TABREEZ. 
221 
as foreign from the present appearance of the city, as the site of 
the two capitals are, in reality, widely distinct from each other. 
Without, however, entering into any comparison between the 
ancient consequence of Tabreez, and that of Ecbatana, we have 
sufficient evidence that the capital of Azerbijan has long been 
considered a place worthy the residence of sovereign princes. 
It has often been the victim of their contentions ; and wars be- 
tween Turks, Persians, and Tatars, have all tended to level its 
7 * 
boasted grandeur in the dust. But perhaps the most destructive 
enemies to the latter pretension, where it meant to express the 
magnificence of the buildings, as well asAhe; population of the 
place, have been the effects of two fatal earthquakes, which at¬ 
tacked the valley, twice in the course of the last century, and 
rendered the city a heap of ruins. During these dreadful ca¬ 
tastrophes, upwards of a hundred thousand of the inhabitants 
perished ; some swallowed up in the tremendous abyss, along 
with their houses and substance ; and others crushed under the 
falling roofs and towers of the city. Terrible as these calamities 
have been, yet, in face of the very monuments of their resistless 
desolation, under the shattered walls, and over the precipitated 
heaps of the old city, a new one has arisen ; and, though still in 
infancy, it bids fair, under the present august resident, to become 
an example of vital prosperity beyond any thing yet existing in 
the kingdom. 
Tabreez has been re-fortified lately, by order of the Prince: 
and, accordingly, is surrounded with a thick wall, protected by 
towers and bastions, with the addition of a very deep dry ditch. 
The whole embraces a circumference of six thousand yards. 
Beyond this boundary, to the north and east, extend the 
suburbs, which rise amidst the ruins and broken ground of what 
