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Kars is a city in northeast Turkey and the capital of the Kars Province, formerly at the head of a sanjak in the Turkish vilayet of Erzurum. It is situated in 40°37′N 43°6′E. Population: 8,672 (1878); 20,891 (1897), 54,000 (1970).

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In the 10th century the region surrounding Kars was an Armenian Kingdom, ruled by the Bagratid family. Later on, Kars was captured and destroyed by the Seljuk Turks, by the Mongols in the 13th century, and by Timur (Tamerlane) in 1387. The citadel was strong enough to withstand a siege by Nadir Shah of Persia, in 1731, and in 1807 it successfully resisted the Russians. After a brave defence it surrendered on June 23, 1828 to the Russian general Count Ivan Paskevich, 11,000 men becoming prisoners of war. During the Crimean War the Turkish garrison, guided by General William Fenwick Williams and other foreign officers, kept the Russians at bay during a protracted siege; but after the garrison had been devastated by cholera and food had utterly failed, nothing was left but to capitulate in November of 1855. The fortress was again stormed by the Russians in the Battle of Kars during the Russo-Turkish War, 1877-78 and on its conclusion was transferred to Russia by the Treaty of San Stefano.

Russia lost Kars, Ardahan and Batum by the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk on March 3, 1918. The Turks occupied Kars on April 25, 1918 and the Republic of Southwest Caucasus was established in the zone, but when the armistice of Mudros (October 1918) was established the Ottoman army withdrew to the frontiers of 1914. The British occupied Batum but the Ottomans refused to relinquish Kars; its military governor constituted a provisional government led by Fahrettin Pirioglu that claimed Turkish sovereignty over Kars and the Turkish-speaking and Islamic neighbouring regions to Batum and Gumru (Alexandropol). The region was occupied by Armenia in January 1919 but the pro-Turkish government was supported in the city of Kars until the arrival of the British troops, who dissolved it on April 19, 1919, sending its leaders to Malta. Kars was given to Armenia together with Ardahan in May 1919. The Turkish-Armenian war of September-December1920, and the fall of the First Republic resulted in the treaty of Alexandropol signed by the representatives of Armenia and Turkey on December 2 1920, in accordance with which Armenia was to give up all the territories granted to her by the treaty of Sevres and to cede to Turkey about 60 per cent of her prewar territory including Kars.

Following the Turkish War of Independence, Turkey signed the Treaty of Kars (October 23, 1921) with the Soviet Union in which Turkey relinquished claims to Batum in return for sovereignty over Kars and Ardahan. The government of Armenia to the present day, do not officially recognize the current border. The borders as defined by the treaty of Kars, are far from been fair from the point of view of Armenian nationalists many of whom still consider the treaty of Sevres as the basis for the resolution of Turkish-Armenian conflict.

As a city at the juncture of Caucasian, Russian, and Turkish cultures, the buildings of Kars come in a variety of architectures. Kars Kalesi, the citadel atop a plateau overlooking Kars, appears to have been built by Ottoman Sultan Murad III during the war with Persia, at the close of the 16th century. At the foot of the plateau is St. Arak'elos Cathedral, or the Church of the Apostles, now a museum. Built in the 10th century, it constitutes a domed tetraconch atop a square base with four apses. The drum of the dome features bas relief depictions of The Twelve Apostles and the dome itself is covered by a conical roof.