MORIER, JAMES JUSTINIAN

born c. 1780, , Smyrna, Tur. died March 19, 1849, Brighton, Sussex, Eng. English diplomat and writer whose fame depends on The Adventures of Hajji Baba of Ispahan (1824), a picaresque romance of Persian life that long influenced English ideas of Persia; its Persian translation (1905) led to the development of the modern Persian novel of social criticism. The first of a series of novels written by Morier after he retired, Hajji Baba drew on the knowledge of Persia and its people that he had acquired on the British embassy staff at Tehran (180915) and in journeys described in two travel books.