On the evening of 31 August 1907, while descending the stairs of the parliamentary building, Iranian Prime Minister Amin al-Sultan had trouble adjusting his eyes to a sudden darkening of the atmosphere. Before he could regain his vision, he was hit by a series of bullets and died briefly afterwards. ʻAbbas Aqa, his assassin, soon collapsed as well. It remains unclear if by his own hand or someone else’s. Until today, the events of this day in Tehran remain as hazy and unclear as Amin al-Sultan’s vision must have felt in his final moments. 

What can be assessed more clearly is the crucial role photographs played in the aftermath of this important political moment during the first years of the Iranian Constitutional Revolution (1905-11). The mashruteh or Constitutionalist movement in Iran embraced photography for its ability to depict alternatives to authoritarian rule, visualize dissent, and memorialize events and people. This talk investigates the varied photographic imagery related to ʻAbbas Aqa and its circulation, reiteration, and interpretation, which crucially impacted this important political episode. Through a close reading of albumen photographs alongside collotype postcards and illustrated Persian-language and French-language periodicals of the time, I will trace how the interpretation, reception, and meaning of the photographs changed along with the public’s assessment of the assassination and the murderer, and how specifically the postcards functioned as tools of resistance against an authoritarian regime.