Oh race of Turks, children of iron and fire, founders
of a thousand homelands, wearers of a thousand crowns. If the sky above did not collapse and the earth did not give way,
oh noble race, who would be able to destroy your nation and institutions...
I-AZERBAIJAN BEFORE THE AZERI TURKS
II-ORIGIN & MIGRATION TO IRAN
III-LANGUAGE
IV-RELIGION
V-CULTURE
I-AZERBAIJAN BEFORE THE AZERI TURKS
Azerbaijan has played a key role in world civilization since the very beginning. Homo habilis was the first hominid to inhabit the region circa 1.1 million years BCE, while by 40.000 BCE homo sapiens sapiens inhabited the region, from this date we also have the Gobustan rock paintings. The first permanent structures were built by 6.000 BCE and by 4.000 BCE bronze using cultures formed on the banks of the Araz and Kura rivers. By 2.300 BCE the area was occupied by the Medes, and later by the Parthians. Not only was Azerbaijan the birthplace of the Yazdani faith(cult of Mithra), and Mazdaism, but is also believed to be the birthplace of Zaratushtra, from whos time the name Azerbaijan originates.
Taken from the old Mede Adurbadagan,"land of fire." It was named so because of the fires which would spring forth from the ground because of natural gas leeks. The land was believed to be sacred because of this and became the centre of the Zorastrian religion as its holiest place. Azerbaijan lasted until the very end as defender of Zorastrianism as it was the last region of Iran to fall to become Moslem, and even after that
the pirs(fire altars) continued to be tended to, and most even are today!
II-ORIGIN & MIGRATION TO IRAN
Like the Iranian peoples, the Azeri Turks find their original homeland on the steps of central Asia. The Azeri Turks originate from the Oguz tribal confederation, a federation of 24 tribes which inhabited the region between the Caspian and Aral seas. It is strongy argued that they were originally matriarchal due to their ancient religion and way of life in general, nonetheless they were a very egalitarian society. In the 10th century the Karakhani and
Ghaznavi became the two most powerful tribes and battled for complete supremacy over the Oguz. In order to escape the bloodshed and opression of the two powerful tribes, the Ak Koyunlu and Kara Koyunlu tribes, the ancestors of the present day Azeri Turks, under the leadership of Seljuk Khan left the ancestral homeland and founded their own kingdom in Khorasan(present day Afghanistan, Tajikistan, and eastern Uzbekistan). Meanwhile the Ghaznavi defeated the Karakhani and turned their attention towards the Ak Koyunlu and Kara Koyunlu. By this time however it was too late as the two were
more powerful and defeated the Ghaznavi to gain supremacy over the Oguz. The Seljuk empire of Khorasan lasted for a hundred years and was dissolved due to arguments of secession. As the two tribes rebuked the authority of the Seljuk dynasty and were fighting among themselves the vassal state of Khorezm(Khiva, in present day Uzbekistan) became more and more powerful as it was the gaurdian of Khorasan from the open steppe. Soon enough the Khorezmshah overthrew the Seljuks. Only in turn to be overthrown
by the Karakitay tribe. From Khorasan the Ak Koyunlu and Kara Koyunlu moved westwards across Iran.
In 1018 AD, the warrior prince Chagri Bey reached what is today Azerbaijan. The Ak Koyunlu and Kara Koyunlu settled in the region with very little opposition. Familiar with Persian culture from Khorasan they quickly blended with the native population to create a new Irano-Turkic culture which today is that of the Azeri Turks.
With the success of settling Azerbaijan and establishing a capital at Tabriz, further tribesmen left Khorasan to migrate west as they were unable to reestablish their supremacy in Khorasan. They pressed further west and in 1071 defeated the Byzantines at the battle of Malazgirt and ruled over the region. Some left Azerbaijan in the 15th century to settle in the south Iranian province of Fars to become the present day Qashqai. Others later migrated into Afghanistan in order to help defend Iran against eastern invasion and are today known as the Qizilbashi, other members of the tribe joined the Shahsevani in the beginning of the 17th century. The Azeri Turks were further separated geographically in 1828 with the Treaty of Turkmenchay which ceded Azerbaijan north of the Aras river to Russia. Northern Azerbaijan was
further divided as Russia severed Daghestan from it.
