Gabala

Gabala is a city located 220 km away from Baku on the territory of Shaki-Zagatala administrative district zone, in the northwest part of Azerbaijan on the border of Dagestan and Georgia. Gabala town is the administrative center of the district. The population is less than 13 thousand people. The ethnic composition of the city is very diverse and international and consists of Azerbaijanis, Lezgins, Udi and representatives of other nationalities. The main religions here are Islam and Christianity. Qabala is one of the most ancient cities of Azerbaijan. One of the first mentioned written sources about Kabala dated to the 1 century of the 1st century Greek and Roman (Pliny). Archaeological findings suggest that the city has an ancient history and were inhabited already in times the Late Stone Age.However, the information in ancient sources and archaeological found around the city allow scientists to roughly determine the date of foundation of Kabala around 2000 years old. Throughout its history, Kabala sways between foreign domination and independence. The city was repeatedly attacked, destroyed to the ground and robbed. In this regard, most of the surviving monuments of architecture dates back to the XVI-XIX BB. From the IV century BC The V century BC Cabal was relatively as important political, economic and commercial center. In the 60s BC Roman legion attacked the city, but could not capture it. Azerbaijani city of Gabala, over 600 years it was the center of Caucasian Albania, and then it became part of the state of Shirvanshahs and Sheki khanate, in successive order. In the XVIII century on the territory of Gabala there was little feudal education – Qutqashen Sultanate, which soon became a member of Sheki khanate and managed Naib appointed Sheki Khans.

In the middle of the XIII century as a result of continuous Mongolian invasions the city lost its former importance and the inhabitants gradually abandoned him. The district has a lot of monuments that have survived from ancient times. Mound Kabalaka, capital of the state of Caucasian Albania, is 20 km to the north- east of the city of Gabala. There are only fragments of the majestic fortifications of the ancient city, which is mentioned by Strabo, Pliny and Ptolemy, one of the oldest cities in the country, it is already mentioned in the context at the end of V century B.C T (that is almost 900 years old) was the capital of Azerbaijan – the Caucasian Albania.