¹ On the princely states, see Ramusack, Barbara N., The Indian Princes and their States (Cambridge, 2004).Google Scholar

² For overviews of the political relations between Russia and Iran in the nineteenth century see Kazemzadeh, Firuz, Russia and Britain in Persia, 1864–1914: A Study in Imperialism (New Haven, CT, 1968)Google Scholar; Atkin, Muriel, Russia and Iran, 1780–1828 (Minneapolis, 1980)Google Scholar; Siegel, Jennifer, Endgame: Britain, Russia and the Final Struggle for Central Asia (London, 2002)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Kulagina, L.M., Rossiia i Iran (Moscow, 2010).Google Scholar An important comparative case connected to the Russian Empire is the emirate of Bukhara: Becker, Seymour, Russia's Protectorates in Central Asia: Bukhara and Khiva, 1865–1924 (London, 2004, repr. Boston, 1968)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

³ As an overview see Wortman, Richard, Scenarios of Power: Myth and Ceremony in Russian Monarchy, 2 vols. (Princeton, NJ, 1995 and 2000).Google Scholar A good survey of the historiography produced on Russia's Asian territories since 1991 is Willard Sunderland, “What Is Asia to Us? Scholarship on the Tsarist East Since the 1990s,” Kritika 12 (2011): 817–33.

⁴ An obvious question in this context concerns the role of “Orientalism” in Russian perceptions of Asia. On Russo-Iranian relations from this point of view see Andreeva, Elena, Russia and Iran in the Great Game: Travelogues and Orientalism (London, 2007).CrossRefGoogle Scholar The relevance of the paradigm has also been discussed for other aspects of Russia's relations with Asia. See for example Knight, Nathaniel, “Grigor'ev in Orenburg, 1851–1862: Russian Orientalism in the Service of Empire?,” Slavic Review 59 (2000): 74–100.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁵ The most relevant studies for Russia and Iran are Wortman, Scenarios of Power and Abbas Amanat's biography of Naser al-Din Shah which gives much space to cultural aspects of the monarchy: Pivot of the Universe: Nasir al-Din Shah Qajar and the Iranian Monarchy, 1831–1896 (Berkeley, CA, 1997).Google Scholar For Ottoman perspectives, see Deringil, Selim, The Well-Protected Domains: Ideology and the Legitimation of Power in the Ottoman Empire, 1876–1909 (New York, 1998).Google Scholar On relations between monarchies see Paulmann, Johannes, Pomp und Politik: Monarchenbegegnungen in Europa zwischen Ancien Régime und Erstem Weltkrieg (Paderborn, 2000).Google Scholar The importance of monarchical and aristocratic politics in the British Empire is pointed out in Cannadine, David, Ornamentalism: How the British saw their Empire (London, 2001).Google Scholar

⁶ Wortman, Scenarios of Power.

⁷ One of the clearest theoretical formulations remains Clifford Geertz's concept of the “theater state”: Geertz, Clifford, Negara: The Theatre State in Nineteenth-Century Bali (Princeton, NJ, 1980), 121–36.Google Scholar

⁸ For criticism of the “Great Game” narrative see for example Amanat, Pivot of the Universe, 423 and Martin, Vanessa, The Qajar Pact: Bargaining, Protest and the State in Nineteenth-Century Persia (London, 2005), 1.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁹ As an overview of the whole period, see Atkin, Russia and Iran.

¹⁰ Akty sobrannye Kavkazskoi Arkheograficheskoi Komissiei: Arkhiv glavnogo upravleniia namestnika Kavkazskogo (Tiflis, 1878–1904), 2: 128.Google Scholar All translations from Russian in the following text are by myself, unless noted otherwise.

¹¹ Instructions for Ermolov, 29 July 1816, in ibid., 122.

¹² Ermolov to Nesselrode, 19 November 1816, in ibid., 137.

¹³ Ibid.

¹⁴ The report is part of a larger text that Sokolov wrote about the mission. Sokolov, A.E., “Zhurnal posol'stva v Persiiu Generala Ermolova,” Chteniia v Imperatorskom Obshchestve Istorii i Drevnostei Rossiiskikh 233 (1910): 3–48.Google Scholar The mission is documented in several other sources, for example Ermolov's own account: Ermolov, A.P., “Zhurnal posol'stva v Persiiu Generala A.P. Ermolova,” Chteniia v Imperatorskom Obshchestve Istorii i Drevnostei Rossiiskikh 2 (1863): 121–84.Google Scholar One of the German participants also left a description: von Kotzebue, Moritz, Reise nach Persien mit der Russisch Kais. Gesandtschaft (Weimar, 1819).Google Scholar

¹⁵ Sokolov, “Zhurnal,” 36.

