THE MAP OF HISTORICAL KARABAKH: ANALYSIS AND SIGNIFICANCE OF ITS CARTOGRAPHIC-TOPONYMIC CONTENT (Research on the occasion of the 125th anniversary of the map)

Sh.K. Azizov, M.A. Abbasova

Institute of Geography PLE, Ministry of Science and Education, Baku, Azerbaijan

azizov.samil@mail.ru

DOI: 10.59423/gnr.2026.46.42.015

Abstract. In the 19th century and at the beginning of the 20th century, the South Caucasus, Azerbaijan, and its regions – then part of Tsarist Russia – were depicted in military-topographic and special maps. To study the historical-geographical aspects of the modern information war, reference was made to the map of Historical Karabakh compiled in 1899 by the Russian researcher, Caucasus scholar M.A. Skibitski. Based on the content of the map and historical sources, an attempt was made to expose the cartographic-toponymic aggression of Armenian nationalists. At the end of the 19th century, M.A. Skibitski showed on the map that Azerbaijani Tatars in Karabakh held significant superiority both in the number of villages and in population. According to the ethnic composition of the population settled in Karabakh in 1899, Azerbaijani Tatars made up 70%, Armenians – 16.6%, Kurds – 12.7%, and Tats accounted for 0.7% of the total population of Karabakh. Out of 452 villages in Karabakh, Azerbajjanis lived in 333 villages (73.7%), Armenians in 47 villages (10.4%), and Kurds in 69 villages (15.3%). According to the map of Karabakh, it can be stated that by the end of the 19th century, the vast majority of geographical names (84%)  were of Azerbaijani-Turkic origin.

Keywords: Historical Karabakh, military-topographic map, cartographic-toponymic war, origin of toponyms, ethnic composition, autochthonous population.

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Accepted for publication: November 20, 2025

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Sh.K. Azizov, M.A. Abbasova – The map of historical Karabakh: analysis and significance of its cartographic-toponymic content (research on the occasion of the 125th anniversary of the map). Geography and Natural Resources, №2 (24), 2025, pp. 113-122.