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Annotated Copy of Persia and the Persian Question by George Curzon, with Inserted Papers [646v] (1309/1814)
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
sisting of 700 horsemen, well mounted and armed, and of 2,000
infantry, provided with Martini-Peabody rifles, that had been
looted from across the Turkish border. The Yali seldom leaves
this position, or places himself in contact with the Persian
authorities, and has evidently very little intention of falling to
any decoy. He is a fine-looking man, with commanding presence,
and a flowing beard, which has procured for him the appellation of
Rish-i-buzurg, or Longbeard. He is also known as El Eeili, The
Feili, and from his cruel and murderous propensities as Abu
Kadareh, or Father of the Sword. The latter title testifies to his
character and rule, the severity of which has driven many of his
people across the Turkish border, and has made him unpopular
with his subjects. Though only fifty-five years of age, he is con
siderably broken down through drink. His son, Reza Kuli Khan,
a young man of twenty-eight, is a sertijo in the Persian service,
and was for some time kept as an hostage for his father’s good
behaviour by the Zil-es-Sultan in Isfahan. He is a handsome
young fellow, and a keen sportsman, and is reported to have a less
tyrannical and more amiable disposition than his parent. If the
Vali and his people move from their quarters, it is in the direction
of Turkey rather than of Persia that they shift their tents. Their
winter domicile is at Huseinieh, at the foot of the Pusht-i-Kuh,
just within the Turkish border ; it is with Baghdad via Kut-el-
Amarah, on the Tigris, that the Yali trades; it is upon Turkish terri
tory that he makes his raids, constant disputes occurring about the
occupation by the Furs of Ottoman soil; 1 and his sworn and in
veterate enemies are the Beni Lam Arabs, who are Turkish subjects.
He is probably the best living representative of the old style of Border
chieftain, and is said to be able to call out 30,000 fighting men.
Nowhere is the peculiar physical conformation of south-west
Persia, analogous, as I have elsewhere remarked, in its features to
Mountains that of north-east Khorasan, more observable than in the
and rivers moun tain abodes of the Feili Furs. The ranges run in
parallel files, inclined from north-west to south-east, projecting
steep and craggy masses of limestone, which are frequently sawn
at right angles to their own trend by the tengs or canons through
which the streams or rivers force their wav . 2 In the narrow
t/
1 Vide vol. i. p. 569.
2 A good description of these extraordinary defiles was given by W. K. Loftus
in a paper on the ‘ Geology of Portions of the Turko-Persian Frontier,’ in the
Quarterly Journal of the Geological (1854), voh xi. p. 247 et seq.
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 [646v] (1309/1814), British Library: India Office Records and Private Papers, Mss Eur F111/33, in Qatar Digital Library <https://www.qdl.qa/archive/81055/vdc_100157213848.0x00006e> [accessed 16 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