Turkestan

Khodja Akhmed Yasaui Mausoleum

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Founded perhaps as early as the 5th century AD, and known as Yasy till the 16th, the town was by the 12th century an important trade and religious centre, on a boundary between nomadic and agricultural societies. Later it became a northerly outpost of the Kokand khanate, falling to the Russian push of 1864.
In Turkestan there is found Kazakhstan‘s greatest building and an important site of Muslim pilgrimage – Khodja Akhmed Yasaui Mausoleum, which according to its size is equal to Bibi-Khanum Mosque in Samarkand. Khodja Akhmed Yasaui, the revered 12th century Sufi teacher and mystical poet, underwent ascetic Sufi training in Bukhara, but spent the rest of his life in Turkestan. He founded the Yasaui Sufi sect. The legend tells that at the age of 63 he retired to an underground cell in mourning for the Prophet Muhammad who had died at the same age.
Khodja Akhmed Yasaui died in 1166 and was buried with great honour in a small mausoleum erected for him, which subsequently became a place of mass pilgrimage and worship for Moslems.
The present mausoleum was built 233 years after his death under the order of Timur in the late 14th century. In numerous bloody battles Timur destroyed the power of the Golden Horde and in honour of this victory he decided to build a new, grandiose memorial complex. Timur had died before it was completed and the front face was left unfinished. In the main chamber there is a vast bronze kazan (iron pot) for holy water. Kazan is the symbol of unity and hospitality. That’s why special significance was attached to its size and exterior. It has diameter 2,45 m., weight – 2 tons and it is made of the alloys of 7 metals.