TASH KHAULI PALACE

A citadel in the heart of the inner city, Tash Khauli or "Stone Palace" was built between 1831 and 1841 for the ruler of the Khiva Khanate, Alla Kouli Khan. Behind high walls, the khan had this palace built, including an audience hall, royal apartments and a harem. It served as his principal residence from 1841 to 1880.

It is best visited for its Harem (or gynecae), i.e. the apartments reserved for women, a practice that dates back to the earliest antiquity (Egypt, Assyria, Greece...). The name comes from the Arabic word harâm meaning "illicit" or "forbidden". Overlooking a long inner courtyard lined with a succession of summer and winter apartments, the five iwans all feature the same architecture: a high room closed on three sides, open to the northeast to avoid the scorching sunshine of the summer months, with a small adjoining room to keep the temperature bearable during the winter months. Slaves and family members of the khan's wives lived in the rooms and small iwans lining the inner courtyard.

The complex was decorated by the finest craftsmen of the time in a particularly refined style: openwork windows in the winter rooms, finely chiselled wooden columns, wooden coffered ceilings painted with geometric motifs. The walls, entirely decorated in blue and white majolica, are the work of master craftsman Abdullah Djinn (who also worked on the Ark mosque). The stylistic resemblance is obvious, but the proportions here are more substantial. The walls are painted in cool colors, contrasting with the warm ceilings.

On the right as you enter the Tash Khauli palace, a corridor leads to the audience hall, or ishrat khauli, a square courtyard flanked on the south by an iwan, the work of Abdullah Djinn. In the past, two yurt sites were used to accommodate guests in winter. Wandering through a maze of corridors, you come to the court room, or arz khauli. Stunning majolica tiles. The court had two exits, one for the acquitted, the other for the condemned.

The black carriage at the end of the corridor was a gift from Nicholas II to his vassal, the last khan of Khiva, Asfandiar Khan. Asfandiar Khan was suffering from a "shameful" disease, and his physician told him that the only way to cure himself was to consume a virgin... So the carriage circulated the city in search of prey, nicknamed "the black death" by the locals.