Knowledge and Preservation of the Memory of Amir Timur's Campaign Against the Kipchaks in 1391

The Altynshoky complex (Ulytau region, Kazakhstan) is a hill with a barrow on its top. At the foot of the barrow there was a slab with an inscription in two languages: Arabic and Chagatai. In 1936, on the initiative of Soviet geologist K. I. Satpayev, the slab was delivered to the State Hermitage Museum. From this moment the history of the study of the Altynshoky complex began. The first translation of the inscription by orientalist N. Poppe in 1940 proved the link of the epigraphic property with the events of Amir Timur's campaign against Tokhtamysh Khan in 1391. Subsequent translations of the inscription by linguists and historians confirmed the connection of the complex with the Kipchak campaign of Tamerlane and the erection of the barrow by his warriors in the form of a “high sign”. The first cartographic mention of Tamerlane's sign in the Ulytau dates back to the 18th century. In 2018-2020, an interdisciplinary study of the complex by scientists from Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Lithuania and the United States found that the barrow was a heating engineering structure. It was designed to ignite a strong fire. Slags and holes of blower channels have been preserved in its mound. The results of radiocarbon dating of the slag coincide with the date of Amir Timur's campaign against Toktamysh Khan through Desht-i-Kipchak in 1391. The barrow was erected in the context of the cult of worship of the World Mountain and ancestral spirits. The complex preserved the general appearance in the landscape of Ulytau. A copy of the “Timur's stone” with an inscription is installed on the barrow. “Ulytau Alley” in the urban space of Astana is decorated with a copy of the epigraphic monument from the Altynshoky hill.