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Annotated Copy of Persia and the Persian Question by George Curzon, with Inserted Papers [819r] (1654/1814)
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.
REVENUE, RESOURCES, AND MANUFACTURES
509
hundred mules, the average price of which is from \2l. to 20Z. in
the native market, although, if it be true, as I have heard, that
each animal so purchased costs the Indian Government 50k by the
time that it is delivered at Lahore, I can scarcely describe the
process as an economical one, and cannot help wondering why
rearing establishments are not instituted on a larger scale in India
itself. In the Bakhtiari country the breeding of mules is an
object of great care and solicitude. Donkey stallions and mares
are kept for this exclusive purpose, the former being neither used
as beasts of burden nor allowed to mix with their own species.
Of the powerful one-humped camel of Khorasan, I have spoken
in my chapter on that province. He will not travel so quickly or
so far as a horse or a mule, but he will carry double the
burden, viz., 600 lbs., and proceed at the rate of twenty
miles a day. The ordinary and inferior camel, which constitutes
the bulk of most caravans, will carry 400 lbs. and march fifteen
miles per diem.
The southern shores of the Caspian and the rivers there flow
ing into the sea are richly stocked with fish, principally sturgeon
and sterlet, the export of which, both in dried state and in
Fisheries
caviar, is in the hands of a Russian, who pays a very
large annual price for the monopoly, and is said to make a hand
some profit from his speculation. Polak, some years ago, estimated
the annual production of caviar in the Caspian fisheries as 687
tons, at the rate of 1,000 fish to a ton.
Skins and hides are exported in large quantities to Baghdad
and Russia from Khorasan, Isfahan, Shiraz, and Hamadan. At
Shiraz is produced a native equivalent to the curled
HicIgs
Bokharan lambskin of Kara Kul, near the Oxus, denomi
nated in Europe Astrakhan. The quality is not so fine as the
Central Asian skin, but it is very extensively used in the manu
facture of the Persian holah, or conical headdress. Hamadan is the
scene of the principal tanneries and leather factories of Persia, and
there the material known in Europe as Russian leather is said to
have been originally prepared.
An increasing amount of sheeps’ wool and of goats’ hair is now
being exported from Persia. The chief areas of production are
Khorasan, Ears and Laristan, Azerbaijan, Kermanshah and
Kurdistan. Of these the Khorasan flocks, especially those
of Turbat-i-Haideri, and of the nomad tribes on the Perso-Afghan
Wool
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 [819r] (1654/1814), British Library: India Office Records and Private Papers, Mss Eur F111/33, in Qatar Digital Library <https://www.qdl.qa/archive/81055/vdc_100157213850.0x000037> [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