Note 606 — A NARRATIVE OF ITALIAN TRAVELS IN PERSIA. (continued 4)

Tauris, or Tabreez, as it is now called, is supposed by most to be the ancient Ecbatana. Kinneir says:—

“The Persians conceive Zobeida, the celebrated wife of Haroun-ul-Rashid to be its founder; but, as they are in general very ignorant regarding the history of their cities, little reliance can be placed on any information obtained from them. That Tauris was a favourite residence of Haroun-ul-Rashid cannot be denied, and, although he might not actually have founded the city, he may yet have improved and embellished it to a considerable degree. It was, in the days of Chardin, one of the largest and most populous cities in the East, and contained, according to that traveller, five hundred thousand inhabitants. But no town has experienced to a greater degree the ravages of war. Situated towards the frontiers of contending empires, it has alternately been in the hands of the Turks, Tartars, and Persians, and has been taken and sacked eight different times; but its ruin has been chiefly owing to the number of earthquakes, which have at different times levelled its proudest edifices with the dust.

“Tabreez does not now contain more than thirty thousand inhabitants, and is, upon the whole, one of the most wretched cities I have seen in Persia. It is seated in an immense plain at the foot of a mountain, on the banks of a small river, whose waters are consumed in the cultivation of the land. It is surrounded with a decayed wall, and the only decent house in the place is a new barrack, erected by the Prince for the accommodation of his troops. The ruins of the ancient city are very extensive and very mean, being nothing but a confused mass of old mud walls.

“The observations of the gentlemen of the Mission give the latitude of Tabreez in 38 deg. 10 min. N., and 46 deg. 37 min. E.”

The population and trade of Tabreez have greatly increased since Kinneir’s time, partly owing to the intercourse with Russia; it has now nearly eighty thousand inhabitants.