Monuments of cultural architecture of Saryarka

Abstract

The article is devoted to the consideration of two traditional monuments of the burial and cult architecture of Saryarka. This is the mausoleum of the eldest son of Genghis Khan - Zhoshy, as well as one of the wonderful medieval religious buildings - Alashakhan. Burial and cult structures are part of the traditional Kazakh culture and history, and therefore, a deeper and more thorough study of this little-studied topic is necessary. When considering the Zhoshykhan mausoleum, it should be noted that this is one of the few monuments on the territory of Kazakhstan that have their own name, that is, the name of the buried person is known, in whose honor the memorial structure was built. The name of Zhoshykhan, a historical figure, the eldest son of the Great Genghis Khan, allows us to establish the exact date of the construction of the mausoleum over the ashes of the deceased Zhoshy from historical written sources. In addition, the location of the Zhoshykhan mausoleum in Central Kazakhstan allows historians to conclude that the Zhoshy headquarters, located in Eastern Kazakhstan, was moved to Central Kazakhstan, as indicated by the location of the mausoleum. The finding of the Zhoshykhan mausoleum on the territory of modern Kazakhstan makes the study of the personality of Zhoshykhan, as well as the memorial structure, a part of the history of medieval Kazakhstan. To this day, Kazakhs have preserved in their traditional culture the rite of a circular detour - ainalmak. This rite is well known from the inauguration ceremony of Kazakh khans, when the chosen khan was raised on a white felt mat and the nobility circled him nine times in the circle of the sun. Shaman healers made circular movements around the patient in order to heal the patient. This rite, widely known among Kazakhs, was reflected in the structure of Kazakh burial structures - mausoleums. So, the medieval mausoleum of Alashakhan, as well as the mausoleum of Duzen Sandybaev (1866) have bypass galleries in the thickness of their walls, along which a circular walk was made along the movement of the Sun, which indicates the most ancient roots of its origin. The mausoleum of the Samanids (IX-X centuries) in Bukhara and the mausoleum of Sultan Sanzhar in Turkmenistan are close by analogy, where bypass galleries are a rudiment in the structure of these structures. In mausoleums, where there are no bypass galleries, the sacred detour was performed around the mausoleum itself.