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This series focuses on South Asia during the colonial period. It includes contemporary accounts of European trade and settlement there, from the arrival of the East India companies to the full-blown colonial administration of the Victorian period, as well as works describing the earlier history of the region for the benefit of European readers.

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97 results in Cambridge Library Collection - South Asian History

Page 2 of 5

History of the Relations of the Government with the Hill Tribes of the North-East Frontier of Bengal
  • Alexander Mackenzie
  • Published online:
    05 October 2013
    Print publication:
    12 July 2012
    First published in:
    1884
  • Sir Alexander Mackenzie (1842–1902) joined the Indian Civil Service in 1862. His career began in Bengal, first as an assistant magistrate and then as a secretary to the local government. His report Memorandum on the North-East Frontier of Bengal (1869) was welcomed as a valuable guide to political relations in the area for government officials. This book, first published in 1884, is the updated and developed version of that report. It was extensively researched by Mackenzie, using government records, and was considered to be authoritative on the political relations between the Government and the hill tribes of Assam, Cachar and Chittagong. Mackenzie dedicates a chapter to each tribe and details their response to British colonisation and any negotiations that took place. Relevant notes and reports by officials who had come into contact with the tribes are also included as appendices. Mackenzie's thorough work remains an authoritative historical source today.

How to Develop Productive Industry in India and the East
  • Mills and Factories
  • P. R. Cola
  • Published online:
    05 October 2013
    Print publication:
    26 April 2012
    First published in:
    1867
  • The craft of manufacturing cotton was learnt by the British in India, but the East India Company's drive for profits caused the development of a cotton-spinning industry in Britain, which grew enormously when mechanical processes were introduced during the industrial revolution. Subsequent protectionist legislation which forbade the export of anything except raw cotton meant that India's supremacy in the industry was lost to Britain in the nineteenth century. This 1867 work, edited by P. R. Cola, who owned the Arkwright Cotton Mills in Bombay (Mumbai), argues for investment in up-to-date machinery, and provides a blueprint for developing a host of industries such as cotton and other textiles, jute, sugar, oil and iron, which would bring prosperity to India. Containing illustrations and statistical data, the book gives useful insights into the early development of many industries in India and in some of the other economies of the East.

Alberuni's India
  • An Account of the Religion, Philosophy, Literature, Geography, Chronology, Astronomy, Customs, Laws and Astrology of India about AD 1030
  • Volume 2
  • Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad Bīrūnī
  • Edited and translated by Edward C. Sachau
  • Published online:
    05 October 2013
    Print publication:
    24 May 2012
    First published in:
    1888
  • Translated and annotated by orientalist Edward Sachau (1845–1930), this 1887–8 two-volume work is the account by Muslim polymath and traveller Alberuni (973–1048) of Indian political and social life in the medieval period. Sachau published the manuscript in Arabic in 1885–6, at the same time working on an English translation. Alberuni, born in Chorasmia, south of the Aral Sea, was one of the leading scholars of his day. He accompanied the Afghan ruler Mahmud on his invasion of India in the early eleventh century, and remained there for thirteen years, making a detailed study of Indian life and culture, and in particular studying the Hindu religion. Alberuni claims that his work is not polemical in nature, but a simple historical record of facts, and he commends the learning of the Hindus in philosophy, mathematics and astronomy. Volume 2 discusses among other subjects astronomy, religion, ritual and law.

Alberuni's India
  • An Account of the Religion, Philosophy, Literature, Geography, Chronology, Astronomy, Customs, Laws and Astrology of India about AD 1030
  • Volume 1
  • Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad Bīrūnī
  • Edited and translated by Edward C. Sachau
  • Published online:
    05 October 2013
    Print publication:
    24 May 2012
    First published in:
    1888
  • Translated and annotated by orientalist Edward Sachau (1845–1930), this 1887–8 two-volume work is the account by Muslim polymath and traveller Alberuni (973–1048) of Indian political and social life in the medieval period. Sachau published the manuscript in Arabic in 1885–6, at the same time working on an English translation. Alberuni, born in Chorasmia, south of the Aral Sea, was one of the leading scholars of his day. He accompanied the Afghan ruler Mahmud on his invasion of India in the early eleventh century, and remained there for thirteen years, making a detailed study of Indian life and culture, and in particular studying the Hindu religion. Alberuni claims that his work is not polemical in nature, but a simple historical record of facts, and he commends the learning of the Hindus in philosophy, mathematics and astronomy. Volume 1 discusses Hindu beliefs, the caste system and the calendar.