¹⁶ Ibid.

¹⁷ On this and more generally on protocol issues see: Horowitz, Richard S., “International Law and State Transformation in China, Siam, and the Ottoman Empire during the Nineteenth Century,” Journal of World History 15 (2004): 445–86.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

¹⁸ Sokolov, “Zhurnal,” 37; Ermolov, “Zhurnal,” 129.

¹⁹ Ibid., 129 and 152.

²⁰ Von Kotzebue, Reise nach Persien, 184.

²¹ The British, however, accepted the gesture not only for the Mughal Kings, but also for other Indian rulers in the early nineteenth century: Fisher, Michael, “The Resident in Court Ritual,” Modern Asian Studies 24 (1990): 426.Google Scholar Khel'ats were also used in Russian relations with khans in the Eurasian steppes, and the term made it into Russian: khalat.

²² Sokolov, “Zhurnal,” 37.

²³ Ibid., 38–39.

²⁴ Ermolov, “Zhurnal,” 129.

²⁵ Bartolomei, F.F., “Posol'stvo Kniaza Men'shikova v Persiiu v 1826 godu,” Russkaia Starina 118 (1904): 303.Google Scholar

²⁶ Ibid.

²⁷ Ibid., 306.

²⁸ Kelly, Laurence, Diplomacy and Murder in Tehran: Alexander Griboyedov and Imperial Russia's Mission to the Shah of Persia (London, 2002).Google Scholar See 187–94 for a detailed summary of the events in the last days before the assassination.

²⁹ Ibid., 187–88.

³⁰ Ibid., 189.

³¹ Ibid., 190.

³² Ibid., 195.

³³ On the background of the treaty see Bitis, Alexander, Russia and the Eastern Question: Army, Government, and Society 1815–1833 (Oxford, 2006), 253–63.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

³⁴ Simonich, I.O., “Smert’ Griboedova,” in A.S. Griboedov v vospominaniiakh sovremennikov, ed. Piksanov, Nikolai K. (Moscow, 1929), 206.Google Scholar

³⁵ Ibid., 207.

³⁶ Ibid., 209.

³⁷ A similar dynamic appears in Russian relations with the Emir of Bukhara in the late nineteenth century, who constantly invoked the “fanaticism” of his own population to argue against further interference in his government practices by the Russians: Khalid, Adeeb, “Society and Politics in Bukhara, 1868–1920,” Central Asian Survey 19 (2000): 370–71.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

³⁸ Martin, Qajar pact, 34.

³⁹ Bogdanovich, Evgenii V., Nasr-Eddin Shakh i ego vyezd v Rossiiu v 1873 godu (St Petersburg, 1873), 13.Google Scholar See also Amanat, Pivot of the Universe, 35 for a picture and a description of the meeting.

⁴⁰ Hurewitz, Jacob Coleman, Diplomacy in the Near and Middle East: A Documentary Record (Princeton, 1956), 1: 98.Google Scholar

⁴¹ On the Persian court see Amanat, Abbas, “Courts and Courtiers,” Encyclopedia Iranica VI: 375–381.Google Scholar

⁴² R-ch, M., “Ot Moskvy do Tegerana i obratno: iz vospominanii russkoi puteshestvennitsy,” Vestnik Evropy 14 (1879): 289.Google Scholar

⁴³ Qaziha, Fatemah, ed., Asnad-e rawabet-e Iran va Rusih az dureh-ye Naser al-Din Shah ta soqut-e Qajar 1267–1344 qamari; 1851–1925 miladi (Tehran, 2001), 167–70Google Scholar and 170–72.

