Southern Khanates of Azerbaijan in the Documents of the Russian State Military Historical Archive

Abstract

Starting from the beginning of the 19th century, Azerbaijan became the battlefield of two great powers, Russia and the Qajar Empire. After 30 years of intermittent war, the territory of Azerbaijan was occupied and divided by these two states. The Russo-Iranian war also resulted in the division of the historical territory of Azerbaijan into two parts. As the result, the concepts of North and South Azerbaijan were created. Since 1828, eleven Azerbaijani khanates located in the south of the Aras River fell under Qajar rule. However, in spite of this, in the 80 years of their existence, these khanates implemented an independent internal and foreign policy and had political weight in the region. The economic, political and cultural life of the khanates has been the subject of research at different times. Various sources, including foreign ones, were used in these studies. Russian sources stand out among these sources. Thus, a valuable document base has been collected in the archives of the Russian Empire, which began military expansion in the region from the beginning of the 18th century. Among these archives, the Russian state military-historical archive stands out. Since the archive specializes in the protection of military documents, the documents of military operations carried out by Russia in the Caucasus are preserved here. Documents also contain information about the Southern khanates of Azerbaijan. This information is mainly about the political, economic, geographical, cultural and social life of the khanates. The article is dedicated to researching the history of Southern khanates based on these materials.