In the Baku village of Balakhani, the director of the Baku crafts, mining engineer N.I. Voskoboynikov founded one of the first oil refineries in the country.

• 1842

The second edition of the Mining Charter was published, two sections of which were devoted to the oil business. One section regulated the extraction of oil and the management of state-owned fields in the Baku and Shemakha districts of the Caspian region ... Oil produced on state-owned lands of the Baku and Shemakha districts came into state ownership.

• 1846

V.N. Semenov in Baku, in the Bibi-Heybat area, drilled the first exploration well for oil with a depth of 21 m.

• 1848

It has been drilling in Bibi-Heybat on the shore of the Caspian Sea since 1847 and on July 14, 1848, the world's first oil well produced by a percussive method using wooden rods produces oil.

• 1857

Construction completed railway Baku - Balakhani. This is the first road in Russia along which oil was transported in metal tanks.

• 1880

There are 195 kerosene factories in Baku, producing 30,000 poods of kerosene per day (491 tons). Russian kerosene began to successfully compete with American kerosene, completely displacing it from the Russian domestic market by 1884.

• 1881

Start in Kuskovo near Moscow oil refinery of the Association of Russian-American oil production, the construction of which was led by V. Shukhov. The plant processed Baku oil, delivered along the Volga, and then by rail to the Kuskovsky platform.

• 1882

The Kokorevskaya school was opened - the first school for the children of oil workers in the Baku oilfield region.

• 1883

Beginning of regular export of Russian kerosene in connection with the opening of a direct connection between Baku and Batum via the Transcaucasian Railway. This year, the Kuban-Black Sea Society exported the first batch of Baku kerosene to London and Austria. The exit of Baku oil products to the Black Sea significantly affected the structure of Russian oil exports, bringing to naught the export of crude oil by the end of the decade.

• 1885

The first gasoline production plant was built in Baku.

The Moscow oil depot, the largest in Russia, built by the Branobel Partnership, began to operate.

• 1886

The Parisian Rothschild banking house comes to the Russian oil market. Having bought a controlling stake in the Batumi Oil Industrial and Trading Society (BNITO), which was called the Caspian-Black Sea Oil Industrial and Trading Society, he becomes the main competitor of the Nobel company in Russia.

The first specialized scientific periodical dedicated to the oil industry is published - "Proceedings of the Baku Branch of the Imperial Russian Technical Society".

• 1897

Start of construction of the Baku-Batumi trunk pipeline, the largest at that time in the world, 835 km long and throughput 1 million tons per year.

In Baku, for the first time, the compressor method of oil extraction (airlift), proposed by the outstanding Russian engineer Shukhov, was tested. In the airlift, compressed air was used as a working agent.

• 1898

The Rothschilds, together with the St. Petersburg International Bank, create a powerful trade and transport company "Mazut".

• 1899

The publication of the first periodical dedicated to oil production, the journal "Oil Business" (1899-1920), begins in Baku.

• 1900

At the World Exhibition in Paris, two leading Russian oil companies - the Nobel Brothers Oil Production Partnership and the Caspian-Black Sea Oil Industrial Society, as well as the Geological Committee of Russia were awarded the highest awards - the Grand Prix.

• 1901

Oil production in the country has reached the highest level - 11.6 million tons, or 51.6% of the world level of oil production. At the same time, 95% of oil production fell on the Baku region. In subsequent years, there is a significant decline in production (for comparison: in 1913, 9.2 million tons were mined, or 18.1% of world production). However, until 1917, Russia held the second place after the United States in terms of oil production.

Kerosene of domestic production inside the country was more expensive than abroad. A pood of Russian kerosene in London cost 94 kopecks, in Hamburg - 98 kopecks, in Moscow - 1 r. 16 kopecks, in St. Petersburg - 1 p. 33 kop.
On the territory of the oil refinery in Surakhani, oilman V.A. Kokorev laid the first borehole for gas in order to obtain gas for heating the plant. A successfully drilled well attracted other oilmen to Surakhani. The Surakhani region gained fame as a large gas field, from where gas was transported through pipes to other regions of the Baku oil fields.

• 1902

The first rotary drilling rig with a 15 m high drilling rig appears in the Baku region.

• 1904

The "Rules on the protection of the Caspian-Volga waterways from oil pollution" were approved.

• 1905

The first large-scale fire in the world history in the Baku oil fields.

As a result of large fires in the oil fields of the Absheron Peninsula, 1996 oil wells were completely destroyed, including 1429 productive ones.
Mass strikes in the Baku oil fields. Adoption of the first collective agreement in the history of Russia.

• 1906

The first oil pipeline in Russia was built from Baku to Batumi (length 833 km, diameter 200 mm).

Creation, in opposition to the American Rockefeller Trust Standard Oil, of an international European association headed by the German bank European Petroleum Union, which included the Nobel Brothers Partnership, the Caspian-Black Sea Society and the Mantashev and Co.
Expansion of the range of petroleum products subject to excise tax (60 kopecks per pood). This was due to the rise in prices for kerosene in the domestic market.

• 1907

Opening of the world's longest main pipeline Baku-Batum with a length of 885 km (kerosene pipeline).

The Marfa Posadnitsa barge (length 172 m, width 24 m, side height 3.85 m, carrying capacity 8800 tons) was built at the Gorokhovets shipyard of Shorin. Later, after minor alterations, the carrying capacity of the barge reached 10.4 thousand tons, which was a record for its time.
On the island of Cheleken in the Caspian Sea from the well br. Nobel, from a depth of 85 m, a fountain of oil was obtained with a daily flow rate of 573 tons. Cheleken has been declared an oil-bearing region. A feverish sale of oil fields began.
The Baku branch of the Russian Technical Society established the Emmanuel Nobel Prize.

• 1911

In Surakhani (Baku) the first well is being drilled in a rotary way.
The appearance in Russia of the first gas stations on the basis of an agreement between the Imperial Automobile Society and the Partnership “Br. Nobel" regarding "gasoline stations".
The departure of the Rothschilds from the Russian market: the sale of the Caspian-Black Sea company "BNITO" to the American company Royal Dutch Shell.

• 1912

The powerful oil holding Russian General Oil Corporation (RGNK) was created, which included the independent companies of Stepan Lianozov, the Mirzoev brothers, the Gukasov brothers, and others.

• 1914

Termination of oil exports from the port of Batum due to the closure of the Turkish straits. Loss of Russian oil product markets in Western Europe and in the Middle East.

• 1915

Started in Baku industrial production toluene - a raw material for the production of explosives (TNT), obtained from crude oil.
Strikes in the Baku oil fields.

• 1917

The Baku oil fields were cut off from the European market. The USA becomes the monopoly exporter of energy carriers.

• 1918

Establishment of a special Economic Commission to help Baku.
Adoption on June 20, 1918 of the Decree on the nationalization of the oil industry throughout the country. The introduction of a state monopoly on the oil trade.
Nationalization of the Baku oilfields: the merger of private oil-industrial enterprises into a single entity based on the production complexes of three largest companies– Oil, Branobel and Shell.
In the first year of the nationalization of the oil industry, the level of oil production at the Baku fields decreased by 3.5 times compared to 1913, and the volume of drilling - by 50 times.

• 1920

Red Army in Baku, May 1920
Foundation of the Azerbaijan Polytechnic Institute (now the Azerbaijan Institute of Oil and Chemistry named after M. Azizbayov).

• 1921

Formation of the largest trusts: "Azneft" (on the basis of the Baku oil fields), "Grozneft" (oil fields of Kuban and Grozny) and "Embaneft" (oil fields in Western Kazakhstan).
Resumption of operation of the Baku-Batum pipeline.
Start of construction of a new Baku-Batum oil pipeline, 834 km long.

• 1924

The first well was drilled in Surakhani using a Kapelyushnikov turbodrill.

• 1925

The first offshore well was drilled on an artificial island in Ilyicha Bay near Baku.
at the Baku factories. Dzerzhinsky and them. Myasnikov, the production of Kapelyushnikov turbodrills began.
Engineer M.M. Skvortsov designed and tested an automatic bit feeder (“automatic driller”) at the Baku fields.

• 1926

The first electric railway in the USSR was built between Baku and the oil fields of Absheron.

• 1928

For the first time in the Soviet Union, the Baku fields used the method of air injection into the oil reservoir in order to increase the productivity of adjacent wells.

• 1930

The construction of a new main oil pipeline Baku-Batumi, 834 km long, with 13 pumping stations, has been completed.
An open political trial in a fabricated case of the Industrial Party, in which a number of oil workers were convicted of "sabotage in the energy sector."

• 1933

First drilled in the USSR deviated well on the shore of the bay named after Ilyich near Baku.

• 1934

N.S. Timofeev on about. Artem in the Caspian Sea, for the first time, cluster drilling was carried out, in which several wells are drilled from a common site.

• 1935

Engineers Timofeev and Mikhailov developed a method for installing metal tubular piles for offshore drilling rigs.

• 1938

At the All-Union Conference of Oil Workers (February 1938), People's Commissar for Heavy Industry L.M. Kaganovich, noting the failure of all planned targets, placed all the blame for the failure to fulfill the second five-year plan for the extraction and processing of oil on the oilmen. Many of them were repressed, including the head of the Main Directorate of the Oil Industry M.V. Barinov.

• 1941

In 1941, the Baku region gave the country 23.5 million tons of oil (75% of the all-Union production). This was the highest level in the history of oil production in Azerbaijan.
By decision of the State Defense Committee, the Experimental Turbine Drilling Office (EKTB) of Narkomneft was evacuated from Baku to Krasnokamsk (Perm Region), headed by the inventors of the multistage turbodrill.

• 1942

For the first time in world practice, the method of transporting oil tankers and metal tanks afloat by sea with the help of tugboats was used (on the Baku-Krasnovodsk route).
A significant part of Azerbaijani oil and oil refineries have been relocated to the regions of the Volga, the Urals, Kazakhstan and Central Asia.

• 1947

In the coastal waters of the Apsheron shelf, the first marine oil deposit Gyurgyan-sea.

• 1949

Formation of offshore exploration, equipment and technology of offshore drilling, infrastructure offshore production oil: the development of a large offshore oil field "Oil stones" (Neft dashlari) began; On November 7, 1949, the first ton of offshore oil was produced at the field.

