...Among the features of public life in Persia that most
quickly strike the stranger’s eye, and that indirectly arise from the same
conditions, is the enormous number of attendants and retainers that swarm round
a minister, or official of any description. In the case of a functionary of
rank or position, these vary in number from 50 to 500. Benjamin says that the
Prime Minister in his time kept 3,000. Now, the theory of social and ceremonial
etiquette that prevails in Persia, and indeed throughout the East, is to some
extent responsible for this phenomenon, personal importance being, to a large
extent, estimated by the public show which it can make, and by the staff of
servants whom on occasions it can parade. But it is the institution of
‘Madakhil’ and of illicit pickings and stealings that is the root of the evil.
If the governor or minister were bound to pay salaries to the whole of this
servile crew their ranks would speedily dwindle. The bulk of them are unpaid;
they attach themselves to their master because of the opportunities for
extortion with which that connection presents them, and they thrive and fatten
on plunder. It may readily be conceived how great a drain is this swarm of blood-suckers
upon the resources of the country. They are true types of unproductive
labourers, absorbing but never creating wealth; and their existence is little
short of a national calamity.... It is a cardinal point of Persian etiquette
when you go out visiting to take as many of your own establishment with you as
possible, whether riding or walking on foot; the number of such retinue being
accepted as an indication of the rank of the master.
- Lord Curzon (Extract from “Persia and the Persian
Question”, quoted by Shoghi Effendi in the Introduction to the Dawn-Breakers)
