1st Edition

The Development of the Babi/Baha'i Communities Exploring Baron Rosen's Archives

By Youli Ioannesyan Copyright 2013
    232 Pages
    by Routledge

    232 Pages
    by Routledge

    Baron Rosen’s Babi/Baha’i archives presents private letters and diplomatic correspondence from the nineteenth century, preserved among the prominent Russian scholar Baron Victor Rosen’s materials in the Archive of the Russian Academy of Sciences, St. Petersburg branch.

    The materials cast light on the first studies of the Babi and Baha’i Faiths, new religious phenomena which, in Baron Rosen’s time, were emerging in Persia. Iran has always been a strategic concern of Russia’s geopolitical interests and the traditional importance which has been given to Persia has manifested itself in hundreds of documents and writings collected by the pre-revolutionary Russian diplomats and scholars. These documents, large parts of which have never been published before, reveal new information on the attitude of the Russian government towards religious and ethnic minorities as well as towards related issues within the Russian Empire and abroad.

    Bringing together materials in Russian, English, Persian, Arabic and French related to the Babi and Baha’i Faiths from Rosen’s archive in the original languages with an English translation, this book will be of great interest to students and researchers in the fields of Iranian Studies, Religion and Middle East Studies amongst others.

    Introduction 1 From A.G. Tumanski’s Correspondence with V.R. Rosen 2 Report by the Russian Charge d’Affaire in Tehran Mr. Zinovyev to Duke Gorchakov 3 Babis in Adrianople: Reportof Chief of the Consulate Staff in Adrianople 4 Information about the Babis Presented by Persians living in Adrianople 5 Information about the Babis by Yunus Mehdi Effendi, the Qadi in Adrianople 6 Report of the Russian Consul General in Adharbayjan Bezobrazov 7 Anonymous Diplomatic Dispatch Concerning an Episode in Isfahan 8 From G. Batyunshkov’s Correspondence with V.R. Rosen 9 From V.I. Ignatyev’s Correspondence with V.R. Rosen 10 Sebastian Voirot’s Correspondence with V.R. Rosen 11 Some Separate Transcripts in V.R. Rosen’s Archive 12 From E.G. Browne’s Correspondence with Rosen 13 I. Khayru’llah’s letter to V.R. Rosen 14 Abu’l-Fazl Gulpaygani’s Transcript

    Biography

    Youli A. Ioannesyan is Senior Researcher, Institute of the Oriental manuscripts of the Russian Academy of Science. His interests include comparative religious studies and Iranian linguistics. Previous publications include Essays on the Babi and Baha’i Faiths (St.Petersburg, 2003) and Afghan Folktales from Heart (New York, 2009).