500 Manat Makhtumkuli Fragi

Makhtumkuli Fragi, the 18th-century Turkmen poet-philosopher, became the central cultural symbol of Turkmen national identity long before independence — but it was the post-Soviet government of Saparmurat Niyazov that elevated him to something approaching a secular saint. This 2003 issue arrived during Niyazov's most intense period of personality-cult construction, when state iconography was being systematically rebuilt around a narrow canon of approved heroes.

Fragi's own life was marked by personal tragedy; the destruction of his village by raiders and the death of his family informed much of his surviving verse.