautifully drawn luscious ears of wheat. The superb quality of the highstemmed cups and outstanding and attractive Kushanid ornament reflect the high stage of development of the Tajik people's ancient craft of potter

Numerous types of pottery developed even in ancient times in historical and cultural centres of the Tajik people in Balkh, Koshon, Isfahan, Nishapur, Bukhara, Samarkand, Khorazm, Panjakant, Istaravshan, Khujand, Konibodom, Isfara, Shuman, Vashgird, Kulob, Hulbuk, Munk, Vakhsh, Hisor, Shahrisabz and other places.

Pre-lslamic Panjakant is one of the ancient pottery centres of the Tajik people. Panjakant potters mostly decorated their tableware with zoomorphic subjects such as pictures of birds, wild animals and domestic animals in an artistic mode.

The 8^th and 9^th centuries are considered to be the new period of Tajik pottery development. New types of tableware enamelling emerged in this period and thenceforth, white clay paint and lead powder were mostly used for decoration. The Samanid period was the time of great development for the production of enamelled and clay-painted ornamented tableware. The present territories of Tajikistan, Bunjikat, Hulbuk, Shishkhona and Khujand were at that time the main centres for the production of enameled and ornamented tableware. One can divide the ornamentation of enameled tableware produced during the Samanid times into vegetal, geometric, zoomorphic and epigraphic styles. By this time, Tajik potters also used artistic inscriptions which appear at first very similar to vegetal ornaments. During the 11^thand 12^th centuries potters mostly used standard ornament. Ornamented buckets left from this period are very beautiful. The Mongol invasion in the middle of the 13^th century put obstacles in the way of subsequent pottery development. However, during the 14^th and 15^th centuries, production of enameled and ornamented tableware with inscriptions developed again. One of the particular features of ornament in enamelled tableware produced during this period is that separate couplets from Tajik classical poems are inscribed in their internal and external parts.

During the 16^th- 20^th centuries, Tajik people

in Shahrisabz, Samarkand, Bukhara, Khujand, Konibodom, Chorkuh, Qaratogh, Sari Khosor, Dashti Jum, Tashkent and Khiva, further developed the pottery traditions of their ancestors and mostly produced ornamented plates, large and small bowls, cups and trays.

An important feature of this period's pottery production is that craftsmen of other Central Asian peoples such as Kyrgyz, Uzbek, Kazakh, made wide use of Tajik ornament. Even the terminology of some the ornament and earthenware produced by them is Tajik. This proves the rich and colourful history of Tajik pottery ski: and its positive influence on others.