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Islam in Armenia

Blue Mosque in Yerevan

Islam in Armenia at present does not have a large number of followers, although at a certain period of history it was the dominant religion in the territory of the Erivan khanate [1] . In modern Armenia, Islam is practiced mainly by the Kurds and Persians . The Muslim Kurdish community numbers 2,000 people and lives mainly in the Abovyan region . Despite the constant decline in the proportion of Muslims in Armenia from the moment the region joined Russia and the population migrations that followed, a large Muslim community, consisting mainly of Azeris , remained in Armenia until the beginning of the Karabakh conflict , but almost all of them were deported from the republic .

Content

The emergence of Islam in Armenia

 
Mausoleum of Pir-Hussein - tomb- turb with an Arabic inscription in the village of Argavand

Islam appeared in Armenia in the VII century AD. er in the period of the Arab conquests . Ibn Haukal , author of the X century, reports:

Dabil - a city larger than Ardabil ; it is the most significant locality and district in inner Armenia. He is the capital of Armenia and in it is the palace of the rulers of the region of Armenia ... There is a wall around the city; There are many Christians in it, and the cathedral mosque of the city next to the temple, like the Hims mosque adjacent to the church and located next to it. ... Most of Armenia is inhabited by Christians. [2]

In order to strengthen their power and speed up the process of Islamization, the Arab caliphs settled the conquered lands by Arab tribes, and quite a lot of them appeared in Armenia. [3]

The first Oguz nomadic tribes, Islamized in Central Asia in the 10th century [4] , appeared on the territory of Armenia in the middle of the 11th century . Starting from the 11th century, the territory of Armenia is under the invasion of Seljuk Turks, accompanied by devastation. The Seljuk invasion led to the resettlement of the Muslim population in the region and the forced emigration of a significant part of the Armenians. From this point on, a centuries-old process began in Armenia of ousting the local Christian population and replacing it with the Muslim one. The Seljuks were fastest established in the southern Armenian lands, from where the Armenian population was forced to emigrate to the borders of Byzantium [5] . A new wave of invasions of Muslim Turks in Armenia is associated with the Tatar-Mongol invasion, then with Timur. At the same time, an increasing number of lands were taken away from the local Armenian population and settled by alien nomads professing Islam [6] . In the 16th century, an attempt was made to Islamize the Armenians, for which purpose the Sc. “Jafar’s laws” (by the name of Imam Jafar al-Sadeq), according to which an Armenian who converted to Islam could single-handedly claim the inheritance of parents [7] . The total resettlement of the inhabitants of the region into the depths of Persia, organized by the Persian Shah Abbas I, in 1603, the so-called. “The great surgun”, and the settlement of the Turkmen tribes in their place finally changed the demographic situation in Armenia in favor of the Islamic population [8] .

The number of Muslims and mosques

 
Erivan . Minaret of a city mosque.
 
Map of the settlement of Muslims in 1886 - 1890 within the present borders of the Republic of Armenia:
Light Green - Shia
Dark Green - Sunni

During the 17-18th centuries, more than 350,000 Armenians were resettled from the territory of the Erivan region during the Ottoman-Safavid wars. The most massive displacements were observed in 1603, when 250 thousand Armenians were resettled from the environs of Yerevan and Nakhichevan in the depths of Persia, in the Khorasan region. In the last decade of the Khanate, between 1795-1810, about 20 thousand Armenians left for Georgia alone.

As a result of the expulsion of more than 350000 Armenians, hundreds of localities are completely empty. About 90,000 Muslims were settled on the almost completely deserted lands.

In the years 1580-1600. In the Erivan region, a Turkic tribe Ustajly was resettled from Asia Minor [9] .

In the late XVI and early XVII centuries. two more Turkic tribes were moved to the region - Alpaut and Bayat [10]

In the 16th century, three Kurdish tribes — chamishkisek, khnuslu, and spazuk — were established in the Erivan region.

