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Mehdi Qoli Hedayat: A Conservative of the Late Qajar Era

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Ali Barzegar
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Extract

Mehdi Qoli Hedayat, Mokhber al-Saltaneh, was born in 1863 into an aristocratic family in Tehran. He was the son of Ali Qoli Khan, Mokhber al-Dowleh, the pioneer in Iranian telegraphy, and the grandson of Reza Qoli Khan Hedayat, the famous historian and teacher of the Qajar period.

Mehdi Qoli went to school at age seven. At fourteen he was sent, in the company of his brother, Morteza Qoli (Sane ‘ al-Dowleh), to study in Germany. His stay lasted a little more than two months. He had intended to study medicine but returned home with his brother when their sister died. Feeling nostalgic for home, he did not heed his father's advice to stay and study. Later, reflecting on this decision, he said, "Alas, that if I had studied medicine I would be a free man and, now, I am bound, bound to a people...." Thus, Mehdi Qoli's education in Europe was limited to learning the German language and sightseeing in Germany and Switzerland.

Type
Articles
Information
Iranian Studies , Volume 20 , Issue 1 , 1987 , pp. 55 - 76
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for Iranian Studies 1987

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References

1 Hedayat, M. Q. (Mokhber al-Saltanen), Khāṭerāt va Khaṭarāt (Tehran: Zavvar Publications, 1329/1949), p. 27.Google Scholar

