In this extreme environment, detailed knowledge of the ecological and climatic circumstances was necessary for survival, and the Loptuq transmitted information to each following generation in different ways. The local knowledge learned in childhood formed a foundation to understand what they observed, heard, perceived and experienced in the landscape, and together with what they learned during their lifetime, it contributed ultimately to their ability to live and subsist in the area. The Loptuq way of life and culture was adapted to the local ecological conditions in many ways: they lived in scattered hamlets spread out along the river and lake shores, consisting of small groups of 10–20 households. Seasonal migrations between summer and winter settlements were common. Especially the abundance of mosquitoes forced many Loptuq away from the waterways in summer [35, 60] The limited biological resources and ecosystem services provided by their habitat were mainly provisional, food, raw materials, energy, folk medicine and ornamental, but they were also used in several important biocultural domains [65, 66].

The Loptuq were well adapted to the local conditions, but they also transformed the environment and named it while obtaining food and raw materials. Knowledge about waterways and channels formed an essential component in Loptuq perceptions of the environment and their mental geography. The most striking example is probably the reed belt in the marshlands and lake. According to Hedin, a belt of gigantic reed, “each fully 25 feet [7.6 m] in height and measuring 2–¼ inches [5–0.6 cm] in circumference at the surface of the water, stretched diagonally across the lake” where the Loptuq lived [40]. Man-made narrow channels, čapγan or ‘small channel’, around one metre wide, ran through the dense reeds. Some of the channels would disperse into the lake, others into further channels, and their importance for the local geography is reflected in the fact that they were named: Qum čapγan ‘Sandy canal’, Jurt čapγan ‘Village canal’, Širge čapγan ‘Širge’s canal’, Tusun čapγan ‘Tusun’s canal’, Abdal čapγan ‘Abdal’s canal’, Gaday čapγan ‘Gaday’s canal’ and so on [26, 53] (Fig. 4).

Loptuq men negotiating a man-made narrow channel, čapγan, in the reed belt of Lop Nor (Photo Sven Hedin)

Ilek on the other hand indicated a wider waterway or stream, often between lake and river, a common feature among reed belts [25]. A number of place names deriving from this hydronym were documented by Hedin: Aqilek ‘The white river’, Bozilek ‘The grey river’, Gun ilek ‘The deep river’, Ïdïq ilek ‘The stinking river’, Jaman ilek ‘The difficult river’, etc. [26, 63]. He noted that it was important to keep the waterways open, or they would grow over. The men took care of this; often they would tie the reeds together or bend them over, so that they could move about among the walls of reed to their fishing grounds in the lake or lagoons between the reeds. Each family had their own channels and locations to put out their nets, although all had the right to use the channels for transport. Hedin observed “hundreds of nets” and “countless shoals of fish” in the clear water during a boat trip [26, 34, 40].

Naming the waterscape was an efficient strategy to describe and transmit knowledge, and also to define and decide on fishing and gathering rights of each family. The toponyms and hydronyms form a mental map closely connected with information, economic, ecological, social, etc., highly important for the Loptuq. Words especially with reed, fish, boat and waterway connotations abound in the Loptuq language, reflecting the importance of these aspects in their everyday life, culture, individual and collective memory, worldview, understanding and perception of the environment. Other dimensions appearing in toponyms are ecological features, such as plant or animal abundance in a place, outward aspect of the landscape, or economic, social or remarkable event-related naming [26]. The environment also provided cultural ecological services such as motifs for their folklore, linguistic expressions and songs [31, 33, 39, 55].

The main food-procuring activity of the Loptuq was fishing. This is also reflected in the abundance of terminology related to fishes and tools. The inhabitants in Lop Nur used gölme ‘fishing nets’, čaŋγaq ‘a type of hook’, sačγaq ‘spear’ and qarmaq ‘fish hook’ [31, 59, 67], and their most important possessions and tools were the above-mentioned and dugout canoes, traps and the nets made of Poacynum fibre. Both men and women knitted nets. The fishing season lasted from early spring to late autumn, but in times of need, fishing could be done also in other seasons. The Loptuq used different techniques for fishing, depending on the place and fish species they wanted to catch. Nets and seines were put into the lakes or rivers from canoes, and the fish were driven into the nets by men and women alike. In the spring, after the flooding of the river, fish remained in isolated lagoons and were easy to catch. Spring catches were dried unsalted in the sun for the winter and then stored in reed huts. Sven Hedin also noted that fishing was done along the Tarim River or in the lake when a sheet of floating ice, kömül or qade, formed on the surface in late autumn [23, 25, 31, 63]. According to Pevtsov, the Loptuq at Qara Qoshun (Kara Koshun on map. Figure 2.) distinguished five species of fish (Table 2) [34]. Minlaj is most probably a loanword from Chinese for the fish miánlǐ. Before 1958, the Tarim River was home to around 15 native fish species [68]. A few other fish species known by the Loptuq were mentioned by travellers, but cannot be identified; among them is Hedin’s and Malov’s laqu, the biggest fish in Lop Nor with a big head [31, 63, 66, 69]. Another unidentified large fish was the juγan [63]. More recently, the Uyghur ethnographer Häbibullah Abdurehim mentions a few other species: bélijan, tirna, patmačuq (over three metres and 15 kg) and loha (more than 25 kg) [70]. Fresh fish were eaten boiled, while dried fish were first steeped in salt water and then fried [24] (Fig. 5).