• 1950

Azmorneft association was founded.

The irony of Armenian fate: “The Tatars of the Baku province come from different Turkic tribes who moved to this region during the invasions and administration of the region by the rulers of the Seljuk, Mongolian, Black and White Sheep, Turkmen and Safavid. These various tribes, when mixed with the former inhabitants of the region, both in eastern Transcaucasia and in the northern part of Persia, made up one common dialect of the Turkic language, the middle between Turkish (Ottoman Turks), Kumyk, Nogai and Jagatai. N. Seydlitz, Russian Caucasian scholar (“Lists of settlements of the Russian Empire in the Caucasus region. Baku province”, Tiflis, 1870, p. 85,87.)

“In Baku, as well as in the Baku province in general, Aderbeidzhan Tatars live most of all. They belong to the Mongolian race and the Turkic generation, they speak a dialect influenced by the Persian language. Supported by the Persian shahs, in the last century they moved from Aderbeidzhan to the southeastern part of Transcaucasia and to the coastal part from Baku to Derbent.

Caucasian calendar for 1908,
Tiflis, 1907, p. 71.

So, until 1918. the concept of "Azerbaijani" did not exist, everyone called them Tatars or Muslims.
Azerbaijan in Persian means: azer - fire and baidzhan - country, that is, the country of fire.
Baku - (from the Armenian word bagin - temple, altar). The connection with fire is again evident.

In the VI century. BC there was a cult of fire. The temples of fire worshipers existed until 624, when the Georgian king Heraclius went on a campaign against the Persians through the Mugan steppes and destroyed them, but 12 years later these altars were restored after the conquest of Persia by the Arabs.
According to the Arab historian Istarkhie, in the 8th century, local residents used oil-soaked land instead of firewood (Review of the Baku oil industry for two years of nationalization 1920-1922, p. 11.).
An Arabic inscription engraved on a stone was found in one of the oil wells, according to which this well was discovered by Allah-Yar, the son of Muhammad-Nur, in 1594 and given to the seids for use (Collection of information about the Caucasus, vol. II, Tiflis, 1872, p. 23.).
Anania Shirakatsi (7th century) in his famous “Ashkharatsuyts” (“Geographical Atlas of the World”) indicates the minerals and natural resources of Big Hayk: iron, coal, oil, salak, dzikhk, coke, smoky quartz, arsenic, salts, hot mineral sources.
Since the 18th century, Russia began to pursue an expansionist policy in the Caucasus and Transcaucasia. In 1801 Georgia was conquered, and according to the Gulistan Treaty concluded on October 12, 1813, Karabakh, Baku, Sheki (Nukhin), Shirvan (Shemakhi), Derbent, Cuban and Talysh khanates were transferred from Persia to Russia (Ganja Khanate came under the protectorate of Russia since 1804) . The conquest of Transcaucasia by Russia (including the Erivan Khanate in 1827) was not only a huge military and political event, but also opened wide opportunities for economic development. Absolutely new economic relations arose in the region... Transcaucasia entered into direct relations with Russia, a vast country with a relatively higher cultural level. Here, a large contingent was established, consisting of Russian officials and the military, who, as consumers, put forward new requirements for the trade of the region.
The Russian contingent - officials and the military did not act as an economic entity, and the implementation economic activity in the region took place through the three main peoples of Transcaucasia: Armenians, Georgians and Tatars (i.e. Azerbaijanis). The main form of economic management of the Russian authorities was a contract, and it was the Armenians who became contractors, thereby entering the stage of formation of the initial capital of the Eastern Armenians.

Immediately after the conclusion of the Gulistan Treaty, the Russian authorities paid close attention to Baku oil. In 1813-1825. oil and salt production was farmed out, bringing the treasury an annual income of 130 thousand rubles (77% of oil, 23% of salt). It should be noted that at that time oil did not have any industrial value, it was used for lighting purposes, lubricating skin, wheels, and for treating livestock from skin diseases. The first attempt to refine oil dates back to 1823: the serf Countess Panina, the Dubinin brothers from the Vladimir region, founded a production facility in Mozdok “to turn black oil into white oil”. The resulting "photogen" - kerosene, began to be exported to Moscow and Nizhny Novgorod, but no attention was paid to it (Review of the Baku oil industry for two years of nationalization 1920-1922, p. 9).
In 1825, the government began to independently manage the oil fields, but failed - revenues fell to 76 thousand rubles. On the next year the state gave up its monopoly and leased the oil lands to the Azerbaijanis. In 1826-1832. the income received by the local residents was so meager that the government again took up oil production on its own. But again, unsuccessfully: the annual income from oil wells and salt mines averaged 100 thousand rubles, and this forced the state from 1850 to completely abandon production and switch to a system of contracts.
In 1850-1854. Tiflis merchants Kukudzhanyan, Babanasyan and General Ter-Ghukasyan became the largest contractors, paying 110,000 rubles in annual rent. In 1854-1863. the largest contractor was Ter-Ghukasyan with 117 thousand rubles, in 1863-1867. - Hov. Mirzoyan with 162 thousand, and in 1867-1873. - the same Mirzoyan, but already with 136 thousand rubles of payment (St. Gulishambarov, “Essay on the development and state of the art oil industry of the Baku region "- Collection of information about the Caucasus, vol. VII, Tiflis, 1880, p. 333).

According to official data, in 1846 the entire trade of Transcaucasia with Russia was in the hands of the Armenians, and its turnover was 5,534,600 rubles. The lease of Baku oil lands since 1850 testified that the representatives of the Armenian merchant capital enriched by various contracts, seeking to find new areas for investment and showing foresight, reoriented and moved into the oil industry, which is still in its infancy, which they themselves must have been developed.
... Oil was obtained from wells - funnel-shaped pits 25-30 meters deep, which began to deepen. Oil came out with water, but, being lighter, floated to the surface. It was collected, poured into wineskins and transported on ox-drawn carts, donkeys or camels.

There were not rare cases when oil mixed with gas gushed out of the ground, immediately enriching the owner of the site (in 1877, such a fountain clogged from a well owned by Hov. Mirzoyan, and, amazingly, this fountain did not dry up for 7 whole years).

The resulting so-called crude oil had a very narrow scope; this oil had to be refined, and the first attempt of this kind was made by a representative of the Russian trading capital, businessman Kokorev, who in 1857. founded a distillery in Surakhani, and in 1863. received a "light lighting product" - kerosene. In 1862 the kerosene plant was founded by A. Vermishyan, in 1863 by J. Melikyan, in 1865 by Tatosyan, in 1869 by Ter-Hakopyan and Sharabandyan, in 1870 by Kalantaryan, in 1871 by Dildaryan and Tarayan. Thus, the oil industry was founded in the truest sense of the word.
But what was Baku like then? In 1851, Spassky-Avtomonov, who visited the city, wrote: “The city consists of extremely crooked and cramped lanes, along which you can only walk or hardly ride on horseback. The squares are small and uneven, the market street is also narrow, the shops are badly arranged. All the houses in the fortress and on the suburb 1992, 505 shops, 23 streets, 3 squares and 2 bridges. There are no factories, there are no commercial establishments. There are 294 all local merchants, of which 75 are shipowners, 67 who sell factory, factory and manufactory products, 231 other goods, 28 merchants from other cities, 2 Persian subjects ”(Caucasian calendar for 1852, Tiflis, 1851, p. 304, 306).

The provincial city of the Caspian province, founded in the 6th century by the Persian Shah Nushirvan, on November 6, 1859, became the administrative center of the Baku province founded at the same time.
The oil industry has evolved...
Despite the fact that the farming system brought significant benefits to the empire (suffice it to mention that if in 1863 340 thousand were produced, then in 1872 - 1.535.981 poods of oil), however, this system had a significant drawback - its temporary , time-limited nature. According to the established procedure, the oil field was leased for four years, and its owner, naturally, was not interested in making large investments, drilling new wells, conducting geological exploration, because after the expiration of the lease, someone else could pay a big price and own deposit. This circumstance clearly interfered with the development of the oil industry, meanwhile, the empire was on an economic upswing and needed large volumes of oil and oil products, and American oil occupied a leading position in the Russian market. It was under these conditions that the Russian government took a radical, revolutionary, economically reasonable step: it decided to sell the oil fields to private ownership. This was an extremely important event, which later played a huge role from the political, economic, and social points of view, as well as in the aspect of interethnic relations.

In November 1872, the government put up for auction 68 oil-bearing sites with a total area of ​​460 acres, setting the initial price at 552,240 rubles. The results of the auction are stunning: instead of the starting price, the state treasury received 2,980,307 rubles. The owners were 12 Russians who paid 1,485,860 rubles (1,333,328 rubles for 60 acres were paid by Kokorev and Gubonin), 11 Armenians (Hov. Hakobyan, Sargsyan brothers) and one Armenian company - “Partners” (founders Bogdan Dolukhanyan, Minas Kachkachyan, S. Kvitko) who paid 1,459,182 rubles. Hov. Mirzoyan alone - 1 million 220 thousand for 40 acres.

Hovhannes Minasovich Mirzoyan (Ivan Minaevich Mirzoev) was a typical representative of the Armenian commercial capital. He was the first in the entire Caucasus to see the prospects of the oil industry, he became the first oil industrialist and one of the "fathers" of the Baku oil business. Initially, he was engaged in activities that have centuries-old traditions among the Armenian merchants - the trade in raw silk. In 1853 he had a cotton shop. Then he founded a silk factory in the city of Nukha and earned a lot of capital. In 1855, having paid the highest price - 312 thousand rubles a year, until 1863 he rented the Salyan fishery located at the mouth of the Kura, which flows into the Caspian Sea, where 2500 people worked. In addition to Baku, since 1867 he rented the Kaitago-Tabasaran oil field. In 1865-188, paying annually 13,250 rubles, he rented only two oil wells discovered in Grozny, increased productivity to 66,500 poods, founded a kerosene plant, which employed mainly Armenians. In addition, in 1878-1886. for an annual fee of 7,850 rubles, he rented and operated the Zagliki alum plant in the Elizavetpol province (Caucasian calendar for 1878, Tiflis, 1877, p. 210).

