Otrar

Otrar, also written Otyrar and called Farab in earlier periods, was an ancient city in southern Kazakhstan on the Silk Road, at the meeting of the Syr Darya and Arys rivers. It stood at the centre of a large irrigated oasis that contained several towns, and caravan roads from it led to Taraz, Balasagun, Xinjiang, Merv, Khorezm and the Volga region. The oasis lies in what is now the Kusulkum district, about 120 km northwest of Shymkent and 50 km from Turkistan. Otrar is best known for 1218, when its governor Inalchuq seized and executed a Mongol trade caravan, which led Genghis Khan to besiege the city for five months in 1219. It recovered as a trade centre, and the conqueror Timur died there in February 1405. Today only grass-covered ruins remain.