More than 94 percent of the residents of Baku practice various forms of Islam (vast majority Shia).
During Soviet times, Baku was a vacation destination where citizens could enjoy beaches or relax in now-dilapidated spa complexes overlooking the Caspian Sea.
Marco Polo (1254–1324) wrote of Baku oil exports to Near Eastern countries.
Destruction of the environment for economic means reflects shortsightedness and lack of understanding of the importance of the environment in the sustenance of humanity, not only in Baku, but wherever it occurs.
In 1960, the first Caucasus house-building plant was built in Baku, and on December 25, 1975, the only plant producing air-conditioners in the Soviet Union began operation.
The Treaty of Gulistan, in 1813, meant Baku was absorbed into the Russian Empire.
Great Britain, in February 1918, sent General Lionel Dunsterville with troops to Baku through Anzali to block the German troops.
The World War II Battle of Stalingrad, which took place between July 17, 1942, and February 2, 1943, was fought to determine who would have control of the Baku oil fields.
The fifth century historian Priscus of Panium mentioned the famous Bakuvian fires, the presence of which meant Baku became a center of ancient Zoroastrianism.
In 1795, Baranov, concerned by sightings of non-Russian Europeans trading with the Natives in southeast Alaska, established Mikhailovsk near present-day Sitka.
On July 10, 1840, the Baku uyezd was turned into an administrative region of the Russian Empire.
The Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline, opened in 2006, transports crude oil 1094 miles (1760km) from the Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli oil field in the Caspian Sea to the Mediterranean Sea.
Baku was inhabited during the Stone Age, up to 100,000 years ago, and possibly a Bronze settlement existed there.
Baku also houses the country's largest art museum—Azerbaijan State Museum of Art, a depository of both domestic and foreign works of art, Western and Eastern.
On February 8, 1924, the first tram line and, two years later, the electric railway Baku-Surakhany—the first in the USSR—started to operate.
Baku (Azerbaijani: Bak?), sometimes known as Baqy, Baky, or Baki, located on the western shore of the Caspian Sea, is the capital, the largest city, and the largest port of Azerbaijan.
Hulagu Khan occupied Baku under the domain of the Shirvan state during the third Mongol campaign in Azerbaijan (1231-1239), and it became a winter residence for Ilkhanids.
On April 28, 1920, the 11th Red Army invaded Baku and reinstalled the Bolshevik power.
Headed by General William Thomson, 5000 English soldiers arrived in Baku on November 17, and martial law was imposed.
The existence of petroleum in Baku has been known since the eighth century, and in the tenth century, the Arabian traveler Marudee reported that both white and black oil were being extracted naturally there.
During World War II, the growing demand for oil pushed Baku oil workers to reach record levels of extraction—23,482 million tons.
Under Communism, the Soviets took most Jewish property in Baku and Kuba.
Peter the Great of Russia captured Baku on June 26, 1723, after a lasting siege using cannons.
Baku was finally occupied by Russian forces, led by General Bulgakov, in September 1806, and Husayn Quli Khan was forced into exile.
Modern Baku consists of three parts: The Old Town (?з?ri ??h?r), the boomtown, and the Soviet-built town.
The oil is selected based on the viscosity for the type of massage being conducted.
The name Baku is derived from the old Persian Bagavan, which translates to "City of God."
In 2005, the population of Baku was 2,036,000 of whom 153,400 were internally displaced persons and 93,400 refugees.
The old Inturist Hotel was one of Baku's largest, was renovated, but overshadowed by the newer Hyatt Park, Hyatt Regency, Park Inn and Excelsior.
Up to 1988, Baku had very large Armenian, Russian, and Jewish populations.
Shipping services operate regularly from Baku across the Caspian Sea to Turkmenbashi (formerly Krasnovodsk) in Turkmenistan and to Bandar Anzali and Bandar Nowshar in Iran.
During World War II (1939-1945), Allied generals considered bombing Baku to wreck the supply of oil and thereby weaken the Soviet Union.
In 1981, a record quantity of 15 billion cubic meters of gas was extracted in Baku.
Seeking to capitalize on inter-ethnic conflicts, by spring 1918, Bolsheviks inspired and condoned civil warfare in and around Baku.
The Maiden Tower, the castles of Ramana, Nardaran, Shagan and Mardakan, and also the famous Sabayel castle on the island of the Baku Bay, were built during this period.
Baku has produced a number of notable figures in the sciences, arts and other fields.
Baku is served by the Heydar Aliyev International Airportand the Baku Metro.
Russian forces, led by Tsitsianov, attempted to besiege Baku during the third Russo-Persian War (1804-1813).
Baku is divided into eleven administrative districts, or raions (Azizbayov, Binagadi, Garadagh, Narimanov, Nasimi, Nizami, Sabail, Sabunchu, Khatai, Surakhany, and Yasamal), and 48 townships.
Large-scale oil development began in 1872, when the Russian imperial authorities auctioned the parcels of oil-rich land around Baku to private investors.
From 1914 to 1917, Baku produced 28,683,000 tons of oil, which constituted 15 percent of world production at the time.
The southwestern part of Great Baku is a more arid part of Azerbaijan, where precipitation is less than six inches (150mm) a year.
Among these are the townships on islands in the Baku Bay and the town of Oil Rocks, built on stilts in the Caspian Sea, 37 miles (60km) away from Baku.
After a devastating earthquake struck Shamakhy, the capital of Shirvan, in 1191, Shirvanshah’s court moved to Baku.
Baku has three different Jewish communities, namely the Ashkenazim Jews, the Mountain Jews, and the Georgian Jews.
Soon, Swiss, British, French, Belgian, German, Swedish, and American investors appeared in Baku, including Nobel brothers and Rothschilds, and an industrial oil belt, better known as Black City, was established near Baku.
Adolf Hitler, the leader of Nazi Germany, said: "Unless we get Baku oil, the war is lost."
Baku became a center of the eponymous province after the devastating earthquake of 1859, in Shamakha.
Shirvanshah Akhsitan I built a navy in Baku, and in 1170, he repelled another Russian assault.
Beginning from the 1890s, Baku provided 95 percent of the oil production in the Russian Empire, and approximately half of world oil production.