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Annotated Copy of Persia and the Persian Question by George Curzon, with Inserted Papers [872v] (1761/1814)
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.
606
PERSIA
selves the most solemn offensive and defensive obligations. When
the occasion arose for redeeming them, we have shirked the
responsibility and have subsequently bought our release from the
self-inflicted tie. We have courted and waged war against the
same Persian sovereigns; we have both trained and routed the
Persian army; we have at once pampered and neglected the Persian
people. Our Persian policy in each successive stage, whether of
interest or apathy, has ever been characterised by the note of
exaggeration. At the dawn of the century, when Lord Wbllesley
first opened negotiations with the Persian Court, we entertained
exaggerated notions of the danger to India arising from a possible
Afghan invasion. We next regarded with an equally exaggerated
apprehension the installation and designs of the I rench at Teheran.
When the Afghan cloud had blown over, and the French bubble
had burst, we thought that Persia could be propped up against any
other enemy by the double buttress of the drill sergeant and the
rupee. It was an exaggerated hope. In 1833, in 1837, and
again in 1856, we entertained a probably exaggerated opinion of
the danger likely to arise from a Persian movement against Herat.
We embarked upon the first Afghan war, with its attendant train
of horrors, from an exaggerated alarm at these aspirations. A
phase of equally exaggerated languor succeeded, and the subse
quent epoch has not been free from analogous spasms of solicitude
and torpor. It has been well said of British policy with regard to
Persia throughout this century that Nil fuit unquam sic imjpar sibi.
The political record of the first three quarters of this period down
to 1875 has been compiled by the masterly hand of Sir H. Raw-
linson, and to his pages may be referred any reader who desires
to trace the balancing vicissitudes of lethargy and zeal. The
ensuing decade was not less fruitful than its predecessors in
illustration of the same phenomenon ; for whereas in the
hands of the brothers Sir Taylor and Sir Ronald Thomson,
both of whom had lived so long in Persia as to yield somewhat to
the pressure of their environment, and to lack the initiative that
comes from change of atmosphere and scene, British influence sank
to a very low ebb in the councils of the Shah, 1 Russia in the same
Justice compels me to state that this decline was quickened by events for which
neither of the Ministers named shared the smallest responsibility, viz. the cala
mitous policy pursued by the British Government of 1880-5 in various parts of "the
empire. The retreat from South Africa, the evacuation of Kandahar, the ever-
About this item
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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 [872v] (1761/1814), British Library: India Office Records and Private Papers, Mss Eur F111/33, in Qatar Digital Library <https://www.qdl.qa/archive/81055/vdc_100157213850.0x0000a2> [accessed 8 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