Dishan Kala

History

Khiva was traditionally split into the inner town, Itchan Kala, and the outer town, Dishan Kala. Allakuli Khan built the outer wall in 1842 against raids by the Yomud Turkmen. According to the historian Ogahiy, every subject owed twelve days’ unpaid labour a year and the wall rose in three years, with more than 200,000 people taking part. The clay was dug at Govuk-kul two kilometres north of town, now a large lake.

Sources put the wall at 5.6–6.2 km long, 6–8 m high and 4–6 m thick at the base, pierced by ten gates. Russian guns damaged parts of it in 1873, and in Soviet times its clay was mined for bricks. About 1.4–1.6 km survives; sections were restored in 2005 with UNESCO support and again in 2008–2009.

What to see

The most striking survivor is the northern Kosh Gate of 1912, with two arched passages between three tiled cylindrical towers; it was also called the Urgench Gate, as the road to Urgench began here. The Hazorasp Gate in the northeast, built in fired brick in 1842, has two massive towers and a crenellated gallery. The Gandimyan Gate, named after the village where the 1873 treaty that made the khanate a Russian dependency was signed, was demolished and rebuilt in 1970 from old drawings and photographs.

Dishan Kala also holds the Nurullabay Palace, the Sayid Mahruyjon, Abdolbobo and Tort Shabboz complexes, and an early-20th-century hospital and post office — the lived-in part of Khiva, with its bazaar and neighbourhoods.