Muhammad Amin Khan Madrasah

The Muhammad Amin Khan madrasah stands in the western part of Ichan-Kala and still impresses by sheer scale: it is the largest madrasah not only in Khiva but in all Central Asia. Above the entrance an Arabic inscription reads that this fine building will stand for ever to the joy of posterity.

Muhammad Amin Khan was drawn to the monumental in general: it was he who began the Kalta-Minor minaret, planned at eighty metres, higher than Bukhara's Kalyan and Delhi's Qutb Minar. The minaret did not work out — the khan was killed fighting the Turkmens on his Khorasan campaign, and the tower stopped at twenty-nine metres. The madrasah fared better.

The first thing you notice is the size. There are a hundred and twenty-five hujra cells, and on the ground floor each has two rooms, while those on the upper floor have small balconies — nothing of the sort had been built into a madrasah before. Up to two hundred and sixty students could study here at once. The Chancellery of the Supreme Muslim Court was also housed in the building.

Five domes and corner towers complete the silhouette. The building is richly finished in glazed brick and traditional majolica, and the doors are covered in carved ornament.

The madrasah now holds the Khiva hotel — so you can sleep in a nineteenth-century cell.