"On the confines toward Georgine there is a fountain from which oil springs in great abundance, inasmuch as a hundred shiploads might be taken from it at one time. This oil is not good to use with food, but 'tis good to burn, and is also used to annoint camels that have the mange. People come from vast distances to fetch it, for in all countries round there is no other oil." Marco Polo, 13^th c AD.

Baku, physical description (taken from The Region of the Eternal Fire by Charles Marvin):

The city Baku is situated on the best bay on the Caspian Sea, a crescent-shaped bay seven miles from point to point and about fifteen miles in circumference. This is at the eastern end of the Caucasus Mountains. An island lies well to sea, across the mouth of the bay - providing a breakwater for the harbor, a protection from wind, and anchorage for several hundred vessels to tie up in perfect safety. In the mid-nineteenth century, a visitor might count hundreds of vessels in the harbor, including masses of 200-foot streamers taking in oil or cargo from the 25 piers stretching out into the bay. In 1888, there was a railroad running west across the strait of the Caucasus (stopping at Tiflis) to the Black Sea ports of Poti and Batum. The Persian buildings were being pulled down and replaced by Russian shops, houses and hotels (ie the hotel London at which the author stayed) and the mass of the old fortress was being laid bare to the eye, as a jumble of old building obscuring it was razed; new streets were being laid out and paved with stone or asphalt. Shipping vessels belonging to Ludwig Nobel ply the Caspian.

Near the Governor's house (on the new quay) there were clubs where cards or billiards may be played. Moored off the new quay were the Caspian Baths; the waters of the Caspian, Marvin writes, are salty and clear, teeming with fish, and of a perfect temperature for swimming throughout most of the year. "There are only two drawbacks--the bay is so full of fish that one never loses the impression that he is in an aquarium, and when the wind lies in a particular direction, it blows inland the oil spouting up on the surface outside, causing a black scum to gather on the top of the water and preventing bathing for a day or two." (This in an area where oil and natural gas have been venting since the beginning of written history!)

This was the Apsheron peninsula, whose heart was the city of Baku. There was at this time no more copious or older known supply of petroleum (ie rock oil) in the entire world. For 2500 years, Baku has been famous for its petroleum springs; historical evidence shows that for nearly 1000 years, its oil has been exported in trade with surrounding nations. It has always been thought of as a bottomless well, inexhaustible of supply. It is also the best harbor on the Caspian Sea--the only good natural harbor on the Caucasus side of the Caspian, and placed opposite what was once (probably) the outlet of the combined Oxus and Jaxartes; into the Balkan bay, which ran inland far further than at present, while the Oxus and Jaxartes joined and ran west, entering the Caspian rather than the Aral Sea. Indian trade in Pliny's time made its way to Europe by this route.

The Apsheron peninsula itself juts far out into the Caspian. Islands rise beyond its point. On the peninsula and upon these islands, natural gas has flared for countless ages, like beacons to navigators at sea (from the east shore of the Caspian, the west bank and mountains can easily be seen, and vice versa). Caravans could see at night the lurid glare of the fire-fountains of Apsheron.

The Caspian Sea on fire: at dusk, one took a boat out of the harbor, sailing around a promontory until about half a mile from the shore, to a spot where gas wells bubbling to the surface made the sea appear to be boiling. The water's depth would be about 3.5 fathoms and there would be a strong stench of naphtha; oil coating the surface painted the ripples in sunlight with a thin iridescent color. Then a piece of flaming tow was tossed over the ship's rail. It might take one or two tries, but soon enough the surface of the waves could be lit--wrapt in flames for several yards around, an eerie and beautiful sight ... a cold fire dancing upon the sea's breast. This fire would burn until a wind extinguished it; rowing away, one could glance back and still see it when as much as a mile distant. There were several spots in the Caspian where naphtha gas bubbling up through the sea could be observed.

The gas flares of Apsheron burned with a white-yellow light. Approaching Baku by night across the Caspian, one could see a brilliant light reflected behind the town, made by the naphtha fires about seven versts off in the mountains.

The oil at the Baku oilwells was a greenish color. The wells always gushed most fiercely after a north wind, though no one knows exactly why they should do so. One British correspondent saw (when for some reason the natural petroleum was exploded) a large cliff fronting onto the sea tumbled over as if by an earthquake, while huge boulders and weighty ships' boilers were tossed a hundred yards. The major oil works were upon two plateau: first the Balakhani plateau, and then the neighboring Saboontchi plateau which was found to be even richer than Balakhani.

Six miles west, across the Boyook salines, are more wells; there is also an extinct mud volcano here, alongside a lake of asphalt.

These petroleum deposits lie underneath the entire Caucasus mountain range, which runs from the north-east shore of the Black Sea, angling southward, to meet the western shore of the Caspian (720 miles); from the end of the Apsheron peninsula, an underwater ridge continues across the sea--giving rise to a local tale that once the Caspian Sea was divided into two lakes by this ridge, until volcanic activity sank it. The great outwelling of the oil fountains occurs at either end of the Caucasus chain, though oil crops to the surface all along the range.

