KERMAN
Short history of Kerman--Its overthrow--City of beggars--Story
of the fort--The jackal's "tale of woe."
"A little red worm--the gard'ner's special dread."
V. Fane.
The first view we had of Kerman was a very picturesque one. We had
been travelling for about twenty days, and on Easter Eve reached a
lovely garden some four or five hours' ride from Kerman, and here we
decided to stay for Easter Day. Early on Monday morning we started
for the last stage of our journey. Just as the sun was rising we
came to the top of a hill, and there away in the distance lay the
city of Kerman, the city towards which our hopes and thoughts had
been tending for so long, as it was the goal to which we had been
pressing for the past twelve months, and which we fondly hoped was
to have been our home for many years; but God ordered otherwise.
Kerman is a very interesting old city, having passed through many
vicissitudes and seen many changes during its varied and chequered
history. It is also a very pretty place, especially as seen from a
short distance, surrounded on three sides by the eternal mountains,
with their ever-changing shades and shadows, and forming a magnificent
background to the city nestling at their feet. On the fourth side
the desert stretches away to Yezd and Isphahan.
Kerman is said to have derived its name from a Persian word Kerm,
meaning a worm, and the legend connected with it is as follows. The
princess who founded the city was one day walking with her followers
over the site of the future town, and plucked an apple from a tree:
upon eating it she found to her disgust and annoyance a worm at
its core. As she threw it away in anger, she declared that the new
city should be called Kerm-an, a worm. Kerman is certainly a very
ancient city: the inhabitants claim that it was a large town in the
time of Solomon. Whether this is so I do not know. The first time it
is mentioned in history is by Herodotus. Alexander is said to have
marched his army through Kerman on his way to India, and Cyrus passed
that way on his return from India. Perhaps few places have suffered
more at the hands of invaders than Kerman. It has been sacked at least
six times, and in 1794 the city was almost entirely destroyed by Agha
Mohammed Khan. The city was bravely defended by the prince-governor,
who was one of the last of the Zend dynasty; he sustained a long
and severe siege, till two-thirds of his troops had perished from
starvation, and then the city was betrayed treacherously into the
hands of the enemy and its brave defenders obliged to flee, only to
meet with a cruel death some two years later from the hands of the
same oppressor. This incarnation of cruelty, Agha Mohammed Khan, gave
the city over to the will of his soldiers, who resembled their leader
in cruelty and barbarity. There was no compassion in his heart, and he
would listen to none of the entreaties of the unfortunate inhabitants
for mercy, nor would he withdraw his troops from the city till he had
received a gift of twenty thousand pairs of human eyes. When these
were brought to him, he insisted on counting them over himself to
see if the number was correct, and is reported to have said to the
trembling man who carried the baskets piled high with these awful
trophies: "It is a good thing the number is correct; if it had not
been, your eyes would have gone to make up the exact number." The
city never recovered from this terrible blow, and to-day Kerman is
a byword among Persians for its poverty and extraordinary number of
beggars. If you were to ride through the bazaars you would be struck
by the tremendous number of beggars, all holding out their hands,
beseeching you for the love of God to give them a copper.
There is a quaint saying among the beggars which one hears very often;
it is as follows:--
"Khuda guft, 'Beddeh,'
Shaitan guft, 'Neddeh'"
(God says, "Give"; Satan says, "Don't give").
Just outside Kerman are the remains of two old fortresses, the larger
of which is called the Galah i Doukhta, or the Fort of the Maiden,
doubtless on account of the story connected with it.
These fortresses were built on small hills, and so alike are they in
formation and colour to the soil that it is difficult to see where
the castle begins and the hill ends. Between these two old fortresses
lie the ruins of ancient Kerman. This city was the last to fall under
the Moslem sway in its invasion of Persia, and the legend connected
with it is interesting.
