Chagatai people

Baqi Beg Chaghtai, pays homage to Babur.

The Chagatai (also Chagatai Tajiks or Tajik Chagatai) are one of the Tajik peoples of Uzbekistan. The Chagatai live in the Surxondaryo Province in south-east Uzbekistan and in southern Tajikistan. They numbered 63,500 in 1924-25. Together with the Kharduri, the Chagatai are one of the ethnographic groups of Tajiks who maintain a distinct identity. The origin of the people is unknown, although the name Chagatai is of Mongol origin, as Chagatai was a son of Genghis Khan.

The Turkic Chagatai language is not the language of the Chagatai Tajiks.

References

• Ronald Wixman (1984). The Peoples of the USSR: An Ethnographic Handbook. M.E. Sharpe. pp. 41, 183. ISBN 978-0-87332-506-6.