⁴⁴ Misl'-Rustem [pseudonym], Persia pri Nasr ed Din Shakhe s 1882 po 1888 g, Ocherki v rasskazakh (St Petersburg, 1897), 79–80.Google Scholar

⁴⁵ Russian interest in these trips is documented in the translation of one of the shah's travelogues about a trip to the coastal province of Mazanderan: Puteshestvie Shakha Nasr-ed-Dina po Mazanderanu: Sobstvennyi Ego Velichestva dnevnik, trans. Koriander, E. (St Petersburg, 1887).Google Scholar

⁴⁶ Alikhanov-Avarskii, Maksut, V gostiakh u Shakha: Ocherki Persii (Tiflis, 1898).Google Scholar

⁴⁷ See Amanat, Abbas, “Central Asia VIII: Relations with Persia in the 19th Century,” Encylopedia Iranica, V: 205–7.Google Scholar

⁴⁸ Alikhanov-Avarskii, V gostiakh, 152.

⁴⁹ Ibid., 154, 162, 199.

⁵⁰ Ibid., 157–58.

⁵¹ Ibid., 162, 193–94.

⁵² Ibid., 37.

⁵³ Umanets, S., “Persidskii Shakh i ego dvor,” Istoricheskii Vestnik 10 (1891): 226Google Scholar, and Smirnov, Konstantin, Persy: Etnograficheskii ocherk Persii (Tiflis, 1916), 94.Google Scholar

⁵⁴ On exchange of gifts between the tsars and Islamic rulers compare Kasinec, Edward and Davis, Robert, “Graphic Documentation of Gift Exchange between the Russian Court and its Islamic Counterparts, Seventeenth to the Nineteenth Century,” in Gifts of the Sultan: The Arts of Giving at the Islamic Courts, ed. Komaroff, Linda and Blair, Sheila (New Haven, CT, 2011).Google Scholar

⁵⁵ Chekhov, Anton P., “Lev i solntse,” in Polnoe sobranie sochinenii i pisem, ed. Bel'chikov, N.F. et al. (Moscow, 1976), 6: 395–99.Google Scholar

⁵⁶ See various lists of peoples whom Kuropatkin wanted to be decorated: Arkhiv vneshnei politiki rossiiskoi imperii/Archive of the Foreign Ministry of the Russian Empire, Moscow (henceforth AVPRI) f. 194, op. 528/1, d. 1774, 59–61, 62, 68–69.

⁵⁷ Smirnov, Konstantin N., Zapiski vospitatelia persidskogo shakha, 1907–1914 gody, ed. Ter-Oganov, Nugzar K. (Tel-Aviv, 2002), 117.Google Scholar A similar case is described for the Zell al-Sultan, the powerful governor of Isfahan, who traded a navigation concession on the Karun River, which gave Britain important economic advantages, in exchange for the “Great Star of India.” See Walcher, Heidi A., In the Shadow of the King: Zill al-Sultan and Isfahan under the Qajars (London, 2008), 87.Google Scholar

⁵⁸ Amanat, Pivot of the Universe, 268–69.

⁵⁹ The experience of the family and its cultural transition from the Persian monarchy to the Russian is recounted in: Nagdaliev, Farkhad, Khany Nakhichevanskie v Rossiiskoi Imperii (Moscow, 2006).Google Scholar

⁶⁰ A major example is the introduction of the telegraph, which was initially due to British imperial policies. Shahvar, Soli, “Iron Poles, Wooden Poles: The Electric Telegraph and the Ottoman-Iranian Boundary Conflict, 1863–1865,” British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies 34 (2007): 23–42.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁶¹ On Siam see for example: Petersson, Niels P., “König Chulalongkorns Europareise 1897: Europäischer Imperialismus, symbolische Politik und monarchisch-bürokratische Modernisierung,” Saeculum 52 (2001): 297–328.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁶² Motadel, David, “Qajar Shahs in Imperial Germany,” Past and Present 213 (2011): 191–235.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁶³ Misl’-Rustem, Persia, 54.

⁶⁴ al-Din Shah, Naser, The Diary of H.M. The Shah of Persia during his Tour through Europe in A.D. 1873 (London, 1874).Google Scholar For further references to the different travelogues in their Persian and English versions, compare Motadel, “Qajar Shahs,” 192, fn. 4. A Russian translation of parts of the first travelogue appeared only in 1889: al-Din Shah, Naser, Prebyvanie Shakha Nasr-Eddina v Rossii vo vremia pervogo puteshestviia ego velichestva po Evrope v 1873 godu: Izvlech. iz sobst. ego vel. dnevnika (St Petersburg, 1889).Google Scholar

⁶⁵ Bogdanovich, Nasr-Eddin Shakh, 12.

⁶⁶ Misl'-Rustem, Persia, 57.

