The "Kyzyl-Kala" fortress (1st–2nd century)

Kyzyl-Kala stands in Karakalpakstan, twenty-seven kilometres from the town of Beruni and not far from Toprak-Kala. It is dated to two periods: the first and second centuries, and the twelfth to the early thirteenth. The fortress guarded the north-eastern edge of ancient Khorezm until the invasion of Genghis Khan, and it has been suggested that it served as an additional strongpoint for Toprak-Kala.

It sits on the plain and is almost square in plan — 65 by 63 metres. The walls are double and in two tiers, pierced with arrow-shaped loopholes, with watchtowers at the corners. Besides its military role the fortress was an agricultural centre and a junction of the caravan roads crossing the Sultanuizdag.

The entrance is cunningly made: the passage twists between sheer walls like a riverbed — an attacker who got inside exposed himself to archers on every side at once. Taking the place by storm was next to impossible, and a siege achieved little: large stores of provisions were kept inside, and water was brought in by underground kariz channels.

Within, residential quarters of small rooms ran along the single street, with a fire temple at one end and the gates at the other. From the wall there is nothing but sand to the horizon — and that view explains why the fortress was built exactly here.