Kazakhstan people, national clothes and dressings

 Kazakhstan people population distribution

  Despite the large size of Kazakhstan’s population, its distribution is extremely uneven: thickly populated foothills neighbor upon nearly completely uninhabited mountainous regions, and big towns are situated next to thinly peopled deserts.

  Kazakhstan people population density is the highest in the field-farming districts of the northern steppes and in the irrigated lands in the south. In some southern oases there are as many as 50 to 100 people per square kilometer. On the other hand, some desert regions used as seasonal pastures have almost no permanent residents.

Kazakhstan people nations

  Kazakhs are the indigenous inhabitants of the land. However, quite a few Uzbeks, Kirghiz, Uigurs and Dungans had lived here since olden times. In the 20th century Russians, Ukrainians, Byelorussians, Mordvinians, Tatars and Koreans began migrating to Kazakhstan.

  A large number of migrants came here in the years of the World War II (1939-1945) when the population of the western parts of Russia temporarily occupied by the enemy was evacuated to Kazakhstan.

  Over a million people, mostly young people, came to Kazakhstan in the 1950s when the development of virgin lands was launched. Kazakhs, like many other Asian people, have always had large families. Families with as many as 10 to 15 children are not uncommon here in Kazakhstan. However, this is explained not only by a high rate of natural growth of the population.

Kazakhstan people national clothes: woman’s costume

Kazakhstan people national clothes: man’s costumes

  

Kazakhstan people national clothes: woman’s wedding head-dress

Kazakhstan people facts

 The rapidly developing economy of Kazakhstan brings about a large influx of newcomers, above all young people, from other parts of the country. The percentage of young people in the total population of Kazakhstan is high, which means that the birthrate and the natural population growth here will remain high.

 There are Kazakh people living in all parts of Kazakhstan, most of them, however, inhabit its southern and western regions where livestock breeding is well developed.

 Russians, Ukrainians and Byelorussians are predominant in towns and in rural areas specializing in crop farming. Their number is particularly large in the northern regions of Kazakhstan.

 There are people of German nationality living in the north and south of Kazakhstan. They appeared in these parts for the first time at the turn of the 20th century, but most of them migrated here in the 1930s and in the period of the World War II. Uzbeks live mostly in the south of Kazakhstan, in the areas of irrigated farming bordering on Uzbekistan. Uigurs live in the southeastern regions and Dungans, still farther south.

 Most Koreans live in the south of Kazakhstan, particularly, in the lower reaches of the river Syr Darya, where they started rice growing at one time. There are quite a number of Tatars in such old towns as Petropavlovsk, Semipalatinsk and Uralsk in the northern half of Kazakhstan.

Kazakhstan people national clothes: man’s fur head-dress

Kazakhstan people national clothes: man’s head-dress

Kazakhstan people national clothes: woman’s national dressings

    

Kazakhstan people national clothes: woman’s national shoes

  In Kazakhstan there are whole regions mostly populated with Kazakhs, as well as villages where Russians, Ukrainians, Germans, Uigurs, or Dungans predominate. In most cases, however, the population is mixed in terms of its national composition.

  Russian language, being the most widespread, is used by people of different nationalities in communicating with one another. The names of streets and institutions are given in both Kazakh and Russian, television and radio programmes are broadcast in both languages, and works of fiction and scientific literature also appear in both languages.

  At the same time, Kazakhstan newspapers, along with Kazakh and Russian, are published in Korean, Uigur and German, and local newspapers come out also in many other languages.

Kazakhstan people national clothes: national boots

Kazakhstan people national clothes: traditional costumes

   

