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Annotated Copy of Persia and the Persian Question by George Curzon, with Inserted Papers [72v] (151/1814)
The record is made up of 2 volumes with inserts (898 folios). It was created in 1892-1924. It was written in English, Urdu and German. The original is part of the British Library: India Office The department of the British Government to which the Government of India reported between 1858 and 1947. The successor to the Court of Directors. Records and Private Papers Documents collected in a private capacity. .
Transcription
This transcription is created automatically. It may contain errors.
12
PERSIA
of travel in the East, they may win a hearing even from the
desultory reader. Nor shall I despair of arousing his concern
when I turn from a past, however eventful, to a present,
lessness of however degenerate and sad. A country that possesses
no railways is ipso facto the possessor of a great charm.
Here may still in many parts be found a people retaining the in
digenous customs and modes of Asiatic life, and as yet unawakened
to the summons that is beating at their doors. Fifty years hence
the outlying towns of Persia may have taken on some of the varnish
of the capital, and have lost their peculiar individuality of com
bined dignity and decay. But for the present Persia is of the
East, most Eastern; and though the Persian nobleman may ride
in a Russian brougham, the Persian merchant carry a French
watch, and the Persian peasant wear a Manchester blouse, yet the
heart of the nation is unregenerate, and is fanatically (and not
always unfortunately) attached to the ancient order of things.
We may still re-echo the words of the philosophic Chardin :—
That it is not in Asia as in our Europe, where there are frequent
changes more or less in the forms of things, as the habits, buildings,
gardenings and the like. In the East they are constant in all things.
The habits are at this day in the same manner as in the precedent
ages ; so that one may reasonably believe that in that part of the world
the exterior forms of things (as their manners and customs) are the
same now as they were 2,000 years since, except in such changes as
may have been introduced by religion, which are nevertheless very
inconsiderable.
And here let me endeavour in some sort to explain to others
what I am sometimes conscious of having only imperfectly ex-
charm iding v]amed , to m y self , viz. the wonderful and incalculable
fascination of the East. Mr. Stanley in one of his letters
spoke of the mysterious Soudan fever which drew Gordon and
many another brave spirit to perish in the dim recesses of Africa,
and which will require how many more human hecatombs before
i s appetite be appeased ? Just such another, though a less perilous
contagion is that which tempts the traveller into Asia, makes him
regardless of the petty restraints of distance and time, animated
only by a burning desire to go on. Perhaps it is that in the wide
andscape, m tlm plains stretching without break to mountains,
and the mountains succeeded by plains, in the routes that are
W 1 ou roads, m the roads that are without banks or ditches, in
About this item
- Content
These two volumes are George Curzon's own personal annotated copies of both volumes of his book Persia and the Persian Question , which was published in 1892. Alongside the volumes are various loose papers relating to Persia [Iran], consisting of the following: received correspondence; newspaper cuttings; publishers' press releases; cuttings from various booksellers' catalogues; various journal and magazine articles; two items of printed official British correspondence; several prints of photographs and sketches; and a few handwritten notes by Curzon.
In most cases these papers, which range in date from 1892 to 1924, relate to the chapters in the book where they were originally inserted, suggesting that they were kept by Curzon with the intention of using them to inform a revised edition of the book.
Of particular note among the small amount of correspondence are two letters received by Curzon in 1914 and 1915 from retired schoolmaster and Islamic scholar Sayyid Mazhar Hasan Musawi of Saharanpur, Uttar Pradesh, India (ff 5-9 and ff 44-53). These letters, which are written in Urdu and are accompanied by English translations, discuss in detail several inaccuracies found in the Urdu version of Persia and the Persian Question .
The various prints of photographs and sketches, which were originally inserted into volume two, are of different locations in the Gulf region. Several of these appear to have been produced in preparation for the publication of the second volume of John Gordon Lorimer's Gazetteer of the Persian Gulf The historical term used to describe the body of water between the Arabian Peninsula and Iran. , Oman and Central Arabia (i.e. the 'Geographical and Statistical' section) in 1908, as they are identical to the versions found in that volume.
Also of note among the loose papers are an illustrated article from Country Life dated 5 June 1920, entitled 'The People of Persia' (ff 36-37), and a printed family tree of the Shah of Persia [Aḥmad Shah Qājār], produced in preparation of his visit to Britain in 1919 (f 233).
Volume one of Persia and the Persian Question contains a map of Persia, Afghanistan and Beluchistan [Balochistan], which is folded inside the front cover (f 1).
The German language material consists of a publisher's press release for two books authored by German archaeologist Ernst Emil Herzfeld (ff 29-30).
- Extent and format
- 2 volumes with inserts (898 folios)
- Physical characteristics
Foliation: this shelfmark consists of two physical volumes. The foliation sequence commences at the first folio of volume one (1-463), and terminates at the last folio of volume two (ff 464-898); these numbers are written in pencil, are circled, and are located in the top right corner of the recto The front of a sheet of paper or leaf, often abbreviated to 'r'. side of each folio. Each volume contains a large number of loose leaves, which have been foliated in the order that they were inserted into the volume; for conservation reasons, these loose folios have been removed from the volume and stored separately. The foliation sequence does not include the front and back covers of the two volumes.
Pagination: the file also contains an original printed pagination sequence.
- Written in
- English, Urdu and German in Latin and Arabic script View the complete information for this record
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Annotated Copy of Persia and the Persian Question by George Curzon, with Inserted Papers [72v] (151/1814), British Library: India Office Records and Private Papers, Mss Eur F111/33, in Qatar Digital Library <https://www.qdl.qa/archive/81055/vdc_100157213842.0x00009e> [accessed 5 June 2026]
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- Reference
- Mss Eur F111/33
- Title
- Annotated Copy of Persia and the Persian Questionby George Curzon, with Inserted Papers
- Pages
- 54r:135v, 147r:149v, 158r:180v, 183r:221v, 224r:224v, 227r:246v, 248r:257v, 259r:260v, 268r:362v, 364r:364v, 367r:388v, 390r:400v, 402r:416v, 419r:432v, 434r:444v, 448r:462v, 464r:471v, 475r:481v, 483r:513v, 516r:525v, 527r:544v, 546r:563v, 566r:598v, 600r:622v, 624r:656v, 658r:665v, 667r:675v, 678r:684v, 687r:688v, 691r:691v, 693r:693v, 695r:708v, 711r:721v, 724r:726v, 728r:729v, 731r:736v, 742r:742v, 746r:757v, 759r:761v, 763r:763v, 765r:765v, 772r:777v, 780r:789v, 793r:794v, 797r:809v, 811r:821v, 825r:840v, 843r:898v
- Author
- Curzon, George Nathaniel, 1st Marquess Curzon of Kedleston
- Usage terms
- Public Domain