⁶⁷ Ekhtiar, Maryam, “An Encounter with the Russian Czar: The Image of Peter the Great in Early Qajar Historical Writings,” Iranian Studies 29 (1996): 57–70.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁶⁸ Vsemirnaia Illiustratsiia, 12 May 1873, 315.

⁶⁹ Ibid.

⁷⁰ Vsemirnaia Illiustratsiia, 26 May 1889, 373.

⁷¹ See, for example, the reports on a wedding in the Chinese royal family (Vsemirnaia Illiustratsiia, 20 January 1873, title), on the arrival of a new viceroy in India (17 February 1873, 129 and 144–45) or the wedding of the daughters of the Egyptian ruler (17 March 1873, 185).

⁷² Vsemirnaia Illiustratsiia, 2 June 1873, 361.

⁷³ Ibid., 2 June 1873, 362.

⁷⁴ On Shamil and Asians at the court of Alexander II in general see Wortman, Scenarios, 2: 52–53.

⁷⁵ See on this Grant, Bruce, The Captive and the Gift: Cultural Histories of Sovereignty in Russia and the Caucasus (Ithaca, NY, 2009)Google Scholar.

⁷⁶ See Motadel, David, “The German Other: Nasir al-Din Shah's Perceptions of Difference and Gender during his Visits to Germany, 1873–89,” Iranian Studies 44 (2011): 574.CrossRefGoogle Scholar In the British case, the Foreign Office also requested information from the envoy in Tehran over a number of protocol issues and asked “how they have been dealt with in Russia.” FO 60/358, 113 (Letter to the Envoy Thomson in Tehran, 19 May 1873). (FO = Foreign Office records, National Archive, London).

⁷⁷ See for example Koskenniemi, Martti, The Gentle Civilizer of Nations: The Rise and Fall of International Law 1870–1960 (Cambridge, 2002)Google Scholar, and Gong, Gerrit W., The Standard of “Civilization” in International Society (Oxford, 1984).Google Scholar

⁷⁸ Vitte, Sergei Y., Vospominaniia: Detstvo. Tsarstvovaniia Aleksandra II i Aleksandra III (Berlin, 1923), 379–80.Google Scholar

⁷⁹ It also contains the word “dura,” a foolish woman, thus giving an additional satirical flavor.

⁸⁰ Saltykov-Shchedrin, Mikhail, “Pompadury i pompadurshi,” in Sobranie sochinenii, ed. Bushmin, A.S. et al. (Moscow, 1969), 8: 260–61.Google Scholar There is an online version of the edition: http://www.rvb.ru/saltykov-shchedrin/toc.htm (accessed 12 January 2013).

⁸¹ Ibid., 261.

⁸² Ibid.

⁸³ Ibid.

⁸⁴ “Shakh Persidskii, Nassr-Eddin,” Vsemirnaia Illiustratsiia, 20 May 1878, 346.

⁸⁵ Ibid.

⁸⁶ “Nasr-Eddin,” in Entsiklopedicheskii Slovar', Izdanie F.A. Brokgausa, ed. Andreevskii, I.E. (St Petersburg, 1890–1907), 20a: 655.Google Scholar

⁸⁷ On the role of orientalism in Russian perceptions of Iran see Andreeva, Russia and Iran.

⁸⁸ Bogdanovich, Nasr-Eddin Shakh, 18.

⁸⁹ See the extensive report by a Russian officer about a bread price riot that broke out shortly after the shah's departure for Europe in 1900: Russkii gosudarstvennyi voenno-istoricheskii arkhiv/Russian State Archive for Military History, Moscow (RGVIA) f. 401, op. 5/929, d. 515, 206 (Report by Kosogovskii, 1900).

⁹⁰ On Russians at the Persian court, see Elena Andreeva, “Russians at the Court of Mohammad-'Ali Shah,” Encyclopedia Iranica, http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/russia-iv-russians-at-the-court-of-mohammad-ali-shah (accessed 1 April 2012).

⁹¹ The brigade has frequently been examined, for example in Rabi, Uzi and Ter-Oganov, Nugza, “The Russian Military Mission and the Birth of the Persian Cossack Brigade, 1879–1894,” Iranian Studies 42 (2009): 445–63CrossRefGoogle Scholar and Krasniak, O.A., Stanovlenie Iranskoi Reguliarnoi Armii v 1879–1921 (Moscow, 2007).Google Scholar

⁹² On Qajar militarism, see Walcher, In the Shadow, 80.

