author

Edward Stack

An Indian Civil Service officer turned vivid travel writer, he left behind sharp-eyed accounts of Persia and the peoples of Assam. His work blends firsthand observation with the curiosity of a field researcher.

1 Audiobook

The Mikirs

The Mikirs

by Edward Stack

About the author

Edward Stack was a British officer in the Indian Civil Service who joined in 1872 and later became the first Director of Land Records and Agriculture in Assam. A short biographical entry also describes him as a travel writer, especially remembered for his account of journeys through Qajar Iran.

His best-known travel book is Six Months in Persia (1882), based on travels in 1881 and 1882. He also carried out close ethnographic work in Assam, where he studied local languages and communities with unusual energy.

Much of that research was published after his death in The Mikirs (1908), edited by Charles Lyall. In its introductory note, Lyall portrays him as an unusually active and observant civil servant whose writings helped shape later studies of the region and its peoples.