Cuma Mescidi was built in 1606 with the order of Shah Abbas I (1587-1625) who took Erivan from the Ottomans in 1604. Erivan and Gence Cuma Mescidi, built in the same period by Sheyh Bahaeddin, the distinguished scholar and artist of the Orient,shared similar constructional designs. This monumental mosque, located in the east of Serdar Palace in Erivan Fortress, made an incredible architectural complex comprising a theological school, a library, a guest house and a vast courtyard surrounding all. In 1918, when vigorous action took place, it was inspected by Isabey Azizov, Azerbaijani archaeologist in a half demolished position. This holy place was later knocked down by Armenians.

In lrevan Fortress, there located Recep Pasha (1725) Mosque and Abbas Mirza (early 18th century) Mosque. After the Russians descended on Erivan, Recep Pasha Mosque was pulled down and in its place the Russian built Pravoslav Church was erected. Abbas Mirza Mosque was destroyed completely.

Outside the fortress, in the area called Sheker in Erivan,were Zalhan City Mosque, Novruzeli Han Mosque, Huseyneli Han Mosque (Goy Mescid), Hoca Cafer Bey Mosque and Mehemmed Sertibhan Mosque. The last three of these were demolished, and Zalhan Mosque, whose artistic design was totally corrupted, was converted into an art gallery after WW II.

In today’s Erivan, only Huseyneli Han Mosque, also called Goy Mescid, survived as the sole witness of Turkish Islamic Period.

Goy Mescid is a remarkable monument with its large courtyard encompassing 71x47 m of land, ritual areas, domes, and a minaret decorated with blue cmi, encaustic tiles. However, it is remembered by the elderly as an outstanding edifice witth four minarets, three of which were demolished after WW II.

Mosques of Erivan used to have large courtyards, in the middle of which was a fountain pool made of stone, surrounded by small cells.Erivan, which used to be a town of great minarets, has only one mosque today, Goy Mescid, with its name and architecture the last mark of the nation that created it.

The most distinctive monument of Erivan about which the European travellers and painters had been most complimentary, was Serdar Palace -also called Han Palace. The complex of Serdar Palace looking over the Han Vineyards on the opposite coast of Zengi Stream had vanished without trace.

At the beginning of the 16th century, when the foundation of the town was laid, Turkish shahs of the Safavids built the Han Palace complex certainly for their regents. However, until the mid 19th century, the palace was enlarged by outhouses several times. In addition, during the process of restoration and maintenance, a serious of alterations had been carried out. The palace complex was located in the inner castle of Erivan. As Chardin, a French traveller, wrote in the 17th century, “... The Regent’ palace in the castle, stands at the edge of the steep cliff This immense and beautiful building is especially impressive in summer”.

This building that Chardin wrote about was reported to be one of the palaces designed in hesht-behisht (Eight Heavens) style. Such buildings used to be built in the capitals and town centres of the Turkish Safavids (The Chinili Koshk in Istanbul is representative of this style).

In the 18th century, Huseyneli Han Khoylu had Mimar Mirza Cafer rebuild the Erivan Place Complex. In 1791, his son Muhammed Han had added on to the complex a hall with mirrors and a summer room called yay imareti. In 1798, it was Mahmud Han, who had new buildings added on to the palace this time. According to H. F. Lince, an English traveller, Serdar Palace formed the essence of Erivan Fortress. Serdar Palace in Erivan had been the pride of the royal architecture used in the Safavid and Kadjar Periods of Azerbaijan. The palace complex and a lot of outhouses having various functions were grouped around the yards. Fountain pools and flower gardens created a heavenly atmosphere in the courtyards of the palace. This charm was evoked even more strongly by the interior design of the palace. Embellishments on the wails and the wooden parts, battle and hunting scenes, portraits with various designs adorned interiors with a magnificent touch.

The last samples of wall pictures and portraits in the Serdar Palace were painted in 1850 by Mirza Gadim Erivani (1825-1875), a distinguished 19th century Azerbaijani painter. Between 1913 and 1918, this architectural treasure was torn down as a result of Armenian-Russian cooperation. It is not difficult to visualize the outstanding architectural and aesthetic texture of the Serdar Palace of Erivan by looking over the plans, pictures and photographs from the last century, and the engravings made by travellers and artists. There used to be a great number of caravanserais (Serdar, Sheyhu’l Islam, Tagli, Sulu, Susuz, Hact All, Komurcu, Gurcu, Culfa, Haci Ilyas and so on) in Erivan designed and built under the influence of Islamic-Turkish architectural tradition. They offered prolific services to the benefit of Erivan’s business arrangements. Those who were strongly motivated to destroy all the traces of Turkish-Islamic architectural tradition did not certainly leave out these samples of civil architecture.

The bridges and houses in old Erivan that mirror characteristics of Turkish architecture are kept under careful artistic examination as if they were Armenian made. In not more than half a century, Islamic-Turkish monuments were confiscated by Armenians, which gradually made the old Turkish town Revan/Erivan into Armenian Yerevan.

Armenians systematically decimated all the Islamic monuments in West Azerbaijan (today’s Armenia) as well as the architectural samples belonging to the periods of Akkoyunlu, Karakoyunlu, Safavid, and Kadjar. The tombs found in the village of Caferabad (today’s Aragvand) belonging to emirs from the region of Saadlu of Chuhur Seed town were later destroyed completely.(9)The wholesale decimation of the Islamic-Turkish monuments by Armenians was substituted, with a cunning manoeuvre, by the so-called restorations, which in fact fostered the construction of churches with fake dates. The underlying intention was to document that they were the “original” owners of these lands.

