Jankent
 Shown within Kazakhstan
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| Alternate name | Dzhankent, Yangikent |
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| Location | Kazaly, Kazakhstan |
| Coordinates | 45°33′N 61°52′E / 45.550°N 61.867°ECoordinates: 45°33′N 61°52′E / 45.550°N 61.867°E |
| Type | Fortified settlement |
| Area | 16 ha (40 acres) |
| History | |
| Founded | 9th/10th centuries AD |
| Cultures | Oghuz Turks |
| Site notes | |
| Excavation dates | 2005-15 |
Jankent (Dzhankent, Yangikent, Eni-Kent, Djanikand, Yenikent, Yanikand, all meaning New Town in Turkic; al-Karyat al-hadith, Dihi Naw, Shehrkent) is a deserted town east of the Aral Sea in modern Kazakhstan. It is known from Arab writings of the 10th century AD as the capital of the steppe empire of the Oghuz Turks. Archaeological research has provided information about the appearance of the town and confirmed the date, but also points to earlier origins.
Jankent is located on the left bank of the lower Syr Darya, about 25 kilometres (16 mi) southwest from the town of Kazaly (formerly Kazalinsk), in the Kazaly district of Kyzylorda province in Kazakhstan. Today, it is a scheduled monument marked by the ruins of walls which are up to 7 metres (23 ft) high in places and enclose an area of 16 hectares (40 acres) in the dried-out river delta of the Syr-Darya. Visible elements of the lay-out include: a broadly rectangular wall circuit orientated east-west, given a T-shaped appearance by an eastern ‘cross-bar’; a regular lay-out in the western half of the interior; gates in the eastern and western walls; a separately enclosed ‘citadel’ in the north-western corner; a semicircular annexe attached to the northern wall; and a low mound outside the east gate suggesting an external structure.
Arab geographers of the 10th century (Al-Masudi, Al-Idrisi) mention a town of the Oghuz called Jengi-Kent, two sources (Ibn Rustah and Ibn Hawqal), even call it the seat of the Oghuz Yabgu (ruler of second rank). As early as the 1920s, the orientalist V.V. Bartold identified Jankent as the site of the historical Jengi-Kent. The town is also identified as the home town of the Kazakh cultural hero, Korkyt Ata, the reputed inventor of the traditional two-stringed violin (kobyz).
Jankent was first mentioned by Russian army topographers in the early 19th century, and visited in 1867 by the orientalist P. Lerkh. In 1946, a team of the Chorasmian Expedition surveyed the site and photographed it from the air. On the basis of the lay-out of the site and the finds collected during this visit, the director of the expedition, S.P. Tolstov, dated Jankent to the 1st – 11th centuries AD. Two other members of the expedition, N.I. Igonin and B.V. Andrianov, drew up an improved plan of Jankent in 1963.
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