In the years 1610-1620. Shah Abbas resettled the Turkic Kajar tribe in Eastern Armenia [10] , only Erivan, Ganja and Karabakh settled 50,000 Kajar families, which over time multiplied even more [11]

As a result of all these events, in 1826 about 90,000 Muslims lived in the Erivan Khanate, among whom there were 54,810 Oghuz Türks from the Ustajly, Alpaut, Bayat tribes, Ayrums and Qadjars (about 10,000 families), 25,237 Kurds from the Chamishzek tribes , khnslu and pazuki (5,223 families) and 10,000 Persian soldiers who served in military service in Armenia [12] .

At the time of the annexation of the territory of Eastern Armenia to Russia in 1828, out of approximately 107 thousand inhabitants of the Erivan khanate, 87 thousand were Muslims. According to the statistics of the imperial administration, compiled in 1831, the number of Muslims decreased to 50 thousand. There was still a Muslim majority in the city of Erivan. Of the 11,400 inhabitants, more than 7,000 were Muslims [13] [14] . By 1869, there were 60 mosques in the Erivan district [15] .

By 1879, the mosques were located in the following settlements of Transcaucasia, which are now located within the present borders of Armenia (* marks the villages where only Muslim prayer houses were located) [16] :

  • In Erivan - 5 mosques
  • In Erivan district : Arbat, Khachapary *, Shorlu-Demurchi, Shorlu-Mehmandar, Donguzian, Nejil Upper *, Nejil Lower *, Sarvanlar-uliya, Karakishlyag, Charbakh *, Agja-kishlag, Haji-Elyaz, Ulukhanlu (in Ulukhanlu ) Karakoyunlu *, Sabunchi (2 mosques), Boyuk Vedi , Avshar, Halisa *, Shikhlyar *.
  • In Echmiadzin district : Haji-Bayram , Megriban , Shagriyar (4 mosques), Djanfida, Kyarim-arch, Igdala, Akerak, Tos, Karahanlu, Zeyva Tatarskaya , Kelani-Aralikh , Molla-Abdal, Kargabazar , Chobancara .
  • In Sharur-Daralaguez district : Chiva .
  • In Novobayazetsky district : Hussein-Kuli-Agal (Agkilisa) (2 mosques).

According to the census of 1897 , in the then Erivan province there were 25,218 Muslims out of 92,323 people in the province (27.3% of the population) [17] , according to other reference data [18] - 41% of the population (36.7% - Shiites , 4.3% - Sunni ). By 1896, there were 10 Muslim schools and 13 mosques in Novobayazet district (approximately corresponding to the territory of Gegharkunik marz) [19] .

In 1906 - 1911 , according to the list of state and public buildings compiled by B. Megrabov, a Yerevan technician, there were 8 mosques : Tapabashinskaya Mosque, Shagarskaya Mosque, Sartib Mosque, Goyi Mosque (Blue Mosque) Haji-Gusein Ali- Khan , Haji-Novruz-Ali-Bek Mosque, Serf Mosque, Demirbulag Mosque and Haji Jafar Mosque. [20] .

By the beginning of the 20th century, Muslims accounted for 62% of the population of Erivan County (52.5% of the population are Shiites ) [21] and 35.6% of Echmiadzin (30% Shia) [22]

However, at present only one mosque operates in the republic - the Blue Mosque , located in Yerevan. It was built by the Erivan khan Hussein Ali in 1765 . [23]

  •  

    Erivan. Gegy Mosque

  •  

    Small Gegy Mosque in Erivan.

History of Islamic Monuments

At the beginning of the 17th century, more than 250,000 local sedentary Armenians were forcibly evicted from Eastern Armenia [24] , and Muslim tribes (most often nomadic) Turkic (Ustajlu, Alpaut, Bayat, Ahcha-Kojünlu Kadjar [26] ) settled in their place [25] and Kurdish (chamishkizek, khnusla and pazouka [26] ) origin. Between 1600 and 1810, there was a massive resettlement of Muslims from Persia and Central Asia to Eastern Armenia. In total, about 90,000 Muslims were resettled to Eastern Armenia, including 54,000 Turks, 25,000 Kurds, and 10,000 Persians [27] . To implement the necessary religious rites of such a large Muslim population, the Persian Empire built dozens of mosques in the Erivan region.

