Saed News: These images, preserved from the Qajar era and now more than a century old, are among those that can be viewed over and over again, each time revealing something new.
According to the History Desk of Saed News, Masoud Mirza Zill al-Sultan, the eldest son of Naser al-Din Shah, was the governor of Isfahan during his father's reign. Zill al-Sultan, like his royal father, was fond of writing and kept a record of his memoirs. Here is an excerpt from his memoirs about his trip to Arak and its surrounding areas:
Nasser al-Dawlah invited me to his village "Amirabad" and the properties he owned around "Latheh Dar." My companions—some hoping for a hunt and rewards, some for leisure, and others to graze and eat for free—totaled nearly two thousand horsemen and foot soldiers who came to Nasser al-Dawlah's unfortunate banquet, completely bringing him to the ground!
... He truly took sycophancy and flattery to an extreme level, to the point that I must admit no one in all of creation could match his flattery skills; out of sycophancy, he even kissed the feet of the Arabs!
He kissed the foot of a mad dog, and when asked why, he said: "This is occasionally a street where Layla has been seen."
... For a week, gunshots rang out in Latheh Dar; no exaggeration, up to one hundred thousand rounds were fired at the poor animals. Nearly a thousand animals, including stags, goats, sheep, deer, wolves, and four leopards, were hunted in this area... Around four hundred large rams were caught. My uncles shot a lot, particularly Parviz Khan, who shot about fifty animals...
I personally shot the least on this trip; I was quite depressed and homesick. I shot only eleven rams. I gifted Nasser al-Dawlah with a very fine Richard bolt-action rifle, a 15-caliber double-barrel rifle, and a first-class jeweled sword as a token of my appreciation.
Zill al-Sultan
A number of children from the royal family, including some of Zill al-Sultan’s own children (the eldest son of Naser al-Din Shah), are pictured with the slaves and eunuchs responsible for caring for them.
In this photograph, Ahmad Shah Qajar and Victor Emmanuel III, the King of Italy at the time, are seen visiting military forces at Castel Sant'Angelo in Rome, Italy. The image is taken from the magazine L'Illustrazione Italiana, Volume 47, Issue 8, dated February 22, 1920 (30th of Bahman, 1298 in the Iranian calendar).
A childhood photo of Mohammad Hassan Mirza, the last crown prince of the Qajar dynasty, taken in the late 1280s of the Iranian calendar.
