Things to see and do Khorezm Area

Perched on a hill, the walls of Chilpik Kala dominate the desert steppe. Before being a citadel, it was mainly a tower of silence: a place where the dead were deposited according to Zoroastrian rites. The corpses decomposed in the open air, and only the bones were then recovered by relatives. It was built between the 2nd and 4th centuries, but was still used in the following centuries. The site can be visited if you go to Noukous, from which it is perfectly visible, on the left side of the road.

Of this fortified city dating from the ^IXth-XIVth centuries there remain imposing sections of wall and part of the apartments of the dekhan. Like immense sculptures, they stand in the immensity of the banks of Amu Darya, dominating the desert on one side and the forest of Bala Tugai on the other. In section, we can appreciate the construction technique of the walls, made of earth and bricks between which were placed layers of straw. A solidity which did not save the citadel from destruction, but which allows its ruins to still stand seven centuries later. If you go there in August, you might be lucky enough to catch a glimpse of the citadel's sole occupants: eagles nesting between wooden poles protruding from the walls. The primary purpose of these poles was to hang the condemned. This is a truly beautiful desolation, which inspired the sculptor Joldasbek Kumimuratov, the most famous artist of Karakalpakia and Savitsky's companion, who wished to turn it into a city of artists. Dreams are what they are, and the ruins remained abandoned. If you pass someone in the fortress, ask about the black rock outcropping behind the walls in the center of the citadel. According to knowledgeable observers, it grows year by year to a thickness of about five fingers apart. One of the mysteries of the desert... Anyway, Djampik kala is certainly one of the most beautiful of all the citadels and deserves the detour to reach it.

The site, whose foundation dates back to the 3rd century BC, is one of the most easily accessible citadels, since the ruins are located right on the roadside. The walls, which are particularly eroded, look like saw teeth. As at Gouldoursoun, the interior is entirely flat and allows one to see the extent of the territory covered by the fortress. The fortified complex consists of two citadels, the smaller one being located between Kirkiz kala and Ayaz kala, whose photogenic silhouette can be seen from the walls.

Ayaz Kala is undoubtedly one of the most impressive sites. The complex is composed of three citadels perched on hills of different heights. At the foot of the hills there are traces of settlements and irrigation. The ruins offer an admirable view of the surrounding desert and the Sultan Uvays Mountains as well as Lake Ayaz kul, which is unfortunately tending to disappear. The citadels have retained a good part of their walls. All year round, you can have breakfast or even sleep under the yurts set up behind the citadels. I

The most famous archaeological site in the region with Toprak kala. But also the most disappointing thing: there are only ruins left, overgrown with vegetation. Nevertheless, if you are accompanied by a good guide, there is no doubt that he will be able to make you relive for a moment this citadel which denotes by its circular shape and has preserved a small maze of rooms whose foundations can still be seen. We recommend that you linger on the reconstructed model in the Museum of the Peoples of Uzbekistan in Tashkent to get an idea of its extent.

Having become the regional capital under the Kushans in the 2nd century, it was attacked by the Huns who, by destroying the irrigation canals, overcame the forgotten royal city. Under the direction of Professor Tolstov, excavations began before the Second World War. The frescoes discovered there are on display in St Petersburg, but a collection of objects found at the excavation site by Igor Savitsky is on display at the Nukus Museum. Here, in Toprak Kala, traces of the many rooms and gardens of the royal palace can still be seen.

A first site surrounded by sections of wall is called Little Gouldoursoun. The great Gouldoursoun is 10 km away. The fortresses controlled and protected the irrigation canals. A legend tells how the daughter of the dekhan who ruled the city fell in love with one of the enemies who were besieging the city and how she betrayed her own people by letting the army enter the walls. The unfortunate woman was then abandoned by her lover and the city fell into the hands of the enemies. The same legend is told in Mizdakhan, the ancient city near Nukus.

" The doors of Pierre ", or gates of the south, built in 1830 by Alla Kuli Khan. Arrival point of caravans coming from the Caspian Sea. The place is often deserted today, offering an amazing spectacle, especially in low season.

