The fortress of Q'ueli, now largely in ruins, lies at the village of Kolköy in the present-day district of
Posof, northeastern Turkey, close to the border with Georgia. It is first mentioned in the early 10th-century Georgian
hagiographic text
Passion of Gobron by
Stepane Mtbevari as the site of resistance to the
invading army of the
Azerbaijani emir Yusuf Ibn Abi'l-Saj—Abu l'K'asim of the Georgian accounts—in 914. According to this source, Q'ueli fell after a
28-day siege and the Georgian commanding officer
Gobron, a devoted
Christian, was put to death for having refused to convert to
Islam. By the 920s, Q'ueli had emerged as a chief fortress of
Javakheti, a Georgian duchy which is mentioned in Constantine Porphyrogennetos's
De Ceremoniis as Kouel (Κουελ), so named after the fortress itself. In this passage, Constantine refers to the "
archon of Kouel", which, according to Professor
Cyril Toumanoff, might have been the Georgian
Bagratid prince
David. Due to its strategic location, Q'ueli was a scene of several military conflicts throughout its history. In the 1040s, Q'ueli fell under control of the rebellious Georgian warlord
Liparit, who was eventually dispossessed of it by King
Bagrat IV of Georgia in 1059. The fortress was then apparently given in possession to Murvan
Jaq'eli, who appears as the
eristavi (duke) of Q'ueli in the 1060s. In 1065 it was passed by the
Seljuqid sultan
Alp-Arslan during his Georgian campaigns. In 1080, the Turks led by amir Ahmad, probably of the
Mamlān dynasty, surprised and defeated King
George II of Georgia at Q'ueli. In the 16th century, Q'ueli, along with much of southwest Georgia, fell under the Ottoman sway and lost its past importance. ==References==