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'GAZETTEER OF PERSIA. VOLUME I' [‎88v] (181/820)

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The record is made up of 1 volume (396 folios). It was created in 1910. It was written in English. 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. .

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160
DAS—DAS
The Tcavir has every appearance of having been the bed of a shallow sea.
The mountains bear all the characteristics of strata formed in the bed of
a shallow sea or lake ; and their red colony caused by the presence of
oxide of iron, would support this theory.
When the uprising occurred which drained the sea, this desert still
remained considerably below the level of the neighbouring Persian high
lands, and the rivers continued to drain into it and formed marshes. They
dry up during the fierce summer heats, to become marshes again when
the winter floods occur. This process is repeated for ages, and in the
course of time the whole soil over which the marsh extends becomes
•encrusted with salt.
When springs are present on a portion of the kavir, the salt is extracted
in the following manner. The water is made to pass over a considerable
piece of the kavir until it becomes very strongly impregnated with salt;
it is then run down into a shallow basin and allowed to evaporate, leaving
a cake of salt nearly a foot thick.
There are various sorts of kavir, depending upon the soil and the amount
of salt. One sort is in ridges looking as if the ground had been ploughed
up, then left fallow for some time* and a glazy coating of salt clay after
wards poured all over it. When this glazy coating is trodden upon it gives
way, and the horse’s hoof sinks into a powdery sort of soil containing much
salt. If this sort of kavir is ridden over, a continued crackling sound is.
heard, caused by the horse’s feet breaking through the glazy surface.
At other times, the whole surface seems rotten, and the horse’s feet sink
deeply into it, causing salt to show white on the surface. Sometimes a
damp spot is come upon* looking as if it had sweated up from below.—
[MacGregor ; Steavart.)
DASHT-I-KHAK—
A hamlet in Kirman about 20 miles north of Zarand on the road to
Ravar. It is the first hamlet reached from the south belonging to the
sub-district of Kuhistan.— (Sykes, 1894.)
DASHT-I-LUT— Lat. 31° O' to 33° 30'; Long. 55° 0' to 59° 30'.
A desert in Khorasan occupying a considerable tract in the south-east
of the province. Its area maybe described as a parallelogram ; the angles
being marked by the towns Neh, Tabas, Yazd, and Kirman. Its least
elevated point will be found on a straight line joining Khabis and Neh. It
is without doubt the lowest depression of surface in all Khorasan, for the
absolute height of its northern boundary varies between 3,000 and 4,000-
feet ; its south-eastern limit at Deh Saif is only 1,200 feet, and its lowest
point is probably not more than 400 or 500 feet in absolute height. Its
mean slope is in the direction of north-north-east to south-south-west.
The term liit is a general term for wastes in this part of the country, but
j differs from kavir, inasmuch as the former may have sand interspersed over
its surface, but not kavir ; and thelut desert is generally sprinkled, on the
borders at any rate, with thorny shrubs which afford grazing for camels.
In a track called lut there is no water, but the soil is not altogether saline,
and therefore does not preclude the formation of hauzes —a very important
i point. The lut soil consists generally of a. greyish, coarse-grained sand,

About this item

Content

The item is Volume I of the four-volume Gazetteer of Persia (1910 edition).

The volume covers the provinces of Astarabad, Shahrud-Bustam, and Khorasan, or such part of them as lies within the following boundaries: on the north the Russo-Persian boundary; on the east the Perso-Afghan boundary; on the south and south-west, a line drawn from the Afghan boundary west through Gazik to Birjand, and the road from Birjand to Kirman, and from Kirman to Yazd; and on the west the road from Yazd to Damghan and thence to Ashraf.

The gazetteer includes entries on villages, towns, administrative divisions, districts, provinces, tribes, halting-places, religious sects, mountains, hills, streams, rivers, springs, wells, dams, passes, islands and bays. The entries provide details of latitude, longitude, and elevation for some places, and information on history, communications, agriculture, produce, population, health, water supply, topography, military intelligence, coastal features, ethnography, trade, economy, administration and political matters.

Information sources are provided at the end of each gazetteer entry, in the form of an author or source’s surname, italicised and bracketed.

The volume contains an index map (from a later edition of the Gazetteer of Persia ), dated January 1917, on folio 397.

The volume also contains a glossary (folios 393-394); and note on weights and measures (folios 394v-395).

Prepared by the General Staff Headquarters, India.

Printed at the Government Monotype Press, India.

Extent and format
1 volume (396 folios)
Physical characteristics

Foliation: the foliation sequence (used for referencing) commences at the front cover with 1, and terminates at the inside back cover with 398; 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. Pagination: the file also contains an original printed pagination sequence.

Written in
English in Latin script
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'GAZETTEER OF PERSIA. VOLUME I' [‎88v] (181/820), British Library: India Office Records and Private Papers, IOR/L/MIL/17/15/2/1, in Qatar Digital Library <https://www.qdl.qa/archive/81055/vdc_100037360147.0x0000b6> [accessed 29 March 2024]

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