Baku

Baku is the capital of Azerbaijan, an industrial port city on the Caspian Sea, famous as a centre of the oil industry.

It was formerly a Russian port, in a district so impregnated and saturated in parts with petroleum that by digging in the soil wells were formed, in some cases so gushing as to overflow in streams, which wells, reckoned by hundreds, were connected by pipes with refineries in the town. It was a district which, from the spontaneous ignition of the petroleum, was long ago a centre of attraction to the Parsees or fire-worshippers of the East, and resorted to by them as holy ground.

Nearby pages
Bakul, Bal, Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Bal Ram Jakhar, Bala