Akinchi
Front page of Akinchi, 1875
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| Type | Weekly |
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| Owner(s) | Hasan bey Zardabi |
| Editor-in-chief | Hasan bey Zardabi |
| Founded | 22 July 1875 |
| Language | Azerbaijani |
| Ceased publication | 29 September 1877 |
| Headquarters | Baku, Azerbaijan |
| Circulation | 300-400 (1875) |
Akinchi (Azerbaijani: Əkinçi / اکينچی), also transliterated as Ekinchi ("The Cultivator"), was the first Azerbaijani-language newspaper, published in Baku (then part of the Russian Empire, now the capital of the Republic of Azerbaijan) between 1875 and 1877. It was the first newspaper fully printed in Azerbaijani, as well as the first newspaper in Russia printed in a Turkic language.
Founded by a journalist,eacher, and scientist, and a Moscow University alumnus Hasan bey Zardabi, Akinchi was regarded almost as revolutionary not only as the first periodical published in Azeri, but for being also the means of reaching the masses. In order to make media accessible to lower classes, Zardabi propagated reforms in the literal Azeri language aimed at making it more vernacular by excluding bulky expressions and loanwords from Persian and Arabic used mostly in religious texts and classical poetry. Akinchi hence would often be subject to criticism by the literati who found its written style too colloquial. In fact, it was deliberately chosen to be written and published using simple, colloquial language so the lower, mainly uneducated (back then) masses would find it easier to grasp the main idea behind all those satirical poems and articles
.The Russian governor of the Caucasus Dmitry Staroselsky sympathized with Zardabi's endeavours and supported him in the establishment of Akinchi. He was also the one proposing the name for the newspaper that in his opinion would convince the authorities that Akinchi was a non-political magazine that dealt with spreading agricultural technique. In addition to agriculture-oriented articles, Zardabi published materials related to medicine and biology as well as editorials dealing with the social and cultural state of Muslims in the Caucasus. The first issue of Akinchi was printed on 22 July 1875.
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