Annotated Copy of Persia and the Persian Question by George Curzon, with Inserted Papers [‎523r] (1058/1814)

FROM ISFAHAN TO SHIRAZ
71
6 llave risen
lre We ari^
011 tIle rente
attractive j,
the Will 0w))
^nattractiv e
Hounded by
post-house^
Llte sum
n o will 0WSt
^gor to the
; half of the
t-Bahur, and
ooting-boxes
and though
lered one of
3 before my
ees of frost;
rred; and I
and upland
.s and other
r seasons of
ing, grazing
herever they
about them
er the hills,
n by a very
oy a recent
arge ruined
Cerim Khan
River, which
successive!)
• persepd! 8 ?
Pul-i-Khan.
track the 11
of hills by'
valleys aI
iat present
pushing o ut
in great abundance from tire hillside it races down the slope, for
all the world just like an English tront-stream. At the bottom
of the descent, the village of Murghab is seen, clustered against
the hillside in an open valley. The distance from Dehbid is
reckoned as seven farsakhs, but is probably a little more, or about
twenty-nine miles. It took me exactly four hours to accomplish,
cantering whenever there was fifty yards of possible ground. At
Murghab the stream was peopled by a number of wild fowl. I
saw several wild dnek, a number of snipe, which were quite tame,
and a great many plovers. Riding down the valley by the side of
a creek infested with these and other water-fowl, I crossed a second
small valley containing the tiny hamlet of Deh-i-Nau, and passed
over a slight acclivity into a third, which contains the ruins of
the famous capital of Cyrus. Here I must pause to deal with
some fulness with a question that has throughout this century been
a disputed point of archaeology and history, and which, if it cannot
be definitely solved by travellers who have been to the spot, can
still less be decided ex cathedra by professors or students sitting,
with their Arrian and Strabo, or with translations of the cuneiform
inscriptions open before them, at home. I have endeavoured to
master both sides of the controversy; and the result at which I
arrive, even if it carries conviction to the mind of any reader, is
advanced with no dogmatism.
The method that I propose to adopt will be first to describe the
nature of the remains still surviving in the valley of the Polvar,
Enins of an d, secondly, to state the arguments that have been, or
Pasargadse. can be, advanced for or against their identification with the
1 OT1T1 • * * • •
ancient Pasargadre. The ruins fall into six separate groups,
the site and relative positions of which have been much confused by
writers who have not been to the spot. 1
1 The names of the scholars who have discussed the question without ocular
knowledge will be given presently. The travellers who have visited and described
the remains at Murghab are as follows: J. P. Morier (1809), First Journey, p. 144,
(1811) Second Journey, p. 117; Sir W. Ouseley (1811), Tracels, vol. ii. cap. xii.
and App. xiii.; Sir R. K. Porter (1818), Travels, vol. i. p. 485 et seq. ; C. J. Rich
(1821), Journey to Perseyjolis, p. 240 ; Ch. Texier (1840), VArmenie, &c., vol. ii.;
Baron de Bode (1841), Travels, vol. i. p. 71 et seq. ; E. Flandinand P. Coste (1841),
Perse Aneienne, Text, pp. 156-63, vol. iv. pis. 194-203 ; R. B. Binning (1851),
Two Years' Travel, vol. ii. cap. xxiii.; M. Dieulafoy (1881), JO Art Antique de la
Perse, part i. Ker Porter and Flandin both give useful maps of the ruins. For
their present condition, vide the photographs in Stolze’s Perseqjolis, and in Dieula
foy. That a comparative idea may be formed of their state at different periods,