Julfa, Azerbaijan (city)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Julfa of Djulfa (Azerbaijani: Culfa; Armenian: Ջուղա, sometimes transliterated as Jugha) is the administrative capital of the Julfa administrative region of the Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic in Azerbaijan.

[edit] History

Two Julfa khachkars from the 16th century, removed from the Julfa graveyard before its destruction

Founded as a village in the early Middle Ages, Julfa grew into a town between the 10th and 13th centuries, with an almost entirely Armenian population. For a time, Julfa was one of the most important settlements in historic Armenia. It became prosperous from the 15th to the 17th centuries due to the role its Armenian merchants played in international trade: the caravans of those merchants travelled the ancient trade routes from Persia, India, South-East Asia and the Middle East, to Russia, the Mediterranean, and North-West Europe.

In 1603, Shah Abbas I of Persia retook Julfa from the Ottoman Empire and was seen as a liberator by the Armenian population. By 1605, however, he realized that he was unable to defend the territory along the Aras River from incursions by the Ottomans. Abbas' solution was to evacuate the region, undertaking a scorched earth policy in order that the region's wealth and population would not fall into Ottoman hands. In October 1605, the Shah issued an edict declaring that the entire population of Julfa must leave their homes and move deep into the Persian Empire.

According to 17th century chronicler Arakel of Tabriz,^[1] the edict stated that they had three days to leave or face being massacred. Another eyewitness, Augustus Badjetsi, Bishop of Nakhchivan, wrote:^[2]

About three thousand families were deported from Julfa, and many drowned while attempting to cross the Aras. After the deportation was completed, the town was destroyed by fire to prevent the inhabitants from returning.

In 1606, a second deportation was made of a surviving population that had escaped the first deportation. These remaining inhabitants were taken to an area near Esfahan, in Persia (now Iran), where a new town, New Julfa, was established. New Julfa is now a district of Esfahan, and still contains a small Armenian population.

In the 17th and 18th century a small settlement was founded amid the ruins of the destroyed town, which, in 1747, became part of the Nakhchivan khanate. At the start of the 19th century this settlement moved to a new location three kilometres to the east of the historical town, at the point where the Yernjak River flows into the Aras. After the Treaty of Turkmenchay in 1828, the village of Julfa became the official border crossing between Persia and Russia, containing state customs services, a garrison and post office.

The town became part of the Armenian oblast from 1840 to 1847, and then part of the Erevan Gubernia of the Russian Empire between 1847 and 1917. Following the Russian Revolution, between 1918 to 1920 Julfa was the subject of a territorial dispute between the Democratic Republic of Armenia and the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic. As a result of the Treaty of Kars, it became part of the Nakhchivan Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic under the Transcaucasian SFSR in 1922, which itself became part of the Azerbaijan SSR in 1936.

During the conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia over the status of Nagorno-Karabakh from 1988 to 1994, the remainder of the Armenian population (which had been slowly declining due to emigration during the Soviet era) either fled or was forcibly deported to Armenia.

[edit] The archaeological site of Old Julfa and destruction of the Julfa cemetery

A photograph taken in 1915 by Aram Vruyr showing part of the medieval Armenian cemetery of Julfa.

At the beginning of the 20th century, the remains of the medieval settlement included a massive ruined bridge, two large caravanserais (one on the Iranian side of the border), the walls of a fortress, and several Armenian churches. The most notable remnant from old Julfa was the town's huge Armenian cemetery, located to the west of the ruined city, on three low hills divided by small valleys, which contained the largest surviving collection of Armenian Khachkar tombstones, most dating to the 15th and 16th centuries. One of the earliest references to the site is that of the French Jesuit missionary Alexander de Rhodes, who wrote that during his visit in 1648 he saw over ten thousand tombstones. However, a large number of the stones were destroyed during the construction of the railway line to Julfa early in the 20th century.