 
View of Erivan with minarets in 1796

Mosques built before the 16th century in Yerevan did not survive, they were all destroyed in the wars of the Ottomans and the Safavids , when the city passed from hand to hand [28] . After the capture of Erivan in 1827 by the Russians, the main Erivan mosque, built by the Turks in 1582 and decorated with a golden moon, was converted into an Orthodox church in the name of the Protection of the Most Holy Theotokos, to commemorate the taking of the fortress on this day [29] (the golden moon itself was sent by the Sardar in Qazvin [30] [31] ). By 1852, there were eight mosques in Erivan, two of which were turned into an arsenal and a shop, and the rest were Zalikhan , Navruz-Ali-Beg , Sartin-Khan, Husein-Ali-Khan , Haji-Imamverdiyev and Haji-Jafar-Beg [ 32] . Also, at each mosque there was a school where several dozens of boys were taught to read and write. In the Huseyn Ali Khan mosque there were about 200 pupils [32] .

 
View of Erivan with minarets during the capture of the fortress by the Russians in 1827. Hood F. Rubo

At the beginning of the twentieth century, when 49% of the population of Erivan and 53.5% of the population of Erivan County were Azeri (Adherbian Tatars), there were 7 Shiite mosques in the city. [21] During the Soviet period, most of them were closed [33] (as well as most Armenian churches ). Of the mosques today, only Huseyn Ali Khan’s ( Blue Mosque ) mosque , restored by Iranian craftsmen, has survived. In 1990, a small Azerbaijani mosque was demolished by a bulldozer on ul. Vardanats, [34] under the influence of rumors about the destruction of the Armenian church in Baku; according to the British journalist Thomas de Waal, “she was not lucky: the building was not considered“ Persian ”and demolished.” [35] Among those demolished in the early 1930s. The monuments also include the Khan's Palace, the memory of which is preserved in the drawings of the artist G. Gagarin , and the ruins of a Turkish fortress.

Archaeologist Philip L. Kohl notes the small number of Islamic monuments in Armenia, including the capital, Yerevan. Pointing to the predominance of the Muslim population in the territory of the Erivan Khanate before the signing of the Turkmenchay Treaty and the ethnic movements that followed it [36] , F. Kohl writes:

Whatever demographic statistics we turn to, there can be no doubt that significant material monuments of Islam should have existed in this region. Their almost complete absence today cannot be accidental. [37]

Original Text (Eng.)
It is simply that they’ve once exiled in this area. Cannot be fortuitous today.

Notes

  1. ↑ Bournoutian, George. Eastern Armenia, 1807–1828 . Undena Publications, 1982; with. 74:

    “[The Armenians] are formed less than 20 percent of the total population of 20% of the khanate of Erevan, with the Muslims exceeding 80 percent. In the case of Muslims. Although it was only after the emigration of over 25,000 Muslims from the territory; during the Persian administration ”.