The activities of Hov. Mirzoyan in the Baku oil industry can be characterized by the word "first". He was the first to establish two kerosene factories in Surakhani in 1868 and received 160,000 poods of kerosene worth 260,000 rubles. He also became the first exporter of kerosene. This was an unthinkable amount: suffice it to note that in that year all the other refineries together produced only 60,000 poods of kerosene worth 64,000 rubles. In 1867, Ov. Mirzoyan produced 665 thousand poods of oil, in 1868 - 716 thousand, in 1872 - 1 million 365 thousand poods, in 1871 he installed the first drilling rig in Balakhany, and in 1872 - the second (St. Gulishambarov , Essay on development ..., p. 345). It was after this that the oil owners switched to oil drilling, and in 1879 not a single oil well remained.

After the death of Hov. Mirzoyan (1885), his widow Daria and sons - temporary merchants of the Moscow 1st guild, the nobles Grigor and Melkon, as well as their daughter, Princess Maria Argutinskaya-Dolgorukaya, in 1886 founded the oil industrial and commercial partnership "Brothers Mirzoev and Co. with a fixed capital of 2.1 million rubles. As representatives of the aristocratic elite of Tiflis, the Mirzoyans prudently handed over the affairs of their firm to oil professionals. B. Korganyan was the chairman of the board of the partnership, the directors were D. Kharazyan, M. Dolukhanyan, Hov. Garsoyan, T. Enfiadzhyants, thanks to which the Mirzoev Brothers and Co. 15 million poods of oil per year (Yearbook "Baku and its regions" - 1912, Baku, p.140).
The company owned oil fields in Balakhani and Sabunchi, factory buildings in Surakhani, an oil pipeline in Balakhani, a kerosene and lubricating oil plant in Baku, as well as various workshops and a chemical laboratory, a pier on the coast of the Caspian Sea, 4 sailboats ("Moscow", "Arseny" , "Prussia", "San-Dadash"), production facilities in Batumi, oil product warehouses in Moscow, Tsaritsyn and Nizhny Novgorod (Charter of the oil industrial and commercial partnership "Brothers Mirzoevgh and Co.", Tiflis, 1901). The Mirzoev Brothers & Co. firm remained one of the best Armenian-owned companies until the tragedy of 1918.

Let's go back to 1872 and ask ourselves: did Azerbaijanis participate in the auction? Yes, two. The first, Selimkhanov, paid 3,000 rubles for a plot with a starting price of 1 ruble and did not play any role in the oil industry. It is worth talking about the second of them, Haji Zeynal-Abdin Tagiyev, in more detail. During the entire pre-revolutionary period, there were three relatively large Azerbaijani oilmen (the other two were Musa Nagiev and Shamsi Asadullayev), but Tagiev was the only one who, having learned from Armenians, became a trustee of a number of Muslim educational institutions and built the building of the Baku theater.

Tagiyev's appearance in business was a curiosity. He was a craftsman, a bricklayer and, for unknown reasons, became a companion of the brothers Baghdasar and Poghos Sargsyans; they paid 14,961 rubles and became co-owners of 20 plots. In 1882, the brothers took part in the All-Russian Industrial and Art Exhibition held in Moscow and were awarded a bronze medal for the produced kerosene. After that, the names of the Sargsyan brothers were almost never mentioned in the oil business, it is only known that P. Sarsisyan was a member of the Baku City Duma and was a member of the board of trustees of the male Armenian two-year school in Baku. His wife Elizabeth, being an ardent supporter of the ideas of one of the best periodicals in the history of the Armenian press - “Mshaka”, named the ship belonging to them after the founding editor of this publication: “Grigor Artsruni”. Ironically, the Bolsheviks expropriated this ship and in 1921 handed it over to the state oil company Azneft.
So, from January 1, 1873, the first owners appeared in the Baku oil industry, who could dispose of their oil at their own discretion, sell plots, lease them, conclude various transactions, establish joint-stock companies, etc. This privatization caused not only an "oil fever", but also served as an impetus for large financial investments, a sharp increase in population, and the rapid development of the city.
If in 1813-1873. were the period of origin, the formation of the oil industry, then 1873-1899. became an era of gigantic progress, which outlined the trends in the development of geopolitical interests and interethnic relations. Trends that intensified with every pound of extracted, processed and exported oil.
If in 1850 260 thousand pounds were mined, in 1863. - 340 thousand, then in 1872 - 1.535.981 pounds, and in 1896 - 386 million. If in 1862 there were 13.392 inhabitants in Baku, in 1873 - 15.604, then in 1886 in the city 83 thousand people lived, and in 1897 - 104 thousand.

Privatization created a situation that gave economic freedom and guaranteed stable high returns on investment. This caused not only the influx of financial investments into the oil industry from all over the Transcaucasus and Russia, but also the fact that Baku became the residence of representatives of the most different peoples owing to which the city became multinational.
The prospects for the oil industry were noticed by the largest representatives of Russian capital of that time, especially the Russian subjects of the Swedes, the Nobel brothers, who created more than 30 industrial enterprises in Russia. In 1875, they bought a small kerosene plant in Baku, oil fields and, with European thoroughness, conducted preparatory work. Since 1879, the Nobel Brothers company has founded a huge modern complex for the extraction, processing and export of oil, with many auxiliary infrastructures, which, in terms of its economic indicators, occupied a leading place in the oil industry of Baku ... Until Stepan Lianosyan appeared.

In 1877 Russian government took a new radical, economically justified step: the excise tax was removed from the oil industry, as a result of which the price of oil decreased by about three times, and in 1883 American oil was completely ousted from Russian market. The world is "divided" between two oil-producing countries - the United States and Russia (that is, Baku).
As rightly noted in one of the sources, “none of the branches of Russian industry played such a significant role in the world capitalist economy as the oil industry: until the beginning of the 20th century. the Baku region was one of the two main centers of world oil production (along with the oil regions of the USA) ”(Monopolistic capital in the oil industry of Russia (1883-1914). Documents and materials, M.-L., 1961, p. 8- nine). This division later had the most serious military-political and economic consequences.
In 1885, the first steps in the oil industry were taken by one of the largest banking firms in Europe - the Parisian banking house "Rothschild Brothers", which is engaged in the provision of state loans. Russian Empire in France. Thanks to their powerful capital, the Rothschilds acquired numerous oil fields, built processing plants, warehouses in Baku and became leaders in exports. And their "Caspian-Black Sea Society" consistently ranked second in terms of economic indicators.
The fourth place in the oil industry hierarchy was occupied by the "Caspian Partnership" company, founded by Karabakh residents Poghos, Arshak, Hakob and Abram Ghukasyans.
In 1878, residents of Shushi Samvel Bagiryan and Harutyun (Artem) Madatyan, united with Bruno de Boer, founded an oil and trading company"Caspian partnership". In the same 1878, 20-year-old Poghos Ghukasyan, who received a secondary education, arrived in Baku from Karabakh. He quickly orients himself in the oil business, thanks to his innate sharpness he foresees the prospects of the oil industry and for 27 thousand rubles he buys out first the share of S. Bagiryan, and then A. Madatyan, and he himself becomes a partner of Bruno de Boer. Their business flourishes and develops in such a way that after 9 years it begins to occupy a leading position in the oil industry. In 1886, the firm was transformed into a joint-stock company with a fixed capital of 2 million rubles. During this time, after graduating from school, the Pogos brothers Arshak, Hakob and Abram come to Baku. In 1888, after the death of Bruno de Boer, the brothers, together with their relative Ov. Ter-Markosyan become the full owners of the Caspian Partnership.

On January 24, 1884, a significant event took place: the body "Congress of Baku Oil Industrialists" (SBN) was created - the first branch, corporate body throughout Russia. In 1890, P. Gukasyan (Pavel Osipovich Gukasov) was elected chairman of the council of the RLS, and in 1896 he “ceded” this position to Arshak, who led this organization with great professionalism until the end of 1918.
P. Ghukasyan together with S. Yakovlev in 1897. founded the Caspian Pipeline with a fixed capital of 1 million rubles. This company, located on Staro-Policeyskaya Street in Baku, was one of the first to sell various imported machine tools, pipes, rolled metal, motors, and power plants for the oil industry. Poghos Ghukasyan was appointed one of the directors of the Maykop oil industrial and trading company "Colchis" and, in fact, was the first Armenian who, in the late XIX - early XX centuries. became a global industrialist. When the State Council of Russia was formed in 1906, 12 seats were given to the industrial and commercial curia of the country. The authority of P. Ghukasyan, his indisputable contribution were so great that he was elected a member of this supreme body and moved to the capital.
When in 1902 P. Ghukasyan and Al. Mantashyants founded the Homelight Oil Co company in England, Abram Ghukasyan settled in London as a permanent representative of the company.
Summarizing the period of formation of the Baku oil industry in 1873-1899, one circumstance should be noted: in 1889, 69 oil companies were registered in Baku, of which 12 (including 9 Armenian and 1 Azerbaijani) were not engaged in oil production. The remaining 57 companies in the aggregate produced 192,247,663 poods of oil. Of these companies, 34 were Armenian, which produced 93.891.585 poods of oil. There were only 3 Azerbaijanis, who received 14.472.370 pounds, and only Tagiev extracted 13.981.105 pounds.

And now let's turn to the figure of a man, without whom it is impossible to get an idea of ​​either the Baku or the world oil industry. A person without whom it is impossible to get an idea of ​​the essence of an Armenian, his enterprise and diligence. Without which the history of the Armenian people would be incomplete.
It's about Alexander Ovanesovich Mantashyants (1842-1911).
One of the closest associates of the Armenian "oil king" Arakel Sarukhan, who in 1921 managed to escape from Bolshevik Baku and ended up in Vienna, among the Mkhitarists, took up Armenian studies and created a number of valuable works. In 1931, he published a book in which he expressed his boundless love and respect for Mantashyants. A.Sarukhan begins his memoirs with the following lines: “I am writing Mantashyants (with a “c” at the end), because the deceased signed in Armenian “Mantashyants”, and in Russian, according to the custom, Mantashev, also in foreign languages ​​- Mantacheff.

