'Persia and the Persian Question by the Hon. George Nathaniel Curzon, M.P.' [‎300] (341/714)

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PERSIA
CHAPTER XI
teheran 1
Over the utmost hill at length I sped,
A snowy steep—the moon was hanging low
Over the Asian mountain—and outspread
The plain, the city, and the camp below.
S helley, The Revolt vf Islam, Canto V.
T eheran , the modern capital of Persia, lias frequently been
spoken of by travellers, with some suspicion of contempt, as a new
An old and city. In the sense in which they use the word—i.e. in
a new city t ] ie historical sense—it is by no means a new, but, on the
contrary, an ancient city. In another sense—viz. structurally—it
was made a new city by Agha Mohammed Shah, a century ago,
and still more by his nephew and successor, Fath Ali Shah; and
has become a yet newer city—so new that the visitors in the first
half of this century would barely recognise it—during the last
twenty years. Before I trace the incidents of this twofold
renaissance, I propose to say something of the antique, forgotten,
but withal not uninteresting Teheran of the past. Research can
never be quite wasted upon the origin and youth of a great
capital.
It has been conjectured that the name Teheran is identical
with the Tazora that appears in the Theodosian tables as near to
Ancient Rhages (Rhey). In the tables, however, it is not the
testimony Median Rhages, but a place of the same name near l ezd,
that is spoken of; and the identity cannot therefore be sustained.
1 I shall not attempt to give, as I have done in the case of previous chapters,
any bibliography of Teheran, for the reason that very nearly every foreign visitor
to Persia has stayed in the capital and has described his stay. Any reader, there
fore, desirous of more ample instruction may be referred to the large bibliography
which I propose to publish. Teheran, however, has been much less rich in
historians than any other Persian capital; and the information contained in this
chapter will, in the main, not be found elsewhere. 1 may add that the popular
etymology which explains Teheran or Tihran as ' the pure ' is false. It is an ol
Persian word which was formerly written with the two-dotted t, and sometimes
also Tirun and Tiran.