Wood mallet used to kill fish. Collected by Georg Söderbom in Charchak at Kum-darya during the Hedin expedition in May 1934 (Museum of Ethnography, Stockholm)

Plant diversity was poor in the Lop Nor area, which might explain the limited use of plants both for food and material culture among the Loptuq. Natural vegetation was sparse in the region overall and poor in the number of species. Useful species were few. For example, in 1979–1982, the Lop Nor Scientific Expedition collected in all 36 species of plants of 13 families, mainly Chenopodiaceae and Compositae and 26 genera. All these species are drought-resistant, salt-tolerant shrubs and perennial grasses. The flora and also the fauna were according to the explorers more species-rich over a hundred years earlier, when water availability was more abundant; today the area is completely arid.

According to Hedin, the Loptuq villagers of Tikenlik ‘Thistle place’ subsisted on fish, stalks and sprouts of jäkän or southern cattail, Typha domingenis Pers., which was common in the reed belts. In addition to fish they also hunted wild ducks, and took eggs from wild ducks and geese [53], gathered berries and consumed the fruits, known as qarγa-jigdä ‘crow berry’, of the oleaster, Elaeagnus angustifolia L. [63, 73, 74]. Häbibulla Abdurehim notes that in the 1930s, cattail pulp, wheat grains and oleaster fruits were consumed. The latter was especially used to season fish soup [59]. According to one of the Russian linguist Nikolay Katanov’s informants in Turpan in the 1890s, these berries were prepared as a kind of soup. Each Loptuq adult would pick an average of 10–20 bags of the berries in summer. The young spring sprouts of reed, Phragmites australis (Cav.) Trin. ex Strud., were also used as food. In summer, panicles were harvested to produce a tough, viscous mass which was used as sugar [23]. According to a couple of sources, roots of Poacynum pictum (Schrenck) Baill. (Syn. Apocynum pictum) were roasted and served as human food [23, 33] (Table 3). Other berries were harvested as well (Fig. 6).

Voucher specimen of wolfberry, Lycium ruthenicum, gathered by Sven Hedin at Lop Nor in the spring of 1900. On the label he noted the local plant name Ak-tikken, i.e. aq tikän, ‘white tikän’, with a note that it is very common, and a popular place name in the Lop Nor region (Swedish Museum of Natural History, Stockholm)

The few fish species provided the Loptuq (Fig. 7) with food and oil, and the migratory and breeding waterfowls, cormorants, ducks, geese and swans gave them nourishment in the form of meat, fat and egg, and feathers for clothing [50], but otherwise the fauna in the Loptuq environment was poor in numbers and species. The Lop Nor Scientific Expedition collected only 127 species; 23 mammals, 91 birds, seven reptiles, one amphibian. Many wild animals, including tiger, wolf and wild hog, which were observed by explorers a century ago, have disappeared [71] (Table 4).

Loptuq fisherman with an impressive fish catch at the Tarim River (Photo David Hummel 1934 during the Fourth Hedin expedition)

The reed waterscape contained besides fish also mussels, snakes, crabs and many kinds of fowl. Ducks and other waterfowl hunting with snares took place in salty shallows during spring and autumn migration seasons, and some of the meat was preserved [24]. Wild boar, wolf, fox, weasel and hare were also hunted [23, 25, 34], as was the Caspian tiger, Panthera tigris virgata, now extinct [75]. The tiger was mostly hunted with poison or iron traps (tozaq) for fur which was traded for other goods [63]. Tiger flesh medicine was popular among the Chinese, and traders paid high prices for tigers [23, 34, 40, 50, 55]. A place was even called Jolbarš äsildi ‘Where the tiger was killed,’ probably an experience-based toponym [63].

