References to Absheron petroleum appear in numerous other records. The Arab scholar and geographer Abu al-Hasan Masudi (d. ca. 956), in chapter 14 of his treatise, The Meadows of Gold and Mines of Gems, wrote: “Ships... visit the coast of an area called Bakukh [Baku]; this is a field of white and variegated petroleum. Only Allah knows where else in the world besides this place there is white petroleum.3 This is the coast of the nation of Shirvan. In this oil-bearing place is a volcano, which is one of the sources of flame. It is never calm at any time, and throws fire high into the air.”
The famous Italian traveler Marco Polo (1254–1324) described how people in Baku used petroleum for medicinal purposes and religious ceremonies, while around 1320, the French missionary Jourdain Catalani de Severac wrote in his notes: “There is one place, called Baku, where they dig wells from which they recover and scoop up oiclass="underline" it is called naphtha, and this oil is flammable, and medicinal, and burns well.”
The Arab geographer Abd ar-Rashid ibn Salih al-Bakuwi asserted that the monthly production of Absheron crude in the early 15th century was 200 khalvars (about 66 barrels, or 10 tons4). Most of it was apparently shipped to Persia.
In the travelogue of Italian Giosafat Barbara (written sometime between 1474 and 1479), one can find the following description: “In this part of the sea is another city, called Baka, from whence the name of the Baka Sea came, near which there is a mountain that spews out black oil, very malodorous, used at night in lamps and for rubbing camels twice a year, because if they are not rubbed, they contract mange.”
The Turkish scholar and traveler of the second half of the 16th century Katip Celebi, also known as Haji Khalifa, wrote that “around the fort of Baku are about 500 wells, from which white and black petroleum oils are produced.”
After his visit to Baku in 1568–1574, the French traveler Jeffrey Duckett wrote the following: “Near the city we observe a strange phenomenon—an amazing quantity of oil comes out of the ground here, for which people come from remote parts of Persia; it serves throughout the country for the lighting of homes. This oil is black and is called ‘nefte.’ It is transported throughout the country on mules and donkeys, which you often encounter in caravans of 400–500. There is also another type of oil near this city of Baku, white and very valuable, and I suppose this is the same as what we call petroleum.”5
In the 17th century, Friedrich, Duke of Holstein, sent two embassies (1633–1635 and 1635–1639) to Muscovy and Persia to establish a trade route to Persia and acquaint themselves with the oil riches of the southern and western coasts of the Caspian. Adam Ölschläger (1599–1671), also known as Olearius, a member of these embassies, visited the Caspian coast in 1636. He wrote that “petroleum is a special oil that is scooped up in very large quantities from permanent wells around Baku and near the Barmakh mountain and is transported in wineskins in large cartloads, as we ourselves witnessed, for sale.... On March 2, we left the mountains and came to a plain a quarter of the way from the sea, passed the high mountain of Barmakh, and not far from the sea saw oil wells. These are various types of pits, numbering up to 30, nearly all located within one gunshot’s range; these issue powerful springs of oil—oleum petroleum. Among these were three main wells, to which we had to descend to a depth of 14 feet, for which purpose several crossbeams were installed, which could be used as steps. From above, we could hear the springs burbling, as if boiling; their odor was fairly strong, and the white oil had a more pleasant smell than the brown oil. Here both brown and white oil could be extracted, but there was more of the former than the latter.”6
Another detailed description of the Baku oil field was made by the secretary of the Swedish embassy to Persia, Engelbert Kämpfer (1651— 1716), during his stay on the peninsula on January 6–8, 1683. He was struck by the “dusty steppe,” which “presented a unique and beautiful sight, for some crevices burned with a large flame, while others emitted a quieter flame and permitted all to approach up close; still others emitted smoke, or in any event a barely noticeable vapor, that widely dispersed a very heavy stench of petroleum. This covered an area 88 paces in length and 26 paces in width.” After describing the area of the temple of fire-worshippers at Surakhany with its eternal flames, the author reported the following: “A thousand paces to the northwest of the eternal flames is another wondrous thing, namely: sources of white petroleum.”7 Kämpfer describes oil production from deep wells using horses and its storage in special covered pools, and also includes drawings of the eternal flames, mud volcanoes, and oil wells.
Oil Springs of the Taman Peninsula
The story of Russian oil production occupies a special place in the pages of the world’s petroleum annals. Rooted deep in antiquity, this history is inextricably linked to the Taman Peninsula and the numerous surface outcrops of oil-bearing rocks there.
From 389 BCE until 375 CE, this territory was part of the Bosporan Kingdom, the largest ancient state in the northern Black Sea region. The residents of this large ancient Greek (and later Roman) colony used petroleum for lighting and other household needs, and for creating the incendiary mixtures that came to be called Greek fire. Excavations by Soviet archeologists in the 1940s and 1950s revealed primitive oil lamps, as well as remnants of clay vessels for storing oil.
The Byzantine Emperor Constantine VII, already mentioned earlier, author of the treatise De Administrando Imperio (10th cent.), made mention of the Taman Peninsula’s petroleum sources as follows: “[You] must know that beyond the city of Tamatarcha are many sources that discharge petroleum.... The oil from these nine sources is not uniform in color, but some of them are red, others yellow, still others nearly black.”
In 965–966, after the victorious campaigns of the Russian forces commanded by the Kievan Prince Svyatoslav (942–971) and the crushing of the Khazar Khanate, this territory was renamed the Tmutarakan Principality, encompassing both the Taman Peninsula and the lower reaches of the Kuban River. As a military and trading outpost of Kievan Rus, the city of Tmutarakan quickly became one of its biggest southern trading ports, gaining it a tenable position in the Black Sea region. At various times from 980 onward, it was ruled by Princes Oleg Svyatoslavovich, Mstislav Udaloy, and Rostislav Novgorodsky. The principality even had the right to coin its own money. Incidentally, the collection of the State Historical Museum in Moscow contains the only three surviving silver coins of the principality minted on a Byzantine pattern during the reign of Prince Oleg Svyatoslavovich.
Unfortunately, very little is known today about the history of this principality. Free peasants, or smerds as they were called in the ancient Russian state, may have worked at the petroleum sources. It is likely that, as before, the oil was shipped to various regions and countries, including Byzantium.
What is known, however, is that around 1111, the Tmutarakan Principality fell under attack by nomadic steppe hordes, the Polovtsy, who, as it turned out, had discovered the key to using Taman petroleum in warfare.
Khan Konchak’s “Living Fire”
According to the Russian chronicles, Ancient Rus’s perennial enemies, the Polovtsy, began actively using their new weapon, “living fire,” made from oil produced from sources on the Taman Peninsula, in 12th-century battles. The Hypatian Chronicle describes the events of one battle of the allied forces of Russian princes in 1184: “The damned and godless and thrice-cursed Konchak with countless detachments of Polovtsy moved against Rus, hoping to capture and burn the Russian cities with fire, for he had found a certain infidel who shot with living fire.... Khan Konchak had a man who knew how to shoot fire and burn cities, who had self-firing bows so great that eight men could barely draw them, and they were mounted on a great carriage. With this, he could throw man-sized stones into the center of the city, and he had a special smaller but very cleverly made device to throw fire.”