At the Black Sea extremity, there are age-old and famous petroleum springs in the Crimea and the Taman Peninsula, around the Sea of Azov. Along the Caucasus, there were oil springs at Ter and Tiflis, and in Daghestan. Then at the Baku end of the range, the entire countryside from the mouth of the Samur river, north of the peninsula, to the mouth of the Kura in the south (a distance of 200 miles) holds an awe-inspiring superabundance of oil. Here, the Apsheron peninsula juts out into the Caspian, and just off it is Sviatai Island; the underwater ridge continues across the sea, to Tcheleken Island (apparently a sodden mass of naphtha and ozokerit, natural paraffin wax; and famous since classic times for its springs of oil) and, at the further shore, a stretch of desert and then the Balkan hills, where extraordinary supplies of oil lie. Here too are whole cliffs of ozokerit, or earth-wax; this can be used to make paraffin candles. The Russians annexed the Balkan hills in 1881; they call them 'Black California'.

These area of Tcheleken and the Balkan hills, also called Transcaspian, is the eastern limit of the oil strata. Petroleum is not again found until a thousand miles have been crossed, to the territory of Ferghana which is rich in oil.

In the 1870s, fire-worshipers from India were still making pilgrimages to Baku, to witness the Eternal Fire; they believed that the Fire had burned ever since the Flood, and would continue to burn till the end of the world.

Some of the history of Baku:

"Twelve versts from Baku we came upon one of the oldest altars in the world, erect and flaming with its natural burnt-offering to this day. Surakhani is the ancient seat of probably one of the most ancient forms of worship. For unnumbered ages the gas which is generated by the subterranean store of oil has escaped from the fissures in the limestone crag, and the fire of this gas has lighted the prayers of generations of priests, as it blazed and flared away to the heavens. Fire-worship in Persia, of which, until the eighteenth century, Baku formed a part, is older than history. It may be that the fire in this temple at Surakhani has been unextinguished for a period extending from before the time of Cyrus (about B. C. 600), the fire-worshipping period being older than Cyrus." - Arthur Arnold, MP for Salford, Through Persia by Karavan, 1875.

"Baku was a celebrated city of the ancient worshippers of fire, and before the conquest of the Saracans <AD 636) was annually visited by thousands of pilgrims." J M Kinneir, Geographical Memoir of the Persian Empire, 1813.

"The peninsula of Apsheron has been celebrated for many centuries, in all eastern countries, as sacred soil, and the fire-worshippers still make pilgrimages to adore the fires which there issue from the earth, arising from the ignition of the naturally formed naphtha. In ancient times Baku was held in the highest veneration by the Guebers, or Parsees, and was frequented by thousands of pilgrims." Imperial Gazetteer, vol i. London, 1855.

"On the site of the modern town once stood a city celebrated in the times of the Guebers for its sacred temple, on the altars of which blazed perpetual flames of fire produced by ignited naphtha. To this place thousands of pilgrims paid their annual visits, till the second expedition of Heraclius <a Christian emperor of Rome, who conquered Persia circa 624 AD> against the Persians, when he wintered in these plains and destroyed the temples of the magi <the Zoroastrians>." George Keppel, Personal Narrative of a Journey from India to England by Persia ... in the Year 1824.

Twelve years after Heraclius extinguished the holy fire, Persian was conquered for the second time - by the Arabs. The Zoroastrians went underground, large numbers of them fleeing to the island of Ormuz and thence to India, where they became the Parsees of Bombay. From India, they continued to make pilgrimages northwest--across half a continent!--to worship the Eternal Flame at Baku.

In 1723, Peter the Great annexed Baku and arranged for its oil to be shipped up the Volga into Russia. After his death, one Nadir Shah reconquered much of the Caspian littoral, and Russia restored Baku to Persia in 1735. A few years later, English pioneers of commerce began to explore the Caspian Sea and its shores, and speculate on establishing a petroleum industry at Baku.

In 1801, Baku was again annexed by Russia.

John Hanway, An Account of British Trade over the Caspian Sea, 1754:

The Everlasting Fire lies about ten miles NE by E off the city of Baku, on a dry rocky land; there are several ancient stone temples there, including one small temple at which 40 or 50 Indian pilgrims may usually be seen. Near the temple is a low cleft of rock, in which is a horizontal gap - two feet from the ground, six feet long, and three feet broad - from which issues a constant flame, in color and gentleness like that of a spirit lamp only more pure; and when the wind blows, this torch rises sometimes eight feet high. On a calm day, the fire burns lower. It leaves no soot or impression on the rock. The Indians worship it, saying that it cannot be resisted, and if extinguished will only spring up in another place.

