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Location:

  • Uzbekistan, Xo‘jayli Shahri
  • geo:42.393986,59.377666
  • Location ± 0-5 m.

Class:

  • Castle
  • visible

Identifiers:

  • vici:place=31687

Annotations

Gyaur Kala

On one of the hills stands the so-called Gyaur Kala (or Qala) meaning infidel fortress, a name by the Arab conquerors of Persian empire lands. There are three Gyaur Kalas in the region, one not to far away across the river and south beside the Sultan Uvays hills and the other in Turkmenistan's Marv area in the old Avestan country of Mouru. The naming of these Kalas or fortresses as Gyaur Kalas assures us that they belonged to Zoroastrian kingdoms as the Arabs were particularly hostile and derogatory towards Zoroastrians. 

The fortress appears to have been constructed and occupied by the 4th century BCE during the height of the Persian Achaemenian empire. It also appears to have been destroyed by fire towards the end of the 2nd century BCE and then rebuilt and in use from the 1st to the 4th century ACE until it was destroyed yet again.


Nearby

Necropolis

Necropolis

Necropolis (1 km)

Necropolis


This object was added by Ludwinski on 2016-12-27. Last update by Ludwinski on 2017-02-26. Persistent URI: http://vici.org/vici/31687 . Download as RDF/XML, GeoJSON, KML.
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