To the east of the city lies a new lake, a vain attempt to recreate a local climate. The covered area reaches 30 km². Futile in view of the disaster, but the large quantity of fish was enough to restore a little heart to the inhabitants. The fishermen are numerous, summer and winter, and use the most varied methods. Traders are criss-crossing the area looking for bargains, and others come straight from Kazakhstan. A short walk around the lake will allow you to meet this new generation of fishermen.

Go up to the monument to the Aral Sea. From this height, you can see what was once a sea, which the catastrophe has turned into a new desert, covering an area of more than 40,000 km². In fact, it is not even possible to see the "sea" anymore, which is now a mere puddle located 200 km from Moynaq. The wrecks, once scattered in this desert infinity, were in 2008 all gathered and lined up at the foot of the monument where they lay on the dunes rusty spots. In fact, there is not much left of the fishing vessels that once plied the Aral Sea: cannibalized to reinforce the roofs and fences of houses when the city was deserted, they now only offer the sad spectacle of decaying ship skeletons. The sand itself is littered with grains of rust, pieces of gnawed steel plates, ropes, old cans... Coming down from the monument and crossing the city, we arrive at the old cannery where everything has remained as it was since the closure in 1993, due to the lack of fish. The machines, rusted to the bone, seem to be stopped in their tracks, empty cans are waiting to be filled, safety instructions are still posted on the walls. It's barely damaged, as if the disaster had struck not long ago, the sea had suddenly receded and the production line had simply been shut down. A science fiction or horror movie setting.

On the right as you enter the Tash Khauli Palace, a corridor leads to the courtroom, or ishrat khauli. The black coach on display at the end of the corridor is a gift from Nicholas II to his eastern vassal, Khiva's last khan, Asfandiar Khan. He was suffering from a shameful illness and his doctor, who was supposed to be in charge of him, told him that the only way to cure himself was to eat virgins... He used to travel around town in this carriage, which the inhabitants had nicknamed "the black death". The courtroom is a square courtyard flanked to the south by a one-column iwan with decorations just as admirable as those of the harem, still the work of Abdullah Djinn, the genius who also decorated the Pakhlavan Makhmoud mausoleum.

Two places for yurts made it possible to receive guests in winter. A maze of corridors leads to the courtroom, or arz khauli. And for those who have not admired the majolica of the iwan in the harem or the reception hall, those in the arz khauli offer a breathtaking catch-up session. The court had two exits, one for the acquitted, the other for the convicted. The khan sometimes received guests in a yurt placed on a brick elevation in the middle of the courtyard. At the back of the courtyard, a small door leads to dark galleries where doors and columns recovered from several Khiva monuments are displayed in a jumble.

Citadel in the heart of the inner city, Tash Khauli was built from 1831 to 1841. Behind high walls, the khan built this palace including an audience hall, the royal apartments and a harem. The Khorezm craftsmen were renowned for the quality of their decorations and their woodwork; the iwans of the harem, as well as those of the judgment hall and the audience hall, are the best illustration of their perfect mastery. From 1841, the "stone palace" became the main residence of the khan of Khiva.

To the west, the Koutloug Mourad Inak madrasa, built between 1804 and 1812, under the reign of the eponymous khan, by the grandfather of Allah Kouli khan. Khan Koutloug Mourad Inak wanted to be buried in his madrasah, but death surprised him while he was in Dichan kala, the outer city. Since the law forbids the entry of the dead into the inner city, Allah Kuli Khan found a solution by tearing down the city walls that separated the madrasah from the outer city. There was no longer any reason why the khan should not be buried in the vestibule of his madrasah. It was Khiva's first madrasah with two floors of cells. Another special feature is that it is built on top of another madrasa dating from 1688: the Khodjamberdibi Madrasa, which, during the new construction, was converted and renamed Khujum. The domes and the gate were removed, and a passage was drilled through the middle of it. It now serves as a terrace at the gate of the Koutloug Mourad Inak madrasa. The arches of the cells are visible at the front of the great madrasah. The large underground well located in his courtyard supplied pure water to the entire inner city. Today the children come to fetch the banknotes that the pilgrims threw there and no one drinks any more of its water. In season, a puppeteer offers his little show to tourists for whom a few benches have been set up in the courtyard.

