Доклады Международного конгресса ИИСАА. Т. 1

II. Middle East, Caucasus and Central Asia / Ближний Восток, Кавказ и Центральная Азия 294 Proceedings of the International Congress on Historiography and Source Studies of Asia and Africa.Vol. I. 2020 referred to was the bad experience of transporting the elephant sent by the previous embassy by sea from Baku to Astrakhan. The elephant stayed for a long time in the ship’s hold that was full of sea water. The salty water reached the animal’s knees irritating its skin, which resulted in wounds on its legs. The shah was worrying that this time the elephants might acquire the same wretched appearance and the gifts would loose their attractiveness, ‘as it is ungracious to look at sick and wounded elephants, and thus the present would no more be a present’. 1 Not all the elephants managed to overcome the hardships of the lengthy and dangerous journey from India to Russia. One of them died while the embassy was still on the territory of Iran, in Sabzavar. 2 Later, one more elephant drowned when the mission was crossing the Kura river by floating bridges. 3 Russian envoy in Iran Semen Arapov, based in Rasht, left the following detailed account on the animals numbering fifteen by that time: ‘…very large, one measuring eight lokot s 4 , five measuring seven lokot s and others measuring six lokot s; and I saw them being led and where they are staying, they have no decorations; the big elephants have teeth projecting outwards at one arshin 5 and the others slightly less, covered with silver and some of them with iron at the ends; out of them four females; and they eat per day one elephant three and a quarter pud s 6 of bread 7 , seven pounds of sugar, seven pounds of butter, eight elephants per day each two pud s thirty pounds of bread, seven pounds of sugar and seven pounds of butter, six — two pud s fifteen pounds of bread, seven pounds of sugar and seven pounds of butter’. 8 The British envoy to Russia Edward Finch later noticed that the height of the biggest elephant brought to St Petersburg reached 5.5 arshin s (around 4 meters). 9 1 AVPRI. Fond 77. Snosheniya Rossii s Persiei. Opis’ 77/1. 1740 g. Delo 6. Fol. 78v; AVPRI. Fond 77. Snosheniya Rossii s Persiei. Opis’ 77/1. 1740 g. Delo 15. Fol. 6v. 2 AVPRI. Fond 77. Snosheniya Rossii s Persiei. Opis’ 77/1. 1740 g. Delo 9. Chast’ I. Fols. 174v, 176; Delo 15. Fol. 143. 3 AVPRI. Fond 77. Snosheniya Rossii s Persiei. Opis’ 77/1. 1740 g. Delo 15. Fols. 111v, 112v. 4 Old Russian measure of length equal to 45 cm. 5 Old Russian measure of length equal to 0.7112 m or 28 inches. 6 Old Russian measure of weigh equal to 16.38 kg. 7 In this context may also mean ‘grain’. 8 AVPRI. Fond 77. Snosheniya Rossii s Persiei. Opis’ 77/1. 1740 g. Delo 9. Chast’ I. Fols. 177v–178; Delo 15. Fol. 145r–145v. 9 Сборник Императорского русского исторического общества. СПб.: Типография Императорской Академии наук, 1894. Т. 91 / Sbornik Imperatorskogo russkogo istorich- eskogo obshchestva [Collected works of the Imperial Russian historical society]. St Petersburg: Tipografiya Imperatorskoi Akademii nauk, 1894. Vol. 91. (In Russian). Р. 283.