According to Argam Aivazian's investigations at the cemetery from 1971 to 1973, there were, either upright or fallen, 462 khachkars on the first cemetery hill, 1,672 khachkars on the second, and 573 on the third. In addition to these khachkars there were in the same cemetery more than a thousand ram-shaped, gabled, or flat tombstones. An additional 250 khachkars were counted in the cemetery of the nearby Amenaprkich monastery and in other parts of the city site. The number of khachkars and ram-shaped tombstones buried in the earth or in fragments, in the main cemetery and elsewhere, was estimated to be more than 1,400.

However, between 1998 and 2006 the entire cemetery was destroyed. The various stages of the destruction process have been documented by photographic and video evidence taken from the Iranian side of the border. ^[3][4][5] Government and state officials of Azerbaijan have denied that any destruction has taken place, stating that an Armenian cemetery never existed on the site and that Armenians have never lived in Julfa. Azerbaijan has, to date, refused neutral observers access to the site. ^[6] The European Parliament has formally called on Azerbaijan to stop the demolition as a breach of the UNESCO World Heritage Convention.^[7] According to its resolution regarding cultural monuments in the South Caucasus, the European Parliament "condemns strongly the destruction of the Julfa cemetery as well as the destruction of all sites of historical importance that has taken place on Armenian or Azerbaijani territory, and condemns any such action that seeks to destroy cultural heritage." ^[8] In 2006, Azerbaijan barred the European Parliament from inspecting and examining the ancient site ^[9], stating that by passing the previously-mentioned resolution the Parliament had committed a hostile act against Azerbaijan. The Institute for War and Peace Reporting reported on April 19, 2006 that "there is nothing left of the celebrated stone crosses of Jugha."^[10]

After several more postponed visits, a renewed attempt was planned by Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) inspectors for August 29 - September 6 2007, led by British MP Edward O'Hara. As well as Nakhchivan, the delegation would visit Baku, Yerevan, Tbilisi, and Nagorno Karabakh ^[11]. The inspectors planned to visit Nagorno Karabakh via Armenia, and had arranged transport to facilitate this. However, on August 28, the head of the Azerbaijani delegation to PACE released a demand that the inspectors must enter Nagorno Karabakh via Azerbaijan. On August 29, PACE Secretary General Mateo Sorinas anmounced that the visit had to be cancelled because of the difficulty in accessing Nagorno Karabagh using the route required by Azerbaijan. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Armenia issued a statement saying that Azerbaijan had stopped the visit "due solely to their intent to veil the demolition of Armenian monuments in Nakhijevan" ^[12].

[edit] Julfa in culture

The sudden and dramatic downfall of Old Julfa in the 17th century made a deep and lasting impression on Armenian society and culture. During the 19th century, poets such Hovhanness Toumanian and historians such as Gevorg Alishan produced works based on the event. The emotions raised as a result of the destruction of the graveyard in 2006 indicates that the fate of Julfa still resonates within contemporary Armenian society.

[edit] References

[edit] Further reading

• Argam Aivazian, Djugha / Ջուղա, Yerevan, 1990. ISBN 5540008111
• Argam Aivazian, Nakhijevan: Book of Monuments / Նախիջեւան. գիրք հուշարձանաց, Yerevan, 1990. OCLC 26842386
• Switzerland-Armenia Parliamentary Group, The Destruction of Jugha, Bern, 2006.

[edit] External links

• Old Jugha page on Armeniapedia
• Djulfa Virtual Memorial and Museum Documenting Cultural Destruction in Nakhichevan
• Destruction of Jugha khachkars by Azeri soldiers captured in photos and movie clips.
• Regnum News Agency report. giving response of Azerbaijan to reports of the destruction of the cemetery.
• IWPR report by a reporter who did not actually visit the graveyard site.
• Archive 1 Archive 2 Two archives of news reports on the issue of the Julfa graveyard's destruction.
• The New Tears of Araxes Documents the destruction of thousands of ancient Armenian headstones by the Azerbaijani authorities in Julfa (Jugha), Nakhchivan.

Coordinates: 38°57′N, 45°38′E