Nizami Ganjavi, a genius Azerbaijani poet who lived in the 11th century, wrote about Naftalan in his work Khamsa. He said that oil was extracted from the area called Safi-Kurd, located near the present Naftala, and it was transported to other countries in caravans.
Marco Polo, a European traveler who lived in the 13th century, while passing through the territory of Azerbaijan, wrote that medicinal oil was extracted from wells in the Naftalan area and transported to other places by camels. Until 1783, Naphthalan oil was extracted here from hand-dug wells. In 1890, the German engineer and businessman E. I. Yeager began to extract oil in Naftalan by drilling a well to a depth of 250 meters using an industrial drilling rig. But the quality of the oil that came out surprised him. The oil from here did not contain any gasoline fractions and it did not burn. A German engineer-businessman who is on the verge of bankruptcy learns the experience of making medicines from the people here and builds a factory for the production of medicinal ointment in Naftalan based on it. The medicines produced by him soon became known in many places.