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Annotated Copy of Persia and the Persian Question by George Curzon, with Inserted Papers [356r] (714/1814)
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.
INSTITUTIONS AND DEFORMS
483
tion of a nation’s birthright in favour of foreign speculators. We
have seen in other and contemporaneous cases enough of the evil
effects of a country or a people sustained and exploited by foreign
capitalists, and falling a prey to successive gangs of selfish adven
turers—according as subconcessions are granted in a descending
scale by the parent government or company—to know that it is
not by such methods that national stability is built up. Persia
may be, and is, deplorably infirm; but she will never be able to
stand if she voluntarily surrenders the use of all her limbs. Her
regeneration must doubtless be worked out by foreign aid, and to
some extent by foreign capital—as is now being attempted—but
native enterpiise, native industry, and native resources must play
some part in the undertaking, or an artificial redemption will only
have been achieved at the cost of national atrophy. England would
seemingly have been placed in a position of overwhelming political
preponderance by the realisation of the Reuter Concession. But it
would have been at the expense of the best interests of Persia, and
since it is one of the objects of this book to show that Persian
interests are British interests, or, in other words, that a strong
Peisia should be the object of British diplomacv, we may con
gratulate ourselves that a scheme which postulated the reduction
of that country to impotence broke down.
It was said at the time of the Reuter Concession that one of
the reasons for confiding powers so enormous to a single individual
Conces- or to a single company, was the desire of the Persian
mongers Governmen t to escape from the conflicting offers of a
horde of foreign speculators, who, ever since the opening
of the Indo-European Telegraph in 1865, had settled down upon
Persia, and were clamouring for a share in the division of the spoils.
Por a time the collapse of the Iteuter scheme frightened away these
harpies; but as confidence was re-established, and more especially
when, under the friendly pressure of the British Government, con
cessions such as those for the navigation of the Karun river and
the Imperial Bank were granted, they began to reassemble; and
on the return of the Shah from his last European journey a crowd
of these interested applicants descended like a flight of locusts upon
Teheran. The air was full of rumours of concessions for the exclusive
introduction, or manufacture, or growth of wine, sugar, glass, tele
phones, electric light, and in one instance for a monopoly of all agri
cultural produce ! To a temperament and to tastes such as those of
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 [356r] (714/1814), British Library: India Office Records and Private Papers, Mss Eur F111/33, in Qatar Digital Library <https://www.qdl.qa/archive/81055/vdc_100157213845.0x000079> [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