Although there have recently been a few remarkable interventions made in the origins, dynamics, extent, and repercussions of 1895 Hamidian massacres in the eastern vilayets, there has been a lack of research to date into the issue of unfolding these massacres in the region of Cilicia (southern Anatolia). The city of Aintab, surrounded by lesser extensions of the Tarsus mountains in the west and the north and being a part of Cilicia, was affected by this atmosphere of violence. The massacres of November 1895 in Aintab, remembered as Balta Senesi (The Year of the Ax), as most of the Christians were killed by cutting tools like knives, axes, and bayonets—though firearms were also used, began on the morning of 16 November and continued until the evening of 19 November. A number of local elites and state officials played an active role in the massacres and plundering. The Armenians of Aintab were not all passive victims of this persecution. They resisted the Muslim mob’s assaults, particularly in the Armenian quarters. The exact number of victims is unknown. According to various records, the approximate number of Armenians killed from 16 to 19 November in Aintab is between 300 and 400 out of an Armenian population of 15,390 recorded in the 1895 Yearbook of Aleppo (the total population of Aintab was recorded as 84,135). The official Ottoman sources report that approximately sixty Muslims and 110 Christians died. The estimated number of plundered shops ranges from 900 to 1,500 and that of pillaged houses from 500 to 600. In addition, Christian graveyards were desecrated, the bones carried off and scattered, and Christian-owned trees were destroyed. Drawing upon primary sources from Ottoman-Turkish, Armenian and British archives as well as memoirs and personal papers, this paper explores the massacres of 1895 in Aintab, unveiling the immediate context, scope, the role of rumour, actors, Armenian resistance and momentous consequences of the anti-Armenian violence. It also aims to disclose how the Zeitun incident affected Armenians of Aintab and to discuss the peculiar dynamics and socio-political atmosphere in the city in the aftermath of the massacres.