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Annotated Copy of Persia and the Persian Question by George Curzon, with Inserted Papers [716v] (1449/1814)
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.
378
PERSIA
hold up its waters, and the excavation of the tunnel and Minau
Canal leading therefrom, in order to carry off a different portion of
the waters so collected for irrigation purposes. Before long, how
ever, the river, scouring a soft and friable bed, deepened its
channel and ceased to fill the canal, a process which would be
accelerated, if, as is probable, the bund had also broken down. It
was at this critical juncture that we may assume the engineering
ability of the Roman prisoner to have been invoked in order to
redress the evil, and the series of waterworks which have made both
the place and its founders famous, to have been initiated in their
entirety. Realising the difficulty of repairing the bund and of
adequately controlling the often swollen torrent of the Karun as
long as there remained no other exit for its superfluous waters, the
monarch or the engineer ordered the excavation of the Gerger
Canal through the rock on the eastern side of the town. No
sooner was the cutting finished than the entire volume of the Karun
rushed through it, entirely deserting the old river bed, a fact which
I regard as established by two considerations. At some distance
below the Gerger bund, where are the existing water-mills, is
another artificial bund, on which are the remains of numerous dis
used water-mills at such a height above the present level of the
canal that it is obvious they must have been placed there when the
canal occupied a much higher level. Further, throughout the
entire course^ of the Gerger from Shushter to Bund-i-Kir, whilst
the canal at present occupies a narrow bed of from 60 to 70 yards
in width with steep banks, there are visible at distances varying*
from a few yards to half a mile from these inland, others and
higher banks, now standing up like cliff* walls from the plain, but
unmistakably indicating a time when they formed the confines of
a much larger and more powerful stream.
JThe Karim having thus been emptied into the Gerger Canal,
the big bund was rebuilt, or, if no previous operations be attributed
Building of ^ r( ^ e skir, was now, along with the tunnel, constructed
^hund^ ^ tlie first time ‘ Simultaneously the opportunity was
seized for raising and paving the river-bed below the
castle rock, in order to prevent any further detrition of the bottom.
These undertakings being completed, and the system of irrigation
which, according to my hypothesis, was their main, if not their
sole raison d etro, being* available for use, orders were now given
partially to dam the Gerger Canal, so as to turn back the Karun
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 [716v] (1449/1814), British Library: India Office Records and Private Papers, Mss Eur F111/33, in Qatar Digital Library <https://www.qdl.qa/archive/81055/vdc_100157213849.0x000032> [accessed 21 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