The Qongrats came to power following a lengthy struggle for political mastery between the major tribes of the Khanate of Khiva in the power vacuum which followed the collapse of the ‘Arabshāhid dynasty (r. 1511 – early 18th century). By 1770, at the latest, when their leader Muḥammad Amīn Inaq (1175-1205/1762-1791) expelled the occupying Yomut Turkmens from Khiva, the Qongrats had good reason to regard themselves as masters of the country. In contrast to their ‘Arabshāhid predecessors, however, the Qongrat tribal chiefs, who bore the title of inaq, did not boast Chingizid descent: without an inherited claim to supreme authority, they thus initially adopted the time-honoured expedient of presenting themselves as regents acting on behalf of khanal puppets descended – or at least supposedly so – from Chingiz Khan. Defying this tradition, however, in 1804 Eltüzär Inaq (r. as khan in 1219-1221/1804-1806) formally assumed the khanal title, thus signaling the accession of a new dynasty which was to rule Khorezm up until the “revolution” of 1920. Such a breach of traditional practice compelled the early .