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Shirvan, was historically part of any kingdom that was in control of this region. So outlining that it was historically part of Persia is original research, which needs to be corrected. Atabek (talk) 23:51, 19 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Peter Golden has described linguistic shifts in the area. That is there were Caucasian languages present. Iranian present starts from Achaemenid times, but actual Iranianization in Shirwan starts in the late Sassanid era and continued to the Sherwanshah Era. So I am not sure what is meant by antiquity. But in antiquity it would be Caucasian tribes. Turkic present (with the exception of Hunnic/Khazaric incursions and minor possible Khazar settlements) starts from the Seljuq era but really the Turkification probably starts from Safavid and Qajar eras. The history section in the book (Altsdadt) is fairly weak and Amazon says: "Altstadt's original research adds the Azerbaijani perspective on the two-century relationship between Russia and Azerbaijan." So Ashurbeyli seems like a local historian. I rather quote Western historians.
The main city of Shirvan, Shemakha, was known to Romans as Xamaxia, so it existed in pre-Sasanian times. That was in the 1st century A.D. It is probably worth mentioning. As for the region in general, Minorsky says that it was mentioned for the first time in Sasanian times, so it is logical to start the history of the region from Sasanian times. According to one of the versions, the name Shirvan means the place of lions (from Persian shir - lion, and van - place). There are other versions too, so there's no consensus on what the name of the region means. It seems like the original Albanian population was Iranized, after it mixed with settlers from Iran, and later Turkisized, after it mixed with Turkic tribes. --Grandmaster10:31, 6 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Yes I have heared that version of the etymology. Khaqani uses Sherwan and Shirwan in one sentence with two different spellings شروان and شیروان. The latter definitely meants protector/protected of/by lions. The linguistic shifts in the region is as you mentioned which I tried to portray accurately. --Nepaheshgar (talk) 15:40, 6 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]