Hazrat-e Turkestan

Hazrat-e Turkestan is a town situated in southern Kazakhstan near the Syr Darya river, on the Trans-Aral Railway between Ak-Mechet (Perovsk) to the north and Tashkent to the south. It is normally known today simply as Turkestan. Its has a population (1999 estimate) of 70,000, almost all of whom are ethnic Kazakh.

Related Topics:
Kazakhstan - Syr Darya - Trans-Aral Railway - Ak-Mechet - Tashkent - Kazakh

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The name Hazrat-e Turkestan literally means "the Saint (or Blessed One) of Turkestan" and refers to Khoja Ahmad Yasavi, the great Sufi Shaikh of Turkestan, who was born here at the turn of the 11th century AD, and is buried in the town. In the 1390s Timur erected a magnificent domed Mazar or tomb over his grave, which is without doubt the most significant architectural monument to be found anywhere in Kazakhstan.

Related Topics:
Khoja Ahmad Yasavi - Sufi - Shaikh - Timur - Tomb over his grave

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Throughout its history Turkestan has been a border town, lying as it does on the fringes of the settled Perso-Islamic oasis culture of Transoxiana to the south, and the world of the Turko-Mongol steppe nomad to the north. Accordingly at times it has been an important Kazakh political centre, and at others a frontier town under the control of the Uzbek Khanates further south. Founded in the 5th century and known as Yasi or Shavgar to the 16th century, it was an important trade center.

Related Topics:
Oasis - Transoxiana - Steppe - Nomad - Uzbek

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When it fell to the Russians in 1863 it was under the suzerainty of the Khanate of Kokand. Turkestan was in the Syr-Darya Oblast of the Governor-Generalship of Russian Turkestan. When the Tsarist regime fell in 1917-18 it was briefly part of the Turkestan Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic before being incorporated into the new Kazakh SSR in 1924.

Related Topics:
Khanate of Kokand - Syr-Darya - Oblast - Governor-Generalship - Russian Turkestan - Tsarist - 1917 - Turkestan Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic - Kazakh SSR

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