Merchants and Government, Tobacco and Trade: The Case of Kordestan, 1333 AH/1919 AD

Abstract

Considerable progress has been made in recent years in studying the economic history of Persia in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. However, scholars have continued to feel the paucity of adequate source materials for such studies. The papers of Amin al-Zarb, a leading member of one of the great merchant families of the nineteenth century, came to light in the 1960s, suggesting that family papers of the merchant houses, if they could be traced, could offer an enormously valuable window onto economic activities and developments in Persia during this period. Few such family collections have turned up, however. The papers of Hajj Rahim Ettehadieh, a member of a merchant family whose activities in Azerbaijan and Tehran can be traced back at least to the last quarter of the nineteenth century, are not as rich as the Amin al-Zarb papers. Nonetheless, if carefully utilized, they have the potential of offering some intriguing glimpses into the activities and attitudes of the merchant community.