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Annotated Copy of Persia and the Persian Question by George Curzon, with Inserted Papers [240r] (482/1814)
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.
IvU- kiM* fft* 2 ZM
t f
0
FROM MESHED TO TEHERAN
t s*.
287
History
in the present century, is now in a pitiable state of decay. The
deserted ruins of a huge square citadel—a room in which used to
be preserved and shown as the apartment wherein Hath Ali Shah
first saw the light—rise above the cubical domes of the bazaar, but
are fast crumbling to pieces. I rode through the bazaar, which
consists of a long covered street, far less cleanly and decorous than
that of Shahrud. Through the town runs a stream, flowing down
from a spring in the mountains called Chashmeh-i-Ali, where is
both a summer residence of the Shah, and also a place of pilgrim
age, as one of the spots where Ali’s charger appears to have
stamped so fiercely with his hoof as to leave a permanent indenta
tion in the rock. On a hill-top near this miraculous site a further
miracle exists in the shape of a spring, called Chashmeh-i-Bad (or
Fountain of the Wind), which, if stirred at certain times, is said to
produce a hurricane that blows everything to destruction. 1
Damghan has a twofold historical interest—legendary and
modern. It is always supposed to mark the site of the ancient
Hekatompylos (or City of a Hundred Gates), the name
given by the Greeks to the capital of the Arsacid dynasty
of Parthian kings, although, with the exception of a number of
mounds and of several underground conduits, built of large slabs
of stone, there does not exist, and is not on record as having
existed, at Damghan a single remain that could be identified
with so illustrious a past. Ferrier, I think erroneously, en
deavours to combat this theory by the argument that the City of
a Hundred Gates must mean a city in which many roads met,
whereas at Damghan there are only two. He, therefore, prefers
the Shahrud-Bostam site for that of Hekatompylos. 2 Apart, how
ever, from the fact that more roads meet at Damghan than two,
it is by no means certain that the Greeks, when they used this
descriptive epithet, referred to city gates at all. The title was
equally applied by them to Egyptian Thebes, where it has been
conjectured to refer to the joyloiis, or gateways, of the many splendid
temples by which the capital of the Bameses was adorned ; and it may
have had some similar application in the case of the Parthian city.
Persia for large and fine buildiDgs, and would apply to the mosque, not to tho
minaret. Similarly, Maschide Jam is, of course, the Musjid-i-Jama (or ‘ Town
Mosque ’ ), like the ‘ Umversity Church ’ at Oxford or Cambridge.
1 J. B. Fraser, A Winter's Journey, vol. ii. p. 400; E. B. Eastwick, vol. ih
p. 157; Colonel Val. Baker, p. 138.
2 Caravan Journeys, pp. 69-74.
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 [240r] (482/1814), British Library: India Office Records and Private Papers, Mss Eur F111/33, in Qatar Digital Library <https://www.qdl.qa/archive/81055/vdc_100157213844.0x000059> [accessed 6 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