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Mohammad Hasan Khan E'temad os-Saltaneh (1843-96), a high official in the court of Naser od-Din Shah Qajar (1848-96), has been something of an enigma to historians of nineteenth-century Iran.1 The bare facts of his life are well known, but despite his fame, the man himself eludes us. Contemporary descriptions are fragmentary: most regard him with varying measures of awe or contempt. Those who despised the man and his politics denounced him as a Russophile reactionary and shameless liar, one who falsified historical facts to justify the heinous acts of his father and to tarnish the reputation of Iran's two reformist Prime Ministers, Mirza Taqi Khan Amir Nezam (Amir Kabir) (1848-51) and Mirza Hossein Khan Moshir od-- Dowleh (Sepahsalar) (1871-73). Those who rushed to his defence praised him as a freedom-loving patriot who only desired the independence and progress of his country. Ignoring his caste-ridden scorn for the common people and numerous references in his diary to beatings of servants and subordinates, these apologists claimed that E'temad os-Saltaneh was an intensely sensitive, polite, and magnanimous man who never used foul language and always treated the people under him with gentleness and kindness.2
The answer may lie in the sources and the beginning of an answer lies in one extraordinary source in particular. During two separate periods, the first from the summer of 1875 to the winter of 1876 and the second from March 1881 to April 1896, E'temad os-Saltaneh scrupulously recorded his personal and political observations and feelings in a diary. But the diary is not merely a history of Naser od-Din Shah's court as recorded by E'temad os-Saltaneh, it is also a self-portrait that reveals its author in all his vulnerability. It confesses his dreams and ambitions. It shows his fears and anxieties. It lists the deep insecurities which always plagued him. But it is even more crowded and lively. Curiously, in the end both the mystery of the seemingly powerful but in fact feeble Qajar state and the riddle of the 'evil' - yet - 'kind' E'temad os-Saltaneh hid a further surprise - the powerful role of women. This article aims to extract from this long and fascinating diary entries that reveal, within the confines of a limited number of pages, the scope and...