Journey to the North of India
Overland from England, through Russia, Persia, and Affghaunistaun

Published 1834, this two-volume work sheds light on the Great Game, as Britain and Russia sought supremacy in Central Asia.

Arthur Conolly (Author)

9781108069229, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 21 August 2014

440 pages, 1 b/w illus. 1 map
21.6 x 14 x 2.5 cm, 0.56 kg

The Great Game, a coinage credited to the British officer Arthur Conolly (1807–42), refers to the nineteenth-century rivalry between Britain and Russia as each power sought supremacy in Central Asia. In a climate of tension and suspicion that the Russians might attempt to invade India via Afghanistan, Conolly, returning from sick leave in England, embarked in 1829 on an expedition through the region. His narrative provides observations on the various Asiatic peoples he encountered, including the social, religious and political aspects of their cultures. He describes also the many dangers he had to deal with, requiring him to assume a series of false identities. The risks that Conolly faced were underscored some years later, when he was captured and executed in Bukhara. Volume 1 recounts the first part of his journey, from St Petersburg, through the Caucasus, via Tiflis and Tehran, towards Herat.

Preface
1. St Petersburgh
2. Journey recommenced
3. Assumed character
4. Tribes of the desert
5. A present to our hostess
6. Peerwullee
7. Departure of Peerwullee
8. Suspicious guide
9. Pilfering of our baggage
10. Departure from Astrabad
11. Road to Meyer
12. Meshed the Holy
13. Interior of the sanctuary
14. Khaff
15. Visit from the Meerza Abdool Jowaut
16. Hatred of the sects of the Sheahs and Soonnees
17. Difficulty of obtaining money
18. Departure from Meshed with the Affghaun army
19. Rosanuck.

Subject Areas: Asian history [HBJF]