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Hazrat-e Turkestan (modern name Türkistan, Kazakh: Түркістан), a city in the southern region of Kazakhstan, near the Syr Darya river, is where the capital of ancient Kangju (康居) was located prior to being moved to Zhe’she. It has a population of 85,600 and is situated 160 km (100 miles) north-west of Taraz (Aulie-Ata) on the Trans-Aral Railway between Ak-Mechet (Perovsk) to the north and Tashkent to the south ().

Türkistan is the most historic city in Kazakhstan with an archaeological record dating back to the 4th century. (For a brief description click here). To the Chinese it was known as Beitian. Later it was known as Yasi or Shavgar to the 16th century, it was an important trade centre.

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. Under his aegis the city became the most important centre of learning for the peoples of the Kazakh steppes. 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.

The city still attracts thousands of pilgrims. According to local tradition, three pilgrimages to Türkistan are said to be equivalent to one Hajj to Mecca, although this is not widely accepted elsewhere in the Muslim World. The Saint was held in such reverence that the city was even known as the Second Mecca of the East, and it is of enormous importance for Muslims in Kazakhstan.

Other important historical sites include a mediaeval bath-house and four other mausoleums, one to Timur's granddaughter and three to Kazakh khans (rulers).

Throughout its history Türkistan 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 nomads 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.

When it fell to the Russians in 1863 it was under the suzerainty of the Khanate of Kokand. Türkistan 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.

Modern-day Türkistan has a population of 85,600 (1999 census), almost all of whom are ethnic Uzbeks. The population rose by 10% from 1989-99, making it the second-fastest growing town in Kazakhstan, after the new capital Astana.

Turkestan may be reached by train from Almaty, in a journey of nearly 20 hours. The road trip from the nearest airport at Shymkent takes about two hours.

Historical background

To the Chinese the Jeti-su became known only at the end of the second century B.C. Wusun dominated the Jeti-Su at the time of the first Chinese embassies, though remnants of both the Saka and the Yüeh-chih remained in the Jeti-su. At the time, Jeti-Su bordered Fargana on the south-west, Kang-chu to the west, and Huns on the east.

The seventh century A.D. Chinese writer Yan Shigu described Wusuns "Among the various Rong in the Western Regions, the Wusun's shape was the strangest; and the present barbarians who have green eyes and red hair, and are like a macaque, belonged to the same race as the Wusun."^[1][2]

Around the year 105 B.C. the Chinese ambassador Chang-Chien came to the Wu-sun with suggestion that they should return to the East and in alliance with the Chinese resume their struggle against the Huns, but was coldly received at the kun-mo's camp and found no response. In the second century the Wusun completely detached themselves from China, and Huns in formidable numbers crossed Jeti-su in their migration from Mongolia to the west. The place of the Huns was taken by the Hsien-pi, who conquered all the Huns lands to the Wusun possessions. In the fourth century the Hsien-pi ruler Yü-lü conquered the ancient Wu-sun lands. From the end of the 4th century to the middle of the 6th the Jeti-su subordinated to the [Joujan]. The raids of the Joujan forced Wusun to abandon the plains of the Jeti-su for the mountains of Tien-shan. After this the name of Wusun as independent people disappeared from history, and as is well-known, their name has survived only in the name of the great Kazakh horde (the Uysun) ^[3].

In the sixth century A.D. Jeti-Su, formerly the land of the Wusun, became the centre of the Western Türkic Kaganate, and as such remained in all successive nomad states in the western part of Central Asia ^[4].

Chinese, Arab and Persian sources draw a comparatively clear picture of the grouping of the Turkic tribes after the fall of the Western Turkic Kaganate. In the Jeti-su alone remained Türgeshes. They had two tribes: Tukhshi (Tukhsi) and Azes, Azes are identical with the people Az] mentioned in the Orkhon inscriptions. At that time was mentioned the Yasi pass on the road from Fargana to Barskhan. In the second half of the 8th century supremacy in the Jeti-su passed to the Karluks. Another reference to the Yasi pass came from 1370es, on the road to Uzgand. In the 1598 the Uzbek khan Tevek Kül took the towns of Tashkent and Yasi,^[5]. already also called Hazrat-e Turkestan.

Notes and references

External links

• Description of archaeological investigations

See also

• Mausoleum of Khoja Ahmed Yasavi