2 Ebrahim Safa'i, Rahbaran Mashruteh (Tehran: Javidan Publications, 1346/1967) Vol. II, p. 449.

3 Ibid., p. 450; See also Hedayat, Khāṭerāt, p. 51.

4 Hedayat, M. Q., Safarnāmeh Tasharrof be Makkeh Mo‘aẓẓameh (Tehran: Majlis Printshop, 1324/1945).Google Scholar

5 Hedayat, M. Q., Afkār-e Umam (Tehran: Elmi Press, 1322/1945).Google Scholar

6 Hedayat, M. Q., Gozāresh-e Īrān (Tehran: Majlis Printshop, 1317/1938).Google Scholar

7 Safa'i, II, p. 468.

8 Hedayat, Toḥfeh, pp. 280-284.

9 Ibid., p. 277.

10 Ibid., p. 279.

11 Ibid.

12 Ibid.

13 Hedayat, Khāṭerāt, p. 476.

14 Ibid.

15 Ibid., p. 480.

16 Ibid.

17 Hedayat, Toḥfeh, p. 15.

18 Ibid., p. 17.

19 Ibid.; See also pp. 460-463 entitled ‘ideology.'

20 Hedayat, Akfār, p. 181.

21 Ibid.

22 Ibid., p. 182.

23 Ibid., p. 179.

24 Although qal‘eh can be translated as fort, here it refers to village housing.

25 Hedayat, Afkār, p. 179.

26 Ibid., p. 180.

27 Ibid.

28 Hedayat, Toḥfeh, pp. 474-476.

29 Hedayat, Afkār, p. 180.

30 Ibid., p. 1833,.

31 Ibid.

32 Hedayat, Khāṭerāt, p. 480.

33 Ibid.

34 Ibid., p. 299.

35 Ibid., p. 145.

36 Hedayat, Toḥfeh, pp. 435-437.

37 Hedayat, Afkār, p. 184.

38 Hedayat, Khāṭerāt, p. 486.

39 Ibid., p. 491.

40 Ibid.

41 Ibid

42 Ibid., p. 497.

43 Hedayat, Toḥfeh, p. 404.

44 Hedayat, Khāṭerāt, p. 496.

45 Hedayat, Toḥfeh, p. 406.

46 Ibid., p. 408.

47 Ibid., p. 353.

48 Ibid., pp. 353-355.

49 Hedayat, Khāṭerāt, p. 496.

50 Hedayat, Afkār, p. 175.

51 Hedayat, Toḥfeh, p. 472.

52 Hedayat, Afkār, p. 182.

53 Sa‘di Is a tenth century Iranian poet.

54 Hedayat, Khāṭerāt, p. 477.

55 Ibid., p. 16.

56 Ibid., p. 477.

57 Hedayat, Toḥfeh, pp. 359-360.

58 Ibid.

59 Hedayat, Khāṭerāt, p. 481.

60 Qoran, III, 92.

61 Hedayat, Khāṭerāt, p. 487.

62 Ibid., p. 302.

63 Hedayat, Afkār, p. 180.

64 Hedayat, Khāṭerāt p. 378.

65 Safa'i, II, p. 452,457.

66 Hedayat, Khāṭerāt, p. 9-l;Safarnāmeh, p. 108, 126.

67 Hedayat, Safarnāmeh, p. 186.

68 Ibid., p. 111. See also criticism of fashion in Toḥfeh, pp. 456-458.

69 Hedayat, Toḥfeh, p. 420.

70 Hedayat, Khāṭerāt, p. 489.

71 Hedayat, Toḥfeh, p. 25.

72 Hedayat, Khāṭerāt, p. 489.

73 Ibid., p. 147.

74 Kasravi, Ahmad, Tārīkh-e Hījdah Sāle-ye Azerbaijan (Tehran: Amir Kabir Publications, 1357/1978), p. 819-822Google Scholar. This book was originally published in 1316/1937.

75 Ibid.

76 Safa'i believes that the Khiabani uprising was against the expansion of Communist influence as well as the 1919 agreement. See Safa'i, II p. 460.

77 Kasravi, p. 846.

78 Ibid., p. 865.

79 Ibid.. See also a collection of speeches by Khiabani in Azari, S.A., Shaykh Mohammad Khiabani (Tehran: Safialishah Publications, 1354/1975)Google Scholar. This book was originally published in 1329/1950.

80 See Taqi Bahar, Mohammad, Tārīkh Mokhtaṣar Aḥzāb Siyāsī īrān (Tehran: Jibi Books, 1357/1978), p. 49.Google Scholar This book was originally published in 1321/1942. See also Kasravi, pp. 883-885. Kasravi reports that the consul was involved in communist propaganda and supported the local communists.

81 Hedayat, Khāṭerāt, p. 317.

82 Kasravi, p. 873.

83 Ibid., p. 872.

84 Dolatabadi, Yahya, Ḥayāt-e Yaḥyā (Tehran: Ebnesina Library, 1331/1952), IV, p. 106.Google Scholar

85 Hedayat, Khāṭerāt, p. 315.

86 At this time there were three organized military and security forces operating in Iran under the auspices of the central government. The gendarmerie, the National Police, and the Cossack Force. The Cossacks, who had been trained by Russian officers, were by now mostly run by Iranian officers. But there were still Russian officers working in the force, including Meshtij, the Cossack chief at Tabriz.

87 Hedayat, Khāṭerāt, p. 316; Kasravi, p. 892; Bahar, p. 53.

88 Kasravi, p. 92.

89 Hedayat, Khāṭerāt, p. 317.

90 Ibid., p. 318.

91 Ibid.

92 Kasravi, p. 893.

93 Naseh Nateq in Azari, p. 497.

94 Ibid., p. 499.

95 Hedayat, Khāṭerāt, p. 303.

96 Ibid., p. 64.

97 This may be the reason for his exclusion from the Vosuq al-Dowleh cabinet.

98 Hedayat, Khāṭerāt, p. 260.

99 Ibid., p. 262.

100 Ibid., pp. 309-311.

101 Ibid., p. 293.

102 Ibid., p. 210.

103 Ibid., p. 142.

104 Ibid., p. 434.

105 Hedayat, Gozāresh, p. 16.

106 Hedayat, Khāṭerāt, p. 402

107 Ibid., p. 407.

108 Ibid., p. 436.

109 See the poem entitled “Two Glasses” in Toḥfeh, pp. 472-473.