III-LANGUAGE
Azeri is spoken by approximately 7 million people in Azerbaijan as well as in the former
USSR, in southern Dagestan, along the Caspian coast, and beyond the Caucasus Mountains. It is spoken in northern Iran (35 million), and in western Afghanistan(3.5 million) as well. Azerbaijani has a long literary history and was, at one time, promoted as the lingua
franca for Turkic speakers in Central Asia. The main religion of the Azerbaijani is Islam, and like
other Islamic peoples their language has been influenced to a considerable extent by Arabic,
especially in terms of vocabulary, the sound system, and grammar. Azeri speakers in Iran are
often bilingual or have no knowledge of Azeri at all. The Persian influence has also been to a great degree, so much that some have referred to Azeri as an Irano-Turkic hybrid. On the other hand the same can be said of Persian as it has an overwhelming Azeri influence as well. Azeri is a member of the Turkic branch of the Altaic language family. Specifically, it belongs to
the Oghuz Seljuk sub-group, along with (Osmanli) Turkish and some dialects of
Crimean Tatar. There are eight Azeri dialect groups: the Eastern dialect group that includes the dialect spoken
in the capital city, Baku; the Western dialect group that includes a dialect called Kazakh; the Central dialect group; the Northern dialect group; and the Southern
dialect group. The Eastern dialect is called Karapapak, . Two dialect groups are spoken in Iran: the Northern Iranian group, whose
single dialect is spoken in the city of Tabriz, and the Southern dialect group. The Arabic script is used for Azeri except in Azerbaijan where a modified latin script is currently in use. Azeri is agglutinative, that is, grammatical functions are
indicated by adding various suffixes to fixed stems. Separate suffixes on nouns indicate both gender
and number, but there is no grammatical gender. There are six nominal cases: nominative, genitive,
dative, accusative, locative, and ablative; number is marked by a plural suffix. Verbs have voice,
mood, tense, and nonfinite forms and they agree with their subjects in case and number, and, as in
nouns, separate identifiable suffixes perform these functions. Subject-Object-Verb word order in Azeri is the norm, but other orders are possible under
certain discourse situations. As a SOV language where objects precede the verb, Azeri has
postpositions rather than prepositions, and relative clauses that precede the verb. Azeri has nine vowels and twenty three consonants. It also has Turkic vowel harmony in which
the vowels of suffixes must harmonize with the vowels of noun and verb stems; thus, for example,
if the stem has a round vowel then the vowel of the suffix must be round, and so on.
IV-RELIGION
The ancient Oguz Turks believed that the creator of the universe was a giant blue she-wolf known as Tengri. This mother goddess was envisioned as the blue sky which covers all. There were several myths explaining the creation of man, in one version man was
born out of the unison of a blue she-wolf and a red elk. In another version Tengri gave birth to a woman, the woman gave birth to fire, then the horse, and thirdly to man. The worship of Tengri was seen as a very personal matter. No temples were built and there was no
priesthood. It was up to each individual to commune with Tengri as they saw fit since the mother goddess was everywhere and all knowing. All was sacred to her, man was seen as a part of nature and not above it. The shaman served as a medicine man and an intermediary between man and the forces of nature,
but not between man and Tengri. An ancient rite which can even be found today is sujeddin, the bathing in sacred streams in order to make communion with ancestors. Fire was seen as the element of supreme truth and being, upon the arrival in Azerbiajan this lead to a deep respect for the Zorastrian fire altars
and to their preservation even unto this day. It helped the proliferation of the Zorastrian faith as well. Zorastrianism is based on the tenets of good thoughts, good words, good deeds. It preaches that life is a struggle between good and evil and that man must do what is right and fight evil in whatever form it is found,
since the amount of one's goodness is what man is measured by when he dies. The tolerance of the old religion mixed with the underlying Zorastrian elements in Azerbaijan to foster the Sufi movement of Shia Islam. It is the Azeri Shah, Ismail Shah Safavi who in 1490 made Shia Islam the official religion of his empire, and thus it became a basis of national identity for Iranian unity, as whether Azeri Turk or Persian, both were united by their common faith. As the cradle of Sufism, Azerbaijan gave birth to the Mevlevi and Bektashi Sufi brotherhoods, the forerunners of all
other orders. The basic tenet of Sufism is that love is the key to life and that the problems of humanity are caused by a lack of love. The oneness of all peoples and the desire to commune with God through acts of love are the main goals. The whirling Dervishes of the Mevlevi sect best exemplify Sufism through their whirling dances, the ritual ceremony
represents the spiritual ascension of a human being, a mortal's turning to truth, being exalted by love, abandoning the self, losing himself in God, and having reached perfection, his return to a mortal state. The ritual dancer, wearing a tall flat-topped hat symbolising his gravestone and a gown symbolising his shroud is born to spiritual
truth by taking off his jacket and then proceeds, and advances spiritually. When the dance begins his arms are crossed in front of him, giving him the appearance of the number 1, thus testifying to the oneness of God. As the dance proceeds his arms are opened , the right one stretched heavenwards as though praying and ready to receive divine favour, and the left one, which he looks at, turned earthwards.