Armenian acts of cultural terrorism are not confined to the lands of West Azerbaijan (today’s occupied lands known as Armenia). At the beginning of the 20th century, during the period of Armenian-Muslim conflict, dozens of Turkish monuments were destroyed in violent conflagrations. In 1918, Armenian bandits deliberately set a number of buildings in Baku aflame. Among them were the building of Ismailiye Hayriye Cemiyeti -a rare architectural sample, the 14th century Keykubat Mosque -one of the buildings of Shirvanshahlar Palace Complex, and Cuma Mescidi-one of the oldest mosques of Azerbaijan. In October of the same year, in collaboration with the Russians, they burned down the town of Urumiye in South Azerbaijan that was inhabited by Afshar Turks.

At that time, Armenians systematically exposed Turks to ethnic cleansing through such diabolic methods as burning people after being crammed into mosques. In other words, cultural genocide were simultaneously accompanied by ethnic genocide. In 1920, after the Russian Empire had become the Soviet Union, attacks against the Turkish civilisation increased in number and became more systematic. The communist bureaucrats of Armenia and Armenians who promoted to the high ranking government positions in Azerbaijan differed greatly from the paid internationalist communist leaders of Azerbaijan. They exhaustively employed atrocious and subversive anti-Turk, anti-Islam policies.

Ahmet Bey Ziverbeyov, the great artist and the first Chief Architect of Baku, committed suicide in 1925 since he could not abide the oppressive attitude of the Armenians and Jews. In the letter he left behind, wrote: “There is no place for us, Azerbaijanis, here as long as Rohlins and Baqdararovs are around.”

In that period, the Azerbaijan’s architectural monuments were fated to the Armenian rationale. In 1930s, the Russian colonies, allied with Armenians, orchestrated new policies to destroy religious monuments in Azerbaijan under cover of suppressing religious affiliation.

This campaign was held in all parts of Azerbaijan and dozens of mosques and tombs were bashed up and wrecked. Armenians were the ones again to be held responsible for the appalling destruction of Bibihaybet Mescidi under the pretext of road construction.

In different regions of Azerbaijan, especially in Baku, restoration of architectural monuments was taken in hand by the Armenian mafia, which destroyed the last surviving relics for decades. In the Armenian fashion, they scraped the ancient stone manuscripts, changed dates, corrupted artistic harmony, added some characteristics -mainly a crucifix- to Islamic monuments. These acts which were assisted by the Armenian craftsmen were carried on till 1990.

Armenian experts who had no architectural, mechanical or cultural training grievously wounded the architectural tradition of Azerbaijan. Companies designing the projects of dams and hydro-electric plans to be built on the lands of Azerbaijan would assign, in principle, Armenians to the most important positions. The plan was to place the dams strategically enough to harm Azerbaijan both ecologically and culturally.For example, dams would be constructed in residential areas where historical and architectural monuments were located, deliberately allowing our cultural heritage to perish. It was for this reason that projects of hydro-technic constructions (Hudaferin Dam, Giz GaIasi Dam, and Tovuz Dam) caused public indignation.

Policy toward a large-scale cultural genocide through decimation of villages, towns and Turkish-Islamic monuments and the uprooting of their population through ethnic cleansing -which, in turn, would transform Armenia into a mono-national homogeneous republic- had been in confirmity with the search for territorial expansion of Armenia created by the Russians on the land of immortal Azerbaijan. Armenians who had lost their spirits because of their synthetic ideal of Great Armenia, which had no historical grounds at all, strove to realise this sickening ideal with the backing of more powerful nations. However, they only managed to create a blind and savage abhorrence toward Islam and Islamic civilisation. In order to achieve their ultimate goal, the inhumane Armenian government, which lacked all the spiritual and ethical norms, encouraged terrorism and onslaughts against the Islamic tradition and Azerbaijani nation for years.

The Armenian hostility toward Turkish culture, became rampant after 1988. The International 10-Year Program of Cultural Improvement which was agreed to be implemented by UN’s General Committee between 1988 and 1997 failed to protect cultural assets -if not eased and maximised the pretexts for Armenian transgression.

As of April 1993 when the Armenian attacks accelerated, the town of Nogorno-Karabakh belonging to the Republic of Azerbaijan and all the historical and cultural assets in the areas neighbouring Armanian border were gunned down, and towns and villages were destroyed. Mosques were plundered and burned down.

During the Baku events, a church in the town was set aflame; the actors of the arson were later found to be Armenian. They confessed that they accused Azerbaijani Turks of burning the church to humiliate Azerbaijan before the world public. With God’s blessing, though, Azerbajani Turks freed themselves of the guilt of burning a holy place.

In 1992, when Khojaly Massacre took place, the so called Khojaly Civilization, comprising the monuments belonging to the Bronze Age and Iron Age, castles, and cemeteries, was severely damaged during the attacks organised by the Russian-Armenian collaboration. In May 1992, Shusha, the pride of the Middle Age architecture and urban planning, was invaded and torn down with the cooperation of the Russian Army and internationalist terrorist groups. Shusha was one of the four cities to be preserved for its authentic characteristics of Azerbaijani-Turkish architecture and urban planning. Therefore, they have applied to UNESCO in order for it to be enlisted among international traditional towns for owning such remarkable architectural treasures. It is a sorry fate that such a rare cultural and natural heritage fell to Armenian chauvinists. Only recently, a specially trained Armenian military team was sent out to deliberately destroy Lachin Turbesi, Zengilan Turbesi, Kelbecer Mabedleri and other architectural monuments in Aghdam and territorial boundaries. This bashful savage continues even today.

So far, no one has ever remembered to arrange heavy campaigns to redeem the samples of Azerbaijani urban planning and architectural tradition, and to encourage international organisations to take concrete action against Armenian vandalism.

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