'Persia and the Persian Question by the Hon. George Nathaniel Curzon, M.P.' [‎536] (599/714)

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PERSIA
unusually extensive population), and lias been compared by the
fancy or the recollection of different voyagers to the lands at the
foot of the Himalayas, to the banks of the Lake of Zurich, and to
the wealthy plains of Lombardy. The city, which is situated at an
elevation of 4,400 feet above the sea, contains a population of
between 30,000 and 40,000, the bulk of whom are Afshar Turks
but which comprises a considerable sprinkling of Nestorian, Jewish'
and Armenian families. In ancient history Urumiah is famous
as one of the legendary birthplaces of the scarcely less legendary
Zoroaster, and also as one of the burial-places of the Three Magi,
the city is enclosed within a wall, with seven gates, and an outer
ditch. J he only interior structure of any importance is the arsenal,
a walled building in the centre of the town, the court of which
contains a dozen ancient smooth-bore six-pounders and a single
brass howitzer. Until recently, and while the Kurdish terror
arising out of the rebellion of Sheikh Obeidullah in 1880 pre
vailed, a garrison of three regiments of regulars, armed with
W erndl rifles, was quartered here. To Christian visitors the chief
interest of the place will consist in the fact that it is the head
quarters of the American, French, and English Missions to the
Nestorian populations of the neighbourhood, to which interesting
but somewhat intricate subject I now turn. 1
The Nestorian Christians of the Turco-Persian highlands have
been variously estimated at figures between 100,000 and 200,000,
Origin
the higher being in all probability the more correct cal-
Nestorians culatl0n - ^ tliese b y far the greater number are Turkish
subjects, the Nestorian population of Azerbaijan being,
according to the latest report (which nearly doubles all previous
As a brief bibliography of the Nestorian Question, I have compiled the follow-
ing. E. Smith and H. G. Dwight, Missionary Researches, including a Journey into
ersia, 18.54; Bishop H. Southgate, Tour through Armenia, Kurdistan, fyc., 2 vols.
1840; Eug. Bore (1839-40), four reports in Correspondance et Memoir eft, vol. ii. ;
Dr. A. Grant (1840), Account of the Nestorian Christians settled in Ooroomia ; W.
F. Ainsworth (1840), Travels and Researches in Asia Minor, Mesopotamia, Chaldcea,
and Armenia, 2 vols. 1842; Rev. J. Perkins, Eight Years' Residence in Persia among
t ^J* es l° r ' lans ' 1843 ; R ev. G. P. Badger (1842), Nestorians and their Ritual, 2 vols.
1852; Sir J. Sheil (circ. 1850), Note E to Lady Shell's Glimpses of Life, $c.] D. T.
Stoddard, Mission to Nestorians, 1858; Rev. J. Bassett (1871-85), The Land of the
waw.?; Rev. E. L. Cutts (1876), Christians under the Crescent in Asia-, W. G.
bbott (1880), Report on the Nestorian Christians of Urmia, No. 55 inParliamen-
ary apers, Imke}', No. 5, 1881; Publications of the Archbishop of Canterbury's
P arti ciilarly reports by A. Riley and Rev. Canon Maclean (1884-
0) ; Mrs. Bishop (1890), Journeys in Persia, vol. ii. p. 221 et seq.