Shusha (, ) or Shushi () is a city in Nagorno-Karabakh, Azerbaijan. Situated at an altitude of 1.4–1.8 kilometres (4,600–5,900 ft) in the Karabakh mountains, the city was a mountain resort in the Soviet era.
The origin of the city is disputed, in the 1750s, Panah Ali Khan founded the Karabakh Khanate, and the city developed with the establishment of the fortress of Shusha. There was an alliance between Panah Ali Khan and Melik Shahnazar, the local Armenian prince () of Varanda. The nearby Armenian village of Shosh (see for further information), has been suggested as an origin of the town's name. The town has been described as an important center within the Armenian melikdoms of Karabakh in the 1720s, and the plateau has been suggested to have been the site of an already existing Armenian fortification.Krunk Hayots Ashkharhin. 8 (1863): p. 622, cited in From the mid-18th century to 1822, Shusha was the capital of the Karabakh Khanate. The town became one of the cultural centers of the South Caucasus after the Russian conquest of the Caucasus region from Qajar Iran in the first half of the 19th century.Timothy C. Dowling Russia at War: From the Mongol Conquest to Afghanistan, Chechnya, and Beyond pp 728 ABC-CLIO, 2 dec. 2014 Over the course of the 19th century, the town grew in size to become a city, and was home to many Armenian and Azerbaijani intellectuals, poets, writers and musicians (including Azerbaijani ashiks, mugham singers and kobuz players."Azerbaijan" (2007) In Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved February 3, 2007, from Encyclopædia Britannica Online: http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-44296
The town has religious, cultural and strategic importance to both groups. Shusha is often considered the cradle of Azerbaijan's music and poetry, and one of the leading centres of the Azerbaijani culture.Mattew O'Brien. Uzeir Hajibeyov and His Role in the Development of Musical Life in Azerbaijan. – Routledge, 2004. – С. 211. – , 9780415302197 Shusha also contains a number of Armenian Apostolic churches, including Ghazanchetsots Cathedral and Kanach Zham (demolished by Azerbaijan as of 2026), and serves as a land link between Nagorno-Karabakh and Armenia, via the Lachin corridor to the west. Throughout modern history, the city fostered a mixed Armenian–Azerbaijani population. The first available demographic information about the city in 1823 suggests the city had an Azerbaijani majority. The Armenian inhabitants of the city steadily grew over time to constitute a majority of the city's population until the Shusha massacre in 1920, in which the Armenian half of the city was destroyed by Azerbaijani forces, resulting in the death or expulsion of the Armenian population, up to 20,000 people.
The city has suffered significant destruction and depopulation during the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. After the capture of Shusha in 1992 by Armenian forces during First Nagorno-Karabakh War, the city's Azerbaijani population fled, and most of the city was destroyed. Between May 1992 and November 2020, Shusha was under the de facto control of the breakaway Republic of Artsakh and administered as the centre of its Shushi Province. On 8 November 2020, Azerbaijani forces gained control of the city during the Second Nagorno-Karabakh War following a three-day long battle. The Armenian population of the city fled, and multiple reports emerged that the Armenian cultural heritage of the city was being destroyed.
Etymology Several historians believe Shusha derives from the New Persian Shīsha ("glass, vessel, bottle, flask"). According to the Oxford Concise Dictionary of World Place-Names, when Iranian ruler Agha Mohammad Khan Qajar approached the town with his army, he reportedly told the ruler of Karabakh Ibrahim Khalil Khan:
Panahabad ("City of Panah"), Shusha's previous name, was a tribute to Panah Ali Khan, the first ruler of the Karabakh Khanate.
According to the Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary, published in the final decades of the Russian Empire, the town's name comes from the nearby village Shushikent (called Shosh in Armenian), which literally means "Shusha village" in the Azerbaijani language. Conversely, the Armenian historian Leo (1860–1932) considered it more likely that the village Shosh received its name from the fortress, which he considered the older settlement.
According to Armenian sources, the name Shusha most likely derives from the dialectal Armenian word shosh/shush (Armenian: շոշ/շուշ), meaning tree sprout or, figuratively, a high place, first applied either to the adjacent village Shosh or to Shusha itself. The form Shusha can also be explained as the genitive form of shosh/shush, as -a or -ay is a common declensional ending for placenames in pre-modern and dialectal Armenian.
Besides the common Armenian name Shushi, the town has historically been referred to in Armenian by various names, including Shoshi/Shushva Berd, Shoshi Sghnakh, Shoshvaghala, which all mean "Shosh/Shushi Fortress".
History Foundation
Some Armenian sources identify Shusha with a fortress called Shikakar or Karaglukh, where the 9th-century Armenian prince Sahl Smbatean is said to have defeated an invading Arab army. According to several sources, a settlement called Shosh served as an ancient fortress in the Armenian principality of Varanda, and had traditionally belonged to the Melik-Shahnazarian princely dynasty.Армяно-русские отношения в XVIII веке. Т. IV. С. 212, as cited in According to some sources, Shushi existed and had a functioning scriptorium in 1428. The fortress was described as a strategic stronghold in one of the Eastern Armenian military districts, called sghnakhs, playing a key role in the Armenian commander Avan Yuzbashi's campaign against Ottoman forces during their incursion into of the South Caucasus in the 1720s and 1730s.Bournoutian, George A. Armenians and Russia, 1626-1796: A Documentary Record. Costa Mesa, CA: Mazda Publishers, 2001, Armenian Military Activities in Karabakh and Ghapan, pages 402-413 Armenian historian and Shusha native Ashot Hovhannisian wrote that the fortress walls must have been built by Avan Yuzbashi in 1724, if not earlier.
