The Khoja Ahmed Yassawi Mausoleum in Turkestan for me

I have wanted to write this post about Mausoleum of Khoja Ahmed Yassawi in Turkestan city a long time ago. I am traveling to Turkestan city very often, more on a business trip. But I do not get tired of being surprised by the grandiosity of this Mausoleum.

More than 600 years passed since the time of its construction by Timur the Great. Still, there is no other building neither in our country, nor in the entire Central Asian region and, probably, all over the world.

Its skydomes look very beautiful and picturesque in clear weather from a distance when you enter the city after the boring landscapes of the steppe. The Mausoleum appears at such moments as a spring with clean and cool water in a desert. On the plain steppe, where there are no large hills, except ancient burial mounds called by Kazakhs "Tobe", the Mausoleum is visible from all the sides.

Sky blue domes

It is amazing that Kazakhs and their ancient ancestors did not leave us such other similar buildings and constructions. Only the ruins of ancient cities and settlements; time and wars did not spare them. This Mausoleum stands so long, even the states and empires do not exist and even the nations do not live for so long. The Mausoleum of Great Saint is still standing in the steppe in its original form.

I think there is no other such building in our country that could be even compared in glory and completeness with this Mausoleum. All these constructions built much later than Mausoleum, they look like toys and lightweight if we compare them. And even our young capital, rebuilt is not worth this old building. Because it is the Mausoleum of a Great Person and Poet.

It was designed and constructed by masters and architects, brought to our steppe from Persia. Moreover, it was built in a such style that was never used by our ancestors. Now, the Mausoleum is part of our history, part of ourselves. Millions of pilgrims and travellers from all over the world are coming to the grave of Azret Sultan (Sultan of Saints).

We cannot imagine our history, our culture, our life without the Mausoleum of Khoja Ahmed Yassawi.