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Annotated Copy of Persia and the Persian Question by George Curzon, with Inserted Papers [158r] (318/1814)
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 KUCHAN TO KELAT-I-NADIRI
141
we threaded this intricate and precipitous defile, clambering over
the boulders in the river-bed, now confined in a narrow chasm,
now emerging upon a neat little valley. MacGregor, who was a
good judge of country from the soldier’s point of view, paid no
ordinary, though a well-deserved, tribute to this section of the
Meshed-Kelat road when, in his graphic way, he said :
I certainly have never seen a stronger bit of country than the
twenty-seven miles between Kardeh and Vardeh, it being one continual
succession of impregnable defiles, any one of which would make the
road celebrated. . . . The country is more like what one would see in
a nightmare than anything one has ever beheld awake. 1
On the way we pass a mighty lump of sheer rock, perched
upon the top of a 1 , 000 -feet slope, and known as the Kuh-i-
Panjmana or Five-mcm (= about 32 lbs.) Mountain, from a
story about a facetious monarch who invited one of his courtiers
to weigh the airy trifle. A little further, on the left hand, is an
Arabic and Persian inscription upon the smoothed surface of a big
limestone block, some twenty feet above the path, which records a
victory of Sheibani Mohammed Khan, the Uzbeg conqueror of
Bokhara, over the Persian unbelievers in the year of the Hejira
916 . We then came to a little village, the name of which was
pronounced to me as Hark (or Whark), where I found an agreeable
shade in an orchard sloping down to the stream. After another
six miles through the same defile, the valley widened into an open
plain, at the head of which, surrounded by trees, was situated the
larger village of Kardeh. It is an insignificant place, but is the
residence of the chief of a petty district.
October 21.—After skirting the eastern slope of the hills that
enclose the valley of Kardeh, the track to Aleshed plunges into a
p c -^ 0 narrow gorge, called the Derbend-i-Kardeh, through
Meshed which the stream, coursing in rapid zigzags between the
walls, occupied the whole of the slender space between. Above
the lower slopes the cliffs rose in craggy magnificence to a sheer
height of 1,000 or 1,500 feet. This ravine equalled m savage
splendour anything that I had seen even during the past week of
astonishing scenery ; and I could not help thinking that if those
who rave about the Alpine passes, set though they be m the
incomparable framework of snow and ice, could travel to this
unvisited corner of Asia, even their senses would be bewildered by
1 Journey through Khorasan, vol. ii. pp. 44, 49.
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 [158r] (318/1814), British Library: India Office Records and Private Papers, Mss Eur F111/33, in Qatar Digital Library <https://www.qdl.qa/archive/81055/vdc_100157213843.0x00007d> [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