Southern route: Jalilabad

Population of the district - 177,700 people; district center, the city of Jalilabad - 35,700 people.

JALILABAD DISTRICT is located on the edge of the Kura-Araz Lowland, its climate zones range from moderately warm with almost evenly distributed precipitation to semi-deserts and dry steppes with dry summers. The rivers INJACHAY, BOLGARCHAY, MISHARCHAY and GOYTEPECHAY flow through the district. The particular climate and terrain have led to intensive development of viticulture here, although in former times this area was the main supplier of various kinds of grain for the whole country. Today this tradition is being actively revived.

There are excellent hunting grounds here, and forests cover almost 14.7 thousand ha. At the ZAVVAR hunting reserve you can, for example, hunt waterfowl. Fauna - wolves, hares, badgers, foxes, wild boar, wild ducks, geese, eagles, black francolins, etc.

The city of JALILABAD is the administrative center of Jalilabad District, 208 km from Baku.

On the outskirts of the city archaeologists discovered and excavated the ancient settlement of HAMSHAHRATEPE. Artifacts of material culture from the Eneolithic era were found. Scholars believe that it was here that the famous tribe of the MAGI lived - one of the Aryan tribes of the early Zoroastrian era. Members of the Magi tribe traditionally became priests of this ancient religion and filled the ranks of its highest priestly caste. They mastered the art of healing and Zoroastrian astrology. They knew so much that over time the tribe's own name became a common noun - "magic". Here, in the small hills of the HAMSHAHRATEPE settlement, household items and tools for preparing HAOMA - the ritual drink of the Zoroastrian religion - were found.

A large number of burial mounds, ancient settlements, villages and necropolises (periods ranging from the Bronze Age to the early Middle Ages) have been discovered in the district.

The oldest name of the city is HASILI, later it was renamed ASTRAKHAN-BAZAR. The current name was given to the city in honor of the outstanding Azerbaijani satirical writer JALIL MAMMADGULUZADEH - founder and long-standing editor of the first satirical magazine in the East, "MOLLA NASREDDIN".

Jalilabad has a small local history museum, a park, a hotel and a motel.