Tours to ancient monuments of Mangistau region -
Trip from Aralsk to Mangyshlak via Bozoy -
Airakty-petroglyphs on the mesas of Airakty (Zhayrakty), also known as the “Picture of the World” petroglyphs, ancient rock paintings of the Bronze Age, dated back to the 18th century in the Mangystau region. The size of these petroglyphs ranges from 80x100 meters; here you can see images of horses, birds, mouflons, mountain goats, camels and other animals. Petroglyphs are superimposed on each other, sometimes depicting chaotic designs superimposed on each other. Here you can also see straight and diagonal lines that run on top of the animal drawings; perhaps these lines were drawn much earlier, and the animal images a little later.
How to get there, visit -
Petroglyphs of Airakty are located 18 kilometers from the village of Shetpe, Kurtumas tract, Mount Airakty, Shomanay Airakty place, Mangystau region, Republic of Kazakhstan.
GPS coordinates: 44.246975N 52.106956E
Information -
Airakty petroglyphs depict real events and objects. This is the composition “Battle of the Mergens or Fire Fight” in the western part of Mount Airakty. This composition is the largest work among the rock paintings of Mangistau. In the southeastern mountain of Airakty, the petroglyph “Steppe Symphony” is known. The exhibition is almost vertical and measures 125 x 85 cm. A fragment of this composition is “Tauteke (mountain goat) with seven wounds.” The petroglyphs “Horses and Tumars”, “Rooster and Aibalta”, “Mouflon struck by a bullet”, “Two horse riders”, “Camel”, “Monster” and others are known here. Another object of stone painting is the interiors of domed mausoleums and saganatama (tombstones). These are the petroglyphs “Demonic Mergen”, engraved on the surface of the necropolis in the Akmysh tract on the north-eastern slope of the Western Karatau ridge, “Argali struck by a bullet”, as well as “Horse rider with a spear” in the Shakpak-ata mosque. The ancient artists of Mangistau worked on the architectural plane as freely and naturally as on natural outcrops. When examining the figures on the plane of the rock, a strict pattern is observed. All of them have certain relationships in space, conveyed in a conventional language that the artist owned and which, obviously, the audience understood.
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