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Annotated Copy of Persia and the Persian Question by George Curzon, with Inserted Papers [427v] (857/1814)
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.
606
PERSIA
already some jealousy between them, the pay, uniform, &c., which
are part of the endowment of the king’s college, acting as an
attraction which the Naib’s college cannot equal. What the
type of officer may be that the latter will ultimately produce
remains to be seen. .The cadets that I saw were very young
bo vs.
•j
While I am upon the subject of military reforms, I may mention
two other schemes whose inauguration followed the first European
Military journey of the Shah, and was itself speedily followed by
hospital their collapse. One of these was a Staff College, under
a Danish officer. The other was a military hospital with twenty
beds. An annual endowment was granted by the Shah, and
regularly disappeared into the pockets of the hospital superinten
dent; and no provision appears to have been made for staff
medicine, or treatment. One day the Shah announced his inten
tion of visiting the hospital, which, as usual, was empty. The
superintendent was equal to the emergency. Twentv soldiers were
hurriedly brought in from the barrack or bazaars, placed under the
coverlets and instructed to groan when the sovereign walked in.
Nor could anyone complain, seeing that the experiment was equally
agreeable to all parties.
The average stamp of Persian officer being what I have described,
it is not to be wondered at that his quality reacts with disastrous
The rank force upon and is reproduced in exaggerated proportions
and file among the men. During the half-century since the Persian
serbaz has ceased to be put through his exercises by British drill
sergeants, and in the absence of any equivalent tuition, and the
chronic stint of equipment, rations, and pay, he has sunk to a very
low position in the scale of efficiency, courage, and fighting power.
Military service is distasteful to him from the start. He is rarely if
ever, a volunteer. Ill-fed, ill-clad, and unpaid, in the intervals’of
service, and often while actually with the colours, he ekes out a scanty
subsistence by plying the trade of a butcher, or porter, or money
changer, or common labourer in the bazaars; from which employ
ment he emerges on parade days, struggles into a uniform supplied
from the depot, and, his perfunctory duty fulfilled, returns to his
civil avocation. Even the men in uniform and actually embodied
are usually to be seen slouching about the bazaars anyhow, and doing
nothing. It is perhaps in respect of his pay that he is most to be
pitied; for the money leaves the State chest in the first place, and
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 [427v] (857/1814), British Library: India Office Records and Private Papers, Mss Eur F111/33, in Qatar Digital Library <https://www.qdl.qa/archive/81055/vdc_100157213846.0x000040> [accessed 30 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