The life and work of one of the greatest figures of Armenian business - Al. Mantashyants, worthy of a serious, thorough, thorough monograph, cannot be perceived without Baku oil.
At the beginning of 1889, Mikael Aramyants, a resident of Shushi, who, together with his compatriots - Karabakh residents A. Tsaturyan, G. Arafelyan and G. Tumayan, was a co-owner of the oil company "A. Tsaturov and others", arrived in Tiflis and asked the vice-chairman (with 1890 chairman for life) and largest shareholder the best Commercial Bank in the Caucasus Al. Mantashyants loan for the purchase of tank cars. This request was not accidental: Aramyants and Mantashyants knew each other from a young age, when they were engaged in manufacturing trade in Tabriz - the first was an assistant to the merchant Tarumyan, the second - to his father.
Al.Mantashyants, who has long noticed the prospects of oil, suggested to M.Aramyants own funds(50 thousand rubles), but with the condition that he becomes a partner in their company. So it was decided, and Al. Mantashyants entered the Baku oil industry under the banner of the firm "Trading House A.I. Mantashev."
Already on November 27 of the same year, on behalf of the 5th Congress of Oil Producers, he submitted a memorandum to the Department of Unpaid Duties of the Ministry of Finance, in which, having subjected the most serious economic analysis and comparing the Russian and American oil industries, he proposed a number of measures thanks to which Baku oil could dominate the world market. . Mantashyants himself exported more than 2 million pounds. kerosene a year to England and owned two sea tankers that sailed between Batum and London and even to America.
This report was a kind of " calling card”: a large-scale personality appeared in the Baku oil industry, rallying all small and large Armenian oil industrialists around him, becoming their leader, partner, assistant, stronghold and forming the concept that we define as “Armenian oil”. A new player appeared on the scene, who was supposed to nullify all attempts by the Nobels and Rothschilds to monopolize the oil industry, and he had to achieve this solely through economic competition. He appeared, without taking into account the opinion of which it was impossible to solve a single issue.
According to data for September 1889, the "Caspian-Black Sea Society" of the Rothschilds had a monopoly on exports from Batumi. On a contractual basis, it received 2280 tanks of kerosene (there were 4195 tanks in total) from 50 oil companies and sold it on foreign markets. Al.Mantashyants built a plant for the production of metal boxes in Batumi and only in 1898 exported 3.2 million poods of oil to them (in 1896, 13 companies exported oil and oil products from Batumi, 4 of which belonged to Armenians. Al. Mantashyants was second only to the Rothschilds and Nobels). In November-March 1892, negotiations were held in Rostov-on-Don, in which 7 largest companies producing kerosene participated: Nobel Brothers, P. Gukasyan's Caspian Partnership, S.M. Shibaev and Co. as well as members of the "Baku Standard" association created a year before - Mantashyants, G. Lianosyan, Budagyan and Tagiyev. Together, these firms annually produced approximately 44 million poods of kerosene, of which 17 million were produced by the Nobel Brothers. The purpose of the negotiations was the creation of the Union of Baku Kerosene Planters, the actual owner of which would be the Nobel Brothers firm. Realizing that the monopoly of the export of kerosene would pass to the Nobels and the Rothschilds acting hand in hand, Al. Mantashyants refused to join this alliance. Moreover, together with other Armenian breeders, he created an independent association, whose members on November 27, 1893 came to a separate agreement and concluded the “Agreement of the second group of the Union of Baku Kerosene Manufacturers”. This was a serious blow to the monopolistic aspirations of the Nobels and the Rothschilds, which is why in February 1894 an agreement was reached between the first and second groups on joint activities on foreign market provided that each group has sufficient autonomy. At the same time, an agreement was signed between the Armenian group of Al. Mantashyants and the Union of Baku Kerosene Planters, according to which foreign markets were divided among Russian exporters. That is, it is obvious that thanks to Al. Mantashyants, Armenian breeders got the opportunity to freely enter the world market. Only after that, on March 2, 1895, E. Nobel and the representative of Standard Oil, W. Libby, concluded a preliminary agreement on the division of the world oil market. According to this agreement, the United States got 75% of the supply of petroleum products, Russia - 25%. One more important circumstance should not be overlooked: energy resources - specifically oil and oil products, have not yet been levers of influence in international politics, since agreements were concluded not by countries, but by firms. And in this sphere the Armenian oilmen played a huge role.
The resounding appearance of Al. Mantashyants in the oil industry was due to several main factors: firstly, being the chairman of the board of the largest financial institution in the Caucasus - the Tiflis commercial bank, he disposed of significant financial resources, and the oil industry was constantly in need of more and more investment. Secondly, being in constant communication and contacts with Europe (in particular, in Manchester and Paris), Al. Mantashyants in practice mastered modern methods and mechanisms of business management. The third factor was his purely human dignity, manifested in deep patriotism and kind, warm, tolerant attitude towards representatives of other nationalities, as well as towards competitors.
Al. Mantashyants' business required new development, and having paid a large sum to his partners, he became practically the sole owner of the company, leaving only M. Aramyants as a partner.
Al. Mantashyants owns 75% of the shares of the future company, M. Aramyants - 25%, and the latter could not interfere in the business and did not receive profit from foreign transactions. This allowed M. Aramyants not to delve into the most difficult ups and downs of the oil business, to live a secure and carefree life. In the future, he will sell his luxurious mansion in Baku, and with 10 million rubles he will move to Tiflis - becoming one of the city's famous benefactors. Years will pass, and he will take part in the funeral of his close friend Al. Mantashyants, and he himself will die in 1922 in the capital of Bolshevik Georgia, ironically deprived of all his fortune and elementary living conditions, in utter poverty...

So, June 11, 1899. The charter of the joint-stock oil industrial and trading company "A.I. Mantashev and K" was approved, according to which the founders of the company were the Tiflis 1st guild merchant Al.Mantashyants, the Baku 1st guild merchant M.Aramyants, and the fixed capital was 22 million rubles. rubles (88,000 shares of 250 rubles each). According to paragraph 22 of the charter, the company was managed by a board of directors consisting of 5 people, elected by general meeting shareholders (Charter of the oil-industrial and trading company "A.I. Mantashev and Co.", St. Petersburg, 1899).
The firm had 173 acres of oil-bearing lands in Balakhany, Sabunchi, Romany, Zabrat, Bibi-Heybat and other places of the Absheron Peninsula. Moreover, 147.7 acres of these lands were the property of the company, and it rented the remaining plots.
The company also owned: in the Black City - a kerosene plant with storage facilities for oil and fuel oil, in the White City - a lubricating oil plant, which had a 100-sazhen pier and an elevator for pumping oil, in Zabrat - a special mechanical workshop and a 50-verst oil pipeline, in Batumi - a plant for the production of metal and wooden boxes, as well as storage of kerosene and lubricating oils and a pumping station. There was also an oil-exporting station in Odessa, with 100 tank cars that circulated along Russia's southwestern railways. Finally, the firm also had offices, agencies and warehouses in Smyrna, Thessaloniki, Constantinople, Alexandria, Cairo, Port Said, Damiet, Marseille, London, Bombay and Shanghai.
The company's oil production was displayed in the following figures: in 1895 - 30 million poods, in 1896 - 31.5 million, in 1897 - 48 million, in 1898 - 52 million. A.I. Mantashev and Co. for 10 years (1899-1909) continued to be the largest in the Russian oil industry.
This is how an industrial giant appeared, which ranked third in terms of its economic indicators, but if we take into account that A.I. position and played a decisive role.
A new difficult period began in the Baku oil industry, which was supposed to mark unimaginable geopolitical developments, predetermine the future of Transcaucasia, and influence the fate of the eastern Armenians.
This period had four characteristics: a) the rapid development of the oil industry, due to the introduction of foreign capital, b) the revolutionary proletarian movement, c) the First World War, d) ethnic conflicts.
With each new pound of oil produced, the oil industry looked more and more like Kronos devouring his own children.
As we have already noted, the world was "divided" between two oil superpowers: the US and Russia. Moreover, the latter, except for Baku, had no other oil deposits and at the beginning of the 20th century. received an annual income of 100 million rubles from oil production. However, the increase in fuel and energy demand, due to both civilian and military factors, forced the European countries represented by England, France and Germany to pay close attention to Baku. The most active were the British.
British capital entered the Baku oil industry from the end of the 1890s, when prices for oil and oil products, especially kerosene, jumped on the world market. To seize the Caucasian oil fields in 1897-1901. in the City of London, 10 companies were created with a fixed capital of 53 million rubles. Six of them founded a group headed by one of the directors of the Bank of England - E. Hubbard, which included G. Gladstone, D. Kitson, C. Moore, W. Johnson, K. and W. Werner.
Let us recall the Azerbaijani Tagiev mentioned above. At the end of 1897, the British offered him to sell his business. Tagiyev demanded 5 million rubles for his oil-bearing lands in Bibi-Heybat, a kerosene-lubricating and carbon dioxide plant, an oil pipeline, an oil-loading flotilla and a train of railway tanks, although he spent 200 thousand rubles on all this and had long ago received several times more profit. The British agreed, but on the condition that they first pay 500 thousand rubles at a time, and the remaining amount will be paid in installments over several years. The deal went through, resulting in the creation of the "Society for the Extraction of Russian Oil and Liquid Fuels" (abbreviated as "Oleum") with a fixed capital of 1.2 million pounds sterling, and Tagiev was out of business. active business. However, the curiosity was that one of the wells went “furious” and began to gush 15 tons of oil daily: it was from the sale of oil from this drilling rig that the British paid the remaining 4.5 million rubles to the Azerbaijani ... E. Hubbard's group in 1898 For 7 million rubles, she bought up the firms of G. Arafelyan, the Budagyan brothers and the Adamyan brothers and created the Baku Russian Oil Society with a fixed capital of 1.5 million pounds sterling. Then, for 2.3 million rubles, she acquired the enterprises of A. Tsaturyan and B. de Boer, on the basis of which in 1899 she created the European Oil Company, the fixed capital of which amounted to 1.1 million pounds sterling. The same group simultaneously founded the "United Russian Oil Company" with a fixed capital of 200 thousand pounds sterling, the "Baku (Zabrat) Kerosene Society" with 50 thousand pounds sterling of fixed capital and the "Kalantarovsk (Baku) Oil Company" with a fixed capital of 50 thousand pounds sterling.
Another group of British capitalists acted under the leadership of F. Lane, the managing director of the large English kerosene export company Lane and Macandrew. In February 1898, this group bought a controlling stake in the company S.M. Shibaev and Co. from two Dutch banks and founded the Shebayev Oil Company with limited liability» with a fixed capital of 750 thousand pounds. Thus, only for 1898-1901. the British invested 4.1 million pounds sterling in the Baku oil industry.
The interests of France were indirectly represented by the Rothschild company. Even Belgian capital has infiltrated the Russian oil industry, controlling the Grozny firm A.I. Akhverdov & Co.
All this testified to one thing: the introduction of foreign capital, on the one hand, opened up wide opportunities for international cooperation, effective management, on the other hand, it turned Baku oil into an instrument of a big geopolitical game.
tributary financial resources became the basis of rapid development, and in 1901. a record amount of oil was produced - more than 706 million poods. As the source notes: “By 1901, when the oil industry of Russia reached the climax of its development, more than a quarter of the entire production of the Baku region and about 40% of the kerosene produced here were concentrated in the hands of Nobel, Rothschild and Mantashev. The share of three firms in export was even higher: they owned about half of all oil products sent inside Russia (including over a third - to Nobel alone), and almost 70% of export from Batum abroad.
It was this "triad" that, jointly and separately, performed at the international market. But Al. Mantashyants did not forget his compatriots. In 1902, together with P. Ghukasyan, he founded the Homlight Oil company in London, and in the same year, together with the same P. Ghukasyan, the Nobels, the Rothschilds and the Tokam-Oleum company, he created the Deutsche-Russiche company in Germany Naphta Import Gasellschaft.
However, difficult times have come for the Baku oil industry, due to unregulated fluctuations in prices on the world oil market and the strike movement of workers in Baku itself, which gradually brought the situation to a crisis. In 1902, 136 enterprises produced 636,528,852 poods of oil, and 24 leading firms - 521 million poods. Of these 24 firms, 13 were Armenian and extracted 203 million poods, or 39% of the total, with 51,946,779 poods mined by Al. Mantashyants.

