Tajik Eagle Dance

The Tajik eagle dance is current in the Taxkorgan Tajik Autonomous County of the Pamir plateau (under Kashgar prefecture), and is the oldest and most representative folk dance of the Tajik people. The Tajiks revere the eagle as the spirit of the mountains and a symbol of the nation, and the dance grows from the imitation of an eagle's soaring and hunting, passed down through generations at festivals, weddings and horse races. It entered the first national ICH list in 2006.

The eagle dance is built of two parts—the dance itself and the melodies of the eagle flute—fairly fixed in form, with named pieces such as "qapsoz" and "melis." The dancers, often men, bend their arms like wings and spin like a soaring bird, riding the long cadence of the eagle flute (a three-hole pipe carved from an eagle's leg bone) and the hand-drum, recreating the proud sweep of an eagle over the plateau.

Hailed as the "dance of the clouds," the eagle dance carries the Tajik reverence for nature and their pursuit of a good life, a treasure of Pamir plateau culture and a touchstone for the study of highland dance art and ecological aesthetics.