Shaki (
Azerbaijani S?ki; until 1968
Nukha, Azerbaijani
Nuxa; also,
Nucha,
Shäki, and
Sheki) is a city in North-west
Azerbaijan, in the
rayon of the same name.
Shaki is situated in northern Azerbaijan on the southern part of the Greater Caucasus mountain range, 325 km (200 miles) from Baku. The population of Shaki is 63,000.
According to the Azerbaijan Development Gateway, the name of the town goes back to the ethnonym of the Sakas, who reached the territory of modern day Azerbaijan in the 7th century B.C. and populated it for several centuries. In the medieval sources, the name of the town is found in various forms such as Sheke, Sheki, Shaka, Shakki, Shakne, Shaken, Shakkan, Shekin.
There are traces of the large-scale settlements in Shaki that date to more than 2700 years ago. The Sakas were an Iranian people that wandered from the north side of the Black Sea through Derbend passage and to the South Caucasus and from there to Asia Minor in the 7th century B.C. They occupied a good deal of the fertile lads in the South Caucasus in an area called Sakasena. The city of Shaki was one of the areas occupied by the Sakas. The original settlement dates back to the late Bronze Age.
