PERSIA 



69 



western Europe produced for him bitter fruits. He 

 was dragged into a war with Russia soon after 

 his accession, and by a treaty concluded in 1797 

 surrendered to that power Derbend and several 

 districts on the Kur. In 1802 Georgia was declared 

 to In; ;i Russian province. War with Russia was 

 recommenced by Persia at the instigation of 

 France ; but, after two years of conflicts disastrous 

 to the Persians, the treaty of Gulistan ( 1813) gave 

 to Russia all the Persian possessions to the north 

 of Armenia, and the right of navigation in the 

 Caspian Sea. In 1826 a third war, equally unfor- 

 tunate for Persia, was commenced with the same 

 power, and cost Persia the remainder of its posses. 

 sions in Armenia, with Erivan, and a sum of 

 18,000,000 rubles for the expenses of the war. The 

 severity exercised in procuring this sum by taxa- 

 tion so exasperated the people that they rose in 

 insurrection (1829), and murdered the Russian 

 ambassador, his wife, and almost all who were 

 connected with the Russian legation. The most 

 humiliating concessions to Russia, and the punish- 

 ment by mutilation of 1500 of the rioters, alone 

 averted war. The death of the crown-prince, 

 Abbas Mir/a, in 1833, seemed to give the final 

 blow to the declining fortunes of Persia, for he was 

 the only man who seriously attempted to raise his 

 country from the state of abasement into which it 

 had fallen. By the assistance of Russia and Britain 

 Mohammed Shah (1834-48), the son of Abbas 

 Mirza, obtained the crown. Mohammed resolved 

 to demand reacknowledgment of sovereignty from 

 his alleged vassals in parts of Afghanistan, Belu- 

 chistan, and Khiva, but an attempt he made to 

 i annex Herat, ' the key to India,' was iv.-i.-t i-d by 

 England. The war was terminated in 1838 by the 

 landing of a small sepoy force on the shores of the 

 Persian (iiilf. 



Nasr-ed-Din succeeded to the throne on his 

 father's death in 1848. The new government 

 announced energetic reforms, but at h'rat failed 

 as completely as those which had preceded it 

 in carrying them out. Following his father's 

 example, the new Shah resolved to reassert his 

 claims in Afghanistan and Keluchistan. The ruler 

 of Herat having recognised the claims of Persia, 

 the English government remonstrated with the 

 Shah, ami he was compelled to sign an engagement 

 ( 1833), by which he became In mini not to interfere 

 further with the internal affairs of Herat. In 1856, 

 however, on the pretext that Dost Mohammed, the 

 Ameer of Kabul, was about to invade Herat, the 

 Persians again took the city. Thereupon a British 

 army was landed on the coast of the gulf, and, 

 under Generals Outram and Havelock, repeatedly 

 defeated the Persians, and compiled them to restore 

 Herat (July lx.17). Since that time the Persians 

 have not interfered with the 'key to India,' but 

 they have been engaged in a long scries of disputes 

 with regard to their frontier north and south of it. 

 After the war of 1857 their encroachments became 

 systematic. In 1868 the}' occupied Seistan, a pro- 

 vince claimed by the Afghans, and extended their 

 Jurisdiction over part of licliicliistan ; but at length 

 they agreed with the Ameer of Afghanistan and 

 the Khan of Kelat to refer the questions in dispute 

 to an English commissioner, General Sir Frederick 

 GoUmnta, who in 1872 fixed the Persian frontier 

 "iilwtantially as it now is a large triangular tract 

 to the east of Lake Zirreh, watered by the Hel- 

 iiiunrl, iH'ing annexed to Persia. By the treaty of 

 l!<Tlin in 1878 the town and territory of Khotour, 

 on the Turco Persian frontier, was ceded to Persia 

 by Turkey. The north-eastern frontier was settled 

 by a treaty between Russia and Persia in 1881. 

