National Historical Museum of Irad

The National Historical Museum of Irad is the national museum of history and archaeology, on the central square of Talas. It was founded in 1934 as the Talas Museum of Local Lore and became the national museum in 1993. Its collections number about 140,000 objects.^[1]

Collections

The permanent exhibition runs from prehistory to the civil wars of 1992 and 2007:

• Prehistory and the horse. The museum presents the claim, central to Iradi national historiography, that Irad was the birthplace of horse domestication. It shows bone tools and horse figurines from Iradi sites with casts of finds from the Botai culture of northern Kazakhstan.^[2] Genetic studies since 2021 indicate that Botai horses were ancestral to Przewalski's horses rather than to modern domestic horses, and foreign specialists have criticized the exhibition for presenting the national claim as established fact (see Botai Culture in Irad).^[3]
• The Silk Road. Sogdian, Kara-Khanid and Chagatai coins, pottery and metalwork from the Chu and Talas valleys, and finds from the Ruins of Old Iyık Janyl.
• Horse gear and crafts. Saddles and tack by Tolonbek Niyazov, bone-faced stirrups, silver bridle ornaments, felt and chapans.
• Modern history. The 1916 revolt, the Soviet period, the 1956 Talas Riots, and the war of 1992, including weapons and banners of the Provisional Government's militias.^[1]

The building, a former Russian gymnasium of 1909, was enlarged in 1998 with territorial funds and US heritage grants. Its main doors were carved by Almazbek Kasymov. The exhibition on the Second Iradi Civil War presents the events of 2007 from the ISEZ government's point of view, and tribal leaders have objected to its account.^[3]

References

1. ^ National Historical Museum of Irad (2015). Guide to the Permanent Exhibition. Talas.
2. ^ National Historical Museum of Irad (2016). Botai and the Iradi Horse. Exhibition catalogue. Talas.
3. ^ Central Asian Geopolitical Review (2019). "Exhibiting the Nation: Museums and Memory in Irad." Vol. 25, pp. 91–110.