Ankara holds event dedicated to legacy of Shah Ismail Khatai

"Azafl?" Azerbaijani Social Support and Culture Society and the Turkic World Cultural Center held an event on the theme "Shah Ismail Khatai: Life Path and Heritage" in Ankara, Azernews reports.

The event was attended by diplomats, scientists, experts, and public representatives from the two fraternal countries.

Opening the event, the head of the Ankara Turkish World Cultural Center, lawyer Arzuman Azafl?, noted that the personality of Shah Ismail Khatai has long been mistakenly associated with Iran and Persia in Turkiye.

According to him, the foundations of the unified Azerbaijani state are connected with the name of the founder of the Safavid state.

"Shah Ismail raised the status of the Azerbaijani language to the level of the state language, wrote lyrical and epic poems in his native language under the pseudonym Khatai," Azafly said, calling for a refusal to distort historical truths.

Professor Abdullah Gundogdu of Ankara University, in turn, called Shah Ismail Khatai a figure who left a deep mark on the history of the entire region. According to him, the Safavid state was the fruit of the Turkic peoples who settled in the regions adjacent to the Ottoman Empire.

Then, researcher Dilgam Ahmad spoke about the understanding of the heritage of the Safavid state by prominent representatives of Azerbaijani intellectuals. As an example, D. Ahmad brought to attention the assessments of one of the founders of the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic, Mahammad Amin Rasulzadeh, who stated that the core of the Safavid state was the Turks.

"Official correspondence in the Safavid state was conducted in Azerbaijani. Turkic was also a means of communication between rulers," the researcher noted.

The event continued with the performance of musical compositions written to the words of Shah Ismail Khatai.