Islam Khoja Minaret

The Islam Khoja madrasah and minaret are a unique architectural ensemble. The madrasa has a large domed hall, forty-two hujras-cells. The tallest minaret in Uzbekistan has been built next to the madrasah. The name of the architect has remained in history – usto Khudaibergen Khoja.

The Islam Khoja minaret is a brick pillar, round in cross section. With a height of about 56 meters, it surpassed Bukhara's Kalyan minaret. The diameter at its base is almost 12 meters. The minaret is noticeably narrowed towards the top, which gives it additional harmony and strength. The tower is crowned by a through lantern with an elegant cornice and a small dome with a golden top. And the trunk of the minaret is decorated with ornamental blue-and-white belts of glazed ceramics, interspersed with figured masonry made of polished bricks. The people of Khiva are proud of the Islam Khoja minaret. It dominates Khiva and is visible from anywhere in the city, so it's difficult for a tourist to get lost in it.

Well, those who want to admire the city from the top of the minaret will have to climb one hundred and seventy-five steep spiral stairs, and the only lifting device here are the legs. Don't be surprised if you sometimes have to climb using your hands on high stone steps. But you will be rewarded with a breathtaking panorama of an oriental city, a city from a fairy tale, and you will forever remain a person who saw Khiva with his own eyes, dimly shimmering in the distance and spreading out in a hot haze of sand. Cotton fields are getting greener. And around the minaret there are countless adobe houses with flat roofs and enclosed courtyards, a maze of narrow crooked streets, domes and towers of mosques and minarets burning in the sun, a winding chain of ancient fortress walls.

The construction of the madrasa and minaret was completed in 1910, and it was the last major architectural complex of the era of the Khiva khans.