Khanate of Khiva
The Khanate of Khiva was an Uzbek monarchy that existed in the historical region of Khorezm from 1511 to 1920, except for a period of Afsharid occupation by Nader Shah between 1740 and 1746. Centred in the irrigated plains of the lower Amu Darya, south of the Aral Sea, with the capital in the city of Khiva. It covered present-day western Uzbekistan, southwestern Kazakhstan and much of Turkmenistan before the Russian conquest at the second half of the 19th century.
In 1873, the Khanate of Khiva was greatly reduced in size and became a Russian protectorate. The other regional protectorate that lasted until the Revolution was the Emirate of Bukhara. Following the Russian Revolution of 1917, Khiva had a revolution too, and in 1920 the Khanate was replaced by the Khorezm People's Soviet Republic. In 1924, the area was formally incorporated into the Soviet Union and today it is largely a part of Karakalpakstan, Xorazm Region in Uzbekistan, and Daşoguz Region of Turkmenistan.
Name
The terms "Khanate of Khiva" and "Khivan Khanate", by which the polity is commonly known in Western scholarship, are a calque that derive from the. The term was first used by the Russians in the second half of the 17th century, or in the 18th century. Locals of the polity did not use this term, and instead referred to it as the vilayet Khwārazm.Prior to the 17th/18th centuries, the polity was often called "Urgench". This name was also sometimes used in Iran and Bukhara, with the designation "Urganji" often being used as the collective name for its inhabitants.
History
After 1500
After the capital was moved to Khiva, Khorezm came to be called the Khanate of Khiva. Some time around 1600, the Daryaliq or west branch of the Oxus dried up causing the capital to be moved south to Khiva from Konye-Urgench. Although based in the Oxus delta, the Khanate usually controlled most of what is now Turkmenistan. The population consisted of agriculturalists along the river, the Turkic Sarts, and nomads or semi-nomads away from the river. It is arbitrary to anachronistically project modern ethnic and national identifications, largely based on Soviet national delimitation policies, on pre-modern societies. The settled population was composed of aristocrats and peasants bound to the land. During the mid-1600s many Persian slaves were captured by Turkmens and a few Russian and Turkic slaves. Before and during this period, the settled area was increasingly infiltrated by Uzbeks from the north, with their Turkic dialects evolving into what is now the Uzbek language, while the original influence of Khorezmian Turkic Language decreased. The swampy area of the lower delta was increasingly populated by Karakalpaks and there were Kazakh nomads on the northern border. The Turkmen nomads paid taxes to the Khan and were a large part of his army, but often revolted. Since the heart of the Khanate was surrounded by semi-desert the only easy military approach was along the Oxus. This led to many wars with the Khanate of Bukhara further up the river.Before 1505, Khorezm was nominally dependent on the Timurid Sultan Husayn Mirza Bayqara based in Khorasan. From 1488 Muhammad Shaybani built a large but short-lived empire in southern Central Asia, taking Khorezm in 1505. At nearly the same time, Shah Ismail I was building a powerful Shiite state in Persia. The two consequently clashed in 1510 near Merv with Muhammad killed in the battle and Khorezm shortly occupied. The Shah's religion provoked resistance and in 1511 his garrison was expelled and power passed to Ilbars, who founded the long-lived Arabshahid dynasty. The Arabshaids or Yadigarids were Shaybanids and are sometimes distinguished from the Abulkhayrids, another branch of the family. They are named after Yadigar Sultan who was proclaimed khan north of the Aral Sea about 1458 and from his great-grandfather Arabshah. Bregel places them north of the Aral Sea and lower Syr Darya circa 1400–1500.
Around 1540 and 1593, the Khans were driven out by the Bukharans. In both cases they fled to Persia and soon returned. In 1558, Anthony Jenkinson visited Old Urgench and was not impressed. Following Arap Muhammad, who moved the capital to Khiva, there was a period of disorder, including an invasion by the Kalmyks, who left laden with plunder. Disorder was ended by Abu al-Ghazi Bahadur who twice defeated the Kalmyks and wrote a history of Central Asia. His son Anusha Khan presided over a period of urban growth until he was deposed and blinded. From 1695, Khiva was for some years a vassal of Bukhara which appointed two khans. Shir Gazi Khan, who was killed by slaves, is said to have been the last proper Arabshahid. Khan Ilbars was a Shibanid ruler, son of Shakhniyaz khan who unwisely killed some Persian ambassadors. In a repeat of the Shah Ismail story, Nadir Shah conquered Khiva, beheaded Ilbars and freed some 12,000–20,000 slaves. Next year the Persian garrison was slaughtered, but the rebellion was quickly suppressed. Persian pretensions ended with Nadir's murder in 1747. After 1746, the Qongrat tribe became increasingly powerful and appointed puppet khans. Their power was formalized as the Qongrat dynasty by Iltuzar Khan in 1804. Khiva flourished under Muhammad Rahim Khan and Allah Quli Khan and then declined. After Muhammad Amin Khan was killed trying to retake Sarakhs on March 19, 1855, there was a long Turkmen rebellion. In the first two years of the rebellion, two or three Khans were killed by Turkmens.
