Aral Sea

The Aral Sea filled an inland basin between the lower courses of the Amu Darya and Syr Darya, in the lands of Khwarazm and Kath. As an endorheic salt lake it had no outlet to the ocean, so its level depended entirely on river inflow and evaporation. The name means roughly “Sea of Islands,” recalling more than eleven hundred islands that once rose from its surface. Both rivers flowed into it, and its fisheries and island settlements depended on the balance between them. The lake's basin reached across Transoxiana and Khorasan, so events far from its shore, such as changes to the rivers upstream, could alter its waters.