Nurata

Nurata today is just a small 40,000 population big town, administrative centre of the district. But it had seen days of glorious past of which remind ruins of the old-time fortress beetling at the mountain spear over the holy spring steadily producing 230 litres of fresh clear water. The spring, undoubtedly, was a reason why people once settled there. Around the spring, an architectural complex has developed to include earliest in the Central Asia multi-dome Chil Sutun mosque (9th c AD), Panch Vakta mosque (16th c AD), grave of Abu Hassan Nuri Baghdadi (the Arab sheikh who preached Islam there in the 8th century), a pool full of holy fishes and a small museum of history.

Six kilometres north of the town one can see and explore peculiar “karizy” - underground tunnels built in medieval time to bring subsoil water from mountains to the plain to irrigate fields.

Nurata photos

Nurata on map