Natural-Historical Museum after G.Zardabi. The main task of the Natural Historical Museum is introduction of visitors to the world of fossils and world of animals in Azerbaijan. Out of the existing 11 landscape zones 9 zones are situated in our republic. Fauna and flora in Azerbaijan are unique in the world. There exist 12 ths. species of fauna and more than 4 ths. species of flora. No wonder that sometimes Azerbaijan is called "natural laboratory". There exist geological and biological departments in the museum and their exhibits give idea about the diversity of the world of animal in our republic, beauty of the landscape and richness of the earth interior.
History of Foundation of the Museum. In 1920 on the initiative of E.L. Stanevich a group of teachers from the Baku grammar school founded 2 museums - excursion department.
In 1921 the historical archeological commission at the Ministry of Culture of Azerbaijan joined this department and as a museum-archive it passed the disposal of the Ministry of education.
Since 1922 the museum-archive has been functioning independently having acquired state legal status. There exist three departments: biological, historical-ethnographic and numismatic. In 1930 on the base of these departments after a fundamental re-organization several independent cultural-educational institutions were founded: museum of history of the peoples in the Azerbaijan SSR, natural historical museum and museum of arts.
In 1937 Natural Historical Museum passed to the Academy of Sciences of the USSR and in March 1945 it acquired a status of the Azerbaijan Academy of Sciences.
Scientific Research in the Museum. The world of animals in Azerbaijan is rich and diverse. In the display cases one can see numerous skeletons and fragments of bones of the animals found during expeditions and processed by our research workers.
Natural-Historical Museum is called in honor of a great son of Azerbaijan Gasanbek Zardabi (Melikov) - enlighterner-democrat, natural scientists, writer of sociopolitical literature, teacher and author of a number of scientific papers dealing with problems of Darwinism and origin of life on the Earth and ecology. G.Zardabi (1842-1907) is the first scientists in Azerbaijan who accepted and spread Darwin's ideas. Moreover, he is one of the founders of the sanitary science in Azerbaijan and a founder of the newspaper "Ekinchi" (Ploughman).
The main directions of scientific research in the Natural-Historical Museum were as follows: the study of the Binagady Quaternary fauna, eldar upper Sarmatian hipparian fauna, Pirekshkyul high vertebral fauna, numerous sites of primitive people in the Azykh cave, etc.
The development of the vertebrate paleontology in Azerbaijan was greatly contributed by the studies of R.D.Jafarov (1883-1978) - the first director of Natural-Historical Museum and his colleagues - V.V.Bogachov and N.I.Burchak-Abramovich and also by their numerous successors - D.V.Gajiev, N.A.Alekperova, S.M.Aslanova, F.M.Akhundova, T.M.Eibatova et al.
R.D.Jafarov directed long-term excavations of a unique Binagadi fauna and flora burial. He is very well known as the author of the first colorful "Atlas of the Quaternary fauna in Binagadi". He initiated and edited publication of twelve volumes of a fundamental series "Proceedings of the Zardabi Natural-Historical Museum" (1951-1959).
D.V.Gajiev (1929-1999) - head laboratory "Evolutional paleontology". He conducted a wide-range studies o in the field of paleontology, paleobiology, paleopathology inclusive, etc. But he was recognized a world-famous scientist due to his studies of the hipparion fauna in the Eurasia. Since the 60's D.V.Gajiev studied the Azykh site of the most ancient cave man (Mountainous Quarabakh). A comparative morphological analysis of the preserved fragments of the low jaw and teeth of this man allowed him to make an important conclusion about its belonging to a chronologically early group of paleoanthrops.
F.M.Akhundov was director of Natural-Historical Museum more than 30 years (1970-1999). He greatly contributed to the museum with new exhibits and systematized and classified them. His field of interests was very wide, in particular - origin, phylogene, spread and evolutional alteration of pinipeds depending on the geological setting. In 1938 in the Apsheron peninsula in the vicinity of Baku (8 km north-west of the village Binagadi in the kir deposits) the 3rd year student from the Azerbaijan Industrial Institute A.S.Mastanzadeh found unique skeleton of vertebrates and invertebrates and vegetative remains of animals. Later on expeditions and the studies were headed by V.V.Bogachov and R.D.Jafarov. As a result of processing of paleontologic material R.D.Jafarov in 1960 identified a new species of rhinoceros (Rhinoceras binagadiensis) N.I.Burchak-Abramovich played a great role in the reconstruction of skeletons of mammals and birds found in the Binagadi kir lake.
N.A.Alekperova studied history of formation and paleogeographic spread of the deepigurative in the Caucasus isthmus (she identified a new subgenus of a deer intricata horn and a species of strongiloceros). S.M.Aslanova studied the Perikyushikyul fauna of higher vertebrates from the Maikopian deposits (she described new families and species of the marine mammals). Zh.D.Jafarova studied fish fauna from the Maikopian deposits in Azerbaijan and described about a hundred otoliths and identified a number of new species. T.M.Eibatov studied chrono-fixing structures of mammals and determined regularities of spatial spread of the most important groups of the fossil vertebrates of the Cenozoic.
Museum Departments. Natural-Historical Museum consists of two departments: geological and biological.
GEOLOGICAL DEPARTMENT. Samples of economic minerals of Azerbaijan are there in the geological department. Among them there are the following minerals and rocks: cobalt, gypsum, salt, quartz, pyrite, barite, molybdenum, calcite, etc. Various economic minerals, such as marble, dolomite, marl, non-metalliferous and construction materials are in showcases of the museum.