 The great extension of Russian territory and 

 Russian power on the north-east, while over- 

 shadowing Persia to some extent, have had the 



effect of sheltering the adjoining regions of Persia 

 from the terrible inroads of the Tekke and other 

 Turkomans, now under Russian authority. Eng- 

 lish officers, including Sir John Bateman-Cham- 

 pain, Sir R. Murdoch Smith, Sir Oliver St John, 

 and Captain Pierson, did much to explore and 

 indirectly to improve the local government of 

 Persia in connection with the establishment, in 

 1864, of the Indo-European telegraph line. Now 

 there are 4500 miles of telegraph line in Persia, 

 partly worked by Englishmen, partly by the Per- 

 sian government. In 1896 Nasr-ed-Din was assas- 

 sinated, and his second son, Muzaffer-ed-Din, peace- 

 fully succeeded to the throne. 



See AHTAXKHXKS, DARICS, GREECE, MARATHON, 

 SALAMIS, &c. ; E. G. Browne, A Year amony the Per- 

 sians ( 1893 ) ; Goldsmid'a Eastern Persia ( 1876 j ; Ar/iold's 

 Through Persia (1876); Wills's In the Land of the 

 Lion and the Sun (1883), and Persia as it is (1886); 

 Benjamin's Persia and the Persians (1886); Hon. G. 

 Curzon's Pertia and the Persian Question ( 1891 ) ; and 

 Holler's Hajji Baba ; Klianikoff's Ethnographie de la 

 PerM (1866) ; Madame Dieulafoy's La Perse, la Chaldi'e, 

 et la Suriane : Barbier de Maynard, Dictioiinain Gfo- 

 yraphique, HMorique, et Litteraire de la Pene (1861); 

 Schwabe, Bibliographic de la Perse ( 1 876 ) ; and German 

 works by Petermann (1861), Polak (1865), Vambery 

 (1867), Stolze and Andreas (1885), and Brunnliofer 

 (1889). See also the histories by Sir John Malcolm (2d 

 ed. 1828), R. G. Watson (1866 ), and Clements Markham 

 ( 1874 ); Kawlinson's The Seventh Great Oriental Monarchy 

 (1876); and German works by Justi (1879), Noldeke 

 ( 1887), and Gutschmid ( 1888). 



PERSIAN ARCHITECTURE. The architecture of 

 Persia and that of Assyria closely resemble one 

 another, and, owing to the mode and the materials 

 in which they were constructed, their remains serve 

 to illustrate and complete each other's history. In 

 Assyria, where no solid building materials exist, 

 the walls are composed of masses of sun-dried 

 brickwork, lined on the inside, to a certain height 

 from the floor, with large sculptured slabs of ala- 

 baster. These have been preserved to us by the 

 falling in of the heavy earthen roofs, with which, 

 as the later Persian buildings explain to us, the 

 Assyrian palaces were covered. The explorations 

 of Layara and Botta have made these sculptures 

 familiar to us. The Assyrian remains are all of 

 palace-temples, buildings somewhat resembling the 

 Egyptian temples (which were also palaces); and 

 many of the sculptures represent the exploits of 

 the king in war and in peace. The palaces are 

 always raised on lofty artificial mounds, and 

 approached by magnificent flights of steps. 



The buildings of Assyria extend over a very long 

 period, the oldest at Nimroud being from 1300 to 

 800 B.C., and the more recent at Khorsabad ami 

 Kovunjik from 800 to 600 B.C. To these succeeded 

 Babylon in the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, and the 

 Birs Nimroud ; but these are mere masses of decom- 

 posed brickwork, without any sculptures of harder 

 material (see ASSYRIA). 



After Babylon came Pasargadse, where the 

 splendid palaces of Cyrus and Cambyses still exist 

 in ruins, and Persepolis, the capital of Darius and 

 Xerxes (560-523 B.C.); and some remains are still 

 to l>e found at Susa, Ecbatana, and Teheran. At 

 Persepolis we find the very parts preserved which 

 at Nimroud and Khorsabad are wanting ; for here 

 there is abundance of stone, and the pillars, walls, 

 doorways, &c. (which in the early examples were 

 no doubt of wood, and have decayed), being of 

 stone, are still preserved. This enabled Fergusson 

 to 'restore' these buildings; the subject has been 

 further studied and illustrated with great care by 

 M. Dieulafoy in L'Art Antique de la Perse ( 1884). 



The halls at Persepolis were square in plan, 

 having an equal number of pillars in each direction 

 for the support of the roof, which was flat. In the 