In 1903, when workers' strikes began in Baku, the volume of production dropped to 597 million poods. In 1904 production increased slightly: 143 firms received 614,810,930 poods of oil, with 34 firms accounting for 279,467 thousand poods, and 9 firms for 335,345 thousand poods. The share of four of these 9 firms was 34.5% of the total production. These were the “Nobel Brothers” (74.892 thousand), the “Caspian-Black Sea Society” of the Rothschilds (53.351 thousand), “A.I. oil industry for 1904, vol. I, Baku, 1905, p. 82).
After that, production steadily fell, and in the year of Russia's economic upsurge, 1913, it amounted to only 560 million poods. As a result, Russia lost its leadership in the world oil industry: if in 1901 its specific gravity was 51.6%, then in 1913 it was only 18.1%. And, conversely, the share of the United States increased: from 39.8% in 1901 to 62.2% in 1913.
Quality, fundamental new stage in the oil industry of Baku began ... with the death of two people: in 1906, the merchant of the Moscow 1st guild, the owner of one of the oldest oil companies - the Russian Oil Industrial Society (RUNO), Gevork Lianosyan, died, and in 1911 - Alexander Mantashyants. They were replaced by their sons - Levon Mantashyants and Stepan Lianosyan (Stepan Georgievich Lianozov, 1872-1951). The latter was to surpass everyone, to become the "king" of the world oil industry. However, a deep tragedy fell to his lot, and a regrettable, unjustified oblivion.
It all started in 1872 when the oil fields were put up for auction. A native of Persia, Astrakhan 1st guild merchant Stepan Martynovich Lianosyan paid 26.220 rubles instead of the starting price of 1310 rubles and became the owner of the 7th plot with 6 oil wells, with an estimated productivity of only 4599 pounds. This step of his was not so much a foresight of the prospects for the oil industry, but rather an ordinary one. financial investment: he bought land, his own plot, as a result of which a company with the chic name "RUNO" was created. But S.M. Lianosyan had a wider range of interests: a year later, in 1873, he received a concession from the Shah's government, giving the monopoly right to fish in the mouths of the Persian rivers flowing into the Caspian Sea. The contract was concluded for 5 years, but was repeatedly renewed. Fishing was carried out in five regions: Astara, Anzeli, Sefidrud, Mashadiser and Astrabad, each of which specialized in the production of certain types of fish.

After the death of S. Lianosyan, the business was inherited by his brother Gevork, who turned to the tsarist government with a request to lease the coastal waters of the Caspian Sea (according to the Turkmenchay Treaty, the Caspian Sea belonged to Russia). March 22, 1900 between G. Lianosyan and the Ministry of Agriculture and state property Russia signed an agreement for a period of 25 years (After 1917, this agreement will be terminated ...).
Thus, G. Lianosyan became the largest fish and seafood manufacturer in the coastal waters of the Caspian Sea and the mouths of the rivers flowing into it. If in the 90s of the nineteenth century. the gross product of fishing firms annually averaged 600 thousand rubles, then in the period from the end of the century to 1906. it reached 900 thousand rubles, and in 1907-1915. - 2.25 million rubles. On the eve of the First World War, the fishing industry of the brothers Martyn, Stepan, Levon Lianosyan was a modern industrial enterprise equipped with the latest technology. It included power plants, refrigeration rooms, telephone communications, mechanical and other workshops, as well as a flotilla of 20 boats, including two large steamships, one of which was called "Pirogov", and the second was named after the grandfather of its owners - "Martyn" . 5,900 people worked in the fishery, on the eve of the war, capital investments amounted to about 3 million 380 thousand francs, and in 1916 - 9 million rubles. Thus, the fishing enterprises of the Lianosyans were the largest in Persia. industrial enterprises until 1909, when the Anglo-Persian Oil Company was created.

Let's leave the "fish" topic and talk about oil. Under G. Lianosyan, RUNO was a medium-sized company. After the death of his father, Stepan Lianosyan plunged headlong into oil, as a result of which a new era began in the world oil industry.

The following observation is extremely important here: the first generation of Armenian oil producers (and merchants in general) had one characteristic feature - patriarchy, which had its own logical explanation. The preservation of property dictated the need to attract trusted persons to the business: sons, close relatives, compatriots (Shusha, Shemakha, Tiflis, etc.). That is, the business was national in the truest sense of the word. Such were dozens of companies: the Mirzoyan brothers, the Adamyan brothers, Amur, Anahit, Aramazd, Vanand, Vorotan, the Gukasyan brothers, the Tumanyants brothers, the Krasilnikov brothers and many others, the listing of which alone would take up a lot of space. .
Even the great Mantashyants, who was well aware of the need for a constant infusion of more and more new investments in the oil industry, was the banking "king" of the Caucasus, a member of the board of two large St. Petersburg banks - even he still did not allow strangers to manage his business: in 1909. the board of his company included his son Levon, relatives David Kharazyan, Gevork Shaumyan, the already mentioned Arakel Sarukhan and S. Cherkezov, whose brother at that time was the mayor of his hometown of Tiflis.
In fact, “closed business territories” were created, which caused jealousy and obvious dissatisfaction among representatives of other nationalities (primarily Russians and Azerbaijanis), on the other hand, the development of the business itself was hampered.
S. Lianosyan was the first to break this stereotype of thinking, the first to point out to his compatriots by his activity that the national nature of business leads to a dead end, and the result of business - capital - should be national.
In 1907, he created in St. Petersburg a joint-stock company "G.M. Lianozova sons" with a fixed capital of 2 million rubles, of which he himself was the managing director, and included P. Lezhdnovsky and one of the largest entrepreneurs of the Russian empire on the board - the owner of the St. Petersburg mechanical and iron foundry joint-stock company "Putilovskiy Zavod" A. Putilov.
In addition to oil-bearing lands, the partnership owned the following enterprises: in Baku, in the White City, - kerosene and oil plants, tanks for storing kerosene and fuel oil; on the shores of the Caspian Sea - an oil loading pier, a 10-verst oil pipeline, in Batumi - tanks and storage facilities. With the involvement of representatives of big Russian capital, S. Lianosyan quickly achieved success: in 1907 he produced 240.7 thousand poods of oil, in 1908 - 1.168 thousand, in 1909 - 2.173 thousand, in 1910 - 2.133 thousand. pounds.

But that was only the beginning. One more person was supposed to join the "oil game", with the direct support and cooperation with whom S. Lianosyan was to conquer the world market. That person was Levon Mantashyants (Leon Mantashev). The one who adhered to the same principles as S. Lianosyan.
We believe that between these two there was a purely Armenian gentlemen's agreement, the loyalty of which they kept to the end.
In 1912, thanks to S. Lianosyan, the world oil industry entered a completely new stage of its development: on July 28 of this year, he created the Russian General Oil Corporation in London with a fixed capital of 2, £5 million. Here is the composition of this corporation: the chairman of the board of the Russian-Asian Bank A. Putilov (chairman), the chairman of the board of the firms G.M. Lianozova sons and A.I. Mantashev and Co. S. Lianosyan (managing director) , chairman of the board of the Caspian Partnership P. Gukasyan, director of the St. Petersburg International Commercial Bank A. Vyshnegradsky and director of the Paris branch of this bank I. Radin, chairman of the board of the St. Petersburg private commercial bank A. Davidov and member of the board of the same bank Viscount de Bretel, chairman of the board of the Siberian Trade Bank M. Soloveichik, Chairman of the Board of the St. Petersburg Accounting and Loan Bank Y. Utin, Chairman of the Board of the Russian Bank for Foreign Trade A. Rafalovich, Managing Director of the Russian Commercial and Industrial Bank I. Kon, Director of the London Branch of the Russian-Asian Bank Sir Nichbold, Chairman of the Board of the Oil Company N. Glasberg, Member of the Parliament of England, Viscount Carrick (V.3iv, Foreign capitals in the Russian oil industry, 1916, p. 53.).
The similar composition of "Oil" gives rise to some reflections. Firstly, it included the leading Baku oil companies - three Armenian and one Russian, the elite of Russian banking capital, representatives of the high society of English society, but there were no Nobels and Rothschilds.
As noted by the well-known economist V. Ziv: "This trust made a complete revolution in the Russian oil industry." What was the essence of this revolution, its economic characteristics? What did S. Lianosyan achieve?
S. Lianosyan's personal contribution was that he managed to do what no one before him could do: he made Baku's oil industry attractive to foreigners and laid the foundation for grandiose investments of foreign capital. In 1912, in England, he founded the British Lianosoff Wife Oil Sotrapu company, in France - La Lianosoff Frangais, and in 1913, together with German capitalists with a fixed capital of 1 million marks, he created the Deutsche Lianozoff company in Hamburg Mineralol Import Act. Ges”, the purpose of which was to import Russian (that is, Baku) oil and oil products into Germany, process them and sell them. To implement all these plans, S. Lianosyan attracted major European financial institutions: banks "O.A. Rosenberg and K" (Paris), "L. Dreyfus and K °" (Paris), B. Margulies (Brussels). That is, on the basis of the oil business, he united Russian and European financial capital. Of the 16 international financial syndicates, 10 had shares in the Russian oil industry for a huge amount - 363.56 million rubles.
The production and economic support of "Oil" was the firm "A.I. Mantashev and K" - this company served as a guarantee of the creation of the corporation. After the death of Al. Mantashyants, already in July 1912, his sons concluded an agreement: most they sold their shares to St. Petersburg banks, the headquarters of the department was transferred from Baku to the capital, after which Oil was born, whose shares were quoted on the stock exchanges of Paris, London, Amsterdam, Brussels and, of course, St. Petersburg.

