Description of the Castle of
Sheki
It
was built by Alexander a Prince of the Shushads, from whose hands it passed
into those of the Prince of Daghistan, and then into those of the Persians.
Lala Kara Mustafa Pasha, the Vezir of Murad III conquered it, and it was
conferred on Erkelad Beg, the son of Levend Khan. In the beginning of the reign
of Sultan Mustafa it returned into the possession of the Persians, and is now
the seat of a Sultan, who commands one thousand men. It is a nice castle built
on a rock, its circuit three thousand paces, a ditch is not required; its two
gates are that of Genje and that of Shirvan; though situated on the frontier of
Daghistan it is reckoned to belong to Georgia, the more so as its builder was a
Georgian; there are three thousand houses, and seven mihrabs; in the market is
the mosque of Mirza Ali Beg, in the castle that of Lagush-oghli Ahmed Beg; that
of Murad III is falling into decay. In the gardens great quantities of silk are
produced. At a journey’s distance east of this castle passes the river Kanuk,
flowing into the Zenghi. Advancing to the north, we crossed the river of
Uzdemir-oghli Osman Pasha and arrived at the place Koyun-gechid, where we saw
piles of human bnes; our companion Yasser Ali Agha told us, that it was on this
spot that Mustafa Pasha, the general of Murad III, was attacked by the Khans of
Tabriz, Lor, Nakshivan, and Karabagh, who with more than two hundred thousand
men surrounded him. Koja Lala Mustafa Pasha ordered a general attack, which was
instantly made on one side by Uzdemir-oghli, on the second by Mohammed, the
governor of Haleb, and on the third by Mustafa, the governor of Mera’ash, who
cut to pieces more than a thousand men, and drove the rest like sheep to the
ferry of Koyun-gechid, where a great many of them were drowned, some in the
river Kanuk and some in the Kapur. In short there remained altogether more than
forty thousand men on the field of battle, whose bones are piled up as an
everlasting monument; I said a Fatihah for their souls, and crossed the sheep’s
ferry. Further on to the north we passed the white river (Aksu), which is
called by the Persians the river of Gilan. It comes from the mountains of Aras,
and flows into the Kur. At the end of three hours we entered the district of
Mahmudabad consisting of two hundred highly cultivated kents, which produce a
thousand Yuks of silk, each kent resembling a large town. The inhabitants are
Turkomans, Kok, Dulak, Moghols, and Ettels.
Narrative of Travels in Europe, Asia, and Africa in
the Seventeenth Century by Evliya Efendi, Vol. II (1850)
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