CHERCHEN  , a

town of East Turkestan, situated at the northern foot of the Altyn-tagh, a range of the Kuen-lun, in 85° 35' E., and on the Cherchen-darya, at an altitude of 4100 ft . It straggles mostly along the irrigation channels that go off from the left side of the river, and in 19oo had a population of about 2000 . The Cherchen-darya, which rises in the Arka-tagh, a more southerly range of the Kuen-lun, in 87° E. and 36° 20' N., flows north until it strikes the desert below Cherchen, after which it turns north-east and meanders through a wide bed (300-400 ft.), beset with dense reeds and flanked by older channels . It is probable that anciently it entered the disused channel of the Ettek-tarim, but at present it joins the existing Tarim in the lake of Kara-buran, a sort of lacustrine " ante-room " to the Kara-koshun (N . M . Przhevalsky's Lop-nor) . At its entrance into the former lake the Cherchen-darya forms a broad delta . The river is frozen in its lower course for two to three months in the winter . From the foot of the mountains to the oasis of Cherchen it has a fall of nearly 4000 ft., whereas in the 300 M. or so from Cherchen to the Kara-buran the fall is 140C ft . The total length is 5oo-600 m., and the drainage basin measures 6000-7000 sq. m . See Sven Hedin, Scientific Results of a Journey in Central Asia, 7899-1902, vols. i. and ii . (1905–1906); also TAKLA-MAKAN .