ARTSAKH HISTORICAL MONUMENTS

Aghdam 20 Monuments

NKR (Country) / Aghdam (District)

Geographical Environment

The district of Aghdam was established in 1930. It covers the area of 1094 sq. km, situated in the basin of the middle and lower course of the Tartar and Khachen Rivers. It borders with the Martakert, Askeran and Martuni districts of the NKR, and the Tartar, Partav and Aghjabedi districts of Azerbaijan. The district comprises one town (Aghdam) and 119 villages.

Azerbaijanian Soviet Encyclopaedia, vol. I, Baku, 1976, p. 105 (in Azerb.).
Samvel Karapetian, Armenian Cultural Monuments in the Region of Karabakh, Yerevan, 2001, p. 209.

Description

During the early Middle Ages the present area of the district constituted the southern part of Uti-Arandznak, one of the districts of the Armenian province of Utik (Metz Hayk), where the most important settlement was Tigranakert. Several old settlements of this district established at least since the early medieval period are presently known only under their Turkish names, acquired during the last two centuries.

Samvel Karapetian, Armenian Cultural Monuments in the Region of Karabakh, Yerevan, 2001, p. 209.

Generally the majority of the historical landmarks preserved in the area of Aghdam belongs to the early medieval period and only a few monuments may date from the XIII-XIV centuries. That is to say, most of the territory of the present day Aghdam is situated in the plain, and similar to other plain regions, was emptied of Armenians and populated by various nomadic tribes much earlier than the settlements situated in the mountains.