The city was surrounded on all hands by the Moslem invaders, and it
seemed as if the enemy would be obliged to retreat, as its defenders
had withdrawn themselves into the castles or fortresses already
mentioned. These had been well provisioned for a long siege in
case of need, and also were connected with the outer world by means
of underground passages, known only to those in the castles. All,
perhaps, might have gone well but for the fact that there lived in
the fortress a beautiful woman--alas! as treacherous as beautiful. She
was the idolised daughter of the king of the castle; nothing was too
good for this loved and spoilt beauty. Her father showered gifts upon
her--gold, jewellery, silks, all were hers; and it is said that just
before the siege began her father had planned and designed a beautiful
garden for her, such as never had been seen before.
Being so loved and such a favourite of all, she was allowed to roam at
will within the castle walls, and often beguiled the time by watching
the besiegers who lay far below in the plain. One day her attention
was attracted by a handsome Arab general, who always seemed to be
foremost in all that was going on, leading his men into the most
dangerous and exposed parts. Where the arrows fell fastest and most
often, there this Arab prince was sure to be seen, always brave and
courageous. His bravery, added to his good looks, so appealed to this
spoilt and petted woman that she immediately fell in love with him. Day
by day this love increased, till her whole soul was afire with all the
abandon of an Eastern love, and she felt that nothing could or should
keep her from her hero. "Love" soon found means of communicating
with the object of its affection, for love is stronger than barred
or barricaded fortresses. By some means, known only to herself and
one other, she gave this Arab to understand that if only he would
promise to marry her, she would deliver the castle into his hands.
The Eastern as well as the Western agree that "All is fair in love
and war," so this general of the East consented to this plan, and
agreed to accept victory at the hands of treachery.
Accordingly, all was arranged satisfactorily to both parties,
and one dark, moonless night the deed was done. The lady of the
castle, the idolised and beloved of all, became the betrayer of her
people. After all had retired to rest that night, and the sentinels
were lost in the dense darkness, she stealthily crept out of the
castle, safely passed the sleeping men supposed to be on guard, and
opened the secret gate to her lover and his soldiers--the enemies
of her father and her country. A terrible massacre ensued, in which
the father was slain, fortunately dying without the knowledge of his
daughter's base action. The prince-general had given strict orders
to his men that on no account was the girl to be touched during the
attack on the castle, but that she was to be conducted to a place of
safety till all was over. At last, in the early hours of the morning,
the general had time to think of his ward.
Tired out with his work of bloodshed and slaughter, but rejoicing in
his unexpected victory, he sent for the girl to find out the reason
of her willingness to thus betray her own people and land into the
hands of the enemy. When brought into his presence he was amazed at the
beauty and loveliness of the girl before him, and his heart went out in
great love and admiration towards her. She, still thinking only of her
own wicked infatuation, was congratulating herself that now her heart's
desire was to be granted her, and she would soon become the wife of
the man so long idealised and idolised. But alas! for her fair hopes.
The general, notwithstanding her beauty, desired to find out what
her motive was for doing as she had done, and so he plied her with
questions. "Was she very unhappy?" "Was her father very cruel to
her?" or "Had she done this to avenge herself for some wrong?" To all
these she replied in the negative. "Then, in the name of wonder, what
was your reason for sacrificing father, home, country and all?" cried
the general. "For love of you," answered the now frightened girl,
and she then told him how kind her father had been to her, how he
had done all in his power to make her happy, and how nothing was ever
denied her that he could possibly procure, but assured him that all
this was as nothing to her compared to the great love which she felt
towards him, her lover, and ended by beseeching him, now that she
had sacrificed all for him, not to cast her away.
At this the general was so disgusted and enraged with her, that he
determined that she must die, and cast about in his mind for some means
of death worthy of her selfishness and wickedness, "for," said he,
"you are not a woman, you are a fiend, and therefore must die."
He therefore ordered his men to bind her with cords, face downwards,
on to the back of a wild horse, and to turn horse and its rider into
the desert. This order was carried out amidst heartrending cries
and entreaties for mercy from the girl, but to all the general paid
no heed, declaring that she was only suffering a just death for the
abominable behaviour to her own people. The soldiers followed the
horse for some distance into the desert to prevent its returning,
and thus perished the beautiful traitress of Kerman.