Geological Structure of Azerbaijan. The beginning of the study of Azerbaijan geological structure is associated with name of "Father of the Caucasian geology" - G.V. Abikh. Systematic and detailed studies of depths of our country had been conducted since 30th-40th of XX century. They cover the fundamental works made by Sh.A. Azizbekov, M.A. Kashkai. M.M. Aliyev, Sh. Shikhalibeili and other outstanding azeri scientists in the field of stratigraphy, tectonics and lithology. According to their results the fundamental geological, tectonical, metallogenical and other maps of Azerbaijan had been compiled being actual for present moment.
Stratigraphy. Deposits of the Phanerozoic onothem, Paleozoic, Mesozoic and Cenozoic erathem are distinguished in the geological structure of Azerbaijan. They consist of the sedimentary, volcanic and metamorphic rocks.
Deposits of the Paleozoic erathem are exposed on the day surface in Nakhchyvan Republic. They are represented by carbonaceous rocks of the Devonian, Carboniferous and Permian stages. Mesozoic deposits are distributed on the Greater and Lesser Caucasus, and also in the Pri-Caspian lowland and Kura intermontane depression. Mesozoic erathem is represented by the volcanogenic, pyroplastic, carbonaceous rocks of the Triassic, Jurassic and Cretaceous systems. Cenozoic erathem consists of the Paleogene, Neogene and the Quaternary periods, the deposits of which take part in the geology of the tectonic structures of the Greater and Lesser Caucasus, also in Kura depression.
Tectonics. Such scientists as A.S. Arkhangelski, V.V.Belousov, V.P.Rengarten, Sh.A.Azizbekov, V.E.Khain, I.Shikhalibeili et al were studying the Caucasian tectonic structure in various years. By their efforts the main tectonic structures (meganticlinoria of the Greater and Lesser Caucasus and dividing them Kura intermontane depression), and Azerbaijan zones (Somkhit-Agdam, Gekcha-Karabakh, Miskhan-Kafan and Talysh) had been distinguished.
Mud Volcanoes. In Azerbaijan the mud volcanoes are spread on the Apsheron peninsula, Gobustan and in the Caspian Sea. Their total number is over 300. Among them there are acting volcanoes (Touraga, Atman-bozdag, Kalmas, etc.). These volcanoes "wake up" from time to time and outburst huge volumes of breccia, liquid and gas.
I.M.Gubkin, S.A.Kovalevski, A.A.Yagubov, F.S.Magerramova, A.A. Aliyev et al had been studying the phenomena of mud volcanoes.
Economic Minerals. The specifics of the geologic structure of Azerbaijan territory (namely, the presence of two mountain systems: Greater and Lesser Caucasus, corresponding to young alpine fold system) causes the existence a great deal of economic minerals. According to reserves of some of them Azerbaijan takes the first place over the world. There are minerals, rocks, metalliferous and non-metalliferous economic minerals and constriction materials in museum showcases.
ZOOLOGICAL DEPARTMENT. There are numerous exhibits of representatives of invertebrate and vertebral animals at the Natural-Historical Museum.
Invertebrate Animals. Invertebrates - a numerous group of animals having the vertebral column. Altogether there are 16-23 types and among them the various types of protozoa, sponges, coelenterates, echinoderms, mollusks, lower worms (Scolecide), annelides, arthropodals, etc. The total number of these organisms reaches to 1-2 mln. species. More numerous are arthropodals, the main mass of which are insects. Due to adaptation for the changeable conditions of the environment and variety of species the invertebrates had founded all the biotypes over the Earth. They also play a base role in matter and energy circulation in the biosphere.
Vertebral Animals. During the process of continual evolution the primary axial skeleton (chord) had begun a backbone (they called vertebral or backboned animals). They have simultaneous improvement of processes of organs of secretion, sense and central nervous system. As a rule, lower vertebrates (Anamnia), to which the cyclostomes, fishes and amphibians corresponded, are oviparous.
Higher vertebrates (Amniotia) to which reptiles, birds and mammals are corresponded, distinguished that they take care about their breed. Usually 7 classes - cyclostomes, cartilaginous fishes, bony fishes, amphibians, reptiles, birds, mammals - are corresponded to the vertebrates. There are 40-45 thousand according to specific. In showcases of the Natural-Historical Museum there are: frogs, tritons and caucasian agama of amphibians; turtles and snakes of reptiles; flamingo, kites, golden eagle, owls, ducks, geese, sparrows, etc. of birds; bear, deer, jeiran, hyena, roe deer of mammals.
Prevention of the Environment. Nature prevention is a complex system of events, directed for preservation, rational usage and reproduction of natural resources, and also for keeping of specific variety (genofund) of the earth flora and fauna, its depths, water resources and atmospheric air. Finally, this system is for natural conditions of the human society development. Atmosphere contamination and non-rational usage of the natural resources is one of the base problems of the humanity. Ecology (Greek -oikos, home) solves these problems. It is a biological science studying the organization and function of over-organism systems of different levels: populations, biocenose (associations), biogeocenoses (ecosystems) and bioshere.
There are a great amount of plants and animals, which are under the threat of disappearance, in our Republic also. All these are listed in so-called "Red Book" the last edition of which had been published last year.
Preservations and reserves had been made to preserve the biological species and places of animals' living. There are 13 reserves and 17 preservations in Azerbaijan. In Natural-Historical Museum there are stuffed animals and skeletons of the following species of animals mentioned at the "Red Book": jeiran (Cazella subguttarosa), bison (Bison bonasus), transcaucasian brown bear (Ursus arctos syriacus) of animals; flamingo (Phoenicopterus roseus), golden eagle (Aguila chrysactos), (Falco peregrinus), (Grus leucageranus), great bustard (Otis tarda), sultana (Porphyrio porphyrio), pink pelican (Pelecanus onocrotalis), curly pelican (Pelicanus crispus) of birds; agama (Agama ratcrata), gray eirard (Versanus crissus) of amphibia.