This signifies the transmission of the spiritual favour that he gets from God to mankind, who sees through God's eyes. He whirls from right to left round his heart, embracing all people and all creation with love and affection. The ancient Turkic and Zorastrian influences can clearly be seen in this. Shia Islam itself is a blending of Zorastrianism and Islam. However nominal this may be, teh Azeri Turks are Shia
Moslem. The keeping of the olden ways still prevails, the tending of fire altars, the sanctity of such trees as the oak and ironwood, giving children the names of animals so that they might have their characteristics(eg. Arslan, meaning lion for bravery), and the wearing of charms and the folk respect for the sun, moon, and fire are but a few of the remnants of the old faiths in Azerbaijan. Even today, Noruz, the Zorastrian
new year remains the major holiday of Azerbaijan as well as of Iran, Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Kazakstan, showing that old traditions are far from dead.
V-CULTURE
Azerbaijan is heavily Persian in its culture due to the centuries of peaceful coexistence between the Azeri Turks and the Persians in the region. The two peoples frequently intermingled
and there is a strong argument by some that the Azeris are even more Persian in race than they are Turkic, by others it has been reversed in that the Persians are more Turkic than Aryan due to the
high amount of Azeri Turk blood among them. The average Iranian, the Tehrani, is by all acounts an Azeri Turk-Persian hybrid! The closeness is such that until the 15th century virtually everyone in the region was bilingual. While the Zorastrians were persecuted elsewhere they still thrived in
Azerbaijan. The Azeri Turks have provided more than their share of great figures in the history of Iran and of the world. The likes of Ghazali contributed to the field of philosophy while in political theory there was Nizam al-Mulk.
In teh field of science, Gazan Khan built the astronomical observatory in Tabriz during the 12th century. tabriz served as the capital of Iran from the mid 13th century until the early 16th when it was moved to Esfahan. Tabriz however retained its importance as a crossroards for caravans and a major textile provider.
Even today, the rugs and carpets of Tabriz are the most valued in the world. In art the most famous court painter was Ghaffari, who lived during the 15th century. The Shirvanshahi, Ilkhani, Safavi, Afshari, and Qajari royal dynasties were all Azeri. Although each dynasty retained Persian as the court language, Azeri was the language
of the military. The military prowess of the Azeris is further exemplified by the fact that during the Mongol invasions of the 14th century the Azeris were the only nation to successfully defeat the armies of Chengiz Khan. Nadir Shah Afshari(1688-1747) is the most famous of the Azeri Shahs, as he reunited the lands Iran lost under the collapse of the Safavi dynasty. Ruling an empire stretching from Turkey to India, Nadir Shah has been dubbed the Asian Napoleon by many historians. Further Azeri dynasties appeared in India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan as the
Moghul emperors, descendents of the Qizilbashi warriors sent to the region to defend Iran from an eastern invasion, these warriors asserted their power and perhaps the most famous of them was Jahan Shah, the builder of the Taj Mahal. The Moghul warlords ruled Afghanistan, Pakistan, and northern India up to the arrival of the British in the late 18th century. The political prowess of the Azeri Turks continued well into the 20th century with the republican movements of Mossadeq, Kalali, and Pishevari! The fathers of the Islamic Revolution, Ayatollah Shariatmadari as well as the first president of Iran, Dr. Mehdi Bazargan all hail from an Azeri Turk Background. Among other notable modern Azeri politicians include Ayatollah Motahari, and Ayatollah Khamenei.
In literature the contributions are no fewer. Nizami(1141-1209), who wrote the famous love story Leila va Majnun 400 years before Shakespeare and his Romeo and Juliet, Fizuli(1498-1558), Omar Khayami(died 1123), Rumi, Rektashi, Yunus Emre. As were Anvari who introduced science and philosophy into his poetry while Sanai, Attar, Nasir Khusrau, and Khaghani wrote
specifically in a style based on Sufism. With the exception of Emre, who wrote in Azeri, all the others wrote in Persian as it was the court language, Nizami wrote in both. Among the greatest prose works written by Azeris are Khalileh o Dimneh, Siyasatnameh, Ghabusnameh, Murznannameh, and Chahar Maghaleh.
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