Abstract:

The subordination of the Albanian-Christian Meliks of Karabakh to the central government by the founder of the Karabakh khanate Panahali Khan Javanshir, is investigated in the article.In the first stage, the history of the Albanian-Christian Meliks of Karabakh is overviewed; meliks of the four melikates - the Dizag, Varanda, Chilaberd and Talysh (Gulustan) were newcomers to Karabakh from different regions of Azerbaijan, and meliks of Khachin were the descendants of the ancient Azerbaijani Albanian dynasty. The distortion of the history of Albanian meliks by Armenian historians and the creation of a fictional history without reference to reliable sources were especially emphasized in the research. It has been illuminated the issue of the Christian population of Karabakh, called “Armenians” by Armenian historians in the 18th century. It is stated that the Christian population of Karabakh was actually Azerbaijani Albanians. The Albanian meliks living in Karabakh during the mentioned period, in a letter to the Russian Tsar Peter I, called themselves not Armenians, but Albanians. Further, the measures taken by Panahali khan to prevent the separatist tendencies of the Albanian-Christian Meliks of Karabakh, their subordination to the central government and a great deal of important issues were investigated on the basis of primary sources.

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