according to Doctor of Historical Sciences Hamlet Petrosyan, received archaeological confirmation during excavations at the beginning of the 21st century.

19th - early 20th centuries
From 1755 to 1823 Shusha remained the capital of the Karabakh khanate. Under Ibrahim Khalil Khan, the city was divided into three quarters: Tabrizli, Kazanchali and Aglisli. According to the source of 1795, there were more than 10 thousand people in Shusha. Since 1813 (actually since 1805) - as part of Russia.
During the Russo-Persian War of 1826-1828, the small garrison of Shushi under the command of Colonel Reutt heroically resisted the Iranian army of Abbas Mirza for about 40 days.
After the transformation of the Karabakh khanate into a province in November 1822, Shusha became the center of the province and the residence of the military district chief of the Muslim provinces, Lieutenant General Prince V. G. Madatov. The position of military district chief was established in 1824. In fact, his activity began in 1817. Since 1840, Shusha has been a county town of the Caspian region, since December 14, 1846 - the newly formed Shemakha, and since 1859 - the Baku province. In December 1867, he became part of the Elizavetpol province.
In the 19th century, three master plans were drawn up (in the 1820s, 1837 and 1855), according to which the active development of the city was carried out. By the end of the 19th century, the upland part of the city was Armenian, while the lower part was Tatar. In the Armenian part there was a real school and a district seminary for girls; offices were also located there. Many rich Armenian merchants lived in the city. In the Tatar part of the city there was a Russian-Tatar school, a number of music schools, as well as private schools of Govkhar-Aga (sister of the last Karabakh khan) and Samed-bek Agayev. The first theater was built in 1896 by Mkrtich Khandamiryan (Khandamirov) (next to the Ghazanchetsots Church). In 1905 a new building of the real school was built. In 1889, at the expense of the Azerbaijani poetess Khurshidbanu Natavan, a water supply was installed in the city from the Isa spring. The oldest surviving mosque in Shusha was built in 1768 by Ibrahim Khan, the oldest church was built in 1816 by the Baaduryan brothers. At the beginning of the 20th century, there were two cathedral and several quarter mosques and one Orthodox church in the city. Parts of the fortress walls, two castles (all from the 18th century), numerous residential stone buildings have survived from the old city. 18th-19th century houses in the Armenian quarters, the Armenian Cathedral. The streets were fairly wide and paved with stone; In general, the city was distinguished by some improvement.
In 1912, the first Russian-Azerbaijani women's school for 20-30 people was opened in Shusha through the efforts of the doctor Abdul Kerim Mehmandarov.
Until 1920, 22 newspapers were published in Shusha at different times, of which 20 were in Armenian and 2 were in Russian.

1905-1906
The first Armenian-Azerbaijani clashes in Shusha date back to the beginning of the 20th century. Back in the 1890s, the tsarist government increased the Armenian representation in local administrative bodies in order to weaken the influence of the Muslim nobility. As a result of the reforms of 1892, Armenians began to dominate the city councils of such cities as Shusha, Baku and Erivan, which caused discontent among the Azerbaijani population. Soon, however, the tsarist authorities, concerned about the excessively increased influence of the Armenian bourgeoisie, especially in large urban centers, tried to neutralize it by provoking conflicts with the local Muslim population. The subsequent reforms of the power structures led to an aggravation of the situation in Shusha, as well as in the territory of the whole of Azerbaijan, now causing discontent among the Armenian intelligentsia, who did not want to give up their positions in political and economic life. Following the events of 1905 in Baku, Elizavetpol and other cities of Azerbaijan, Armenian-Azerbaijani clashes also began in Shusha.
In Shusha, the Armenian-Tatar massacre in the summer of 1906 was provoked by the armed formations of the Armenian nationalist party Dashnaktsutyun. Both sides used the tactic of burning houses, leading to massive fires. A lot of houses of Armenians and the entire commercial part, the theater were burned down. About 80 houses burned down in the Azerbaijani sector. The number of victims of the massacre was 300 people, of which 200 were Muslims. The material damage amounted to about 5 million rubles.

