Samtskhe Eyalet
| Eyālet-i Čildir | |||||
| Eyalet of the Ottoman Empire | |||||
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| Capital |
Çıldır 1578-1628; Ahıska 1628-1829 Oltu 1829-1845 |
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| History | |||||
| • | Battle of Çıldır | 1578 | |||
| • | Disestablished | 1845 | |||
| Today part of |
 Georgia Turkey
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The Eyalet of Childir (Ottoman Turkish: ایالت ایالت چلدر; Eyālet-i Çıldır) or Akhalzik was an eyalet of the Ottoman Empire in the Southwestern Caucasus. The area of the former Çıldır Eyalet is now divided between Samtskhe-Javakheti and the Autonomous Republic of Adjara in Georgia and provinces of Artvin, Ardahan and Erzurum in Turkey. The administrative center was Çıldır between 1578-1628, Ahıska between 1628-1829, and Oltu between 1829-1845.
Samtskhe was the only Georgian principality to permanently become an Ottoman province (as the eyalet of Cildir). In the eighty years after the battle of Zivin the region was gradually absorbed into the empire.
The Ottomans took the Ahıska region from the Principality of Guria, a vassal state of Safavid dynasty. In 1578, when the new province was established, they appointed the former Georgian prince, Minuchir (who took the name of Mustafa after converting to Islam) as the first governor. From 1625 onwards the entire eyalet was a hereditary possession of the now-Muslim atabegs of Samtskhe, which administered it as hereditary governors, with some exceptions, until the mid-18th century.
During the Russo-Turkish War (1828–1829), Russians occupied much of the province. The administrative centre was moved from Ahıska, which was ceded to Russia, to Oltu.
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