With the creation of Oil, the global oil industry has been transformed, polarized, elicited adequate responses, and set the stage for Her Majesty Politics. And this meant new rules of the game and new players. One of them was the Royal Dutch Shell and its Lianosian, Henry Deterding.
On the islands of Indonesia (Java, Sumatra, Borneo) - one of the largest oil-producing states of the modern world, the oil industry was founded in 1887. A number of Dutch oil companies were created, among which stood out founded in 1890. India" (subsequently - "Royal Datch C °"). It was notable for its vigorous activity: in 1897, having a fixed capital of 5 million florins, it paid shareholders a 55% dividend. In 1896 commercial director"Royal Datch C °" was G. Deterding, who in 1901 became the chairman of the board of the company and its full owner. In 1907, he merged his company with the powerful Shell Transport and Trading Company (Shell Transport and Trading C °), created the Royal Dutch Shell company, one of the world's oil monopolies, 60% of whose shares belonged to him. When in 1911 the English fleet switched to oil products, G. Deterding realized that he could become one of the most influential people of the world, and declared: “The army, the navy, all the gold of the world and all the peoples are powerless against the owners of oil. Who needs cars and motorcycles, ships, tanks and planes without this precious black liquid? He began to pursue an aggressive policy: to acquire all new oil fields, as well as shares of various European, Asian, African and American companies. Suffice it to say that G. Deterding bought up the oil fields in the states of Oklahoma and California and in 1915 controlled 1/9 of the US oil industry.
One of the first "victims" of Deterding was the Russian oil industry. In 1912, Royal Dutch Shell bought a 90% stake in the Caspian-Black Sea Society of the Rothschilds (for about 10 million rubles), as well as the Mazut company owned by them (fixed capital - 12 million rubles). In addition, it acquired a significant number of blocks of shares in a number of other Baku and Grozny enterprises. As a result, in 1915 Deterding owned approximately 15% of Russian oil production.

Thus, the world was "divided" between three oil giants - Rockefeller's Standard Oil, Deterding's Royal Dutch Shell and Lianosyan's Oil. Tough competition began and the struggle for oil markets intensified.
However, there was another power - Germany, which could not accept this state of affairs, to be out of the game, and it set its sights on the newly discovered oil lands of the Ottoman Empire. Those lands, in the discovery and exploitation of which the leading role belongs to Calouste Gulbenkian...

Since 1912, the world began to prepare for war, one of the main causes of which was oil. Soon the smell of oil and the smell of death will replace each other.
The insatiable jaws of the war were thirsty for oil, and in 1915 571.4 million poods were produced in Baku. The share of 17 companies included in Oil accounted for 114.4 million pounds (including the company A.I. Mantashev and Co. extracted 15.2, the Caspian Partnership - 14.6, G.M. Lianozova sons" - 12.8, "Brothers Mirzoev" - 8.1, "I.N. Ter-Akopov" - 6.0, "Aramazd" - 4.9, "I.E. Pitoev" - 2.7 , "Syunik" - 0.8 million).
The share of 8 firms included in the "Royal Dutch Shell" amounted to 91.8 million pounds. And 5 firms from the Nobel Brothers group - 79.7 million. In addition, 11 firms, mostly Armenian and not included in the mentioned groups, produced 113.3 million poods of oil.
There were also firms owned by Azerbaijanis. Asadullayev's firm produced 6.6 million poods, Nagiyev's - 4.1 million. Two years later, in 1913, 187 firms were registered in Baku, of which 65 were Armenian, 62 of which (information about 3 is missing) produced 136.895 .025 pounds. There were 39 Azerbaijani firms, and they extracted only 24,011,094 pounds. It is up to the reader to compare these figures and, consequently, evaluate the share of Azerbaijanis in the Baku oil industry.

One more area connected with the activities of Armenians in the oil industry should not be ignored - navigation in the Caspian Sea. Sea transportation of oil and oil products was a serious business. In 1889, transportation across the Caspian Sea was carried out by 34 steamships with a total carrying capacity of 1 million 330 thousand poods. Of these, 7 belonged to Armenians (“Vaspurakan” and “Evelina” Avetyan, “Rescuer” brothers Kolmanyants and Buniatyan, “Grigoryan” Parsadanyan, “Serezha”, “Arshak” and “Konstantin” Tumayan) - their total carrying capacity was 249.524 pounds (18.7%).
Three Azerbaijanis had 6 vessels with a carrying capacity of 192,270 pounds (14.4%).
In the same year, 20 special steamships were used, which carried exclusively kerosene. Their total carrying capacity was 750,000 poods, and 5 of them belonged to the Armenians (Armeniak of the Armenian Shipping Company, Rafael of Arafelyan, Admiral, Lazar, Konstantin Tumayan) with a carrying capacity of 156,820 poods. The Azerbaijanis did not have such ships.
In 1912, there were 66 ship owners and shipping companies in Baku, 14 of which were Armenians, owning 24 ships. These were: Hakob and Hovhannes Avetyans (“Menastan”), A. Adamyan (“Vaan”), “Armenian Shipping Company” (“Ashot Yerkat”, “Amasia”), the Buniatyan brothers (“Benardaki”, “Buniat”, “ Nikolai"), Volga Company ("Artsiv Vaspurakani"), Eastern Company of Warehouses ("Sevan", "Van"), Avetis Ghukasyan ("Tamara"), M. Ghukasyan ("Anna"), "Trans-Caspian Commercial and Industrial Company (Vaspurakan), Elizaveta Sargsyan (Grigor Artsruni), Sarukhan-Kura Joint-Stock Company (Sarukhan, Serezha), I.N. Ter-Akopov (Gadir -Guseinov"), Ter-Stepanyan and Kolmanyants ("Arshaluys"), H. Tumayan ("Tatiana") and the company "G.M. Lianozova sons" ("Worker", "Martyn", "Pirogov", "Brave" , "Sefidrud").
The largest shipping company on the Caspian Sea was, of course, the Russian company Kavkaz and Mercury. It is noteworthy that among her many ships there were steamships with the following names: "Armenian", "Ani", "Pambak", "Zang", "Mush", "Arag", "Grigoryan".
As for oil tankers, here the undeniable leadership belonged to the Nobel Brothers company, and the best vessel on the Caspian Sea was their steamship K. Hagelin.
Having as scrupulously as possible presented the origin and course of development of the oil industry in Baku, citing numerous facts, statistical data, economic indicators, we sought not only to show the huge contribution of the Armenians, but also that indisputable fact that allows us to state quite convincingly: the Baku oil industry was founded and developed by Armenians, Russians, Swedes, British, representatives of other nations, but not Azerbaijanis. They had a different national mission: to take possession of what others had created. They successfully completed this mission.

First well

The first attempts to extract oil were made in Baku at the end of the 16th century, as evidenced by a stone found in an oil well in 1594. However, it acquired a truly industrial scale in the second half of the 19th century with the arrival of foreign capital and new technologies. In 1846, on the Absheron in Bibi-Heybat, at the suggestion of State Councilor Vasily Semenov, the world's first oil well was drilled to a depth of 21 m. It was exploratory. And only 13 years later, the famous well of Edwin Drake was drilled in Pennsylvania, it was for a long time considered the first in the world.

Lifting oil with a manual winch in the 19th century at the Bibi-Heybat field

Already in 1859, an oil refinery was built to produce lighting oils. And in 1863, Javad Melikov built a kerosene plant in Baku and for the first time in the world used refrigerators in the distillation process. But, like many people working for an idea, Melikov could not resist the big oil owners and make capital, he died in poverty. In 1871, a 64-meter well was drilled mechanically.

But the real development of the industry received after the abolition of the oil tax in 1872. Foreign investors are showing interest in the region, such as Ludwig Nobel, the elder brother of that same Nobel, and Baron Rothschild. The number of various oil-industrial firms and trading companies began to grow rapidly: “G.Z. Tagiev” (1872), “Baku Oil Society” (1874), Rothschild’s “Caspian-Black Sea Society” (1883), etc.

Foreign capital as an engine of progress

The Nobel brothers in 1879 founded the Nobel Brothers Oil Production Association, which soon became a major oil company. It was their company that turned oil production in Baku into a full-fledged industry. Not only the oil refining process was established, but also the production of auxiliary substances, such as soda and sulfuric acid. The company was a pioneer in many aspects of the industry: it was the Nobel brothers who built the first Russian oil pipeline that connected the Balakhani field and plants in the Black City. In addition, they refused to transport oil products on wooden ships, as this contributed to a large loss of raw materials. The first oil tanker was built by L. Nobel in 1877 and was named Zoroaster. Soon the company acquired a whole oil tanker fleet and more than 2 thousand tank cars, they delivered oil products to their plants throughout Russia. In addition to its own distribution network, the company has also developed its own packaging.