Kehva Chelebi, an early Armenian national activist who maintained correspondence between the meliks of Karabakh and the Russian authorities, in a 1725 report describes Shusha as a town and a fort:
A 1769 letter by Georgian king Heraclius II to Russian diplomat Count P. Panin states that there was "an ancient fortress in the realm of the Khamsa [melikdoms]" which was "conquered, through deceit" by "one Muslim man from the Jevanshir tribe." The same information about the ancient fortress is confirmed by the Russian field marshal Alexander Suvorov in a letter to Prince Grigory Potemkin.Bournoutian, George A. Armenians and Russia, 1626-1796: A Documentary Record. Costa Mesa, CA: Mazda Publishers, 2001, pp. 134, 269. Suvorov writes that the Armenian prince Melik Shahnazar of Varanda surrendered his fortress Shushikala to "certain Panah", whom he called a chief of nomadic Muslims living near the Karabakh borders. When discussing Karabakh and Shusha in the 18th century, the Russian diplomat and historian S. M. Bronevsky writes in his Historical Notes that Shusha fortress was a possession of the Melik-Shahnazarian clan, which was given to Panah Ali Khan in return for aid against the other Armenian meliks of Karabakh.S.M.Bronesvskiy. Historical Notes... St. Petersburg,1996. Исторические выписки о сношениях России с Персиею, Грузиею и вообще с горскими народами, в Кавказе обитающими, со времён Ивана Васильевича доныне». СПб. 1996, секция "Карабаг". Bronesvskiy writes: "Мелик Шахназор призвал к себе на помощь владетеля кочующаго чавонширскаго народа Фона хана и здал ему крепость Шуши." Russian historian P. G. Butkov (1775–1857) writes that "Shushi village" was given to Panah Ali Khan by the Melik-Shahnazarian prince after they entered into an alliance, and that Panah Ali Khan fortified the village. ПРИЛОЖЕНИЕ М. к стр. 236. Also see Walker Christopher "The Armenian Presence in Mountainous Karabakh" in "Transcaucasian Boundaries" (SOAS/GRC Geopolitics) edited by John Wright, Richard Schofield, Suzanne Goldenberg, 1995 p. 93 "South of Khachen lay the small territory of Varanda, originally part of its southern neighbour, Dizak, and only given a separate identity in the early sixteenth century. The ruling family, confirmed in that capacity by Shah Abbas I, was that of the Melik Shahnazarians. In the territory of Varanda lies the modern town of Shushi (or Shusha)" The missionary Joseph Wolff (1795–1862), during his mission in the Middle East, visited "Shushee, in the province of Carabagh, in Armenia Major".Joseph Wolff. Travels and Adventures of the Rev. Joseph Wolff . London: Saunders, Otley, and Co., 1861, p. 226.
Some sources, including Mirza Jamal Javanshir, Mirza Adigozal bey, Abbasgulu Bakikhanov and Mirza Yusuf Nersesov, attest to the foundation of the town in 1750–1752 (according to other sources, 1756–1757) by Panah Ali Khan (), the founder and the first ruler of the Karabakh Khanate (1748–1822), which comprised both Lowland and Highland Karabakh.Hewsen, Robert H., Armenia: A Historical Atlas. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2001, p. 155. The mid-18th century foundation is supported by the second edition of the Encyclopaedia of Islam, and the Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary.
According to Mirza Jamal Javanshir, the author of the Persian-language text History of Karabakh,Bournoutian George A. A History of Qarabagh: An Annotated Translation of Mirza Jamal Javanshir Qarabaghi's Tarikh-E Qarabagh. Costa Mesa, CA: Mazda Publishers, 1994, p. 72. The original text by Mirza Jamal Javanshir calls the village "Shoshi." one of the most significant chronicles on the history of Karabakh in 18th-19th centuries, the Karabakh nobility assembled to discuss the danger of invasion from Iran and told Panah Ali Khan, "We must build among the impassable mountains such an inviolable and inaccessible fort, so that no strong enemy could take it." Melik Shahnazar of Varanda, who was the first of the Armenian meliks (dukes) to accept the suzerainty of Panah Ali Khan and who would remain his loyal supporter, suggested a location for the new fortress. Thus, Panahabad-Shusha was founded.
According to Mirza Jamal Javanshir, before Panah Ali Khan constructed the fortress there were no buildings there and it was used as cropland and pasture by the people of the nearby village of Shoshi. Mirza Jamal Javanshir Karabagi. The History of Karabakh . Panah khan resettled to Shusha the population of Shahbulag and some nearby villages and built strong fortifications.
Another account is presented by Raffi (1835–1888), an Armenian novelist and historian, in his work The Princedoms of Khamsa, which asserts that the place where Shushi was built was desolate and uninhabited before Panah Ali Khan's arrival. He states, "[Panah-Ali Khan and Melik-Shahnazar of Varanda] soon completed the construction (1762) [of the fortress] and moved the Armenian population of the nearby village of Shosh, called also Shoshi, or Shushi into the fortress.″Raffi. The Princedoms of Khamsa .
Conflict with the Qajars
Although Panah Ali Khan had been in conflict with Nader Shah, the new ruler of Persia, Adil Shah, issued a firman (decree) recognizing Panah Ali as the Khan of Karabakh.Mirza Adigozel-bek, Karabakh-name (1845), Baku, 1950, p. 54 Less than a year after Shusha was founded, the Karabakh Khanate was attacked by Mohammad Hassan Khan Qajar, one of the major claimants to the Iranian throne. During the Safavid Empire Karabakh was for almost two centuries ruled by Ziyad-oglu family of the clan of Qajars (of Turkic origin).Encyclopædia Britannica, Qajar Dynasty , Online Academic Edition, 2007.