The people of Shusha made it the pearl of the Caucasus, the cradle of our culture, the mugham-singing heart of Azerbaijan
Panah Ali Khan Javanshir (1693-Sarijali-1763
The people of Shusha made it the pearl of the Caucasus, the cradle of our culture, the mugham-singing heart of Azerbaijan
Panah Ali Khan Javanshir (1693-Sarijali-1763, Shiraz) was the founder and first ruler of the Karabakh Khanate.
Panah Ali Khan was from the Sarijali branch of the clan of Javanshir, who with their associate clan of Otuz-Iki (meaning thirty-two in Azerbaijani) had for long been rivals of the Yirmi-Dört (meaning twenty-four in Azerbaijani) and Ziyadoglu Qajars of Ganja, whose chiefs had been official rulers of Karabakh since Safavid times. His father’s name was Ibrahim agha Javanshir.
According to Mirza Adigozal bey, Panah Ali’s paternal great-grandfather and namesake Panah Ali bey served at the headquarters of the governors (beylerbeyi) of the Karabakh-Ganja province in the early 17th century, at the time when the region’s was directly controlled by the Safavid Empire. He soon retired, married a woman from the Javanshir clan of Karabakh and had a son by the name of Ali (nicknamed Sarija Ali). They lived in their estate located in Arasbar (Arasbaran) (present-day Khojavend and Agdam rayons of Azerbaijan) but also owned land in Tartar and the northern shores of the Aras River. The Arasbar estate was rebuilt into a castle in Sarija Ali’s son Ibrahim Khalil’s lifetime and has been known as Ibrahim Khalil Galasi.
However, aforementioned information were contested by different sources – namely Mir Mehdi Khazani who named Panah Ali khan’s grandfather as Ibrahim Sultan and great-grandfather as Budagh Sultan. While Azerbaijani historian E.B.Shukurzade proposed his grandfather as Panah Ali agha (I) and great-grandfather as Ibrahim Khalil agha (I). However, in all versions his father was same. He had two brothers – Fazlali bey and Behbud Ali bey.
After the dethronement of the Safavids in 1736 by Nadir Shah, the landed classes of Ganja and Karabakh gathered in Mughan (the Javanshirs were also among them) deciding to oppose the new shah and agreeing on trying to get the Safavids back on the throne. When this news reached Nadir Shah, he ordered all Muslim landowners of the region and their families deported to Khorasan (northeastern Iran) as a punishment. As such, Panah Ali happened to be among the deportees. His elder brother and former master of ceremonies (Azerbaijani: eşikağası) of Nadir, Fazlali bey was murdered in 1738. This was when Panah Ali found himself displeased with Nader Shah’s attitude towards him and having gathered many of those deported from Karabakh in 1736, returned to his homeland in 1747. The shah sent troops to bring back the runaway however the order was never fulfilled: Nadir Shah himself was killed in Khorasan in June of the same year. The new ruler of the Empire, Adil Shah issued a decree recognizing Panah Ali as the Khan of Karabakh Khanate.
Adil Shah’s murder in 1748 left Panah Ali virtually independent. He campaigned on Five Melikdoms of Karabakh on his plan to solidify rule in Karabakh. He forged an alliance with new Melik of Varanda – Melik Shahnazar II, who had recently killed his uncle or elder brother Hovsep and usurped the rule. As a result, Melik Shahnazar II’s daughter Hurizad was wed to Panah Ali’s son Ibrahim Khalil and the melik swore fealty to khan. Alarmed meliks forged an alliance and raided 