THE TORN-OUT HEART OF YEREVAN

The numerous statements made by Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev that the capital of present-day Armenia was created out of the ruins of the Irevan khanate have once again been confirmed on the pages of the erevangala500.com website, the presentation of which took place in Baku on 23 December.

The essence of the event was reflected in its slogan: "To mark the 500th anniversary of the Erivan Fortress - the torn-out heart of present-day Yerevan." The reaction of the guests at the presentation, as well as the numerous responses by Internet users, showed that the subject of the Erivan Fortress has for many people been a discovery, because this seam of Azerbaijan's history has for many years remained torn from the hearts, minds and memory of the international community.

The website, which was devised by the Centre of the History of the Caucasus and Asia Minor of the Azer-Globe Institute of Socio-Political Research, provides information about the destruction of the Erivan Fortress and the Armenization of ancient Azerbaijani lands. Irrefutable historical facts about the creation and affiliation of the present-day Armenian capital have been presented.

A digital picture of the eminent Russian painter of battles Franz Roubaud "The surrender of the Erivan Fortress on 1 October 1827" was presented as proof of the Muslim and Turkic past of present-day Yerevan. In the picture Roubaud has depicted in primitive form the Erivan Fortress, the domes of its mosques, minarets, the barn of a khan and people in oriental Muslim clothes.

According to Salala Hasanova, head of the Centre of the History of the Caucasus and Asia Minor, unique photographic and video material, as well as books by various authors, mainly foreign, about the history of the creation of the city of Irevan, the name of which was later changed to Erivan, and then Yerevan, and its jewel - the Erivan Fortress - have been gathered together on the website.

Evidence is given that present-day Yerevan was founded by Azerbaijanis, rulers of the Safavid dynasty. In 1504 the Safavid Shah Ismail ordered his military commander Revangulu-khan to build a fortress on this land. It was built in seven years on a rocky coast in the south-eastern part of the Zanga River and named in honour of Revangulu-khan - Revan, and later Irevan. In October 1827 the Erivan Fortress was taken by Russian troops under the command of General Paskevich, and the Irevan khanate was annexed to the Russian Empire. "The fortress was not destroyed right up until the Armenian SSR was formed on this territory. After that began the systematic destruction of the fortress of which not a trace is left today," the website says.

The partially preserved Erivan Fortress began to be destroyed by the Armenian authorities in the 1920s, when the Sardar Palace, mosques, bath houses and other buildings reminiscent of the city's Muslim and Turkic past were torn down. When this process was completed in 1936 the Armenians renamed the city Yerevan, thus removing any mention of who created the city and who lived in this jewel of Azerbaijani and Muslim culture.

There was another unpleasant surprise for the Armenian falsifiers of history from the head of the Political Research and Analysis sector of the socio-political department of the president's administration, Fuad Axundov. At the presentation he handed over to the Azerbaijani historians the text of a book by a Soviet Russian historian of Armenian origin, Iosif Orbeli "Epigraphs of Gandzasar", which was published in Petrograd in 1919. The book was long thought to have been lost because after it was published, where over 300 epigraphs of Gandzasar and the surrounding temples of Nagornyy Karabakh had been collected, Orbeli himself suddenly bought up the whole print-run which was subsequently destroyed.

The reason was that the book, which was Orbeli's dissertation, included all the epigraphs of the Albanian Gandzasar monastery complex of the 13th century in Nagornyy Karabakh and other Karabakh temples. It was clear from them that these temples related not to the Armenians but were Albanian cultural and historical heirlooms.

Fuad Axundov noted that, thanks to the historical documents, it was discovered that the Gandzasar church, which the Armenians call their own "Notre Dame", historically belonged to ancient Albanians. After the abolition by tsarist Russia of the Albanian Autocephalous Church in 1836, all its property, temples, religious books and flock were transferred to the Armenian Church.