Russian conquest and protectorate
Russians made five attacks on Khiva. Around 1602, some free Ural Cossacks unsuccessfully raided Khorezm. In 1717, Alexander Bekovich-Cherkassky attacked Khiva from the Caspian Sea. After he won the battle, Shir Ghazi Khan made a treaty and suggested that the Russians disperse so that they could be better fed. However, after dispersing, they were all killed or enslaved, only a few surviving and escaping to tell the tale. In 1801, an army was sent toward Khiva but was recalled when Paul I was murdered. In the Khivan campaign of 1839, Perovsky tried an attack from Orenburg. The weather was unusually cold and he was forced to turn back after losing many men and most of his camels. Khiva was finally conquered by the Khivan campaign of 1873. The Russians installed Sayyid Muhammad Rahim Bahadur Khan II as the vassal ruler of the region.The conquest of Khiva was part of the Russian conquest of Turkestan. British attempts to deal with this were called the Great Game. One of the reasons for the 1839 attack was the increasing number of Russian slaves held at Khiva. To remove this pretext Britain launched its own effort to free the slaves. Major Todd, the senior British political officer stationed in Herat dispatched Captain James Abbott, disguised as an Afghan, on 24 December 1839, for Khiva. Abbott arrived in late January 1840 and, although the Khan was suspicious of his identity, he succeeded in talking the Khan into allowing him to carry a letter for the Tsar regarding the slaves. He left on 7 March 1840, for Fort Alexandrovsk, and was subsequently betrayed by his guide, robbed, then released when the bandits realized the origin and destination of his letter. His superiors in Herat, not knowing of his fate, sent another officer, Lieutenant Richmond Shakespear, after him. Shakespear had more success than Abbott: he convinced the khan to free all Russian subjects under his control, and also to make the ownership of Russian slaves a crime punishable by death. The freed slaves and Shakespear arrived in Fort Alexandrovsk on 15 August 1840, and Russia lost its primary motive for the conquest of Khiva, for the time being.
A permanent Russian presence on the Aral Sea began in 1848 with the building of Fort Aralsk at the mouth of the Syr Darya. The Empire's military superiority was such that Khiva and the other Central Asian principalities, Bukhara and Kokand, had no chance of repelling the Russian advance, despite years of fighting. In 1873, after Russia conquered the great cities of Tashkent and Samarkand, General Von Kaufman launched an attack on Khiva consisting of 13,000 infantry and cavalry. The city of Khiva fell on 10 June 1873 and, on 12 August 1873, a peace treaty was signed that established Khiva as a quasi-independent Russian protectorate. The conquest ended the Khivan slave trade. After the conquest of what is now Turkmenistan the protectorates of Khiva and Bukhara were surrounded by Russian territory.
File:Representatives of the Khanate of Khiva at the coronation of Nicholas II.jpg|300px|thumb|right|Muhammad Rahim Khan II and his officials at the coronation of Nicholas II
Khiva's status as a Russian protectorate initially had little effect on its internal affairs. The Russian military was not stationed in Khiva, and railroads were not built in the country, nor were Russian courts or customs buildings. While a few thousand Russians settled in Urgench, they did not receive separate services from the native population. The Khanate of Khiva was less wealthy and of interest to Russia than the Emirate of Bukhara which had also been made a protectorate during the Russian conquest. As such it drew much less criticism, and played less of a part in the national politics of the Russian Empire. Despite the relative non-intervention of Russia, especially in military matters, the Khanate of Khiva was still beholden to the state. Per the treaty, the Khanate was obligated to pay up to 200,000 Rubles in war indemnities every year, a debt only paid off in 1900 due to the Khanate falling behind on payments. The Khanate was also pressured by Russia to create irrigation projects that would benefit them, which stoked conflict between Khiva and the Turkmens.
In 1910, Muhammad Rahim Khan II died, and was succeeded by his son Isfandiyar Khan. During this time, critiques were being raised of the poor state of infrastructure, justice, and critically cotton production. To this end, infringing on the autonomy of Khiva to increase production and better the country was seen as justified. Upon Isfandiyar's accession to the throne in 1911, he was pressured by Russia to introduce several reforms, including the creation of new financial systems, infrastructure modernizations, and the establishment of hospitals and elementary schools. Isfandiyar primarily left governance up the ministers under the liberal Seyid Islam-khodja, who supported these reforms and attempted to implement them. However, they received significant opposition from Yomut Turkmens and few were actually put into effect.
The financial reforms greatly increased the taxes places on Turkmens, inflaming the existing dispute over irrigation. After an influential Turkmen was assassinated by Khivan officials in 1912, a full revolt broke out. Islam-khodja proposed Khiva compromise with the Turkmens, but was sidelined by war minister Sheikh Nazar-beg, who convinced Isfandiyar to let him to lead a punitive expedition. The Turkmen forces were strongly fortified, and fought off the Khivan expedition until the arrival of Russian Cossacks convinced them to surrender. Islam-khodja led the peace talks, ending the tax but imposing a fine, and taking the leaders as hostages. As a result, Isfandiyar assassinated Islam-khodja soon after. Russia strongly opposed the leniency of the peace terms.
After World War I began, the commandant of the Syr-Darya military district and several other Russian military leaders extorted over 250,000 rubles from Isfandiyar. While the money purportedly went to the war effort, a large majority was pocketed by the leaders. During this time, was appointed acting governor-general of Turkestan. While he took bribes from Isfandiyar, he would continually favored Turkmens in political disputes. Isfandiyar raised taxes to pay for the expenses, once again flaming conflicts with the Turkmens.