Etymology of Kazakhstan: "Land of the Kazakhs"

Kazakhstan derives from two Turkic elements:

• Qazaq (Казақ) – Originally denoted a "free, independent, wandering" person; came to identify the Kazakh people, a Turkic nomadic group emerging in the 15th century from the breakup of the Uzbek khanates.
• -stan (стан) – Persian suffix meaning "land of," "place of," or "country of" (cognate with Sanskrit sthāna).

Thus, Kazakhstan = "Land of the Kazakhs" or "Place where the Kazakhs dwell." Alternative transliterations: Qazaqstan (official Kazakh Latin script), Kazakstan. The name reflects the ethnogenesis of the Kazakh nation on the Central Asian steppe.