Kizlyar: Difference between revisions

==History==

The first documented reference to Kizlyar dates back to 1609, although some historians associate the place with [[Samandar (city)|Samandar]], the 8th-century capital of [[Khazaria]].{{citation needed|date= February 2012}} In 1735 the Russian government built a [[fortress]] in Kizlyar and laid foundations for the [[Caucasus]] fortified borderline. In the 18th and 19th centuries, Kizlyar operated as one of the [[trading post]]s between Russia and the [[Middle East]] and [[Central Asia]]. During this period, the population was largely [[Armenians|Armenian]] and [[Russians|Russian]]. In 1796 2,800 Armenians and 1,000 Russians lived in Kizlyar.<ref>Jane Burbank and David L. Ransel, ''Imperial Russia: New Histories of the Empire'' (Indiana University Press, 1998), 160.</ref>

 

In January 1996 Chechen separatists raided the local airbase in the course of the [[Kizlyar raid]], which claimed the lives of seventy-eight Russian soldiers.