Hazar (until 1999 known as Çeleken, also written Cheleken; ;
Persian: Chaharken ) is a seaport town located on the
Cheleken Peninsula of the
Caspian Sea
The Caspian Sea is the world's largest inland body of water, described as the List of lakes by area, world's largest lake and usually referred to as a full-fledged sea. An endorheic basin, it lies between Europe and Asia: east of the Caucasus, ...
. It is directly subordinate to the city of
Balkanabat in
Balkan Province of western
Turkmenistan
Turkmenistan is a landlocked country in Central Asia bordered by Kazakhstan to the northwest, Uzbekistan to the north, east and northeast, Afghanistan to the southeast, Iran to the south and southwest and the Caspian Sea to the west. Ash ...
. In November 2022, it was downgraded from city-with-district-status to a town, and alongside
Gumdag, it became subordinate to City of
Balkanabat.
Etymology
Hazar (also Khazar, a backformation of ) was the name of a Turkic people, the
Khazars
The Khazars ; 突厥可薩 ''Tūjué Kěsà'', () were a nomadic Turkic people who, in the late 6th century CE, established a major commercial empire covering the southeastern section of modern European Russia, southern Ukraine, Crimea, a ...
(''viz.''), who lived on the shores of the Caspian Sea and lent their tribal name to the body of water in several Turkic languages, including
Turkmen. The current name of the city thus comes from the Turkmen name of the Caspian Sea. The former name, Çeleken (Cheleken), is the name of the former island, now peninsula, on which the city is located. The word comes from Persian ''chahar kan'' چهارکن, meaning "four wells" or "four riches", referring to the wealth of petroleum found on the peninsula.
Economy
Petroleum
This city and area are rich in
petroleum oil reserves. As far back as the 1st century, the Greek philosopher
Strabo
Strabo''Strabo'' (meaning "squinty", as in strabismus) was a term employed by the Romans for anyone whose eyes were distorted or deformed. The father of Pompey was called "Gnaeus Pompeius Strabo, Pompeius Strabo". A native of Sicily so clear-si ...
said, "They say, diggers opened oily springs near the Okh River. Indeed, if a country has alkaline, asphalt, sticky, sulfurous waters, it is most likely to have oily springs. Only, their scarceness makes this fact miraculous." In 1743, a Captain by the name of Woodruff of a British merchant company remarked that 36
Ogurdjali families resided on the island. They had 26 large boats and some
oil well
An oil well is a drillhole boring in Earth that is designed to bring petroleum oil hydrocarbons to the surface. Usually some natural gas is released as associated petroleum gas along with the oil. A well that is designed to produce only gas m ...
s.
Prior to 1917, the Moscow Society, Cheleken-Dagestan Society, Kuzmin and Co, Bostondjoglo, South Caucasian Mining Society, and Second Moscow Group were among the established Russian oil companies. By 1925, after the establishment of
Soviet Turkmenistan, wells had been nationalized and oil production decreased. By the late 1950s, oil production index went up again.
Dragon Oil, a petroleum extraction firm owned by
Emirates National Oil Company, is the major employer in Hazar and operates the oil loading terminal there.
Iodine
Following planned renovations and upgrades, the Hazar iodine plant will have a design capacity of 300 tonnes of iodine, plus 4500 tonnes of
bromine
Bromine is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol Br and atomic number 35. It is a volatile red-brown liquid at room temperature that evaporates readily to form a similarly coloured vapour. Its properties are intermediate between th ...
per year.
References
Hazar İnfo
External links
Picture of Hazar / Chelekenon Panoramio
Populated coastal places in Turkmenistan
Populated places in Balkan Region
Populated places established in 1956
Cities and towns built in the Soviet Union
{{Turkmenistan-geo-stub