Okhchu Shabadini

Okhchu Shabadini was a village in the Zangezur uezd of the Yelizavetpol (Ganja) governorate, later in the former Gafan district, and currently in the Syunik province. It was located 4 km to the north of the town of Gafan and on the bank of the Okhchu River.

The village was inhabited by 65 Azerbaijanis in 1831, 371 in 1873, 582 in 1886, 433 in 1897, 789 in 1904 and 516 Azerbaijanis in 1914. The Azerbaijanis were attacked, massacred or expelled from the village by Armenian armed units in 1918. Later, the village was abolished. At present, it lies in ruins.

The toponym was coined on the basis of the Turkic ethnonym “Okhchu” and by combining the words “chap (shab)” meaning “a precipice, a slope”, “an elevation in the depression between two mountains” in Turkic and “adin” meaning “animals and other household stuff of a nomadic cattle- breeder”.