I had taken a room in the caravanserai of Ghafur Agha—who was then the Mayor—and found there no other residents save an old Arab gentleman, a native of Tripoli of Africa, who held a post of “mudir” or petty governor of a village, whither he could not proceed, as the village in question had not hitherto possessed such an official, and the Kurdish inhabitants would have slain any one bold enough to attempt to establish himself there as their ruler.
My neighbour, Mustafa Beg, was a courteous and well-educated old man, whose life had been spent in the Mediterranean ports and consulates at Malta, Trieste, and such places. He spoke Arabic and Turkish perfectly, but knew no word of Kurdish; nor could his well-bred and gentle nature at all cope with the rough manners he met in Sulaimania. A more complete example of the absurd disregard of suitability of man for post could not have been seen. Failing the opportunity of assuming his duties, the old man lived alone in a miserable room in the caravanserai. He possessed no covering for his floor; his only furniture was a couple of boxes containing his clothing, a coffee-boiler, an old spirit stove, one coffee cup, and some bedding. He slept at nights in a disused palanquin whose owner had been killed, and it was partly owing to this habit that he met his ghastly death some months later.
In the entrance to the caravanserai a merchant, half-owner of the place, had an office, and some Jewish pedlars stored their wares in two rooms. The rest remained empty, their bare walls testifying to the condition of Sulaimania. The courtyard lay deep in dust and scraps of paper, and a stagnant pool stank in its midst. Desolation was near it, and by the shaikhs’ agency eventually lay upon it.
I arrived at about half an hour to sunset, and being foodless, locked my door—that slid like a shutter, up and down—and went out to find something. Bread was naturally the first thing needful, and this I found of two kinds, one very thin flaps and the other thick round cakes, each being sold for two “pul”—the pul being a copper coin of Persia worth about a seventh of a penny. Three flaps (or a pennyworth) was enough for my needs, and this, with two lettuces—at a farthing each—a sticky lump of dates, very dear in this cold country, and a bowl full of watered curds, or “du,” made an excellent dinner.
SULAIMANIA CURRENCY
Buying anything at first was rather an ordeal, for Sulaimania has retained the Persian currency, though it is many a long year since it belonged to that nation, no Turkish coins except the mejidie being accepted. Thus old names and coins remain, while the names of Turkish coins are applied to the currency as well, resulting in confusion. There are three actual tokens: the copper “pul”; the silver “baichu,” or Persian “panj shahi”; and the ordinary two-kran piece of Persia, here called “tihrani.” But we encounter such names as “charkhi,” “jout,” “deh para,” “ghazi,” “qamari,” “qran,” and “qran-i-rash,” besides these.
Everything is reckoned in “qamari,” and this imaginary coin is worth four “pul,” and the “baichu” (which being the actual token must be handled) is worth seven pul. For larger amounts the tihrani is quoted, consisting of five baichu and one pul, or nine qamari; and the stranger plunges about in despair, not lessened by the fact that in Kirkuk they call the baichu a qamari, and the tihrani a qran.
I quote an example of the working of this system, which, it is to be hoped, is not more confusing than the unexplained situation. When I would go to where fragments of a sheep suspended from a pole constituted a butcher’s shop, to ask the price, I was informed “thirty-two.” I must know that this means thirty-two qamari, or three qrans and five qamaris, which is in tokens, three qran and two baichu and six pul. This is the price of a Sulaimania “oke,” or as the Kurd calls it, “huqqa.” Every town in the East fixes its own scheme of weights; and being asked, the Sulaimanian will, with excess of lucidity, explain that the local huqqa is four-fifths of the Panjwin huqqa, five-fourths of a Tabriz “man,” two-fifths of the Halabja “man,” and will not, till the last moment, give the information that it equals two and a half of the Stamboul “oke,” which passes as a base for calculation throughout Asiatic Turkey.
Thus, receiving the reply “thirty-two,” one arrives, or is expected to arrive, at the knowledge that the amount of meat necessary, usually a quarter of a huqqa, costs eight qamari, which must be paid for by four baichu and four pul. At the same time is discovered the fact that the huqqa—like a Persian “man,” which it really is—misnamed, is divided into four hundred dirhams, and that all fractions of the huqqa must be expressed in Turkish and not in the native Kurdish.
It was a great relief to find that nearly all the population knew some Persian, for the northern and eastern Kurdish I knew was not current here, and to the population less comprehensible than Persian. At first, and before I became recognised, the fact of my wearing a fez gave everyone to think that I was a Turk; and those who possessed any would air their little Turkish upon me, and, it must be said, show considerably more gratification at the opportunity of talking Persian.