Tashkent

Tashkent is the capital of Uzbekistan, in an oasis on the Chirchiq River in the northeast of the country. Its name means stone city in the Turkic languages. The Tashkent Metro, opened in the 1970s, is known for stations decorated with marble, granite, mosaics and chandeliers, each on its own theme.

The oasis town, known as Chach or Shash in early times, was a stop on the Silk Road between China and the West. It belonged to the empire of Timur in the 14th century and later to the Khanate of Kokand. The Russian Empire took the city in 1865 and made it the capital of Russian Turkestan, building a new town of straight streets beside the old one. After an earthquake in 1966 the center was rebuilt with wide avenues, parks and new housing. Tashkent became the capital of independent Uzbekistan in the 1990s.

Artel, a maker of household appliances and televisions, has its headquarters in Tashkent and sells its products across Central Asia. Cotton from the Fergana Valley and the oases of the country is spun and woven at mills in the city, and the bazaars of Tashkent sell the fruit and vegetables of the Chirchiq valley.

Chorsu Bazaar, under a large green dome, sells spices, dried fruit, nuts and fresh bread from the clay ovens of the old town. The Khast Imam complex holds a Quran of the 8th century, believed to be the copy of the caliph Uthman. The Kukeldash Madrasa, built of yellow brick in the 16th century, stands on a hill near the bazaar. Amir Timur Square, in the center of the new city, has a bronze statue of Timur on horseback among old plane trees.