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Gadabay's history

The district is renowned for its potatoes and its gold fields. Drainage of the district is significantly poor. Akhinja, Zayam and Shamkir are the largest rivers. Mountain-forest, mountain-meadow and other grounds spread here. Mountain Shrubland and rare forest meadows in midlands, broad-leaved forests, subalpine and alpine meadows at the top of mountains occupy the greatest territory of district . The history of the town of Gadabay in the Lesser Caucasus Mountains is tightly linked to the German Siemens brothers and their copper mining operations here in the late 19th century. A copper mine had already existed in Gadabay, but the Siemens brothers introduced modern methods as well as constructing a 28-kilometre railway connecting the mines with a copper smelting plant in Galakend – an engineering masterpiece given the complexity of the mountainous terrain. 

Visiting Gadabay today, you can still see some of the German-style brick housing the Siemens brothers left behind after abandoning the area shortly after World War I. Look out for the miners’ old administrative building (now the Agricultural Seed Office) and the Culture House (now a library) in particular. And if you travel about 30-40 kilometres further into the mountains, preferably with a local guide, you can also discover the spectacular remains of arched bridges from the Siemens’ pioneering narrow-gauge railway.