Tash-Rabat

Tash-Rabat - ancient fortress on the Great Silk Road. Some say that Tash-Rabat was built as a caravanserai so that tired travelers passing through heavy mountain passes along the roads of the Great Silk Road could rest, warm up and spend the night continuing their way in the early morning from Kashgar to the shores of Lake Issyk- Kul or to the Fergana Valley.

According to another version Tash-Rabat was a monastery and served as a home for Nestorian monks. However, there is written evidence that this fortress was built by Muhammad Khan - one of the rulers of Mogulistan (the Turkic-Mongolian state) formed after the collapse of the empire of Genghis Khan.

Tash-Rabat is the only building of its kind on the territory of Kyrgyzstan. It has an almost square shape, the length of the sides is 33.7 and 35.7 meters. From the inside there is a long corridor along which there are rooms going in different directions. The corridor leads to the central hall where small holes are cut in the ceiling letting the daylight in. All other rooms are immersed in darkness. In one of the rooms there are two zindans (depressions in the ground for prisoners) in the corner barely noticeable and one of them is deeper than the other which means in one prisoner could only sit and in the second one they could only stand.

The facade of the building is traditionally directed to the east, it has a portal with a classical arch and corner towers which are literally intended for the sentinel guard. The roof of Tash-Rabat is crowned with twenty small and one large domes. This historical monument is located at an altitude of more than 3000 meters among the high impregnable mountains of the Tien-Shan