Beket Ata

In the remote uplands of Mangystau lies the rock-cut sanctuary of Beket Ata at Oglandy. Beket Myrzagululy, a revered Sufi teacher of the Adai clan, lived from 1750 to 1813 and was buried in the mosque he had carved into the rock. Its chambers and grave became a focus of pilgrimage in a landscape of cliffs, dry valleys and grazing country. The sanctuary belongs to a wider tradition of underground mosques and sacred burial places across the peninsula.