⁹³ Mostofi, Abdollah, The Administrative and Social History of the Qajar period (Costa Mesa, CA, 1997), 1: 76.Google Scholar

⁹⁴ See Keep, John, “The Military Style of the Romanov Rulers,” War and Society 1 (1983): 61–84.CrossRefGoogle Scholar An impressive description of merciless military drill and a parade held in spite of an outbreak of fever among the soldiers comes from one of the Russian military instructors: RGVIA f. 446, op. 1, d. 48, 33–62 (Report by Kosogovskii, 3 September 1897).

⁹⁵ Smirnov, Konstantin N., Zapiski vospitatelia persidskogo shakha, 1907–1914 gody, ed. Ter-Oganov, Nugzar K. (Tel-Aviv, 2002).Google Scholar

⁹⁶ See for example a request by the Persian consul in Tiflis, who wanted to send his son to the Nikolaevskii Kadetskii Korpus, an elite military school: AVPRI f. 194, op. 581/1, d. 1473, 14–15 (Foreign Ministry to Russian mission in Tehran, 19 July 1902). Even a governor on the Persian Gulf Coast inquired about the possibility of sending his sons to Russia: AVPRI f. 144, op. 488, d. 2517. When the Russian officer Mamontov visited the Cossack Brigade in 1908, he found some of his old classmates: N.P. Mamontov, Ocherkii sovremennoi Persii (St Petersburg, 1909), 141.

⁹⁷ A good description of this is Nagdaliev, Khany, 99–105.

⁹⁸ On one of the earlier tutors, see Petrov-Dubinskii, O.V., “S.M. Shapshal (Edib-us-Sultan)—uchitel' Valiakhda Mokhammed-Ali, General-adiutant Mokhammed Ali-Shakha,” Vostok 5 (2007): 64–78.Google Scholar Compare also Andreeva, “Russians.”

⁹⁹ RGVIA f. 400, op. 1, d. 3583, 1 (Izvol'skii to Palitsyn, 19 March 1907).

¹⁰⁰ On Russian “military Orientalists” see Baskhanov, M.K., Russkie voennye vostokovedy (Moscow, 2005).Google Scholar

¹⁰¹ See his articles: “Dervishi i ikh politicheskoe znachenie,” Izvestiia Shtaba Kavkazskogo Voennogo Okruga 31 (1911): 20–81Google Scholar and 32 (1911): 1–46; “Russko-Persidskaia Voina 1826–1828 g. s persidskoi tochki zreniia,” Izvestiia Shtaba Kavkazskogo Voennogo Okruga 37 (1914): 1–52Google Scholar; “Missionery v Persii,” Izvestiia Shtaba Kavkazskogo Voennogo Okruga 23 (1908).Google Scholar Two longer studies summarizing many of the earlier publications appeared in 1916 and 1917: Persy: Ocherk Religii Persii (Tiflis, 1916)Google Scholar and Persy: Etnograficheskii ocherk Persii (Tiflis, 1917).Google Scholar

¹⁰² See Smirnov, Konstantin N., “Kadetskie shkoly v Turtsii,” Izvestiia Shtaba Kavkazskogo Voennogo Okruga 1 (1904): 1–17.Google Scholar

¹⁰³ Smirnov, Zapiski, 81.

¹⁰⁴ This is mentioned about Smirnov's predecessor Kol'man. Ibid., 46.

¹⁰⁵ Smirnov, Zapiski, 223.

¹⁰⁶ For a mostly negative characterization of members of the suite, see Smirnov, Zapiski, 230–232.

¹⁰⁷ Smirnov, Zapiski, 226.

¹⁰⁸ On the role of women at the court in the late Qajar period compare Taj al-Saltanah's court diary and the introduction by Abbas Amanat: al-Saltanah, Taj, Crowning Anguish: Memoirs of a Persian Princess from the Harem to Modernity, 1884-1914, ed. Amanat, Abbas (Washington, DC, 1993).Google Scholar

¹⁰⁹ Smirnov, Etnograficheskii ocherk Persii, 62.

¹¹⁰ Ibid., 63.

¹¹¹ Ibid., 78.

¹¹² Smirnov, Zapiski, 225.

¹¹³ Ibid., 108.

¹¹⁴ Ibid., 235.

¹¹⁵ Ibid., 267. It is not clear if Smirnov used the poem by Pushkin or other versions by later authors.

