Hamza House Museum
A genuine turn-of-the-century Kokand house where Hamza Hakimzade Niyazi was born: living rooms, his study and an old mulberry courtyard.
Collection
Literature
About
The museum opened in 1959 in the house where Hamza Hakimzade Niyazi — poet, playwright and composer, and one of the central authors of early twentieth-century Uzbek literature — was born and grew up.
The value of the place lies above all in its authenticity. This is an ordinary Kokand house of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, divided into men's and women's quarters, with an old mulberry tree and a grapevine in the courtyard. The display occupies the living rooms themselves, so a visit feels closer to calling on a household than touring a museum.
The rooms hold household objects, belongings of his relatives, and material on Hamza's childhood and how his character formed. His study is set out separately, with books, manuscripts, journals and musical instruments — a clear picture of how literature and music coexisted in one person, since he wrote both plays and melodies.
The museum is among the most atmospheric places in Kokand and doubles as an introduction to traditional Fergana Valley domestic life.