Bab wa-l-Abwab (Derbent)

Bab al-Abwab (the Gate of Gates): a city built by Anushirvan Khosrow ibn Qubadh, according to al-Baladhuri. It was called "the Gates" because it was built on narrow passes. ¹

His father Qubadh had built before it the dam of mud brick between the land of Shirwan and the Gate of al-Lan, and on it were three hundred and sixty cities that were ruined after the building of the Gate and the Gates. Anushirvan's wall was built of rock and lead from the side of the sea, its width three hundred cubits, and it is joined to the tops of the mountains. It was carried three miles into the sea on stones sunk in ships. At its entrance are iron gates, and a hundred horsemen were appointed to guard it, after fifty thousand soldiers. ¹

It is a site in the accounts of the wall of Khosrow at Derbent.

The EI2 article (vol. 1, pp. 892-893) names the place Bab al-Abwab, 'Gate of the Gates' — in older texts al-Bab wa'l-Abwab and often simply al-Bab — the Arabic designation of a pass and fortress at the eastern end of the Caucasus, Persian Darband, later Turkish 'Iron Gate', modern Derbent. The 'Gates' are the mouths of the eastern Caucasus valleys (Ibn Khurradadhbih; cf. Yakut). It was fortified against northern invaders at an undetermined date, traditionally by Anushirwan (sixth century), who is said to have built a wall seven farsakhs long from the mountains to the sea (Qazwini); the present remains extend from Derbent to the Kara Syrt. When the first Muslims reached Darband in 22/643 a Persian garrison held it. In the fighting between Arabs and Khazars Bab al-Abwab is repeatedly mentioned: Maslama b. 'Abd al-Malik reached it in a spectacular retreat from Khazaria in 113/731, and Marwan b. Muhammad (later Marwan II) assaulted the Khazars simultaneously from Bab al-Abwab and Darial (Bab al-Lan) in 119/737, briefly mastering the country to the Volga. The last great Khazar invasion through Bab al-Abwab was in 183/799. ²

Al-Istakhri (c. 340/951) describes a harbour for Caspian ships inside the town, its oblique entrance between sea-walls narrow and defended by a chain or boom — arrangements mostly Sasanid, improved by the Arabs, for example under the vizier 'Ali b. al-Furat (after 296/908). In his time Bab al-Abwab was a principal Caspian port, larger than Ardabil, exporting linen garments (in which it held a near monopoly), saffron, and slaves from the northern infidel lands; al-Mas'udi records the black fox-skins of Burtas among its imports, and implies it was no Arab town despite earlier attempts to plant colonies. Later research has revealed a local dynasty, the Hashimids, connected with the neighbouring Shirwan Shahs as early as the 4th/10th century, known chiefly through an anonymous eleventh-century Tarikh al-Bab quoted by Munajjim Bashi, which records among other things that the ghazis of al-Bab destroyed a party of Russian raiders in 423/1032. Turkish predominance begins with the Saljuks; Jebe campaigned nearby in 1222, as did Timur, and the Mongol period confirmed the Turkification of the region. ³

Al-Qazwini (674/1275) gives the fullest account: a thriving Muslim town built of stone, its wall washed by the Caspian, about two-thirds of a farsakh long and a bowshot wide, towers on the wall each with a mosque, constant guards and a beacon-fire ready against invasion, 'talismans' against the Turks (probably pre-Muslim sculpture), a stepped cistern outside, and a mosque said to hold the sword of Maslama b. 'Abd al-Malik. Thereafter Bab al-Abwab ceased to be an imperial frontier and shared the fortunes of the semi-independent Caucasian principalities; Persian until it became Russian in 1806, it has since been of much less relative importance. ³