All around this place, for a distance of two miles, if one digs a mere two or three inches into the ground and applies a live coal, the uncovered soil instantly takes fire--almost before the coil touches the earth. This flame heats the soil but neither consumes nor marks it, and it is not terribly hot. This soil, if carried away, does not light or burn. The ground is dry and stony, and the stonier it is, the stronger and clearer is the flame kindled there. There is a sulphurous smell, like that of naphtha, but this is not too offensive.

If a trench of soil is uncovered and lit at one end, the flame runs right down the trench, burning wherever the soil is turned. In the 1750s, eight horses perished in an accident, when the soil of the shed which was their stable was accidently set afire.

Brimstone is dug near this place, and naphtha springs are found.

If a cane or tube, even one of paper, is thrust into the ground here, and blown upon while a live coal is touched to the top--then a fire issues forth. Merely coating the rim of the tube with clay will protect this tube from harm. In this way, the local people light their houses; three or four such tubes, lighted, will boil water in a pot, and thus they cook their food. This fire is put out in the same manner as spirits of wine.

By this means, lime is burned to perfection: pieces of raw limestone are piled in a pit, and a live coal tossed in to start it afire, the result being allowed to roast for three days until completion.

In the old times, the Persians took naphtha from the Holy Island, Sviatoi, which lies off the tip of the peninsula of Apsheron - they loaded it in bulk on wretched and leaking vessels, and sometimes during the work of this the sea became covered with it for leagues around. (Sviatoi had this advantage: the naphtha wells lay close to the shore, on a level with the sea.) During thick hazy weather, the springs boil up the higher; the naphtha sometimes takes fire on the surface of the earth and runs aflame into the sea, in great quantities and to an unbelievable distance. During clear weather, the springs boil up about three feet, no higher; the mouths of the springs gradually become shut, blocked by hillocks of oil as black as pitch, but whenever the spring is choked off it only erupts in another place. Some of the younger springs had mouths eight or ten feet across. The workers drain off the naphtha by troughs into pit reservoirs, purifying it by drawing it from reservoir to reservoir; during this process all water and heavier oil is left behind. The result smells bad, and only pure people burn it to heat their houses, to light their lamps or boil their food; to solidify it for burning, they mix the naphtha with dirt or ashes. It must be stored in jars underground, at a distance from any building; keeping it indoors is too dangerous.

Sviatoi has been left alone by Europeans, because Baku with its splendid harbor is a better site for mass-production of oil. Many of the islands around the Apsheron peninsula, though, are impregnated with black naphtha. The Persians also obtained white naphtha from the peninsula itself.

Finally, something like a natural kerosene was to be found; it is a thinner fluid than black naphtha, and the Russians drank it as a cordial and medicine. It did not intoxicate. Applied externally, it was a cure for pains, gouts, cramps--with the caution that it must be painted on the afflicted part only, for it penetrated instantly to the blood and caused a short-lived but violent pain! If drunk, it was said to be good for the stone, for disorders of the breast, for venereal diseases and sore heads. It was shipped into India as a rarity, and made into a beautiful and lasting japan.

Description of Sviatoi island, by a British traveler in 1861: "The naphtha beds lie on the west of the island, and are of a very considerable extent. They are nearly all on a level with the sea, and of a uniform black color, nothing growing upon them, and the surface flat, with pools of black-colored water upon it. In several places gas was bubbling up through the water, and on a calm day it will easily ignite. Stones had been piled around one of these bubblings, forming a little chimney round it. On applying a lighted stick the whole chimney would fill with a pale yellow flame, which would continue burning for any length of time, if not extinguished by wind or rain." John Osmaston.

Description of Baku area in 1813: "The quantity of naphtha produced in the plain to the south-east of the city is enormous. The oil is drawn from wells, some of which have been found ... to yield from 1,000 to 1,500 lbs a day. These wells are, to a certain degree, inexhaustible, as they are no sooner emptied than they again begin to fill, and the naphtha continues gradually to increase until it has attained its former level. It is used by the natives as a substitute for lamp-oil, and when ignited emits a clear light, with much smoke and a disagreeable smell. ... The whole country around Baku has at times the appearance of being enveloped in flames. It often seems as if the fire rolled down from the mountains in large masses with incredible velocity; and during the clear moonshine nights of November and December a bright blue light is observed at times to cover the whole western range. This fire does not consume, and if a person finds himself in the middle of it, no warmth is felt." J M Kinneir, Geographical Memoir of the Persian Empire, 1813.

Credits

Arthur Arnold, MP for Salford, Through Persia by Karavan, 1875.

John Hanway, An Account of British Trade over the Caspian Sea (1754)

Imperial Gazetteer, vol i. London, 1855

George Keppel, Personal Narrative of a Journey from India to England by Persia ... in the Year 1824

J M Kinneir, Geographical Memoir of the Persian Empire (1813)

Charles Marvin, The Region of the Eternal Fire

John Osmaston (1881)

Marco Polo, 13^th c AD.

Art For This Website Courtesy of Moyra:

Return toMyths Table of Contents

Last Updated on March 28th, 1999 by Lisa and Sylvia