Fuad Axundov recalled that if Pompeii is the best preserved ancient city, then Yerevan is the only city whose historic centre was deliberately razed to the ground." After Pompeii had been exhumed from the volcanic ash, not a single stone was altered, but not a single stone was left of old Erivan," he said, stressing that the destruction of Erivan is linked with the fact that the city was alien to the Armenians who had settled there.

The head of the sector of the president's administration recalled that the question of the Erivan Fortress was first raised in 2006 by President Ilham Aliyev himself. After each summit when he speaks about this the Armenians get into a flap. 

The Armenian nationalists' acts of vandalism are cleverly protected by Russia. They give Russian names to everything that is erected on the ruins of the Azerbaijani monuments, as was demonstrated at the opening ceremony of Rossiya Square in Yerevan in October 2008.

In the presence of Russian President Dmitriy Medvedev, Armenian leader Serzh Sargsyan admitted that Rossiya Square had been built on the site of the Erivan Fortress. At the same time, he tried to present the Azerbaijani fortress as a memorial to Armenian-Russian relations! "In telling the Russian president about the house in which the play 'Woe from Wit' was presented, Sargsyan did not mention that he was talking about the Sardar Palace of the Irevan khanate, about the luxurious khan's palace with its hall of mirrors which was visited by Griboyedov and in which he wrote with pleasure about it! Now this palace has been wiped from the face of the earth, although it was here that the exiled Decembrists organized their first and only performance of 'Woe from Wit'. And this is a very significant event to be depicted on the memorial plaque, and even more to protect this architectural masterpiece," the erevangala500.com website says.

Through the singular cynicism of statements by the Armenian leaders that naming the Erivan Fortress a "monument to Armenian-Russian relations", Sargsyan virtually admits they wiped it from the face of the earth. At the same time, he stresses that the Temple of St Basil the Blessed in Moscow (the Pokrovskiy Cathedral on the Rvu) contains the chapel of St. Gregory the illuminator (an apostle of the Armenian Apostolic Church).

As Axundov has pointed out, civilized states preserve the cultural heritage of other peoples, which is confirmed by the head of the Armenian state which destroyed a huge number of memorials of material and cultural heritage not only of Azerbaijan but of other peoples, too.

We should point out that the erevangala500.com website has set up an inter-active map of Armenia showing Azerbaijani place-names, residential areas and other places renamed in the Armenian manner. There is also a section where in inter-active mode one can see how, according to foreign travellers, the Erivan Fortress was built and looked, and how it was then gradually destroyed in the 19th-21st centuries by the Armenians.

The Erivan Fortress was renowned in the East as the city of minarets. In the fortress there were 8 mosques, 800 houses and only Azerbaijani Turks lived there, as was written back in the 17th century by the French travellers Tavernier and Chardon, and in the 19th century the Russian archaeologist Uvarov, and others. Many documents show that the Armenians lived in the outskirts of the khanate and only entered the fortress for their day-to-day work.

No information about Yerevan had been found in sources and archives up the beginning of the 16th century when the foundations of the Erivan Fortress were laid. The Erivan Fortress and its buildings reminded one of the Icari Sahar (Old Town) in Baku, the Khan's Palace and the now almost completely destroyed by the Armenians Khan's Palace in Susa on occupied Azerbaijani land. All these and many other architectural monuments, including the Erivan Fortress, clearly show how far Azerbaijani medieval culture was spread which, clearly, makes the Armenians feel uneasy. After all, many ancient cities have their own historic centre which is its pride and joy, preserved by the authorities and the people. Moscow, Tbilisi, Baku and numerous other old cities in the world have their own historic centre.

If Yerevan's historic centre - the Erivan Fortress - had at least some relevance to Armenians they would have preserved it. But the city centre was destroyed only because its architecture clearly reflected elements of Azerbaijani medieval architecture which is impossible to depict as Armenian.