I may say here that this form of death is not unknown even now in
Persia, and I heard a story of a man who treated his wife in much
the same way, only the idea was perhaps a little more diabolical. He
was angry with her for some reason, and desired to rid himself of
her, so he caught a cow, and kept it shut up without water for some
days. Then he bound his wife under the body of the animal and sent
it off. Of course the cow made for the nearest stream, and we can
imagine better than describe the fate of the poor woman.
The Kerman of to-day is a large walled-in city of about forty thousand
souls. This wall is pierced by some dozen gates, some of which are
in good repair, but others are fast falling into ruin. In fact,
most of the buildings in Kerman, as well as other parts of Persia,
are "kharab shodeh"--that is, either in ruins, or fast falling into
that state. The "kharab" buildings outside the town are the abode of
jackals, hyaenas, owls, and other creatures of the desert.
The story of how the jackals came to be inhabiters of the desert is
told by the Kermanis with great gusto, and they quite sympathise with
them in their banishment from the civilisation of town life. When
in Kerman our house was outside the city, so we had the full benefit
of the cries and wailings of these jackals, and at first it used to
make me feel quite creepy, but after a time we became more accustomed
to the weird music of the night, and missed the evening concerts when
absent from Kerman. Sometimes the jackals would come right up into our
garden, at other times their howling would come from the desert, like
the far-away cry of a soul in torment, or the wailing of the banshee;
but all night and every night the wailing, wailing went on, always
crying for what they had not and never could have--never satisfied,
and always letting people know the fact!
The story of the dispute between the jackals and the dogs of Kerman was
told me soon after our arrival there. It is said that, in olden days,
the jackals were the domesticated pets of the inhabitants of the town,
and lived quite happily and contentedly in their respective homes,
always enjoying security and peace within the closed gates, while
the dogs had to be content to be dwellers of the desert and ruins,
outside the walls of the city. One day the dogs awoke to the fact
that the jackals had much the better time of it, and they did not
see why this unequal state of things should remain. They were tired
of being always outsiders, always short of food, and exposed to all
the chances of wind and weather--so they resolved to make a great
effort to obtain a position inside the gates, where there was plenty
of everything. Being Socialists, they believed in the maxim of "share
and share alike," so they called a committee to consider by what means
they could oust the jackals from their comfortable quarters and install
themselves in their places. After due thought and much discussion,
they determined to send some leading representatives to the city to
interview the jackals. This they accordingly did, telling them that
many of the dogs had been ill, and the doctor had ordered change of
air for three days. Would not the noble jackals allow their humble
neighbours the dogs to exchange places with them just for three days,
in order that the invalids might have a chance of recovering their
strength and health. At the same time they enlarged upon the beauties
of the desert air, which they said would be so good for those who
had been cooped up in the stifling city for so long. The jackals,
after long and careful consideration, agreed to this proposition,
arranging to leave their comfortable homes for three days only, at the
expiration of which time all were to return to their original places.
The next night the change was accomplished, and in the morning the
people were all surprised to see dogs where the night before there
had been jackals. However, they did not object very much. At the end
of the three nights, the jackals came to the gates of the city and
demanded admission, longing to return to their own haunts and homes,
having found three days in the desert quite enough, there being no
comparison between the comforts of the town and the dreariness and
cold of the outside life. The dogs appreciated the change so much
that they answered, "No, thank you, we prefer to stay where we are,
and do not wish ever to return to the desert." So the poor jackals
saw that they had been fooled, and went away sad and sorrowful, and
every night since then have come howling for admission to the gates,
and on the dogs answering "No," they go away wailing. And that is
the reason why every night we can hear the howling and wailing of
these disappointed creatures. And they will probably go on howling
and wailing till the end of time, for the dogs are never likely to
wish to return to the desert life.
Such is the legend of the jackals and the dogs of Kerman.