looked to the Russians became disappointed by their weak showing
in the war and in some cases were brought under tighter Iranian con-
trol.^20
Morale among the Iranian troops seems to have been fairly good.
Even though the pay was poor, the opportunity to take booty was a
considerable attraction. In fact, the tribal levies expected the shah to
provide them with some campaign each year. (If the government had
not been strong, the tribes might well have raided within Iran.) Herds
of animals and a wide variety of objects were carried off, but the
most valuable and prestigious type of loot was slaves, particularly
Georgian women who were highly valued as concubines. There was
also a slave trade conducted by merchants, but the war provided op-
portunities for Iranian soldiers to kidnap slaves themselves. In 1810,
an incentive of another sort was provided by the declaration of a
holy war against the Russians. Several mojtaheds agreed to the gov-
ernment's arguments that a holy war was incumbent upon pious Mus-
lims because the Russians had invaded Iran and oppressed Muslims.^21
Reports of Napoleon's invasion of Russia, to which a rumor of Alex-
ander's surrender had been added, buoyed the Iranians' hopes for a
time.
While some of the characteristics of Iran's traditional army gave it
an advantage over the Russians, others had the opposite effect. The
most obvious problem for both tactics and morale was the woeful
inadequacy of Iran's artillery. Until the French-assisted military re-
forms, there was no functional heavy artillery at all, only a few can-
non left over from the Safavi era or captured from the Russians. One
of the Russian cannons was fired on ceremonial occasions at the
shah's palace in Tehran, but the rest were broken beyond repair. The
only kind of artillery used in battle was the zamburak ("little wasp"),
a small, short-range piece similar to the European falconet. Zambur-
aks were mounted on camels for great mobility and usually fired in
group volleys to compensate for the fact that they were not careful-
ly aimed (or designed for accuracy). The zamburaks and projectiles
were made of copper, (which was very expensive) or lead (which was
too soft and heavy). The projectiles were often flawed; this caused
them to break easily or, worse, explode upon firing. The clamor of
battle and their frequent injuries caused many of the camels to run
amok during a battle, doing at least as much damage to the Iranians
as to the enemy. Many of the infantry's guns were also extremely
poor, especially the type that had so long a barrel it required a two-
foot-high crutch to support the front. However, this mattered little
since the infantry was not considered important.^22 The artillery's
110 The War, 1804-1813