1918
On May 28, 1918, the Provisional National Council of Azerbaijan proclaimed the creation of an independent state - the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic - on the territory of the former Baku and Elizavetpol provinces of the Russian Empire, including Karabakh and Zangezur. However, the Armenian population of Karabakh and Zangezur categorically refused to recognize the authority of the ADR. July 22, 1918 in Shusha The First Congress of the Armenians of Karabakh took place, which proclaimed the independence of Nagorno-Karabakh and elected its own People's Government. In September 1918, at the II Congress of the Armenians of Karabakh, the government was renamed the Armenian National Council of Karabakh.
The new government, according to the Armenian population, managed to restore order in the region covered by anarchy: “the unbridled were tamed, the robbers were driven away, the spies of the Armenians of Azerbaijan [sic] were shot. Life began to return to normal.” At the same time, the report of N. Mikhailov, a member of the Extraordinary Investigative Commission established by the ADR parliament, stated that it was at this time that the massacres of the Muslim population of Shusha and the Shusha district by Armenians began. The report recorded data on more than a hundred Muslims killed, including women, the elderly and children. The report reported that the killings of Muslims were accompanied by robberies and theft of their property, arson of houses and other buildings.
Meanwhile, the ADR government tried to subdue Nagorno-Karabakh with the help of Turkish troops that invaded Transcaucasia after the signing of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk between the Central Powers and Soviet Russia. The commander of the Turkish troops, Nuri Pasha, presented an ultimatum to the National Council of Karabakh on recognizing the authority of the ADR, but the Second Congress of the Armenians of Karabakh, convened on September 6, 1918, rejected it. In September, Shusha was occupied by the combined Azerbaijani-Turkish troops, who disarmed the Armenian units and carried out mass arrests among the local intelligentsia.
In November 1918, after the capitulation of Turkey to the Entente, the evacuation of Turkish troops from Karabakh and the entry of British troops into Azerbaijan, power in Karabakh again passed to the Armenian National Council (government) of Karabakh.

1919 dual power
On January 15, 1919, the British command, before the final resolution of disputes at the Paris Peace Conference, approved Khosrov-bek Sultanov, appointed by the Azerbaijani government, as the governor-general of Karabakh (with Zangezur). The Armenians were shocked not only by the open support of the Azerbaijani authorities by the British, but also by the very choice of the governor-general. Khosrov-bek Sultanov was known for his pan-Turkist and Armenophobic views and participation in the Baku in September 1918.
Sultanov arrived in Shusha on 10 February. The National Council of the Armenians of Karabakh refused, however, to submit to him, and an actual dual power was established in the city. On April 23, the 5th Congress of Armenians of Karabakh declared "unacceptable any administrative program that has at least some connection with Azerbaijan."
Sultanov, meanwhile, with the connivance of the British, blocked the communication and trade of Nagorno-Karabakh with the plain, which caused famine in Nagorno-Karabakh. At the same time, he organized irregular Kurdish-Tatar cavalry units under the leadership of two of his brothers.

On June 4, the Azerbaijani army tried to occupy the Armenian positions and the Armenian part of the city. The attack was repulsed, and the parties were separated by British sepoys, under whose guard three days later the Azerbaijani unit was brought into the Armenian quarter and occupied the barracks. According to the statements of the National Council of the Armenians of Karabakh, Sultanov gave direct orders for the massacre and pogrom in the Armenian quarters (“you can do everything, just do not set fire to houses. We need houses.”
Simultaneously with the events in Shusha, the Azerbaijanis massacred several Armenian villages. On June 5, a detachment led by Sultan-bek Sultanov (the governor's brother) completely cut out the village of Gaiballu (Armenian Gaibalushen, also known as Kaybalikend), which was, as the British specifically noted, "directly next to Shusha in full view of Sultanov's house." According to the British, out of 700 inhabitants, 11 men and 87 women and children survived. The Azerbaijani officer who stopped the pogroms of two Armenian villages was punished by Sultanov. Based on these facts, the representative of the British command, Colonel Cloterberg, in his report demanded that Sultanov be brought to justice.
On August 12, the 7th Congress of Armenians of Karabakh opened in Shusha. Sultanov, in response, ordered to block the Shusha-Yevlakh highway and all roads leading to Nagorno-Karabakh, pointed guns at the Armenian part of the city and demanded in an ultimatum to recognize the power of Azerbaijan within 48 hours. Considering that the English garrison, preparing for the upcoming evacuation from Azerbaijan, was withdrawn from Shusha, the Armenians found themselves in a hopeless situation and on August 22 concluded an agreement according to which Nagorno-Karabakh declared that it considers itself “temporarily within the borders of the Republic of Azerbaijan” (until the final decision question at the Paris Peace Conference). The governor received an Armenian assistant and 6 advisers (three Armenians and three Muslims); the Armenians retained