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Annotated Copy of Persia and the Persian Question by George Curzon, with Inserted Papers [114r] (234/1814)
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.
FROM ASHKABAD TO KUCHAN 93
village of Imam Kuli, built, as are all these Persian mountain
villages, in tiers upon the hill side—a series of squalid mud terraces
pierced by low holes for doorways. The headman of the village
offered me his house, but I preferred the prospect of cold in a tent
to the certainty of fleas indoors. Here I was met by a messenger
from the
Ilkhani
The paramount chief of certain tribes in south west Iran.
or Chief of Kuchan, whose capital I was to visit
on the morrow, and who had been apprised of my arrival. The
emissary, an old gentleman with white beard most imperfectly dyed
with henna, inquired at what hour I proposed to arrive at Kuchan,
as his master wished to give me a befitting reception outside the
town. I gave him the rendezvous at noon. He suggested that I
should spend an entire day at Imam Kuli—a solicitude on my
behalf which I found to be due to his own reluctance to make the
return journey to Kuchan with sufficient speed to anticipate my
arrival. I replied that the irresistible attractions of Kuchan drew
me on.
As I started at seven o’clock the next morning, a party of
pilgrims for Meshed, who had come from Resht, via Uzun Ada and
Zobaran to Ashkabad, 1 passed out of the village on donkey back in
Kuchan front of me, singing loudly in praise of Ali and Husein,
and other saints of the Shiah calendar. I followed the main road
out of the valley, and then struck off to the south-west, taking a short
cut over a rolling range of hills which constitute the
watershed
The boundary between adjacent drainage basins.
between the streams that drain north to the Atek and those that
drain south to Kuchan. In a ravine on the left could be discerned
the small villages of Kelat-i-Shah Mohammed, watered by a Jcanat
or underground aqueduct, and further on Kelat-i-Mullammamud
(Mullah Mahmud ?). There was no contrast of colour on the
barren hills, even though they now became lower and more
undulating, while their flanks had in parts been ploughed for
grain. The landscape might have been draped in hdiaki, that
excellent but unlovely material with which we clothe our soldiers in
torrid climes. Zobaran (15 miles), though the name signifies plenty,
did not by its appearance betray that it enjoyed plenty of anything
but stones and dust. However, a tiny rill of clear water fed a
1 The Transcaspian Railway is very largely used by Mussulman pilgrims of
both persuasions, making their way to or from the sacred shrines, b or the
Sunnis of Central Asia it supplies an agreeable abridgment of the long journey
to Mecca, and is equally serviceable for that to Kerbela and iSejef. By the
Persian Shiahs and the Mahometans of the West, it is enormously used on the
pilgrimage to the shrine of Imam Reza at Meshed.
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 [114r] (234/1814), British Library: India Office Records and Private Papers, Mss Eur F111/33, in Qatar Digital Library <https://www.qdl.qa/archive/81055/vdc_100157213843.0x000029> [accessed 4 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