Other fur and skin animals the Loptuq hunted were Eurasian otter, Lutra lutra, red foxes, Vulpes vulpes and whooper swans, Cygnus cygnus. All these were bartered with traders or peasants in settlements [49, 66]. Local begs also collected tax in furs, and the Loptuq paid yearly a certain amount of otter skin to the amban of Turpan. Wild Bactrian camels, Camelus bactrianus ferus, were killed at water spots in summer and autumn by specialized hunters, often in the Kumtagh desert, for their wool, which fetched high prices in towns like Turpan [76]. The Loptuq ate the meat and made footwear of the skins. Already in the 1870s, camels were decreasing in number and today they are almost extinct [22, 23]. In the summer, some Loptuq escaped from mosquitoes and other insects in the marshes to the mountains, where they hunted wild yak, Bos grunniens mutus, and Asian wild ass, Equus hemionus, for meat and hides. Hunters would also leave for the Tibetan plateau in autumn to obtain fur animals such as Tibetan antelopes Pantholops hodgsonii, Maral deer, Cervus elaphus yarkandensis, and wild horses, Equus ferus przewalskii [49]. Being Muslims, however, the Loptuq did not hunt wild boar, Sus scrofa L., 1758 [77]; therefore, according to some explorers, the numerous boars did not fear humans [23, 25]. Snares were set among the reed in order to catch ducks. Also swans were taken with snares [33].

Animal skins and bird feathers were utilized for clothing purposes. A traditional winter headdress was a sheepskin cap, and men could wear a fox fur hat in winter and a lighter felt cap in summer. In winter, women wore duck-feather hats with feathers facing to the outside, and in summer they covered their heads with a scarf made of Lop hemp fibres. Swans provided downs used in clothing [33]. Duck feathers were sold to visiting pedlars [23, 24] (Fig. 8).

Torsion trap made of wood and fibres for capturing pigeons and chukars. Gathered by Nils Ambolt in Cherchen village during the Fourth Hedin expedition in the 1930s (Hedin-Bendix Collection, Museum of Ethnography, Stockholm)

Except daily garments the Loptuq also had festive clothing. At Qara-Qoshun at least, people habitually slept without taking off their clothes. They also thought that to avoid sudden fire or robbery, it was best to keep extra clothes far from home, and bury the clothes in the sand; only they knew where [23].

The Loptuq normally walked bare-footed, but in wintertime, they wore čoruk,simple shoes made of undressed hide. In winter, they usually lined their cloaks with duck-skins dressed with salt. When animal husbandry increased among the Loptuq at the end of the nineteenth century, sheepskin coats appeared. According to Huntington, the Loptuq summer dress in 1905 consisted of quilted common tunics reaching below the knee, high leather boots and fur-brimmed caps [23, 27].

The common reed, Phragmites australis, in the Loptuq vernacular referred to as qamïš [31], was abundant and in addition to food also essential for the construction of huts, satma or qamïš öj (Fig. 9), furniture and as fuel. In the autumn, reed panicles were gathered for making beds [23]. Reed provided many services also for the culture: corpses were placed on a stretcher made of reeds at funerals, and often also covered with reeds [33]. In the reed belts, there was a kind of grass known as aqčï, identified as Arundinella nepalensis, which was used for making baskets and mats [63] (Table 5).

Huts were generally constructed with a framework of poplar, Populus euphratica logs. Corner logs, tuluk, roof beams baraj, and smaller joints, čäsijaγač, were important to keep the structure together. Vertical reed bundles were tied to the logs, and the earthen floor covered with reeds. A flat reed roof was added, with the hope that it would keep against the rough handling by the winds [78].Three categories have been identified by Uyghur ethnographer Häbibulla: wall house (tam öj) made of wood; adobe house (čaplima öj) made of reed, covered with a layer of straw and mud; and reed house (qamïš öj) [59]. Basement houses, geme, are huts dug out in the ground and built of branches and reed [55, 63, 70], while alčuq is a small wooden shed [63] (Fig. 10).

A house was never demolished if a Loptuq family had to move elsewhere, because they might return at a later point; and if someone else chose to settle in the area, they could use the house [67]. Henri d’Orléans noticed swallow nests inside the huts and was told that birds were greatly respect [33].

Euphrates poplar, Populus euphratica, locally known as toγraq, was used for dugout canoes (kemi) (Figs. 11, 12). The poplars must grow at a distance from the water to be of good quality for a canoe [21, 31, 43,