![Annotated Copy of <em>Persia and the Persian Question</em> by George Curzon, with Inserted Papers [‎488r] (986/1814)](https://iiif.qdl.qa/iiif/images/81055/vdc_100000001491.0x00033b/Mss Eur F111_33_1000.jp2/full/!1200,1200/0/default.jpg "Annotated Copy of <em>Persia and the Persian Question</em> by George Curzon, with Inserted Papers [‎488r] (986/1814)")
Annotated Copy of Persia and the Persian Question by George Curzon, with Inserted Papers [488r] (986/1814)
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.
19
FROM TEHERAN TO ISFAHAN
village of Murchakhar, near to which, on November 13. 1729 Nadir
Shah inflicted a decisive defeat on the Afghans, who were soon ex
pelled root and branch from the country. Here also in 1785 died
Ali Murad Khan, who enjoyed a brief reign of four years in the
anarchy that succeeded the death of Kerim Khan Zend. A short
rise leads past the large Mader-i-Shah
caravanserai
A roadside inn providing accommodation for caravans (groups of travellers).
, built of brick
upon a foundation of blueish stone by the mother of Shah Abbas,
to the crest of a low ri( % e tlia t separates the plains of Murchakhar
and Isfahan. Thence over the fiat we speed in the direction of the
Sefavi capital, already indicated by faint blue smoke-wreaths and
by the converging lines of innumerable Imnats. Behind it the
panorama is closed by mountains of striking and irregular outline. 1
As we approach the city the most conspicuous objects in the
landscape are a number of large circular towers with smaller turrets
Pigeon- projecting from their summits, sometimes sixty to seventy
towers feet in total lieiglltj planted in the midgt of enclosures
and gardens, and suggesting to the untutored eye the fortalices of
a feudal baronage. The real explanation is deplorably material
and deficient in the slenderest element of romance. They are
pigeon-towers, erected for the preservation of the dung and for the
breeding of those birds, who spend the day afield and return at
night to these comfortable quarters. The photograph which I
present of a section of the interior will show that the towers con
tain an infinite number of cells 2 and a well in the middle for col
lecting the manure, which is spread upon the melon-beds in the
surrounding fields. 3 They are opened and cleaned once a year,
but I should imagine that the damage inflicted on the grain crops
by the depredations of the birds would all but counterbalance the
profit accruing from the distribution of their guano. In Char
din’s time there were reckoned to be 3,000 of these pigeon-towers
1 From Kashan to Isfahan, an alternative, but more circuitous, route runs to
the east via Natanz. It was followed and described by several of the seventeenth
century travellers, e.g. John Struys (1672), Travels, cap. xxx., and C. Le Brun
(1703), Travels, cap. xxxvii. Compare A. H. Schindler (1879), Zeit. d. Gesell.f.
Erd. z. Berlin, vol. xiv. pp. 307-66.
2 Dr. Wills mentions a single tower as containing 7,000 cells, and giving
accommodation, therefore, to 14,000 pigeons. Since Isfahan, however, ceased to be
a capital, melons do not fetch so high a price; and, accordingly, the majority of
the towers have fallen into ruin.
3 Dr. Fryer {Travels into Persia, 1676, letter v.) is responsible for the state
ment that the pigeons’ dung was used ‘ to supply the Magazines with Salt-Petre
for making gunpowder,’ a use which is, I confess, novel to me.
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 [488r] (986/1814), British Library: India Office Records and Private Papers, Mss Eur F111/33, in Qatar Digital Library <https://www.qdl.qa/archive/81055/vdc_100157213846.0x0000bb> [accessed 9 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