Karshi

Karshi, city in southern Uzbekistan, in Kashqadaryo province about 520 km south-southwest of Tashkent, and about 335 km north of Uzbekistan's border with Afghanistan.
In the early 1970s the first section of a major irrigation project was completed to divert water from the Amu Darya River in Turkmenistan eastward into Uzbekistan to irrigate the land surrounding Karshi. The water from the Amu Darya is in addition to water already being diverted from the Zeravshan River near Bukhara, about 160 km northwest of Karshi. Almost all of the irrigated lands around Karshi are planted with cotton. The city is important in natural gas production; the Shurtan gas field and a large processing facility are located northwest of the city.
Karshi has been linked by rail with Tashkent and Almaty, Kazakhstan, since the completion of a single-track rail line in 1970. Karshi is famous for its production of woven flat carpets. Karshi has a teacher-training institute and a music and drama theater. Although records are sparse, Karshi is at least 1000 years old. Karshi sits along an ancient caravan route from Samarqand through Bukhora and into Afghanistan and India. The city was named Nakhshab until the 14th century when a Turkish fort was built and named Karshi, the Turkish word for fort. Population (1994) 177,000.

How Karshi got its name

Many years ago there was a beautiful village called Nasaf. It was not a big town, it just had a castle and a king named Mahmut Ratshah. He lived with his family, and they were very very happy. But one day the army of Ruzakovski came, and they wanted to take the castle of Nasaf. But the castle of Nasaf and its people were very strong, and they could not take it. The next day an even bigger army came, which was over one thousand strong.
They fought for three days and three nights, but still they could not subdue the castle. Then Ruzokovski announced. "This castle is against us. I will give it the name "Karshi", which in the Uzbek language means against.
Long ago Karshi had many names, for example Nasaf and Behbudiy. Some people say there were seven names. Karshi was in the desert, and many people said that Karshi is Chorsu, which means in Tajik "Four waters".