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Annotated Copy of Persia and the Persian Question by George Curzon, with Inserted Papers [706v] (1429/1814)
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.
364
PERSIA
elevation, evidently terminating on its right or eastern side in a
steep gorge. Thick groves of I’onar trees 1 were scattered over
what are now arable plots, but were once the famous gardens of
Shushter ; in the midst of which numerous brick towers of refuge—
not unlike those that I have seen dotted in such numbers over the
old hunting-grounds of the Turkoman freebooters in Transcaspia
and Khorasan—showed that agriculture, even in the immediate
vicinity of the town, can at one period have been far from safe, and
paid an eloquent homage to the lawless proclivities of the Persian
nomads in the past. I forded the shrunken stream of a canal,
called the Minau, which formerly irrigated the suburbs to the south
of Shushter, and of which I shall have occasion again to speak,
passed the ruined imamzade/i of Abdullah on its isolated hill-top,
the building being flanked on its northern front by two tottering
minarets, and surmounted by a hideous plaster cone which looks,
as Loftus said, exactly like the extinguisher of a candle; picked
my way through heaps of debris that once marked a town wall, and
emerged on to an open space round which, in open stalls, smiths
and brass-workers were making a horrid din, and which was the
wreck of a once extensive bazaar, dhus, almost before I was aware
of it, I found myself in the interior of the capital of Khuzistan,
and perhaps the most dilapidated city in Persia.
The derivation of the name Shushter is not positively certain,
though it appears to be a comparative of the Pehlevi word Shus,
History signifying ‘ pleasant, and consecrated to more than one
site in this neighbourhood, particularly to the great
mounds of Sus or Shush, commonly called Susa, and now definitely
ascertained to be the ruins of £ Shushan the palace/wherein Daniel
relates that he saw the vision. 2 Whether or not the town was
built by Shapur, the famous warrior king of the Sassanian dynasty
(the probability being that it is of earlier date), that it has been
the city of kings is certain, not merely from tradition but from the
1 The konar (Greek, K6wapo S ; Latin, Zizyphus lotns vulgaris') is a tree with dark
green foliage and a long, yellowish berry, acid, but agreeable to the taste.
Daniel, viii. 2. Sir R. Murdoch-Smith {Journal of the Society of Arts, May 10,
1889) suggested the derivation Shah Shatra, or City of the King. But the old
Persian for these words would be Khshathra and Khshatya, out of which the
modern Shushter, medieval Tostar, and Sostrate, Sosirate, or Sostra of Pliny could
never have been formed. Moreover, from Khshathra was derived the modern Shehr
(e.g. Abu Shehr = Bushire), which originally meant a country, and has only in
modern times stood for a city.
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 [706v] (1429/1814), British Library: India Office Records and Private Papers, Mss Eur F111/33, in Qatar Digital Library <https://www.qdl.qa/archive/81055/vdc_100157213849.0x00001e> [accessed 10 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