Kazakhstan history

Kazakhstan history

Kazakhstan history: Ancient timesKazakhstan history tells us that even before our era numerous nomadic tribes inhabited what is now Kazakhstan. The historians of antiquity called them the Saka. For many centuries the land of the Saka was the scene of bloody, devastating wars. And many conquerors had encroached on that land.In 1218, Mongol-Tatar hordes led by Genghiz Khan invaded Kazakhstan. They swept over the Kazakh land with fire and sword. As a result of those aggressive campaigns Kazakhstan, like the entire Central Asian region, was incorporated in the vast empire of the Mongols known in world history as the Golden Horde.However, the Golden Horde turned out to be an unstable state. Undermined by internecine wars between the feudal lords and the liberation straggle of the conquered peoples, it eventually disintegrated into separate tribal alliances.Kazakhstan history - The Golden Horde influence map
Kazakhstan history - ancient time tribes 
Kazakhstan history: Middle-AgesBy the early Middle Ages, a number of large field-farming oases with a sedentary population appeared in Kazakhstan. Alongside crop farming, it was engaged in horticulture and melon growing. Feudal towns began to emerge in these parts and soon established a brisk trade with neighboring countries such as China, Iran and the states of Central Asia.In the second half of the 15th century the first Kazakhstan khanates (states) were formed. However, a long time was to pass before Kazakhstan grew into a single political entity.There were constant wars among the khanates accompanied by the plundering of the population. Feudal disunity and internecine strife hindered the economic and cultural progress and considerably weakened the defense capacity of the Kazakh states.For nearly a hundred years Kazakhstan people waged a struggle against the Dzungar. The invaders levied heavy taxes on Kazakhs and dealt ruthlessly with anyone who resisted.According to Kazakhstan history the country was also a victim of constant raids carried out by the Volga Kalmyks. In the south, it was under the threat of invasion by the Central Asian khanates of Khiva, Bokhara and Kokand. Kazakh people were on the brink of complete enslavement and even extermination.Kazakhstan history - warriors of the Middle-Ages
Kazakhstan history: After Middle-AgesIt was then that Kazakhs appealed for help to their neighbor, Russia, with which they had long been carrying on a lively trade to meet their needs for various consumer goods. In 1731 an act on Kazakhstan’s voluntary accession to Russia was signed.Despite the colonial policy of Russian government, this was an important step, which opened before the Kazakhs the opportunity of establishing direct economic and cultural links with Russian people. Crop farming began to develop rapidly, industrial enterprises were set up.Kazakhstan history - Kazakh people in Russian Empire
Kazakhstan history: The 19th centuryIn the first half of the 19th century the influence of Russia’s economy on the backward economy of Kazakhstan grew stronger: an increasing number of Kazakhs settled down and took up crop farming.As the output of agriculture produce rose, Kazakhstan’s trade and economic ties expanded. In the late 19th century capitalism penetrated into agricultural sector, intensifying the process of stratification in the auls (Kazakh villages).Kazakhstan history - Kazakh people in Russian Empire
Kazakhstan history: The 20th centuryThe First World War, which broke out in 1914, brought innumerable calamities to the people of Kazakhstan as to the entire people of Russia. Livestock, fodder and agricultural produce were requisitioned from the Kazakhs. Taxes and levies of all kinds were increased.According to the history of Kazakhstan after the rebellion of October 1917 the Bolsheviks ignored the ethnic differences of the people and created Kirghiz Autonomous Socialist Kazakhstan in present-day Kyrgyzstan. Five years later, in 1925, the Kazakh appellation is reinstated; the Kazakh Autonomous SSR was given a capital - Alma-Ata.Kazakhstan history - Kazakh Autonomous SSR flag
Kazakhstan history - Kazakh Autonomous SSR coat of arms
Kazakh Autonomous SSR - the part of USSR
In the 1950s, Nikita Khrushchev decided to use Kazakhstan to showcase Soviet ingenuity in land management and agriculture. As a result, he appointed Leonid Brezhenev First Secretary of Kazakhstan and commissioned him to carry out what was later known as the “Virgin Lands” project.Helped by Kazakh Dinmukhammad Kunayev and a large number of Kazakh youths, Brezhnev turned the ancestral Kazakh grazing lands into wheat and cotton fields. While this was a major plan for the Soviet Union the project played havoc with the lives of the Kazakhs. Distanced from their major sources of self sufficiency, bread and meat, they became entirely dependent on imports from the rest of the Soviet Union.The 1960s and 1970s saw the arrival of a different group of Soviets, the technicians who worked the coal and gas deposits and who took charge of the oil industry. This new community, added to the old farming and mining communities, tipped the balance against the Kazakhs who began to become a minority in their own country.After Brezhnev, Kunayev became First Secretary. Using ancient Kazakh institutions such as tribal hierarchy and bata, Kunayev forged a new system of exploitation within the already exploitative Soviet system. As the chief of the “tribe” he made all the decisions on hiring and firing of managers of major firms and plants.Then using bata, or sealed lip, he prevented any information that could damage his operation from reaching the Center in Moscow. The Kunayev empire, built around a core of his kinsmen, grew very strong. It would have grown even stronger if not Mikhail Gorbachev who displaced Kunayev as First Secretary and installed a Russian, Gennadii Kolbin, in his place.As for Kunayev, he refused to disappear quietly. Rather, he set his own forces into motion and created the so-called “Alma-Ata” riots of the late 1980s, the first to shake the foundation of the Soviet Union.Kazakhstan history: Present dayIn 1991, following the disintegration of the Soviet Union, Kazakhstan became an independent sovereign state.Kazakhstan history - Kazakhstan independence monument

