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Annotated Copy of Persia and the Persian Question by George Curzon, with Inserted Papers [559r] (1130/1814)
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.
PERSEPOLIS, AND OTHER RUINS
133
previously been much heard of outside of Persia. It was in his winter
quarters at Susa, or in his summer palace at Ecbatana, that foreign
History of ambassadors or refugees usually found the Great King. To
Istakhr Persepolis, which boasted a middle temperature, he appears
pons PerSe onl y h ave come at springtime, to receive the first-fruit
offerings of his people, the reports of his officers, and the
tribute of his subjects. The great platform, with its palaces and
halls, was a place of ceremonial resort rather than of habitual occu
pation ; but its proximity to the Pasargadse of Cyrus, and its own
associations, rendered it a site of peculiar importance. There its
kings sat in state ; there they worshipped at the fire-altars of the
Magian faith ; there, according to Persian tradition, Darius laid up the
Avesta, written in gold and silver letters upon 12,000 tanned ox-hides ;
and there six of the Achsemenian monarchs were laid to rest. But
while the platform was devoted to the pomp and the residence of the
sovereign, around it, and far over the adjoining plain, must have
stretched the city of the shopkeepers, the middle and lower classes, and
the artisans ; and in the ruins on the Polvar, generally denoted Istakhr,
that will presently be described, are to be traced the probable relics of
its shrunken greatness. With the invasion of Alexander and the con-
fiagration of one or more of the palaces by his command—an event
which will be noticed later on—Persepolis drops suddenly into the
background : its name all but vanishes from existence ; and when,
after the blank interval of Seleucid domination (during the over
throw of which it retained sufficient importance to be plundered by
Antiochus Epiphanes in 164 b.c. 1 ) it reappears under the Parthian
dynasty, the city, which in 200 a.d. was the seat of a local governor,
has changed its title, and is known as Istakhr . 2 Here, amid the general
decline of the national faith, the Zoroastrian fire-altars burned un
ceasingly ; and here stood the temple of the goddess Anahidh , 3 one
1 2 Maccab. ix. 1, 2.
2 Persian legend ascribes its foundation to Istakhr, son of the legendary
Kaiomars. But Istakhr, or Stakin', is said to be a Pehlevi word signifying pond
or reservoir, wherein an allusion is sought to the famous tanks that were con
structed on one of the three curious pointed hills that rise from the centre of the
Mervdasht plain by the Asad-ed-Dowleh, a ruler of the Al-i-Buyah dynasty in the
tenth century a.d. But the name is found in existence centuries before the tanks
were made, and unless we are to assume that the reservoirs existed long before
the Asad-ed-Dowleh’s days, and were merely enlarged or reconstructed by him, I
should prefer to leave the derivation unsolved, and to assume that any earlier
name may afterwards have been adapted to a local interpretation. The best
historical account of Istakhr is that of Ouseley {Travels, vol. ii. pp. 304-411).
3 Anahit a, Anahidh, or Tanata, the Anaitis of the Greeks, the ruins of a
temple to whom at Kangavar I have already noticed in vol. i. p. 51, was a goddess
who from the end of the fifth century B.c. played a part in the official religion
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 [559r] (1130/1814), British Library: India Office Records and Private Papers, Mss Eur F111/33, in Qatar Digital Library <https://www.qdl.qa/archive/81055/vdc_100157213847.0x000083> [accessed 2 April 2025]
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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