Kipchak branch
Kazakhs
A Kipchak Turk people of the steppe of Turkistan, heirs to the Kazakh Khanate and a rich tradition of nomadic music and oral poetry.
Qazaqtar / Kazaklar
The Kazakhs take their name from the groups who, around 1465 under the sultans Kerey and Janibek, broke away from the Uzbek khan Abu’l-Khayr and moved east into Moghulistan. The Kazakh Khanate they founded came to dominate much of the steppe, and later divided into three hordes (zhuz): the Great, Middle and Little Hordes.
Southern Kazakhstan holds one of the most important sites of Turk spiritual history: the city of Turkistan (historic Yasi), where the 12th-century Sufi poet Khoja Ahmed Yasawi lived and was buried. The great mausoleum over his tomb was built by order of Timur from 1389 and left unfinished at Timur’s death in 1405.
In the 18th century the hordes accepted Russian protection against Dzungar raids, and by the mid-19th century their autonomy had ended. Under Soviet rule, forced collectivisation and the settlement of nomadic herders in the early 1930s caused a devastating famine. Kazakhstan declared independence on 16 December 1991.
- Language
- Kazakh, a Kipchak Turk language
- Branch
- Kipchak
- Homeland
- Kazakhstan and the steppes of Turkistan
- Also living in
- China (East Turkestan), Mongolia (Bayan-Ölgii), Russia, Uzbekistan, Türkiye and wider diaspora
Key dates
1166
Death of the Sufi poet Khoja Ahmed Yasawi at Yasi, today’s Turkistan.
c. 1465
Kerey and Janibek lead their followers away from Abu’l-Khayr’s realm and found the Kazakh Khanate.
1731–1742
The Little and Middle Hordes, and part of the Great Horde, accept Russian protection against the Dzungars.
Early 1930s
Forced collectivisation and sedentarisation of nomads lead to a catastrophic famine among the Kazakhs.
16 December 1991
Kazakhstan declares its independence.
Heritage
- The Mausoleum of Khoja Ahmed Yasawi in Turkistan, inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage site in 2003
- Kazakh traditional art of Dombra Kuy, instrumental pieces for the two-stringed dombra (UNESCO, 2014)
- Aitys, the art of improvised sung poetry shared with the Kyrgyz (UNESCO, 2015), and the 19th-century poet Abai Qunanbaiuly, founder of modern Kazakh literature
Sources
- Encyclopaedia Britannica, “Kazakh”
- M. B. Olcott, The Kazakhs, 2nd ed. (Hoover Institution Press, 1995)
- UNESCO World Heritage Centre, “Mausoleum of Khoja Ahmed Yasawi”