Muhammad Rahim Bahadur Khan II

Sayyid Muhammad Rahim Bahadur Khan II ( – 1910) was Khan of Khiva of the Uzbek ”Kongirad” Dynasty from 1864 to 1910, succeeding his father Sayyid Muhammad Khan. Khiva was turned into a Russian protectorate during his rule, in 1873.

Life The reign of Muhammad Rahim II marked the peak of a cultural revival, during which "more than a hundred works were translated, mostly from Persian into Chagatai Turkic." Muhammad Rahim II introduced printing to Khiva in 1874. He was also "a munificent patron" and wrote poetry under the pen name Feruz.

Muhammad Rahim II also abolished the Khivan slave trade and slavery. When the Russian general Konstantin Petrovich von Kaufmann and his army approached the city of Khiva during the Khivan campaign of 1873, the Khan fled to hide among the Yomuts, and the slaves in Khiva rebelled, informed about the eminent downfall of the city. When Kaufmann's Russian army entered Khiva on 28 March, he was approached by Khivans who begged him to put down the ongoing slave uprising, during which slaves avenged themselves on their former enslavers. When the Khan returned to his capital after the Russian conquest, the Russian General Kaufmann presented him with a demand to abolish the Khivan slave trade and slavery, which he did.

Excerpt from Ghazals

Below is one of Muhammad Rahim's ghazals in modern Uzbek Latin script: