Barak Khan Madrasah, Tashkent

One of the most impressive buildings within the Hazrati Imam Complex in Tashkent is the Madrasah of Barak Khan. It was built in 1531-1532, first as a mausoleum, and then, in the middle of the 16th century, was rebuilt into a madrasah (religious educational institution) during the rule of Shibanid Navruz Ahmed Khan, nicknamed "Barak Khan", which means "lucky".

Originally, there were two mausoleums on the site: big and small. The former was a two-domed mausoleum – khanaka, built in 1530 in honor of the governor of Tashkent, Suyunchkhoja Khan (1454-1525). It was under his rule and that of his immediate heirs that the role of the Uzbek language in literature became firmly established, and Tashkent became a magnet for the intellectual elite of that time. The other mausoleum is called Nameless, for it was built for Barak Khan who was subsequently buried in Samarkand.

The artistic design of the madrasah's gate is not typical for Tashkent and is close to the architectural style of Samarkand. Its vault is made in the form of a niche – colab-kori; tympanums and piers are decorated with carved bricks and various mosaics.

The thick walls of the building are made of bricks of different sizes, clad in colorful glazed ceramic tiles, making up intricate geometrical patterns. Doors of the cells inside the madrasah are also richly decorated, with ivory and non-ferrous metals. The overall shape and decoration of the building remains unchanged, despite numerous earthquakes, thanks to the meticulous restorations carried out in 1946, 1949, 1951, and 1967.