Guillaune-Antoine Olivier’s Mission in Iran (1796) and his Information

Abstract

At the end of the 18th century, in October 1795, on the instructions of the French Directory (1795-1799), two French scientists - the entomologist Guillaume-Antoine Olivier and the zoologist Jean-Guillaume Bruguière were commissioned to go to Iran, to make Agha Mohammad Khan agree to establish relationship with France and to create a Turkish-Persian alliance against Russia. The French emissaries were received twice by Haji Ibrahim, the vizier of Agha Mohammad Khan, on September 23 and 24, 1796. But their mission was not followed by a result, as the Ottomans declared war on France in September 1798 because of Bonaparte's expedition to Egypt (1798-1799). 

In the present article we focused on Olivier's data about Georgia, presented in the third volume of his Voyage published in 1807. Particularly noteworthy is the presentation of articles 1-13 of Treaty of Georgievsk in chapter XX of his work. The French scholar does not cite the source, but we think he used a work published in 1791 in German and French by the German lawyer Georg Friedrich von Martens. The publication of this document had a definite meaning: on May 4, 1807, the treaty of alliance was concluded between France and Iran. Napoleon recognizes Georgia as legitimately belonging to Fath-Ali Shah (Art. 3), and he undertakes to make all his efforts „to force Russia to evacuate Georgia and Persian territory“ (Art. 4). The mention of the kingdom of Kartl-Kakheti as the ‘Georgia of Persia’ by Olivier, reinforced in the minds of Europeans the idea that Eastern Georgia was a country belonging to Persia and taken by force by Russia, because it was clear from the text of the treaty that this is an unequal agreement with Georgia. 

Olivier notes that the Treaty of Georgievsk was signed in 1783, four years after the death of Karim Khan (1779), when many claimants fought for the throne of Iran. According to him, after the conquest of the southern provinces of Persia Agha Mohammad Khan could not give up his rights that he had upon Georgia, as otherwise he would compromise his honor and would not be worthy of the crown usurped by him. This reference of Olivier clearly shows how important the integration of Georgia as part of Persia was for the new dynasty of the Kadjars from a moral and political point of view. 

In his Voyage Olivier presents the information by the Hungarian doctor, eyewitness Auguste Aros, on the invasion of Aga Mohammad Khan in Tbilisi in 1795 and the barbaric behavior of his warriors.

The third volume of Olivier's Voyage was immediately translated into English, German, Dutch, Spanish, and Italian. The above information is the first data on Georgia presented to a large audience of European readers.