The Allah Kouli Khan madrasa was built in 1834 opposite the Koutloug Mourad Inak madrasa, forming the traditional couple of kosh madrasas. One of the largest in the city, it housed Khiva's library. At that time, Allah Kouli Khan wanted to completely reorganize the eastern entrance of the city. He had the inner city wall demolished and a whole complex of commercial and religious buildings erected, thus moving the centre of the city to the vicinity of the Tash Khauli Palace. The new complex included a huge caravanserai, a covered market, baths as well as a madrasah and a mosque. The caravanserai was turned into a supermarket by the Soviets. A curiosity! It opens onto a 14-dome timer. A gallery with 6 domes runs along the Allah Kouli Khan Madrasa and leads to Palvan Darvosa, the east gate, which opens to the outer city and the bazaar. The Allah Kouli Khan Madrasa is only really interesting because of its majestic deep blue portal. Inside, around a rectangular courtyard measuring 30 m by 34 m, the cells are spread over two floors, as in the Koutloug Mourad Inak madrasa.

Located east of the Friday Mosque, the Abdullah Khan Madrasa was built in honour of the 17-year-old Khan, who died fighting the Turkmen, after a short reign of five months. The madrasa houses a Natural History Museum, and each of its cells is arranged around a theme: cotton, silk, fruit... The museum also presents a rich collection of stuffed animals, including birds and reptiles. Facing the madrasah, the Ak mosque, built in 1838, was built on foundations dating back to the middle of the 17th century.

In front of the palace gates, the great square was the venue for parades and military exercises as well as capital executions. In the centre of the square, a hole allowed the evacuation of blood during mass executions, such as those in 1717, when the 3,000 Russian soldiers of Prince Bekovich's expedition and the prince himself were beheaded. In the western corner, one can visit an insalubrious model prison dating from the 19th century, the zindan, a cousin of the rat hole of Bukhara where the unfortunate convicts rotted abandoned from the world of the living.

Built in 1851, during the reign of Khan Mohammed Amin, it was one of the largest madrasas in Central Asia, with a square courtyard of 38 m on each side for a building measuring a total of 72 m by 60 m. A construction in the image of the khan, Khiva's most illustrious ruler: he conquered Merv and imposed his law on the warring Tekke before dying beheaded in a battle on the Iranian border, leaving Khiva open to nomadic attacks for the next decades. To make way for the impressive building, part of the fortification walls had to be demolished. The one hundred and twenty-five cells on two levels housed two hundred and sixty students until 1924. The tympanums of the high portal and of the two storeys of cells on the façade are decorated with blue majolica motifs. The construction of the madrasa offered Soviet historians an illustration of the class struggle under the khans. Indeed, after two years of exhausting work, the workers, who, of course, received no money, revolted: most of them being peasants, they could no longer look after their fields and famine was looming. The revolt was suppressed the Khivian way: Matiakoub, the leader of the rebellion, was wrapped in a wet animal skin and buried alive under the foundations of the minaret. The recent history of the madrasah is not necessarily more cheerful, since the Soviets turned it into a prison in the 1930s and 1940s.

«Giant doors», or eastern doors built between 1806 and 1835, are the oldest in the city. A vaulted passage to 6 domes leads to the old town. Left of the gates, facing Ichan kala, was the slave market. In a retreat, in the niches on each side of the corridor, the slaves who had tried to escape were chained while waiting for a fatal fate: it was in front of the market that the convicts were beaten or killed from 1840.

