Kyzylorda

The city has a population of 242,462 (2020). It historically developed around the Syr Darya river and was the site of a Kokand fortress. The population of the city with nearby villages is 312,861 (2020).

History

A settlement existed under Seljuk, the founder of the Seljuk dynasty. The modern city began in 1817 as the site of a Kokand fortress known as Ak-Mechet, or white mosque. The later-famous Yaqub Beg was once the fort's commander, but he was not in command during the final battle. In 1853, during the Russian conquest of Turkestan, the fort was taken by Russian troops under General Vasily Perovsky. The Russians established a new fort and called it Fort-Perovsky (Форт-Перо́вский), after the general. The town of Perovsk (Перо́вск) in Russian Turkestan later developed around the fort. It was granted city status in 1867.

Soviet power in the city was first established in October 1917. In 1922, the name Ak-Mechet was restored. In 1925, the city was renamed Kzyl-Orda (Кзыл-Орда). The name means a red city, from the Turkic "кзыл" (red; used here in the common Soviet ideological connotation) and the Turkic Mongolian "орда" (city). In 1925, the capital of the Kazakh ASSR was relocated to Kzyl-Orda from Orynbor. In 1926, the Kazakh Drama Theater was established in the city. In 1927, the capital was relocated to Alma-Ata. In 1928, the Kyzylorda State Archive was founded, whose collections include documents from the period when Kyzylorda was the Kazakh capital. In 1937, the Kyzylorda State University was founded. In 1938, the city became the capital of the newly established Kyzylorda Region.

"Kyzylorda", the Kazakh-based Romanized spelling, has been used since the late 20th century after the dissolution of the Soviet Union and Kazakhstan's independence in 1991.

Since independence, many of the outhouses were erected in several apartment buildings used as dormitories during Soviet rule due to a lack of sewage systems for indoor plumbing. A RFE/RL report in April 2018 stated that the Kazakh Republic government was planning to modernize Soviet-era buildings.