¹¹⁶ Ibid., 267.

¹¹⁷ Ibid., 226.

¹¹⁸ Ibid., 229.

¹¹⁹ Ibid., 227.

¹²⁰ Ibid., 237.

¹²¹ For a theoretical treatment on the Qajars' style of government see Abrahamian, Ervand, “Oriental Despotism,” International Journal of Middle East Studies 5 (1974): 3–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

¹²² Smirnov, Zapiski, 237.

¹²³ Ibid., 277.

¹²⁴ Ibid.

¹²⁵ Ibid., 227.

¹²⁶ Ibid.

¹²⁷ Ibid., 311.

¹²⁸ Ibid., 57.

¹²⁹ See his extensive report in RGVIA f. 401, op. 5/929, d. 515, 206 (Report by Kosogvskii, 1900).

¹³⁰ “Serious Bread Riots in Persia,” The Times, 5 August 1895, 3 and “Persia,” The Times, 8 August 1895, 5.

¹³¹ AVPRI f. 144, op. 488, d. 603, 6–7 (Pokhitonov to mission, 2 March 1902).

¹³² AVPRI f. 144, op. 488, d. 603, 14 (Ministry of Finance to Lambsdorff, 18 April 1902).

¹³³ AVPRI f. 144, op. 488, d. 356, l. 9 (16 April 1905).

¹³⁴ AVPRI f. 144, op. 488, d. 356, l. 10 (16 April 1905).

¹³⁵ From summer 1906 on, a representative of the mission, for example, had several meetings with leading ulama representatives. AVPRI f. 194, op. 528/2, d. 229, 5–8 (Report about meeting with ulama representatives, 10 August 1906). The Russian envoy considered it even to be “highly desirable and even necessary” to improve relations with the ulama: AVPRI f. 194, op. 528/2, d. 229, 11–12 (Draft message to Foreign Ministry, February 1907).

¹³⁶ AVPRI f. 144, op. 1., d. 3818, l. 203 (Benkendorff to Foreign Ministry, 16/29 June 1908).

¹³⁷ AVPRI f. 144, op. 1, d. 3818, l. 311–12 (Hartwig to Foreign Ministry, 21 June/4 July 1908).

¹³⁸ Smirnov, Zapiski, 270.

¹³⁹ Ibid.

¹⁴⁰ Ibid., 75.

¹⁴¹ Smirnov, Zapiski, 122, pointed out that the Russians had not done enough to save the shah.

¹⁴² AVPRI f. 147, op. 485, d. 38, 15/8 (Foreign Ministry to Poklevskii-Kozell, 13 January 1912). See also Siegel, Endgame, 101.

¹⁴³ Kazemzadeh, Russia and Britain, 619–20. On autonomous actions by the consuls see also Siegel, Endgame, 119.

¹⁴⁴ Compare the books by Siegel and Kazemzadeh.

¹⁴⁵ Wortman, Scenarios of Power, 2: 159 passim.

¹⁴⁶ Ibid., 2: 244 passim.

¹⁴⁷ Schimmelpenninck Oye, David van der, Toward the Rising Sun: Russian Ideologies of Empire and the Path to War with Japan (DeKalb, IL, 2001), 15–23.Google Scholar

¹⁴⁸ On Ukhtomskii, see ibid., 42–60. On the role of Asia for the Russian monarchy see also Marlène Laruelle, ‘“The White Tsar”: Romantic Imperialism in Russia's Legitimizing of Conquering the Far East,’ Acta Slavica Iaponica 25 (2008): 113–34Google Scholar.

¹⁴⁹ Ukhtomskii, Esper E., Snosheniia s Persiei pri Godunove (St Petersburg, 1890).Google Scholar

¹⁵⁰ See Schimmelpenninck Oye, David van der, “Russia's Ambivalent Response to the Boxers,” Cahiers du Monde russe et soviétique 41 (2000): 57–78.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

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¹⁵² In the studies on diplomatic history, the tsar appears rather in the background. Kazemzadeh's study contains numerous references, but he tends to portray the tsar as undecided and easy to influence by his ministers. See for example Kazemzadeh, Russia and Britain, 339.

¹⁵³ The file is AVPRI f. 144, op. 488, d. 603.

¹⁵⁴ See AVPRI f. 147, op. 485, d. 38, l. 113/72 (Message to Kamereger Sosnovskii in Odessa, 8 March 1912).