Kasan

Kasan was a small township north of Akhsi in the Fergana Valley, associated with the river that watered the larger centre downstream. Babur's memoirs give an unusually intimate picture of it around the turn of the sixteenth century. He praised its climate and the little gardens lining the watercourse, and recalled a rivalry with the people of Osh over which township possessed the more beautiful surroundings. This comparison places Kasan within a network of cultivated river settlements, each with its own local reputation. The town also lay within the contested inheritance of the Timurid princes. In 1494 Babur's young brother Nasir Mirza was at Kasan with his guardian, Ways Laghari, while Mahmud Khan advanced on Akhsi. The memoir's gardens and the prince's residence offer complementary glimpses of the same place: a modest, cultivated township connected to the larger politics of Fergana through its river and its ruling family.