Qazakh
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Qazakh (Azerbaijani: Qazax, Armenian: Քազաք; Russian: Казах; also known as Kazakh or Gazakh) is a rayon of Azerbaijan. It has two exclaves, Yukhari Askipara and Barkhudarli inside Armenia and have been under Armenian control since the Nagorno-Karabakh War.
In antiquity, this rayon was part of Utik, a historic province of the Kingdom of Armenia as described by Greco-Roman historians with the Kura River marking the border between Armenia and neighboring Caucasian Albania.[1][2][3] This boundary, however, was often overrun by armies of both countries[4] and came under Albanian control in 387 AD. After this, medieval Armenian historians (e.g., Movses Khorenatsi,[5] Hovaness Draskhanakertci,[6] and Moisey Kalankatuyski (Movses Dasxuranci)[7]) around the 5th-7th cc. A.D. referred to it as the "Albanian plain." The region was eventually conquered by several neighboring powers including the Sassanid Persians, the Byzantine Greeks, the Arabs, the Seljuq Turks, the Georgians, the Mongols, the Timurids, the states of Kara Koyunlu and Ak Koyunlu, and finally the Safavid Persians.
After the Russo-Persian War (1804-1813), the Russian Empire gained control of the area by virtue of the Treaty of Gulistan. Under Russian rule, it formed the northeastern part of the Kazakh uyezd of the Elisabethpol Governorate. A contemporary military historian noted the following ethnographic detail: "Abbas Mirza's route lay through the country of the great tribe of the Casaks, which is extremely strong and thickly wooded." He further notes that: "These have no connection with the Russian Cossacks. They are descended from men of the Kirgis Casaks, left by Genghis Khan, and are Mahomedans of the Soonnie [Sunni Muslims] sect. They are frequently called Kara Papaks, from wearing black sheep-skin caps."[8]
With the fall of the Russian Empire, dispute over the region arose between the Armenians (who made up 39% of the population) and the Azerbaijanis (who comprised 57%).[9] When the South Caucasus came under British occupation, Sir John Oliver Wardrop, British Chief Commissioner in the South Caucasus, decided that assigning the Erivan Governorate and the Kars Oblast to Democratic Republic of Armenia (DRA) and the Elisabethpol and Baku Governorates to the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic (ADR) would solve the region's outstanding disputes. However, this proposal was rejected by both Armenians (who did not wish to give up their claims to Kazakh, Zangezur (today Syunik), and Nagorno-Karabakh) and Azerbaijanis (who found it unacceptable to give up their claims to Nakhichevan). As conflict broke out between the two groups, the British left the region in mid-1919.
After the British evacuation and more fighting between Armenians and Azerbaijanis ensued, the Soviet Eleventh Army led by Grigoriy Ordzhonikidze gained control of the region which was later incorporated into the Soviet Union as part of the Transcaucasian SFSR. During the process of Sovietization, the borders of the Transcaucasian republics were redrawn several times. The territory of the former Kazakh uyezd was eventually divided between the Armenian and Azerbaijani republics along ethnic and sectarian lines.[10] The northern region, including the town of Qazakh itself was given to Azerbaijan while the southern portion, roughly corresponding to the present-day Armenian province Tavush was given to Armenia.[10] During the Nagorno-Karabakh War, Armenia gained control of Qazakh's exclaves of Yukhari Askipara and Barkhudarli. Besides this, neither country has disputed the boundary since.
[edit] Footnotes
- ^ Strabo, Geography, 11.14.4
- ^ Pliny the Elder, "The Natural history ", 6.39: "..the tribe of Albanians settled on the Caucasian mountains, reaches ... the river Kir making border of Armenia and Iberia"
- ^ Claudius Ptolemy, "Geography" 5.12: "Armenia is located from the north to a part of Colchida, Iberia and Albania along the line, which goes through the river Kir (Kura)"
- ^ Encyclopedia Iranica. M. L. Chaumont. Albania.
- ^ Movses Khorenatsi, "History of Armenia", Book 2, Chapter 8, translated into Russian by G.Sarkisyan, Hayastan Publishing House: Yerevan, 1990
- ^ Hovaness Draskhanakertci, "History of Armenia", Chapter XXXI, translated into Russian by M.O.Darbinyan-Melikyan, Yerevan, 1984
- ^ Moisey Kalankatuyski, "History of Caucasian Albanians", Book I, Chapter IV, translation into Russian by Sh.V.Smbatyan, Yerevan, 1984
- ^ Lt-Gen. William Monteith, Kars and Erzeroum: With the Campaigns of Prince Paskiewitch, in 1828 and 1829; and an Account of the conquests of Russia beyond the Caucasus, from the time of Peter the Great to the Treaty of Turcoman Chie and Adrianople, London: Longman, 1856, p. 60
- ^ (Russian) Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary. "Kazakh". St. Petersburg, Russia, 1890-1907
- ^ a b W.E.D. Allen (published 1927). New Political Boundaries in the Caucasus. The Geographical Journal.
[edit] External links
- Dr. Andrew Andersen, Ph.D. Atlas of Conflicts: Armenia: Nation Building and Territorial Disputes: 1918-1920.
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| Cities | Ali Bayramli · Baku · Ganja · Khankendi · Lankaran · Mingachevir · Naftalan · Nakhichevan City · Shaki · Sumqayit · Shusha · Yevlakh |
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Names in italics indicate parts of the Nakhichevan Autonomous Republic
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