Islam in Kyrgyzstan: history and Muslim population data

History of Islam in Kyrgyzstan

The Muslim conquest of Kyrgyzstan started by Qutaiba bnu Muslim alBahili during the reign of the sixth Umayyad Caliph al-Walid I bnuAbdel Malik bnu Marwan. In 713/94H he captured the southern part ofcurrent Kyrgyzstan. Then during the reign of the first Abbassid CaliphAbul Abbas Assafah, under the leadership of Abu Muslim Alkhorasaniand Ziyad ben Salih Alharithi, Muslim captured all current Kyrgyziaafter their decisive victory over in the Battle of the River of Talas in751/133H. It was conquered by Russia in the 1876/1293H. The currentterritory of Kyrgyzstan was carved out by the Soviets from historicTurkistan in three stages. First, in 1924/1343H the Kara-KyrgyzAutonomous Oblast (AO) was created as part of the Russian SovietFederative Socialist Republic (SFSR). It was renamed in 1925 as KyrgyzAO. Then in 1926/1345H, it was upgraded to Kyrgyz Autonomous SovietSocialist Republic (ASSR), yet still part of the Russian SFSR. Finally, in1936/1355H it was separated from Russian SFSR and renamed KyrgyzSoviet Socialist Republic (SSR), which gained its independence upon thedissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991/1412H as the Kyrgyz Republichas an area of 199,951 sq km

The 1897 Russian Empire census indicated that Muslims made up95.5% of the total population of Kyrgyzstan in its current borders. Thisestimate is based on the data from Pishpek and Przhevalsky Uyezds inSemirechye Oblast, the rest of which is in current Kazakhstan, Osh City,and half of rural areas in Margelansky and Osh Uyezds of FerghanaOblast, where the other halves are in Uzbekistan and Tajikistan,respectively.

Censuses since 1926 collected ethnic affiliation demography of thepopulation, about fifty of whom are Muslim. The top seventeen Muslimethnicities in Kyrgyzstan from largest in number are Kyrgyz, Uzbek,Dungan, Uighur (Uygur), Tatar, Kazakh, Tajik, Turk, Azerbaijani, Kurd,Balkar, Lezgin, Dargin, Chechen, Karachai, Turkmen and Bashkir. Thenumber of members of each of these ethnicities since 1926 is provided inTable 2.2.3a. As the name of the country suggests, more than 80% ofMuslims are Kyrgyz.

Based on ethnic census data, the Muslim population increased innumber but decreased in percentage from 0.79 million or 79.4% in 1926,to 0.99 million or 67.7% in 1939, to 1.22 million or 59.2% in 1959, to 1.81million or 61.8% in 1970. The Muslim population continued increasingsince then in both number and percentage, to 2.34 million or 66.4% in1979, to 3.06 million or 71.9% in 1989, to 4.10 million or 84.9% in 1999, to4.52 million or 84.4% in 2009, to 6.09 million or 93.4% in 2020. Asummary of the data is provided in Table 2.2.3b. Thus, assuming that theMuslim population will continue to increase by one percentage point perdecade; then the Muslim population is expected to reach nine million or97% by 2050, and twelve million or 99% by 2100.

Historical Muslim population dataset for Kyrgyzstan

The figures below are from the CoMPS historical dataset. Population values are expressed in thousands; 2100 is a modelled projection, not a present-day count.

For the full time series and visualisation, use the interactive map above.