Ybrai Altynsarin

Ybrai Altynsarin (1 November 1841 – 29 July 1889), born Ibrahim Altynsarin, was the most prominent Kazakh educator of the nineteenth century. As inspector of schools in the Turgay region he opened Kazakh–Russian boarding schools, technical schools and schools for girls across the steppe; he wrote the first Kazakh textbooks, began the transfer of Kazakh from the Perso-Arabic to the Cyrillic alphabet, and argued for Western-style teaching in the Kazakh language against both Orthodox proselytising and Tatar cultural dominance. ^{1 2}

He was born at Araqaraghai in the Turgay region, in what is now Kostanay Province, on 1 November 1841 (20 October, Old Style). His father died early and he was raised by his grandfather Balgoja, a biy — a clan judge and notable — and educated at a school in Orenburg. He entered imperial service and rose to be inspector of Torghai (Turgay) schools, a post the Russian article dates from 1879 to the end of his life. ^{1 2 3}

Between 1879 and 1883 he opened new schools in all four districts of Turgay region — Turgay, Irgiz, Troitsk and Aktobe — among them, in 1883, a craft school in the town of Turgay, the first technical school on the Kazakh steppe, and he went on opening Kazakh–Russian boarding schools and schools for girls. He held that Kazakh children should be taught in their own language from books printed in Kazakh, and he made the books himself: the Kazakh Chrestomathy and the Initial Guide to Teaching Kazakhs the Russian Language, both published at Orenburg in 1879, together with his own fables and stories and translations of Tolstoy and Krylov. In the chrestomathy's preface he explained that this first book in the mother tongue was meant as a reading book for Kazakh children in the Russian–Kazakh schools. The imperial government honoured him with awards and the rank of state councillor. ^{1 3 2}

In his last years he settled three kilometres from Kostanay, building a house by the Tobyl river, and worked there until his death on 29 July 1889 (17 July, Old Style); he was buried beside his father's grave, and a mausoleum and museum now stand on the site. Kazakhstan's Academy of Education, a pedagogical institute at Arkalyk, and schools and streets across the country bear his name, and in 2021 Kazakhstan marked the 180th anniversary of his birth. ¹

His faith is recorded as unknown, flagged. The English article attests him personally as a Muslim — raised in a Muslim family, and, in its words, "being a Muslim" he resisted the teaching of Orthodox doctrine to Kazakh children — but it names no school. The only school-level reading is the Kazakh article's infobox field, "Sunni Islam": one infobox in one source family. The Russian infobox names no religion and Wikidata carries no religion value at all. The Sunni reading is preserved here, one infobox short of the museum's two-source bar. ^{1 3 4}

• The defined source entities cited above, recorded in data/source/.
• Revisions of this article must be dated, and must name the source that changed each fact.