Architecture of Exclusion: The Savujbulagh-i Mukri Garrison, Border-Making, and the Transformation of the Ottoman-Qajar Frontier

This article investigates the emergence of the Savujbulagh (current-day Mahabad) garrison during the transformation of the Ottoman-Qajar frontier into the bordered lands in the Mukri region in southern Azerbaijan and eastern Kurdistan in the late nineteenth century. During its short life between 1883 and the second decade of the twentieth century, the garrison was a manifestation of the exclusion of the Mukris from the Qajar political power structure and the transformation of the Ottoman-Qajar frontier into bordered lands in the Mukri region. By examining a newly found architectural drawing of the garrison and images from an album of photography by ‘Ali Khan Vali, this article suggests that the Savujbulagh garrison participated in the symbolic constitution and institutionalization of the processes of border-making in the last stages of the final establishment of the Ottoman-Qajar borders.