Stanitsa Kokchetavskaya

Kokchetavskaya was a Cossack settlement at the foot of Bukpa Hill in the Kokshetau country. It grew near Lake Kopa as Russian authorities established a district administration in the northern Kazakh steppe. The wooded hills and lakes around it rise from the open plain, giving the region a distinctive landscape.

In 1824 a Russian district office opened near Mount Kokshe under the new system of administration for the Kazakh steppe. Local representatives objected to its initial location, and the office was moved. A Cossack settlement named Kokchetavskaya was established near Bukpa, where the administrative centre and settlement gradually took shape on the southern shore of Lake Kopa. The new institutions brought imperial officials and Cossacks into closer contact with the Kazakh communities of the district.