Anusha Khan

Anusha Khan (full name Abu’l-Muzaffar Muhammad Anusha Khan) was a ruler of the Khanate of Khiva from the Shaybanid dynasty. The son and successor of Abu al-Ghazi Bahadur, he held the throne from 1663 until 1685–1686. His birth year is not known exactly: sources point to the early 1640s, since he was still an adolescent at the battle of 1657.

His name first appears in connection with the battle near Karmana in 1657. When Abu al-Ghazi’s army was suddenly surrounded by a much larger force of Abd al-Aziz, the Khan of Bukhara, Anusha showed courage, helped turn the battle in Khiva’s favour and saved his father. As a reward his father gave him an army and the town of Hazarasp, and in honour of the victory had a bath built in Khiva beside the White Mosque in the Ichan Kala; it is known as the Anusha Khan bath.

After Abu al-Ghazi died in 1663, Anusha became khan and continued his father’s policy of strengthening the khan’s power. The war with the Khanate of Bukhara resumed under him: sources speak of fighting in 1664–1680 and 1683–1687, and the cause was the struggle for trade routes. In 1685 (according to some sources 1686) he briefly occupied Samarkand but soon had to leave it.

To defend the frontiers the fortresses of Yangi Kot and Shahabad were built, and two large canals, the Shahabad and the Yarmysh, were dug. In Khiva a bath and a madrasa bearing the khan’s name were built; the mausoleums of Sultan Vays Baba (in Karakalpakstan) and of Pahlavon Mahmud in Khiva, and the White Mosque, were repaired. His reign also saw the completion of the historical work “Shajara-i Turk” (“Genealogy of the Turks”), begun by his father.

In foreign policy Anusha tried to restore trade and diplomatic ties with Russia: in 1668 he sent a letter to Tsar Alexis Mikhailovich and in 1669 and 1675 tried again to establish relations. He also improved relations with the Turkmen tribes, which helped reopen a trade route toward the Caspian.

Towards the end of his reign a court conspiracy overthrew Anusha, and he was blinded. He died in 1686 or 1687. According to some accounts he was buried in the Pahlavon Mahmud mausoleum in Khiva.