Nobel oil refinery in Baku, late 1880s

Since the 1870s, active drilling of wells begins, which leads to a fall in oil prices. After the well of the oilman Vermishev in Balakhany blew a 611-meter-high oil gusher for 3 months and threw out about 90 million poods of oil, prices per pood fell from 45 to 2 kopecks. This greatly exceeded the oil inflows from Pennsylvania.

Lamps began to appear that could use domestically produced kerosene. And thanks to the work of Dmitry Mendeleev, who visited Baku more than once and was even a consultant at the Baku Oil Refinery in Surakhani, they began to use the residues after the extraction of kerosene to produce lubricating oils. He described in detail the method of obtaining lighting oil, which he called "bakuoil".

Russia's first oil pipeline Balakhani - Black City

The tsarist government strongly supported and encouraged the development large firms and private industries, including foreign ones, as they were better organized. For example, Finance Minister Witte pointed out: "The competition of our oil products on the world market is completely unthinkable without the involvement of foreign and especially English entrepreneurs and their capital."

Nobel oil gusher

But not only foreigners were successful in Baku. One of the largest oil producers in the region was Alexander Mantashev. He bought unprofitable wells, hoping to enrich himself, and did not lose. Mantashev built a kerosene plant and a lubricating oil plant, in addition, a sea pier was built for pumping fuel oil to ships. Soon the wells began to bring huge income. Mantashev bought shares in other oil companies, including the Nobel Brothers. More than 60% of the oil reserves of the Caspian Sea are concentrated in his company. And in 1907, with his participation, the world's first 835-kilometer Baku-Batumi oil pipeline was built, and this made Mantashev the "oil king". For 10 years since 1889, his company has become the largest in Russia in terms of fixed capital (22 million rubles).

Burning oil rigs

Since 1880, ships from Baku have been delivering oil products to many countries of the world. The participation of Russian oil producers in various world exhibitions has repeatedly confirmed the high quality of Russian products. Soon, Baku oil begins to compete with American oil in world markets, and even temporarily forces it out of Europe and Asia. Kerosene from Baku fully provided for the needs of the country, and since 1883 the import of American kerosene into the empire was stopped.

Oil production in the region by 1890 amounted to 16.7 million barrels, against 14 million barrels of Pennsylvania oil. In 1901, the area was already producing 95% of the total imperial oil production, and Russia came out on top in the world (production was half of the world), leaving behind the United States and Argentina.

Postcard from 1863. “Balakhany, from where oil was delivered to the Baku oil refineries in skins and barrels, transported on carts and by pack.”

Baku oil and gas region- the largest region in terms of production, oil and gas reserves in the Russian Empire, the Azerbaijan SSR, and then on the territory of modern Azerbaijan. The oil fields of the region are located within the South Caspian oil and gas basin, on the territory of the Apsheron Peninsula and the adjacent waters of the Caspian Sea.

Industrial development began in the last third of the 19th century. Since 1870, more than 2 billion tons of oil have been produced. Here, for the first time in the USSR, the development of oil in the sea was started. There are over 80 oil and gas fields in the Baku oil and gas region. Main fields: Shah Deniz, Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli, Oil Rocks, Bakhar, Sangachali-sea, Bibi-Heybat, Surakhani, Karachukhur, Karadag.

Story

The world's first oil well with a positive result at a depth of 21 m was drilled in 1846 near the city of Baku (Bibi-Heybat); while the Americans drilled an oil well only in 1859 in Pennsylvania. The work on Bibi-Heybat was carried out under the leadership of the director of the Baku industries, Major Alekseev.

Chronology of oil production in the territory of the current Baku oil and gas region:

• 1837 - in the village of Balakhani, one of the first oil refineries in the Russian Empire was founded under the leadership of Voskoboynikov.
• 1842 - according to one of the regulations of the Mining Charter, oil produced as a result of drilling in the territory of the Absheron Peninsula was transferred to the state treasury.

Mining during the USSR

In the Caspian Sea, in the city, the Gyurgyany-Sea field was discovered, in the city - Oil Rocks, in the city - Darwin Bank. The largest field was Oil Rocks, which came into operation in the town of It was located 50 km from the coast, at sea depths from 6 to 27 m.

The history of the development of the oil industry in Azerbaijan

There are 5 stages in the development of the oil industry in Azerbaijan: STAGE I - well oil production until 1871. STAGE II - industrial oil production using mechanical drilling from 1871 until the nationalization of the oil industry in 1920. STAGE III - after the nationalization of the oil industry in Soviet times until the discovery and commissioning of a large offshore field Oil stones in 1950.

There are 5 stages in the development of the oil industry in Azerbaijan:
STAGE I - well oil production until 1871.
STAGE II - industrial oil production using mechanical drilling from 1871 until the nationalization of the oil industry in 1920.
STAGE III - after the nationalization of the oil industry in Soviet times until the discovery and commissioning of a large offshore oil field Oil stones (now Neft dashlari) in 1950.
STAGE IV - with the commissioning of the Oil Rocks field in 1950 (a significant expansion of prospecting and exploration, the discovery and commissioning of new oil and gas fields in the Caspian Sea, the intensive development of offshore oil and gas production infrastructure) until the signing in 1994 of the first "Contract of the Century" with attracting foreign investment.
STAGE V - begins with the signing on September 20, 1994 of the first major "Contract of the Century" on the Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli fields (deepwater part) and the involvement of large-scale foreign investments in the oil industry of sovereign Azerbaijan.

The oil industry of Azerbaijan has a 130-year history of its development. Well oil production in Azerbaijan has been known since ancient times.
According to Prisk Pontus (V century), Abu-Ishag Istakhri (VIII century), Masudi (X century), Olearius (XII century), Marco Polo (XIII-XIV century) and others, even before our era, oil was exported from the Absheron Peninsula to Iran, Iraq, India and other countries.

According to Marco Polo, already in the 13th century, numerous oil wells operated on the Absheron Peninsula and the oil extracted from them was used for lighting and treating the sick. At the beginning of the 14th century, the French missionary monk Jourdain Catalani de Severac, who visited Azerbaijan, mentions oil production in the vicinity of Baku in his notes.
Valuable information about well oil production in Azerbaijan is contained in the reports of travelers of the 16th-17th centuries.

English trade agent Geoffrey Duket, who visited Azerbaijan in the 16th century, writes that black oil, called "naphtha", extracted in the vicinity of Baku, is transported on mules and donkeys in caravans of 400-500 at a time. These reports also mention the production of "white oil" in Surakhani.

D. Duquet's reports on the transportation of oil by caravans from Baku testify to the significant well extraction of oil in the 16th century from the deposits of the Absheron Peninsula.
According to Amin Ahmed Razi (Iran, 1601), at the beginning of the 16th century there were about 500 oil wells in the vicinity of Baku, from which black and white oil was extracted.

The German traveler Engelbert Kaempfer, a doctor by education and a scientist, visited Azerbaijan in 1683 as a secretary of the Swedish embassy and visited the oil fields of the Apsheron peninsula in Balakhani, Ramana, Binagadi and Surakhani. According to E. Kaempfer, oil from the fields of the Apsheron Peninsula was exported on pack animals, carts and camels to Baku and further by sea to the countries of the Caspian Sea - Iran, Central Asia, Dagestan and "Cherkessia" (Northern Caucasus).

Well oil production in Azerbaijan continued until 1871.
Since 1871, industrial oil production began in Azerbaijan at the Balakhani and Bibi-Heybat fields using a mechanical method of drilling wells. The first well, drilled in 1871 in Balakhany, produced 70 barrels (10 tons) of oil per day.

With the development of techniques and technology for the mechanical method of drilling wells on the Apsheron Peninsula, new oil fields are discovered one after another (Binagady, Artem Island, Surakhany, etc.), oil production increases, the development of the infrastructure of the oil industry begins, oil refining is intensively developing, in Azerbaijan a national bourgeoisie is formed.
In the early 1970s, the Russian government abolished the monopoly on oil production in the recently annexed Azerbaijan.
In 1872 two legislative act, regulating relations in the oil industry: these are the "Law on oil fields and the collection of excise taxes on petroleum products" and the "Law on the auction sale of oil fields to individuals in the hands of tenants."

After the adoption of these laws in 1872, oil fields began to be sold to private individuals. The first auction took place on December 31, 1872, when 15 plots in Balakhany, 2 plots in Bibi-Heybat with a total cost of 2975 rubles were put up for sale. According to the adopted laws, unused state lands were leased for a period of 24 years for oil exploration and exploitation of open deposits with the condition of an annual rent of 10 rubles per 1 acre of land, equal to 1,092 hectares. The right of monopoly export of oil, in accordance with the contract, belonged to the tenant. The tenant had the right to set the price for the produced oil at his own discretion. According to archival data, the tenant's net profit was 14-15% of the oil sold. If a prospecting work for oil were unsuccessful, then the tenant had the right to buy out the leased area or return it to the state, having previously completely cleared it.

In those years, the share of Azerbaijani capital in the oil industry was not so great. At the first auction in 1872, local capital was represented by only one mixed Azerbaijani firm (G.Z. Tagiyeva and others) with a share of participation in the auction of only 0.1%. By the end of the 70s of the XIX century, the volume of domestic capital in oil production slightly increased, which amounted to more than 4%. Mixed Azerbaijani-Armenian and Russian-Azerbaijani capital in oil production accounted for about 10% taken together. Of the 135 owners of oil enterprises in 1883, there were 17 Azerbaijanis. By the end of the 19th century, representatives of Azerbaijan owned 49 enterprises out of 167, which accounted for 29.3%. During the period of the origin of the oil industry in Azerbaijan, there were three main sources of domestic investment: commercial, industrial and government officials. The concentration of capital also went through the formation joint-stock companies. The first joint-stock company - "Baku Oil Society" was established in 1874.
In 1859, the first oil refinery (kerosene) plant was built in Baku. In 1867, 15 such factories were already operating here. After the abolition of the excise tax on petroleum products in 1876, new plants began to be built and a new technology was introduced, which made it possible to obtain new types of processed products. So, in 1876 and 1881, two new factories for the production of lubricating oils were built.
In the early 70s, representatives of Azerbaijani capital owned 25 out of 46 small enterprises for the production of kerosene. In 1883, out of 100 kerosene producers in Baku, 21 were Azerbaijanis. Since this year, Baku kerosene has been exported abroad.

