One Town, Two Empires: Urban Planning in Late Medieval and Modern Axalc‘ixe
One Town, Two Empires: Urban Planning in Late Medieval and Modern Axalc‘ixe

Summary/Abstract: The city of Axalc‘ixe is located in south Georgia near the present Georgian-Turkish border. Historically being and still remaining a frontier city, Axalc‘ixe has a complex history different from that of the other cities of the Caucasus. Unlike other historic cities of the country, it was completely cut off from the Georgian world in the Late Medieval and Early Modern periods. During the first stage of its observable history, Axalc‘ixe was a remote regional centre in the extreme east of the Ottoman Empire. Since 1828, it became a provincial town of the Russian Empire. These two periods are vividly reflected in the urban fabric of Axalc‘ixe. It is a typical example of what is usually referred to as a binary or double town, with the Ottoman quarter that grew without any preordained plan around the Medieval fortress on the left bank of the Poc‘xovi River and the regularly planned Russian quarter on the right bank. The new part of Axalc‘ixe developed since 1830s as a modest European town. It was not thoroughly shaped by the contemporary urban theories and did not reflect advanced architectural ideas. Nevertheless, it formed a sharp contrast to the old quarter, which remained unmodernized being neglected by the government. Spatial inequality in living standards was directly linked with the social inequality. Until the mid-twentieth century, these two parts of the city remained different in design, architecture, infrastructure, and quality of housing. Even now, despite the destruction of many landmarks and development in the Soviet period, two different urban patterns are still distinguishable in Axalc‘ixe.

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