Talysh Khanate

Khanate of Talysh
Persian: Khānāt-e Talesh Talysh: Tolshi hanәti
Khanate
← 1747–1826 →
Khanate of Talysh in the Map of Caucasus with the borders as of 1801-1813
Capital		Lenkaran
Languages		Persian (official),[1][2] Talysh, Azerbaijani[3]
Political structure		Khanate
History
•	Established	1747
•	Disestablished	1826

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The Talysh Khanate (Persian: خانات تالش‎‎ — Khānāt-e Talesh, Azerbaijani: Talış xanlığı, Talysh: Tolshi hanəti, also known as the Lenkaran Khanate) ^[4] was a khanate of Iranian origin that was established in Persia and existed from the middle of the 18th century till the beginning of the 19th century, located in the south-west coast of the Caspian Sea. It comprised the southeastern part of the modern day Republic of Azerbaijan and the eastern tip of north-western Iran. The capital of the Khanate was its chief city, Lenkaran. Its population mainly consisted of Azerbaijanis and Talysh people.^[3]

As a result of the Persian defeat in the Russo-Persian War of 1826-28, the khanate was dissolved and absorbed by the Russian Empire.

History

According to Mirza Ahmad Mirza oglu Khudaverdi, the founder of the Talysh Khanate, Seyyid Abbas,^[5] his ancestors were members of the Safavid dynasty, who had moved into the Talish region during the 1720s during a turbulent period in Iranian history. When Seyyid Abbas died in 1747^[6] he was succeeded by his son Jamaladdin, often remembered as Gara Khan (the 'Black King'), because of his dark skin. Because of his good service to Nader Shah, Nader officially awarded him the hereditary title of khan.^[4] Gara Khan was pro-Russian in his foreign policy which upset the rulers of neighboring khanates notably Hidayat Khan of Gilan. In 1768 Hidayat Khan attacked the Talysh khanate. Seeing aid against the superior enemy, Gara Khan send his brother Karbalayi Sultan to Fath Ali Khan, ruler of the Quba Khanate resulting in an alliance between Quba and Lenkaran. By 1785 the territory of the Talysh khanate had formally become a dependency of that much stronger Quba Khanate together with certain other Azerbaijani khanates. However, in 1789 following Fath Ali Khan's death, the Talysh Khanate regained its independence under Mir Mustafa, the son of Gara Khan who had himself died in 1786.

In 1794-5 the Persian Shah Agha Muhammad Khan Qajar called on the various khanates of the South Caucasus to form an alliance against the Russian Empire and mounted a military expedition against those who refused to join him. The Talysh khanate refused to do and was attacked in 1795. Mir Mustafa Khan’s disparate army was not strong enough to resist and he send his representatives to General Gudovich asking for Russian protection. However, the Russians took a long time to respond, only finally arriving in 1802 when the Talysh Khanate became a protectorate of the Russian Empire.

The khanate was to remain a pawn between the Persian and Russian empires over the subsequent two decades. In 1809 as a part of the Russo-Persian War (1804-1813), Iranian troops took the city of Lenkaran and expelled the Russian-leaning khan. In 1812, with Napoleon attacking Moscow, the Russians were also battling again in the Caucasus. After a brief siege led by Pyotr Kotlyarevsky on January 1, 1813 2,000 Russian troops managed to retake the citadel of Lenkaran from the Persian army. There were heavy losses on both sides, but strategic capture of Lankaran led inexorably to the September 12, 1813 Treaty of Gulistan. This forced defeated Persia to cede many of the formerly independent khanates to Russia. In 1814 Mir Mustafa khan died and his son Mir Hasan Khan succeeded him but only in name.

With Russia busy in European wars, Persia attempted to reassert its hegemony in the area and to revert the Treaty of Gulistan and thus invaded the south Caucasus, starting the 1826-28 Russo-Persian war. In the campaign of 1826, Persia managed to regain all lost territories, but after the numerous defeats in the campaign of 1827, the war ended up with the even more humiliating Treaty of Turkmenchay which permanently ceded the Talysh Khanate to Russia. Mir Hasan khan had died in 1826 and the khanate was abolished.

The Talysh Khans proved a stimulating subject for famed Azeri poet-playwright Mirza Fatali Akhundov (Mirza Fatali Akhundzade), nicknamed the Muslim Molière. A 1938 production of his Sərgüzəşti Vəziri-Xani Lənkəran ('The Adventures of the Lankaran Khan's Visier'), starred the future president Heydar Aliyev, then just a teenager^[7]

Rulers

1747 (founder) Sa`id `Abbas

1747-1786 (1785-6 under Quba Khanate) Jamaladdin (Gara Khan)

1786-1814 (1786-9 under Quba Khanate) Mir Mustafa Khan

1814-1826 (under Russia) Mir Hasan Khan^[6]

See also

• Khanates of the Caucasus
• Russian conquest of the Caucasus

Sources

• Lankaran.aznet.org Archived December 17, 2007 at the Wayback Machine
• Archived February 23, 2012 at the Wayback Machine

References