  2. ↑ Karaulov N. A. Information of Arab writers of the X and XI centuries by R. Chr. about the Caucasus, Armenia and Aderbeydzhane.
  3. ↑ East in the middle ages. I. Transcaucasia in the 4th — 9th centuries.
  4. ↑ "History of the East" (East in the Middle Ages). Chapter III Middle Asia in the III-XIII centuries. (before the Mongol conquest). “ Before the beginning of the conquests in the Middle East, the nomadic Oguzes lived on the Syr Darya and in the Aral region by the tribal system. Among them were the pagan cults of war, the forces of nature, the cult of the wolf, and others. There is information about the spread among the Oguz also Zoroastrianism, Manichaeism and, perhaps, Christianity. Along with the advance of the Oguzes from the northern steppes to the cultural regions of Central Asia, their Islamization occurs. "
  5. ↑ "History of the East" (East in the Middle Ages - from the 13th century AD). Chapter V. THE TRANSLATION In the 11th-15th centuries. "The invasion of the Seljuks was accompanied by terrible devastation and destruction of many Transcaucasian cities. It had enormous consequences for historical fates of Transcaucasia. For the first time a big wave of the Turkic population came here ... Of course, the matter was not limited to the Seljuk period itself (XI-XIII centuries). The masses of the Turkic population arrived in Transcaucasia and later, with the Mongols and Timur. Mostly they were Oguzes or their related tribes based on Nare of which Turkish and Azeri languages ​​were formed ... Selcuk was fastest established in the southern Armenian lands, from where the Armenian population was forced to emigrate to the borders of Byzantium. Thus arose the Cilician Armenian kingdom, which existed until the end of the XIV century. In the Armenian Highland, the centuries-old process of alienation of the Armenian and the Kurdish population was alien Turkic. The same thing happened in Transcaucasia. ”
  6. ↑ History of the East. In 6 t. T. 2. East in the Middle Ages. M., "Oriental Literature", 2002. ISBN 5-02-017711-3
  7. ↑ Iranika. ARMENIA AND IRAN Archival copy dated May 14, 2009 on the Wayback Machine (inaccessible link from 03-04-2011 [3036 days]) : “ attempt to assimilate by forced apostasy. Fanatics rulers the so-called "Jaʿfarī" (i.e., the Imam of the Jaʿfar al-wealthādeq) . "
  8. Ovan Hovannisian RG - Palgrave Macmillan , 1997. - Vol. Ii. Foreign Dominion to Statehood: The Fifteenth Century to the Twentieth Century. - P. 96. - 493 p. - ISBN 0312101686 , ISBN 9780312101688 .

    "By the end of the eighteenth century, the population of the territory has been shrunk, along with the national population of the Armenians. This has been the case for Armenians by Shah Abbas and the number of exoduses described in this chapter.

  9. ↑ Petrushevsky I.P. Essays on the history of feudal relations in Azerbaijan and Armenia in the XVI - early XIX centuries. - L. , 1949. - p. 58.
  10. 2 1 2 Petrushevsky I.P. Essays on the history of feudal relations in Azerbaijan and Armenia in the XVI - early XIX centuries. - L. , 1949. - p. 74 .

    In the Yerevan (Chukhur-Sa'd) region (vilayet), most of the territory was sofa lands and was under the direct control of the local runner. After the death of Nadir Shah, fugitiveness became hereditary and turned into a semi-independent Khanate. In the Yerevan region in the XVI century. parts of the Kyzylbash tribes of Ustajlu, Alpaut and Bayat were settled, and Ahcha-Koyunlu Kadzhar were also settled under Shah Abbas I; Kurdish tribes of Chamishkizek, khnuslu and azuki were established here even earlier.

  11. ↑ Abbas-Kuli-agha Bakikhanov. Gulistan-i Iram. Baku. 1991 pp. 172 -173
  12. ↑ George A. Bournoutian. The Russian Empire: 1826-1832 (Eng.) // Conference on "NATIONALISM AND SOCIAL CHANGE IN TRANSCAUCASIN '. - 1980. - No. 91. - P. 12 .
  13. Ovan Hovannisian RG - Palgrave Macmillan , 1997. - Vol. Ii. Foreign Dominion to Statehood: The Fifteenth Century to the Twentieth Century. - P. 112. - 493 p. - ISBN 0312101686 , ISBN 9780312101688 .
  14. "The approval of Russian sovereignty in the Caucasus", vol. XII, p. 229
  15. ↑ N. I. Voronov. Collection of statistical information about the Caucasus. - The Imperial Russian Geographical Society. Caucasian otdel, 1869. - p. 71.

    Orthodox churches 2, Armenian Gregory 141, Muslim mosques 60.

