Gəncə

Gθ (AFI:[gænκdκæ] (listen), also written as Ganja) is the second most populous city of Azerbaijan, after the capital, Baku. During the tsarist period it was called Elizavétpol and during Soviet rule Kirovabad. It is located on the two banks of the river Ganyáchay, a tributary of the Kura.

Name

It carried the name Gəncə until 1826, from which date it was called Elizavétpol. In 1917 it began to be officially called Gəncə again, and it was the seat of the Azerbaijan government led by the Musavat (1918) until the conquest of Baku. In 1924 it formally adopted the name Gəncə, until 1935 when it was changed to Kirovabad in honor of the Soviet hero S. M. Kirov. It got its old name back after 1989.

History

There are different opinions of the founding of Gəncə. According to one of them, Gəncə was founded in the years 659-660, at the time of the Arab invasion. According to the other opinion, the city was founded in 859 under the name of Tarik Bab al-Abwad, on the ruins of the ancient capital of Azerbaijan, known as Takht i Sulayman. In the years of governance of Fadlun I (895-1030) the city was strengthened. After the decline of Bardha'a, Gəncə became the capital of Arran with the Shaddadi dynasty around 952.

The Gates of Gønc(XI century)

Taken by Sultan Malik Shah, his son Muhammad received Gəncə as a fiefdom. In 1138 an earthquake destroyed Gəncə and killed thousands of people, among them the wife and children of Sultan Kara Sonkur of Arran and Azerbaijan (who was absent during the earthquake). King Demetrius I of Georgia sacked it in 1139, taking with him the Gəncə Gates which are now in the Gelati Monastery near Kutaisi. In the 11th century and 12th century in Gəncə the great poets Mahsati Ganyaví and Nezamí Ganyaví created their work. Sultan Kara Sonkur died in 1140 and his successor Chavil in 1146.

The Rawadí dynasty continued in Arran, but after a few years Gəncə once again belonged to the sovereigns of Azerbaijan, with the Ildiguizis. During the 12th century-13th century Gəncə, as the second capital of the Ildiguizíes, flourished.

In the 13th century it was rebuilt by Sultan Kara Sunkur. The Mongols appeared before her in 1221 but did not attack her. In 1225 the last Ildiguizí, Ozbeg, took refuge there fleeing from Tabriz, taken by Jalal al-Din Khwarizm Shah, who ended up subduing it. In 1231 the rebellion of its citizens was suppressed. In 1235 it was taken and burned by the Mongols, and although it was rebuilt it lost its importance. It passed to the Ilkhans with all the territory of Arran and then followed the fate of Azerbaijan until the Safavid Ismail Shah incorporated it into Persia. Its governors bore the title of khan. During the 16th-18th centuries, Gəncə was part of the Safavid Empire and was the center of the Karabakh province.

In 1583 the khan Imam Kuli was defeated by the Turks, who occupied the city in 1588, being recaptured by the Persians in 1606. The main mosque of the city, Djuma Mosque was built in 1620 by Shah Abbas I. In 1723 It was reoccupied by the Turks, and recaptured by Nadir Shah in 1735, at the death of whom its governors (khanes) were de facto independent for several years, but at the end of the 18th century they recognized the sovereignty of the Persian Kajar dynasty.

Russian General Pavel Tsitsianov conquered it on January 3, 1804, and it was formally ceded to the Russian Empire in the Treaty of Gulistan (1813). Since 1804 Gəncə has been called Elizavétpol (after Alexander I's wife, Elizaveta Alekséievna). In 1806 in Gəncə the district court was established and in 1824 police. An attempt by the Persians to recapture it ended in a heavy defeat on September 13, 1826.

In 1840 the commander's regime was abolished. Gəncə has been the center of the county and was part of the Georgian gubernia of Imereti. In 1868 it was the center of the new government of Elizavetpol. In 1883 Gəncə was connected with Baku, Tbilisi and Batumi by railway.

In the Soviet years Gəncə (Kirovabad) was the second industrial and cultural center of Azerbaijan after Baku. From 1933 to 1976, trams operated in the city. In Kirovabad (sometimes abbreviated Kírov) the fighter pilots of the aviation of the government side during the Spanish Civil War carried out their training (source: I was a red fighter pilot, Francisco Tarazona, San Martín editorial, Madrid, 1974).

Currently in Gəncə there is a civil airport, which in 2007 obtained the international status. On November 21, 2013, it was elected as the European Youth Capital in 2016. The Azerbaijan Ministry of Defense on October 5, 2020 said that the city of Gəncə was attacked from the territory of the Berd region of Armenia. On October 11, 2020 around 02:00 at night in the central part of Gəncə was attacked by the Armenian armed forces, 10 people, including 4 women, were killed as a result of rocket fire.

Demographics

According to 1861 data, 15,029 people lived in the city, of which 1,300 families were Muslim and 1,000 Armenian. According to the data of 1893, Elizavetpol had 25,758 citizens, of which 13,392 were Azerbaijanis. In the city there were 13 mosques, 6 Armenian churches, 2 Orthodox churches and one Lutheran.

According to an estimate of 2010, it had a population of 325,820 inhabitants.

Climate

Average Ganyá climate parameters (1991-2020)
Month	Ene.	Feb.	Mar.	Open up.	May.	Jun.	Jul.	Ago.	Sep.	Oct.	Nov.	Dec.	Annual
Temp. max. abs. (°C)	22.8	25.0	28.0	35.6	39.5	39.2	42.0	41.7	38.8	33.4	29.0	23.3	42.0
Average temperature (°C)	7.1	8.5	13.2	18.4	24.0	29.3	32.1	31.6	26.3	20.0	12.9	8.5	19.3
Average temperature (°C)	3.3	4.3	8.3	13.1	18.7	23.6	26.3	25.9	21.1	15.3	8.7	4.7	14.4
Temp. medium (°C)	0.9	1.6	5.0	9.4	14.7	19.3	21.8	21.6	17.2	12.2	6.1	2.4	11
Temp. min. abs. (°C)	-17.8	-15.2	-12.0	-3.2	1.5	5.8	10.4	10.5	2.8	-0.6	-7.9	-13.0	-17.8
Total precipitation (mm)	11	31	20	26	42	31	15	30	32	35	18	12	303
Nevadas (cm)	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
Days of rain (≥ 1 mm)	3	4	6	8	9	6	4	3	4	6	6	4	63
Days of snowfall (≥ 1 mm)	3	5	2	0.2	0	0	0	0	0	0.4	1	2	13.6
Hours of sun	120	113	141	182	229	267	278	252	212	168	123	115	2200
Relative humidity (%)	71	71	68	70	68	61	59	61	65	74	76	74	68.2
Source #1: Погода и климат
Source No. 2: Deutscher Wetterdienst (Horas de sol, 1961-1990)

Consulates

Callejón de los Mártires en Gønc

In 2010 the consulate general of Turkey was opened in the city and in 2014 that of Georgia.

Mayors

• Sabuhi Abdinov (1992)
• Murshud Mammadov (1992-1993)
• Elkhan Qadimov (1993)
• Vagif Veliev (1993)
• Elsever Ibrahimov (1993-1994)
• Rasim Dashdemiov (1994-2000)
• Eyvaz Babayev (2000-2003)
• Eldar Azizov (2003-2011)
• Elmar Veliyev (2011-2018)
• Niyazi Bayramov (2018-currently)

Twinned cities