The Arabshahids, who took over Khorezm in 1511 (see map 25) under the leadership of the two sons of Bürge Sultan, Ilbars and Balbars, were joined by other members of the clan and by some Özbek tribes that were hostile to the Özbek supporters of the Abulkhayrids. They subjugated the Turkmen tribes that were nomadizing on the Üst-Yurt and in the Qara-qum, west and south of Khorezm, and after the death of Shah Ismail in 1523 they occupied the oases of northern Khorasan, along the Kopet-Dagh mountains. The country was divided into appanages of the sultans, with the eldest member of the clan usually elected as a khan. The seat of the first khans was Vezir (until ca. 1518), and then, for almost a century, Urgench.
A sultan’s appanage would often include a region in Khorezm (which was called “the side of the water,” i.e. the Amu-Darya) and a region in Khorasan (which was called “the side of the mountain”), as well as a Turkmen tribe in the steppe. A partial redistribution of the appanages occured with the accession of each new khan. Throughout the 16th century the khanate was a confederation of practically independent principalities.
The Arabshahids were divided into four sub-clans, and conflicts and wars among them resulted in the elimination of some of them, until, in the second half of the century, only one branch of the dynasty could claim the title of khan.

Very soon after their establishment in Khorezm, the Özbeks under the #Arabshahids began to raid Khorasan and Astarabad, sometimes in cooperation with the Abulkhayrids. Especially active in these raids were Din Muhammad Sultan, whose “mountain-side” appanage was in Nesa and Abiverd, and #Ali Sultan, whose appanage was in Durun. In 1538 the Abulkhayrids interfered in the feuds among the #Arabshahids, and the Uzbeks of Mavarannahr, under #Ubaydallah Khan, invaded and occupied Khorezm.
But the next year the Khorezmian Uzbeks under Din Muhammad Sultan, who came from his appanage supported by a Qïzïlbash detachment, routed the Abulkhayrids in a battle near Hazarasp, and the Abulkhayrid troops abandoned Khorezm. The alliance between the Khorezmian Özbeks and the Qïzïlbash was short-lived: by 1543 Din Muhammad Sultan resumed his raids into Khorasan, and the #Arabshahids continued these raids for two decades.