This immense necropolis, more than two thousand years old, houses mainly Muslim tombs, but also Nestorian tombs as crosses were found engraved on some of the buildings. Most of the mausoleums are in ruins, some have been summarily renovated, such as those of Khalif Erdjep and Bugar Jumart Kassab, while others are waiting for the government to release a budget to resume work. The mausoleum of Nazlimkhan, built in the 14th century, is half buried underground. A must-see visit on the road to Nukus!

Armin Vambery tells how, during his visit in 1863, the surroundings of Khiva were populated by "khauli", which he describes as dwarf fortresses shaded by tall poplars and surrounded by fertile fields. Of these numerous mini-fortresses, only Chadra Khauli apparently remains, with its original architecture perfectly adapted to the unbearable heat of the summer months. A superimposition of iwan on three levels recovers all the draughts and makes it possible to monitor the surroundings as in a watchtower.

Located 2 km southwest of Uzs, the summer palace of Muhammad Rakhim khan was built at the end of the th century. It is a set of three courses subtly decorated with blue and so majoliques of iwan behind which are the apartments, as in the palaces of Ichan kala. The palace also features a summer mosque and a winter mosque. A large pool brought freshness to the whole. Although years old, the summer palace, like Nouroullah Bey's palace, is already equipped with European windows. Just next door, we visit the residence of Islam Khodja, with architecture that is also characterised by European influence.

These gates, the most impressive of the city, take their name from the village where the 1873 treaty was signed attaching the Khiva Khanate to the Russian Empire. They are located in Mustakillik street, next to the palace of Nurullah Bey. They consist of a single passage flanked by two more graceful turrets beautifully decorated with blue majolica. It is in fact a total reconstruction, made by the Soviets in the 1970s from archival documents.

Built in the 19th century, they are located in Palvan Kari street which starts from the eastern gates of Ichan kala. Although their architecture is reminiscent of the Ichan kala doors, their appearance is much more massive and free of any colourful decoration. Between Palvan Darvoza and Koi Darvoza stood a large bazaar where animals, horses, sheep, camels and slaves were sold. Even today, a bazaar is still held in Dichan kala, still very colourful, but fortunately the goods have changed.

Leaving Ichan kala through the east gate, the bazaar is on the left and two minarets stand in line with the gate. The first is the Sayyid Niyaz Shalikarbey Mosque. The complex was built between 1835 and 1845, making it one of the oldest minarets in Khiva. Its flared top, decorated with small niches carved into the structure to give relief to the decorations, resembles more the minarets of Registan in Samarkand than the other minarets of Khiva. A little further on, the Palvan Kari minaret yields 3 m to the first with a height of 21 m. More recently, it was erected in 1905 and is named after the rich merchant who undertook its construction and that of the adjacent madrasah and mosque. With a simpler architecture than the previous one, it seems more massive and its crownless imposing. Looking towards Ichan kala, one can see the impeccable alignment of the two minarets of Dichan kala with the minaret of the Friday Mosque in Ichan kala.

Built in 1726, it houses the Museum of Medicine dedicated to Avicenna and Al-Khorezmi. Above the entrance, an inscription states: "I accept death at the hands of slaves. "It was engraved after the death of Shirgazi Khan inside the madrasah. He had used Persian slaves and Russian prisoners to build this madrasa, promising them a freedom he never gave them. One day when he came to supervise the work, the overworked slaves stoned him to death with bricks.

" Double doors ", or northern doors, built at the beginning of the th century.

Those who have not been sufficiently depressed by the spectacle of Moynaq can push to Uchsay, ten kilometres north. Perched on the edge of a huge dune, this small village does not even have access to water. It is harvested in artificial wells buried in the soil and made of old rusty sheets. When it doesn't rain, it's in the puddles that the kids are sent out of water, where the cars drove and where the cattle came to drink. At the end of the village, a small base camp brings together the gas workers, without a lot of work in the region. In the basement of the Aral Sea, we are still in the drill and on the horizon of this new desert, over visible derricks around Uchsay. Many people have hoped that the Aral subsoil could be as rich as that of the Caspian Sea, and indeed, in this sense, no one really had any interest in saving this sea. ''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''