Azerbaijani People

Azerbaijani People

The Azerbaijanis ( /ˌæzərbaɪˈdʒɑːni/; Azerbaijani: Azərbaycanlılar, آذربایجانلیلار ) are a Turkic people living mainly in northwestern Iran and the Republic of Azerbaijan, as well as in the neighboring states. Also referred to as Azerbaijani Turks (Azərbaycan türkləri) or Azeris (Azərilər, آذریلر ), they live in a wider area from the Caucasus to the Iranian plateau. The Azerbaijanis are predominantly Shi'a Muslim and have a mixed cultural heritage including Turkic, Iranian and Caucasian elements.

Following the Russo-Persian Wars of 1813 and 1828, the territories of the Qajar Persian Empire in the Caucasus were ceded to the Russian Empire and the treaties of Gulistan in 1813 and Turkmenchay in 1828 finalized the borders between Czarist Russia and Qajar Iran. The formation of the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic in 1918 established the territory of the Republic of Azerbaijan. Despite living on two sides of an international border, the Azeris form a single ethnic group. However, northerners and southerners differ due to nearly two centuries of separate social evolution in Iranian Azerbaijan and Russian/Soviet-influenced Azerbaijan. The Azerbaijani language unifies Azerbaijanis, and is mutually intelligible with Turkmen, Qashqai, Gagauz and Anatolian Turkish (including the dialects spoken by the Iraqi Turkmen), all of which belong to the Oghuz, or Western, group of Turkic languages. Also, it is known that national identity of "Azerbaijani" is a recent formation as the people of the region were alternatively referred to as Turks, Tatars and Caucasian Muslims before.