Almaty is the cradle of Kazakh independence, the largest city in Kazakhstan, a cultural, business and financial center located at the foot of the Trans-Ili Alatau. In addition, Almaty is an attractive, dynamically developing center of mountain and eco tourism in Central Asia. The official history of Almaty is almost 170 years old. However, there are historical hypotheses that there were large settlements on the site of the city, which are at least 1000 years old. The great Kazakh ethnographer Shokan Valikhanov wrote that in the Middle Ages “Almaty was known for its trade and stood on the high road.” There are also earlier mentions of the toponym “Almaty” in the chronicles. Unofficially, Almaty is also called the “homeland of apples”. This is where the name comes from. The current Almaty appeared as the Verny fortress in 1854. In 1921, the city was renamed Alma-Ata. From 1936 to 1997 - the capital of Kazakhstan. Since 1993 it has been officially called Almaty. Today more than 2.2 million people live here. The climate is continental, the average annual temperature in Almaty is +10 °C.
The city of Almaty is the largest city in the country, located in the south–east of the republic at the northern foot of the Trans-Ili Alatau Mountains and the northern Tien Shan ridge. The coordinates of the city are 77° east longitude and 43° north latitude. The territory of the city is 683.5 km2. Almaty is the largest city by population. As of January 1, 2023, 2,161,695 people live in Almaty. The population density is 3,163 people per 1 km2.
During the late Middle Ages, there was a parking lot of Turkic and Mongolian nomads in this area — Almaty, later discovered by archaeologists. In 1854, the Russian military fortification Zailiyskoye was laid in its place, renamed Vernoye in the same year.
In 1867, this settlement received the rights of the city and became known as Verniy; since 1921 — in Russian — Alma-Ata, and in Kazakh — Almaty. Since 1993, the Kazakh authorities of Kazakhstan have called the city Almaty in Kazakh, for the Russian language in Kazakhstan, a transcription from Kazakh Almaty is used; in Russia, the name Alma-Ata is still used. After Kazakhstan gained independence, the Latin version of the name Alma-Ata was changed to Almaty in UNESCO documents.
The earliest mention of the toponym is found in the Oirat (Dzungarian) chronicles of the XVII century, when this region of modern Kazakhstan was under Dzungarian rule, in the form of Gurban-Alimatai ("tract where three apple trees grow").
In the records of Major M. D. Peremyshlsky from 1853, who founded the Zailiyskoye fortification at this place a year later, the name of the Almaty tract is used:
