English: A rare military manuscript comissioned by Persian Prime Minister Amir Kabir (1848-51), Mohammad 'Ali Yavar Anjudani, Ketab-e Hijda Harkat, Qajar Iran, dated 1851

Book of eighteen manoeuvres, autograph copy, Persian manuscript on paper, 80ff. plus four flyleaves, most pages with text, charts and tables in black nasta’liq with red highlighs, 18 folios with military diagrams and annotated charts, boards with morocco spine, dated 17 ½ x 14 1/8in. (44.5 x 36cm.)

It is significant that this manuscript was written in the same year as the founding of the Dar al-Funun in 1851 by Amir Kabir, the chief minister of Iran at that time. Ekhtiar notes that the Dar al-Funun was originally conceived as a sort of military academy – a means of implementing a unified knowledge among a new generation of Iranian youth of “useful sciences” including the military disciplines. (Maryam Ekhtiar. “Nasir Al-Din Shah and the Dar Al-Funun: The Evolution of an Institution.” Iranian Studies, vol.34, no ¼, 2001, pp. 153–163). Amir Kabir was executed only thirteen days after the inauguration of the Dar al-Funun, and in 1852, Aziz Khan Mukri Ajudan (1792-1871), an high-ranking army official and dignitary of Qajar Iran from early in Nasir-al-din Shah’s reign became its director. The preface to this manuscript indicates that the manual was produced to educate 'Ali Khan Sarhang, the son of Aziz Khan and it is therefore very likely that this manuscript was produced in the early stages of the Dar al-Funun.