In 1878, the first field oil pipeline was built, 12 km long, connecting the Balakhani field with an oil refinery in Baku. By the end of 1898, the total length of oil field pipelines connecting oil fields with oil refineries in Baku was 230 km with a total capacity of 1 million tons of oil.
Starting from the 70s of the 19th century, an unprecedented economic take-off took place in Baku.

A powerful industrial potential was created in the city, hundreds of large and small firms for the extraction, processing and trade of oil were opened. Baku is turning into one of the financial centers of the world. In 1873, Robert Nobel, a Swede by origin, who visited the Caucasus (in search of wood for the weapons factory of the Nobel brothers in the city of Izhevsk in Siberia), caught the "oil fever" in Baku and invested 25,000 rubles to purchase a small kerosene plant.
A few years later, in 1876, the Nobel brothers organized an oil production and refining company in Baku, which later became the largest oil company in Russia, which completely ousted the Rockefeller company Standard Oil from the Russian market. The Nobel brothers owned oil fields, dozens of oil refineries, oil tankers, barges, railways, hotels, etc.
By the 80th year of the 19th century, 200 small oil refineries (installations) were built in Baku, a significant part of which belonged to the Nobel brothers.
Samples of oil products from Baku refineries were shown at world exhibitions in Paris (1878), Brussels (1880), London (1881) and received high marks from experts.
In those years, the Nobel brothers built the world's first oil tanker in the Caspian Sea.

Baku's "oil boom" attracted the attention of the French "House of Rothschilds".
Starting from 1883, the Rothschilds were mainly engaged in credit and loan operations and oil trade in Baku. The initial capital of the Rothschilds increased from 1.5 million rubles in 1883 to 6 million rubles in 1895 and to 10 million rubles in 1913.

The Rothschilds also owned oil fields in Balakhani, Sabunchi, Ramany, kerosene and oil plants in Kishli.
By 1883, thanks to the capital of the Rothschilds, the Baku-Batumi railway was completed, which played an important role in the export of oil and oil products (mainly kerosene) from Baku to European countries. With the construction of this railway, Batumi becomes one of the most important port cities in the world.

In 1886, the Rothschilds founded the "Caspian-Black Sea" oil company. By 1890, the capital of the Rothschild bank controlled 42% of Baku oil exports.
At the beginning of the 20th century, the Rothschilds ceded their oil interests in Azerbaijan to the Anglo-Dutch corporation "Royal-Dutch-Shell" and since that time English capital has occupied a prominent place in the oil industry of Azerbaijan.
During these years, more than 60% of the oil fields on the Apsheron Peninsula were concentrated in the field of activity of three large companies: Royal-Dutch-Shell, the Nobel Brothers Oil Production Partnership and the Russian General Oil Society. The share capital in the oil industry of Azerbaijan has reached 165 million rubles.

From 1874 to 1899, 29 joint-stock companies, including with the participation of foreign capital. As the positions of foreign capital strengthened, the oil industry of Azerbaijan increasingly passed into the hands of foreign investors. So, for example, if in 1902 16% of the capital invested in the oil industry belonged to foreign investors, then in 1912 the share of foreign capital in the oil industry of Azerbaijan was already 42%. The growing need of world industrial centers for oil and oil products has contributed to a significant increase in oil production in Azerbaijan. At the beginning of the 20th century (in 1901), 11.0 million tons of oil were produced here, which accounted for more than half of the world's oil production.

The intensively growing oil production on the Apsheron Peninsula was not supported by the export of oil products (kerosene) by rail to the Black Sea to the port of Batumi and further to European countries.
Back in 1880, the famous chemist D.I. Mendeleev put forward the idea of ​​the need to build the Baku-Batumi oil pipeline to enter the world oil market through the Black and Mediterranean Seas. It was substantiated that pipeline transport of oil and oil products is much cheaper and more efficient than rail transport. Despite this, the construction of the Baku-Batumi oil pipeline (833 km long and 200 mm in diameter) for pumping about 1 million tons of oil and oil products was started only in 1897 and completed in 1907.
Before the nationalization of the oil industry, 109 joint-stock companies functioned in Azerbaijan. Of these, 72 belonged to Russian capital in the total amount of 240 million rubles and 37 to British capital in the total amount of 100 million pounds sterling.
The largest capital in the oil industry of Azerbaijan belonged to the Nobel Brothers company (30 million rubles, with the highest share price of 5,000 rubles). The capital of the company A.I. Mantashov was 20 million rubles.

The Caspian-Black Sea Oil Industrial and Commercial Society owned 10 million rubles of Russian capital.
The "Haji-Cheleken Oil Company" of a large Azerbaijani oilman at that time - philanthropist Isa bek Hajinsky owned 1.25 million pounds sterling of British capital. On the eve of the nationalization of the oil industry in Azerbaijan, there were 270 oil producing enterprises, 49 large and small firms engaged in contract drilling, 25 oil refinery firms, more than 100 mechanical factories(workshops) and repair shops, etc.

After the establishment of Soviet power in Azerbaijan in 1920, the oil industry was nationalized and oil production in 1921 fell to 2.4 million tons. In subsequent years, with the expansion of prospecting and exploration, new deposits were discovered and put into development, oil production increased from year to year, reaching 23.6 million tons in 1941, which accounted for almost 76% of the all-Union oil production at that time.
In 1941-1945, during the war, oil production in Azerbaijan fell to 11.1 million tons due to the relocation of Azerbaijan's oil production capacities to the new oil regions of Turkmenistan, Tataria, Bashkiria and other eastern regions of Russia.

In the post-war years, with the discovery of the Gyurgyany-Sea fields in 1947, offshore oil production in Azerbaijan began, although oil had been produced on Pirallahi Island (Artem Island) since 1902. In 1950, a large oil field Oil stones (Neft dashlari) was discovered and put into development in the open sea. Since that time, a new stage in the development of the oil industry has begun, offshore geological exploration has significantly expanded, new oil and gas fields are discovered and put into development one after another (Sandy-Sea, Bahar, Sangachali-Duvanny-Sea-O. Bulla, Bulla-Sea and etc.), the technique and technology of offshore drilling, the infrastructure of offshore oil production are being developed. In 1965, the level of oil production in Azerbaijan reaches 21.6 million tons

In the early 80s of the 20th century, a large field was discovered in the deep waters of the Azerbaijani sector of the Caspian Sea. April 28 (now Gunashli), which currently provides about 65% of offshore oil production in Azerbaijan (excluding oil production by the Azerbaijan International Operating Company - AIOC under the "Contract of the Century").
In subsequent years, new large deposits of Chirag (1985), Azeri (1987), Kapez (1988) and others were discovered in the Azerbaijani sector of the Caspian Sea.

Thus, real prerequisites were created for the intensive development of oil and gas production in the Azerbaijani sector of the Caspian Sea, which was of great importance in the economic and political life of the newly independent Azerbaijan Republic. There is no doubt that Azerbaijan will soon become one of the richest oil and gas producing countries in the world.
Since the beginning of the development of hydrocarbon resources in Azerbaijan (onshore and offshore), more than 70 oil and gas fields have been discovered, of which 54 are currently under development. Since the beginning of the industrial development of Azerbaijan's fields, 1.4 billion tons of oil with condensate and 463 billion m3 of gas have been produced.

Over the entire 130-year history of the development of the oil industry, 43 oil and gas fields have been discovered on land in Azerbaijan (37 of them are under development), 935 million tons of oil and 130 billion m3 of gas have been produced. As follows from Fig. 1 and 2 in the dynamics of oil production onshore in Azerbaijan, there were repeated declines and rises, which was associated with political upheavals in the XX century (the war with the Armenians in 1905, the First World War in 1914-1917, the October Revolution in Russia, the establishment of Soviet power in Baku and the genocide of Azerbaijanis by the Armenian Dashnaks in 1918, the occupation of Azerbaijan, which received sovereignty in October 1918, the introduction of the XI Red Army in 1920 and the nationalization of the oil industry, World War II in 1941-1945, the occupation by Armenians of 20% of the territory that received the second time the sovereignty of Azerbaijan, etc.).

The decline in oil production onshore in Azerbaijan since 1965 is associated with the depletion of long-term developed fields and the low efficiency of prospecting and exploration.
Currently, onshore oil production in Azerbaijan is 1.5 million tons per year.

Further prospects for the development of oil and gas production in Azerbaijan are mainly related to offshore fields. In the Azerbaijan sector of the Caspian Sea, 28 oil and gas fields have been discovered (18 of them are under development), more than 130 promising structures have been identified. Over the entire history of the development of offshore fields in Azerbaijan, more than 460 million tons of oil with condensate and about 345 billion m3 of gas have been produced. The maximum level of oil production from offshore fields in the amount of 12.9 million tons was reached in 1970, and gas in the amount of 14 billion m3 - in 1982. Currently, the State Oil Company of the Republic of Azerbaijan (SOCAR) produces 7.5 million tons of oil and 5 billion m3 of gas per year from offshore fields.

After the collapse Soviet Union In the early 90s of the 20th century, the economy of the Republic of Azerbaijan collapsed due to the rupture of long-established economic relations in the former Soviet Union, as well as a difficult financial situation. old economic relations were destroyed and new ones were not created.

In the oil industry, a significant part of the operating well stock was idle, the volume of production and exploratory drilling was reduced, and oil and gas production in the republic fell significantly. Oil engineering plants, which previously provided 70% of the demand for oil equipment in the Soviet Union, did not operate at full capacity.

Thus, the restoration of the oil industry of Azerbaijan and the development of large oil and gas fields discovered in the deep-water parts of the Azerbaijani sector of the Caspian Sea and the exploration of promising structures required large capital investments and the introduction into the practice of oil and gas production in general, including offshore oil and gas production, modern technology and technology, which could be feasible with large-scale foreign investment in the oil industry.

In September 1994, for the development of the Azeri, Chirag and deepwater Gunashli fields discovered back in the 80s, a large (in terms of recoverable reserves and investment volume) "Contract of the Century" type "Production-Sharing" or "PSA" (Sharing Agreement) was signed. Products) with the participation of 12 well-known oil companies of the world from 8 countries.

With the signing of the first major PSA-type contract for the Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli fields (deepwater part) in the Azerbaijani sector of the Caspian Sea, the oil industry of Azerbaijan has entered a new stage of its development.