The historian Farida Mammadova, a professor in Albanian studies, who spoke at the presentation, related how she and other researchers from Azerbaijan were prevented in Soviet times from studying archive material and works of Albanian heritage. She said this was done so that no-one would know that all Albanian heritage had been accredited to the Armenians. Mammadova also provided evidence to the effect that Yerevan is not the historic but the acquired homeland of the Armenians. Among other things, she recalled her speech a few years ago at a history forum in Vienna when she indicated to her Armenian counterparts that one of their main sources - "The History of the Armenians" by the medieval author, Movses Khorenatsi - describes the homeland of the Armenians as a locality on the Euphrates River in Asia Minor. In this work Khorenatsi, describing the baptism of the Armenians, notes that they came from Vagarshapat and were baptised in the Euphrates. Therefore, the present efforts of Armenian historians to place Vagarshapat near Yerevan are completely without foundation because the Euphrates is 1,000 km away from these places.

According to Guram Marhulin, a professor of Sukhumi State University (Georgia), when he first wrote the work "The capital of Armenia - the ancient Azerbaijani city Erivan", many people did not understand him. "At the time I asked Armenian historians: what does the word 'Erivan' mean in Armenian? For example, Tbilisi means 'hot water'. Do you know the meaning of the expression 'one's city'? No, because it is an ancient Azerbaijani city," Marhulin said. History shows that the Armenians are settlers in this land, he says.

Kamran Imanov, the head of the Azerbaijani Copyright Agency, said that the time has come to switch to the attack to expose the Armenian lies. The Armenian propaganda machine wants to make us look ridiculous but people who have logical minds know how to differentiate between the truth and lies. 

Taking part in the presentation of the website were Azerbaijani Milli Maclis deputy Qanira Pasayeva, professor of the history faculty of Moscow State University Ismail Atakisiyev, Azerbaijani historians and representatives of the diplomatic corps, NGOs and the media.

In summing up I would like to remind you that this year the Erivan Fortress would be celebrating its 500th anniversary. But it won't! The Armenians have wiped this historical monument from the face of the earth and completely destroyed the Sardar Palace just because their architecture clearly depicted elements of Azerbaijani medieval architecture and they could not possible be presented as Armenian. Therefore, as the erevangala500.com website states, "its splendid image, which has been preserved for us on the canvas of the Russian artist Franz Roubeau, is dear to us. Its history is also dear to us. Because it is OURS."

FIRSTHAND

"We are all well aware that the present Armenian state was created on historic Azerbaijani land. The Irevan khanate, the makhal of Zangazur and other regions are our historic lands." 

Ilham Aliyev, President of Azerbaijan.

A VIEW FROM THE SIDE

"IT IS AN UNFORGIVABLE CRIME"

The professor of Georgia's Sukhumi State University, doctor of historical sciences, Guram MARKHULIA, on the destruction of Erivan Fortress by Armenians

- What can you say about the origin of Erivan Fortress as a scientist who studies the history of our region?

- Of course, Erivan Fortress was built by the Iravan Khanate. Azerbaijanis lived there, and Erivan was their homeland. History shows that this city was artificially Armenianized later. The painting which the Azerbaijani side found and which depicts Erivan Fortress, also suggests that today's Armenia is located in the territory of the Iravan Khanate. It is clear that the Azerbaijani city became the capital of today's Armenia only later. Armenians destroyed all the monuments belonging to Azerbaijan there.

- What aims did Armenia pursue by distorting historical facts?

- The Armenians had to wipe such evidence as Erivan Fortress off the face of the Earth. Therefore, they left no evidence of the Azerbaijani origin of this fortress. But one way of another, history will show that these historical lands belong not to Armenia, but to Azerbaijan. The Armenians know that the time will come when history will prove that they are incomers in these territories.

- Can the deliberate destruction of the past of an entire people be considered a crime?

- Of course, it is a crime. Moreover, it is an unforgivable crime. Today's Armenia was actually created on Azerbaijani and Georgian lands. Yerevan and the southern part of Armenia belonged to Azerbaijan. But today they are considered Armenian territory.