  16. ↑ Caucasian Statistical Committee. Collection svdniy about the Caucasusѣ / Ed. N. Seidlits. - Tiflis, 1879. - T. 5.
  17. ↑ Population census of the Russian Empire in 1897
  18. ↑ Erivan Province // Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary : 86 t. (82 t. And 4 extra.). - SPb. , 1890-1907.
  19. ↑ Novy Beyazeta uyezd in ESBE
  20. ↑ Explication to the plan of the city of Erivan, taken from nature by a city technician B. Ya. Mehrabov in 1906–1911
  21. ↑ 1 2 Erivan // Encyclopedic dictionary of Brockhaus and Efron : in 86 t. (82 t. And 4 add.). - SPb. , 1890-1907.
  22. ↑ Echmiadzin County // Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary : 86 tons (82 tons and 4 extra). - SPb. , 1890-1907.
  23. ↑ “Blue Mosque” in Yerevan Archival copy dated April 1, 2009 on Wayback Machine
  24. ↑ James Stuart Olson, Lee Brigance Pappas, Nicholas Charles Pappas. An Ethnohistorical dictionary of the Russian and Soviet empires, p.44: "Armenians were uprooted during these wars, and, in 1604, some 250,000 Armenians were forcibly adopted by the Shah Abbas to Iran. By the seventeenth century, the Armenians had become a minority in parts of their historic lands
  25. ↑ History of the East: in six volumes. - M .: "Oriental Literature" RAS, 2000. - T. III. - p. 113.
  26. 2 1 2 Petrushevsky I.P. Essays on the history of feudal relations in Azerbaijan and Armenia in the XVI - early XIX centuries. - L., 1949. - p. 74.
  27. ↑ George A. Bournoutian. The Russian Empire: 1826-1832 (Eng.) // Conference on "NATIONALISM AND SOCIAL CHANGE IN TRANSCAUCASIN '. - 1980. - No. 91. - P. 12.
  28. ↑ Encyclopaedia Iranica. George A. Bournoutian and Robert H. Hewsen. Erevan Archival copy dated October 9, 2007 on the Wayback Machine (inaccessible link from 03-04-2011 [3036 days]) : " The sixth century charm of the Ottoman- Sofire hands
  29. ↑ Vasily Alexandrovich Potto. Caucasian war. Persian war of 1826-1828 - Tsentrpoligraf , 2007. - T. 3.
  30. ↑ A detailed description of Persia and the states of Kabul, Seidstan Sindi, Balh, Baluchshistan, the Land of Khorassan: also Georgia and the Persian provinces attached to Russia. With the addition of descriptions of the campaign Persians against Russia in 1826, 1827 and 1828 . - M .: In S. Salivanovsky's printing house, 1829. - T. 1. - S. 36.
  31. ↑ Vasily Alexandrovich Potto. Caucasian war. - Caucasian region, 1993. - T. 1.
  32. ↑ 1 2 I. Chopin. Historical monument of the state of the Armenian region in the era of its accession to the Russian Empire. - St. Petersburg: The Imperial Academy of Sciences , 1852. - P. 468. - 1232 p.
  33. ↑ Encyclopaedia Iranica. George A. Bournoutian and Robert H. Hewsen. Erevan Archival copy of October 9, 2007 on the Wayback Machine (inaccessible link from 03-04-2011 [3036 days]) : “ All of the Muslim population since 1991 it seems doubtful that it will be opened. "
  34. ↑ Robert Cullen, A Reporter at Large, "Roots," The New Yorker, April 15, 1991, p. 55
  35. ↑ Tom de Waal. Black garden Between peace and war. Chapter 5. Yerevan. Secrets of the East.
  36. ↑ Philip L. Kohl , Clare P. Fawcett. Nationalism, politics, and the practice of archaeology . - Cambridge: Cambridge University Press , 1995. - P. 155 . - 329 p. - ISBN 0521558395 , ISBN 9780521558396 .
    Original Text (Eng.)
    But it’s not worth it. It was followed that in 1826, there was approximately 90,000 of the total population of 110,000 and there were Muslims - Persians, Kurds, and “ Turko-Tatar ”nomads (self-conscious Azeris).
  37. ↑ Philip L. Kohl , Clare P. Fawcett. Nationalism, politics, and the practice of archaeology . - Cambridge: Cambridge University Press , 1995. - P. 155 . - 329 p. - ISBN 0521558395 , ISBN 9780521558396 .

See also

  • Religion in Armenia
  • Blue Mosque (Yerevan)
  • Azerbaijanis in Armenia
  • Deportation and resettlement of Azerbaijanis from Armenia in the 20th century
Source - https://ru.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Islam_Armenia&oldid=100343130


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