The Constitutional Revolution of 1905-09 was a major watershed in Persian history. It ended the traditional system of government in which the Shah, as the Shadow of God on Earth, ruled his people without any legal and institutional limitations. And it introduced the constitutional system of government in which “the people” were sovereign, and their elected representatives made and unmade ministers, laws, budgets, concessions and foreign treaties. In this revolution the political crowd played a prominent role. An organized procession in April 1905 raised the issue whether the Shah could freely choose his administrators. A larger assembly, nine months later, initiated the demand to limit the monarch's arbitrary powers by creating a “House of Justice.” Spontaneous riots in June 1906, and the killing of demonstrators, poured a stream of blood into the wide gap between the government (dawlat) and the nation (millat). A general strike in July, and the exodus of 15,000 from Tehran into the British Legation, forced the court to grant the country a written constitution with an elected House of Parliament.

The processes of development in the “Third World” are of great concern to historical sociologists and economic historians. However, despite the great interest displayed by the founding fathers of sociology in the nineteenth century in similar questions, and despite their historical orientation and liking of historical periodization, present day sociologists tend to be uninterested in both this subject matter and this orientation. In this respect they have lagged behind economists interested in questions of development and economic historians.

Following in Marx & Weber's tradition of social-economic science the objective of this paper is to demonstrate the importance of historical analysis for a deeper understanding of the problem of economic development. From the outset tha basic question will be the proper use of history to construct the historical processes of development both in the past and the future.

To state that the bibliography of Iranian studies is accumulating at an alarming rate is perhaps to belabor the obvious. It is an impression most students of the field will share. The project described in the following few pages was undertaken in part to explore this impression, and to test a solution to the problem implicit in it. Whatever small part impressionism may have thus played in its conceptual phase, the project's findings are strictly empirical. Our general finding has been that the accumulation of bibliography in Iranian studies is faster than its students dare imagine, and is accelerating. For all practical purposes, it is beyond the control of the traditional methods of compiling and publication. Only the application of modern automated methods of data storage and control can allow the individual scholar to keep abreast of developments in his field, and save him an appreciable amount of time-consuming drudgery.

A considerable amount of Persian poetry has been translated into other languages including English. Quite frequently these translations are free renderings of the original, only vaguely conveying the message of the poet. Other translators have tried to be more faithful to the original and to give the English reader a closer understanding of the meaning. However, even such attempts do not enable the reader to experience the poem as in the original language with its poetic felicities. The following is an attempt to present a Persian poem in a different way, by providing a literal translation accompanied by a commentary. The literal translation is accompanied by the Persian text so that those who have even the slightest familiarity with the language may be able to experience the poem in a fuller and deeper way. In addition the lines of the literal translation are numbered so that the reader may refer to the related subjects under discussion.

Recent archaeological excavations in Iran have contributed fundamentally to our understanding of the economic subsistence patterns in man's earliest communities. Excavations at the sites of Tepe Yahya in Kerman, Ali Kosh in Khuzistan, and Ganj-i-Dareh in Western Azerbaijan, to name but a few within different environmental zones and ecological niches, show that within the area of present-day Iran the cultural and economic transition from an earlier subsistence of hunting and gathering to settled village agricultural communities took place. This transition has been documented in other areas, i. e. Palestine, Anatolia, of Southwestern Asia. The development from a hunting and gathering economy to settled village agricultural productivity, often referred to as the ‘Neolithic Revolution’, was not an historical event (taking place in a moment of time) nor restricted to a single geographical area, but a cultural process which necessitated millennia for its achievement. The important role which Iran played can perhaps best be documented by summarizing the developing economic subsistence patterns in three loosely defined periods of time about 7000, 6000, and 5000 B.C.

As with the majority of great national figures of the Middle Ages, we know relatively little about the facts, and, in particular, about the dates of the life of the major Persian language poet of the twelfth century, ode-writer to the Shirvānshāhs, son of a carpenter of Shirvān, Afẓāl al-dīn Ibrāhīm Khāqānī.

A brief sketch of the biographical information concerning the poet, which was compiled from oriental sources by N. Khanikoff almost a century ago, was then somewhat expanded and supplemented by K. G. Zaleman. With some insignificant variations and additions, this sunmary was then reproduced in all the works on Khāqānī up to our day. The question of the role of Transcaucasian elements In the works of Khāqānī was raised in the study carried out by Ju. N. Marr, in cooperation with K. I. Chajkin, during the last year of his life. Following the excellent tradition of V. A. Žukovskij, both sought first of all to extract bibliographical material from the poet's divan itself.

A leading force demanding change during the mid-20th century has been the university student. These demands are increasingly being backed by riot and rebellion as students throughout the world intensely challenge ongoing institutions and administrations. Few societies, regardless of geographic position, political system, or stage of economic development, have escaped recent episodes of serious student upheaval. France and Holland, the United States and Mexico, Czechoslovakia and Hungary, Egypt and Pakistan, Japan and Vietnam, and Turkey and Korea have witnessed shattering outbursts of student activity. The student has become the loudest spokesman for social change and a leading catalyst for political transformation. Political elites everywhere now realize that they can no longer ignore student demands but must devise policies to come to grips with them. The substance of these demands and the consequent elite policy are two key factors that are shaping the direction and progress of nations.

The Turkmen inhabit a portion of the Central Asian steppe extending cast from the Caspian Sea to the Amu Darya, a region divided among three countries--Iran, Afghanistan, and the Soviet Union. The central part of this area is the Kara Kum, or “black sand,” a vast, largely uninhabited desert. The majority of the Turkmen are concentrated in two somewhat more fertile regions bordering the Kara Kum. One area consists of the banks of the Amu Darya; the other is a long strip of plains and low mountains, lying south of the Kara Kum and separating it from the Iranian Plateau (see Map below). The Turkmen number about a million and a half, with approximately a million living in the Soviet Union, and roughly a quarter of a million each in Iran and Afghanistan.