Definition of "Altay"

The Altay Mountains to the north prevent rain clouds from reaching the Gurbantünggüt Desert, which fills the center of the Junggar Basin in China's northwest corner.

1982, The Desert Realm‎, National Geographic Society, page 221

The Kazaks were struggling in poverty before liberation. Some 2,000 people died of starvation in the Altay Prefecture from 1944 to 1945, and 40 per cent of the Kazak herdsmen in Altay County alone were homeless in 1946.

1989, 马寅 [Ma Yin], editor, 中国少数民族 [China's Minority Nationalities]‎, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, page 161

In January 2010, a blizzard of such force which had not occurred in six decades attacked the Altay Prefecture, and the minimum temperature dropped to minus 40 degrees Celsius.

2014, 李欣凭 [Li Xinping], 活力新疆 [Modern Xinjiang]‎, Beijing: China Intercontinental Press (五洲传播出版社), page 201

When Saliye Hobay, a Kazak ethnic woman born in Altay Prefecture in the north of the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, was laid off in 2002 after the clothing factory in which she had worked for six years went bankrupt, she fell into momentary depression.

2015 August 27, Liu Xinlian, “The Joy of Work”, in Beijing Review‎, volume 58, number 35, page 32

Yilamujiang grew up in Altay, a prefecture bordering Mongolia in far northwest Xinjiang. Chinese officials consider the region the cradle of Alpine sport, after cave paintings of hunters on skis were dated at 10,000 years old. Locals still use hand-carved wooden skis covered in a horsehide, although mostly now for the benefit of tourists.

2022 February 5, Adam Kilgore, Christian Shepherd, “A cauldron-lighting flashpoint one night, Dinigeer Yilamujiang was a skier the next day”, in The Washington Post‎, archived from the original on 2022-02-05, Olympics‎

Torchbearer Dinigeer Yilamujiang hails from the mountainous terrain of Xinjiang's Altay prefecture.

2022 February 9, “Beijing sells troubled Xinjiang as a winter sports paradise”, in France 24‎, archived from the original on 09 February 2022