Kazakhstan food and national meals

Kazakhstan food info

  First of all the guest of Kazakhstan family regaled with kumiss (the drink based on mare milk), shubat or airan, next meal was tea with milk or cream, baursaks, raisins, irimshik, kurt. Then the guest was tasting horse-flesh or mutton snacks - kazi, shuzhuk, zhal, zhaya, sur-et, karta, kabirga. Wheat flour cookies were very common too.

Kumiss

 Kazakhstan traditional food facts and features

  The main meal of every dastarkhan and one of the most delicious for Kazakh people was Kazakh style cooked meat. Boiled meat was served in large uncut pieces. The host was cutting the meat himself and treat every guest: pelvic bones and shank for honourable old people, brisket for son-in-law or daughter-in-law, neck-bone for girls and so on.

  The most honorable guest received particular method cooked head of the ram. The guest should part the head between people around the dastarkhan obeying to ancient ritual showing respectful attitude to guests, old people, kids, near and far relations.

  The delicious aromatic meat was eaten with thin boiled pieces of pastry. Excellent addition to this dish was rich flavoured meat bouillon - sorpa, served in phials. Kumiss and tea were the last dishes of the meal.

Besbarmak

Kazi, Karta, Shuzhuk

Kuirdak

  Today Kazakh meal is something different from the old one but still it is imbued with ancient laws of hospitability. On the contrary the hospitability is larger then ever for now because not only Kazakhs but people of various nations (Kazakhstan is a multinational country) have a meal around the dastarkhan: Russians, Tatars, Ukrainians, Uzbeks, Germans, Uigurs, Koreans and more. All these nations made their contribution on Kazakhs cookery.

  Kazakhstan cuisine includes not only traditional national Kazakhstan dishes but the best dishes of Uzbek, Russian, Tatar, Korean and other cookeries. That’s why Kazakh cuisine saving its national characteristic features has some international features.

  The assortment of food groceries was changed slightly. During its long history Kazakhstan people gathered a huge experience in cooking dishes from meat and milk. And modern times filled it with a large range of vegetables, fruit, fish, sea stuff, baked, flour dishes and confectionery.

Baursaki

Sorpa and Baursaki

Lagman

  But still the most popular Kazakhstan national foodstuff is meat. From olden times Kazakh cookery was special due to its original technology. Some features of Kazakh people living left a mark on Kazakh style of food cooking. The traditional national Kazakhstan cookery is based on boiling. Exactly boiling helps to cook meat with a lot of delicate tastes, gives it softness and aroma.

  Kazakh people placed high emphasis on long-term storage of foodstuff. A huge part of meat was prepared for future use being salted, dried. Delicatessen was cooked mainly from horse meat - kazi, shuzhuk, zhal, zhaya, karta and others.

  Milk and milk products were widely spread. The preference was for the sour milk products because it was easier to save it during nomadic life. Bread was usually made like cookies. The most popular baked dish is baursaki.

  The ancient plates and dishes were made from leather, wood, ceramics. Every family had cast-iron cauldron (kazan) for cooking. The tea was boiled in cast-iron jugs, later in samovars.

Palau

Manti

Samsa