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Annotated Copy of Persia and the Persian Question by George Curzon, with Inserted Papers [307v] (617/1814)
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.
PERSIA
392
and can be reduced to impotence or beggary in the twinkling of
an eye. The ministers are elevated and degraded at the Royal
pleasure. The sovereign is the sole executive, and all officials are
his deputies. No civil tribunals are in existence to check or modify
his prerogative. Enormous, therefore, is the importance attaching
to the character of the individual in whose person is concentrated
such a wealth of plenary powers.
Nasr-ed-Din Shah, as I have before said, is not a Persian but
a Turk, by descent, and is the fourth sovereign of the Kajar
The Dynasty which has occupied the throne of Persia for close
Kajar upon one hundred years. The Kajars, whose family history
Dynasty j iag k een wr itten by more than one Persian biographer
and has even been translated into English , 1 are not content with
any more modest descent than from Japhet, the son of Noah
Even if we question the authenticity of so illustrious a pedigree it
is yet indisputable that for 700 years the Kajar tribe have been
heard of in history. A chieftain of that race ruled the country
from Rhey to the Oxus, as deputy for one of the Mongol descendants
of Jenghiz Khan. Timur is said to have banished them to Syria,
but afterwards to have suffered them to return. Later on they
espoused the cause of the Sefavi Shahs and assisted in raising them
to the throne, in return for which service they were included in the
Kizil-bash or seven Red-Head tribes, so called from the scarlet
head-covering which they were permitted to wear. According to
one account the mother of Shah Ismail himself was of Kajar blood . 2
Under his successor, Shah Tahmasp, we hear of a Kajar governor of
Kanaahar, and of a Kajar ambassador to the Porte, demonstrating
the prominence to which the tribe had already attained; whilst in
the reign of Abbas the Great their power had become so consider
able that that monarch found it expedient to divide them into three
branches, whom he settled respectively in Merv and Khorasan
to fight against the Tartars, in Georgia to fight against the
Lesghians, and on the Gurgan and at Astrabad to fight against
the Turkomans. The latter became the main Persian settlement
Hie Dynasty of the Kajars, translated from an Oriental Persian MS. by Sir
Harford Jones Brydges, 1833. Compare Morier, Journal of the R.G.S., vol. vii.
p. 231. y
So says Mr. Watson in his History of Persia ; but I have always understood
that the mother of Shah Ismail was Martha, the daughter of Uzun Hasan, chief
tain of the White Sheep, and his Christian wife Despoina, who was a daughter of
Kalo Johannes Emperor of Trebizond.
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 [307v] (617/1814), British Library: India Office Records and Private Papers, Mss Eur F111/33, in Qatar Digital Library <https://www.qdl.qa/archive/81055/vdc_100157213845.0x000018> [accessed 12 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