Elisabethpol Governorate


Elisabethpol Governorate or Elizavetpol Governorate or Elizavetapol Governorate was one of the guberniyas of the Caucasus Viceroyalty of the Russian Empire, with its centre in Elisabethpol. Its area was 44,136 sq. kilometres, and it had 878,415 inhabitants by 1897.

Geography

The area of the governorate includes:
Elsewhere the country has the character of a plateau, 7,000 to 8,000 ft. high, deeply trenched by tributaries of the Aras. All varieties of climate are found from that of the snowclad peaks, Alpine meadows, and stony deserts of the high levels, to that of the hill slopes and of the arid Caspian steppes.

History

Elisabethpol Governorate was created in 1868 from parts of Baku Governorate and Tiflis Governorate. This
included lands of the former Ganja Khanate, Shaki Khanate, and Karabakh Khanate. It bordered with Baku Governorate, Tiflis Governorate, Yerevan Governorate, Dagestan Oblast, and Persia.
Starting in 1905, there were attempts by the region's ethnic Armenians to separate the highland areas from the rest of Elisabethpol. Another attempt to create an independent Armenian state in the region was the Republic of Mountainous Armenia in 1921.
On the establishment of the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic in 1918, Elisabethpol Governorate was renamed Ganja Governorate. The area to the south of the Murov Range was made into Karabakh Governorate General. The governorate system was abolished in the early 1920s.
Today, the territory of the former Elisabethpol Governorate is in western Azerbaijan and adjacent areas of Armenia.

Administrative division

Elisabethpol Governorate was originally divided into eight uyezds:
The 1886 population estimate was 728,943, living in 3 cities and 1521 villages.
According to the 1897 census, the total population was 878,415. Tatars at 534,086 and Armenians at 292,188 were the largest ethnic groups. Other ethnic groups included Lezgins, Russians, Udis, Germans and Kurds.
According to 1886 statistics reported in Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary,
the Orthodox Christians constituted 0.21% of the Governorate's population, and various "sectarians" around 1%. This means that most of the ethnic Russians in the Governorate at the time were members of various dissenter communities, such as Doukhobors and Molokans.

Ethnic groups in 1897

Source:
UyezdTatars ArmeniansLezginsRussiansBelarusiansGermansKurdsUdis
TOTAL60.8%33.3%1.7%1.6%............
Aresh70.1%20.5%8.7%...............
Jebrayil74.1%23.7%...1.1%............
Javanshir71.6%26.9%..................
Elisabethpol63.9%26.4%...4.4%1.7%1.9%......
Zangezur51.6%46.1%............1.3%...
Kazakh57.2%38.9%...3.0%............
Nukha69.3%15.7%7.1%............5.8%
Shusha45.3%53.3%...1.0%............

Known governors