Two Letters to Sir Charles Forbes
  • And Other Short Writings on the East India Company and the Freedom of the Press
  • James Silk Buckingham
  • Published online:
    05 October 2013
    Print publication:
    13 December 2012
    First published in:
    1824
  • Originally published between 1824 and 1853, these four pieces by James Silk Buckingham (1786–1855) illuminate the concerns of a broad-minded traveller and the problems of governing an empire. A newspaperman, social reformer and fierce critic of the East India Company, Buckingham published the Calcutta Journal until his expulsion from India in 1823 for attacking vested interests. The first and second pieces reissued here are his open letters, written anonymously in 1824, to the MP Sir Charles Forbes regarding press freedom and the expulsion, without trial, of himself and another editor. These are followed by an 1830 account of the reception of his public lecture tour on the East India Company's monopoly, and an 1853 outline for the future government of India. Together, these polemical texts provide great insight into contemporary colonial debates surrounding British rule in India.

A Scheme for the Government of India
  • George Campbell
  • Published online:
    05 October 2013
    Print publication:
    02 August 2012
    First published in:
    1853
  • Sir George Campbell (1824–92) spent a number of years in the administration of India at a time when rule over the country was being transferred from the East India Company to the British Crown. In this 1853 work, he offers an outline of policy for a future government. He believes that India is capable of being the most civilised country in the world, and favours introduction of the western model of development to India. Campbell laments the lack of co-ordination among various agencies of the government, and finds executive efficiency in an inverse proportion to staff numbers, thus supporting the idea of a small government. He argues for the establishment of an authoritative central power to guide, direct and propel the local administrations. Some of the problems he identified and the remedies he suggested are as relevant to the governance of India today as they were then.

The Indian Borderland, 1880–1900
  • Thomas Hungerford Holdich
  • Published online:
    05 October 2013
    Print publication:
    26 April 2012
    First published in:
    1901
  • An English geographer of great distinction, Sir Thomas Hungerford Holdich (1843–1929) is best remembered as Superintendent of Frontier Surveys in British India. He served on a number of boundary commissions including the one on Afghanistan that settled the country's border with British India in 1884–6. He was also invited by the governments of Argentina and Chile in 1892 to define their boundary along the Andes Mountains. Holdich wrote and lectured extensively on geographical issues in the later part of his life. In 1887 his work on the Afghan frontier received the Gold Medal of the Royal Geographical Society (of which he was President from 1917 to 1919). This work of 1901 describes the geography and border disputes of the north-west frontier, including the Second Anglo-Afghan War, in which Holdich himself fought. The book also contains illustrations, and an appendix that provides a short history of Afghanistan.

Summary of the Administration of the Indian Government, by the Marquess of Hastings, during the Period that he Filled the Office of Governor General
  • Francis Rawdon-Hastings
  • Published online:
    05 August 2013
    Print publication:
    13 December 2012
    First published in:
    1824
  • When the Army officer and politician Francis Rawdon-Hastings (1754–1826) arrived in Calcutta to serve as Governor-General in October 1813, British India comprised three presidencies and was beset by problems relating to warring states, weakened armed forces, insufficient funds, and rebellious Gurkhas and Maratha chieftains. This brief first-person account discusses these problems, touching especially on the war against Nepal (1814–16) - after which the Governor-General was created First Marquess of Hastings - and the offensive operations against Pindari raiders and restive chieftains in the Third Anglo-Maratha War (1817–18). First published in 1824 to justify Hastings' political, military and financial conduct in office, this work offers direct insight into a colonial leader's mentality and the strategic thinking behind the expenditure of blood and money for the furtherance of British imperialism.

The Private Life of an Eastern King
  • By a Member of the Household of His Late Majesty, Nussir-u-deen, King of Oude
  • William Knighton
  • Published online:
    05 July 2013
    Print publication:
    13 December 2012
    First published in:
    1855
  • The writer William Knighton (c.1824–1900) spent much of his career in Sri Lanka and India. Published in 1855, this is an account of the court of the notorious Indian King Nussir-u-deen (c.1803–37), written from the viewpoint and using the testimony of an anonymous British member of the King's retinue. Richly descriptive, it is an intimate portrait of life in the service of a hedonistic sovereign so hated and paranoid that he feared his own family would try to poison him. He is characterised as a cruel and frivolous man who only trusted his sycophantic barber. As well as describing the lavish royal lifestyle, the narrator documents the King's thirst for hunting, for exotic-animal fights and for abusing and humiliating members of the royal family. This is a lurid and engrossing tale of a monarch in decline and the corruption and favouritism that led to his eventual assassination.

A Review of the Financial Situation of the East India Company in 1824
  • Henry St. George Tucker
  • Published online:
    05 July 2013
    Print publication:
    13 December 2012
    First published in:
    1825
  • Henry St George Tucker (1772−1851) sailed to India in 1786 and worked in a number of administrative posts before becoming a director of the East India Company in 1826. He wrote this book following the publication of an essay by French economist Jean-Baptiste Say (1767−1832) which suggested that British possession of territories in India was a burden to the mother country. Tucker's aim with this work was to give an accurate report of the finances of the East India Company in order to show Say's claim to be false. First published in 1825, this book contains an analysis of the company's sources of revenue and gives the details of revenue raised from opium, salt, stamps and land taxes. It includes information on the revenue raised from different territories and finally concludes with an overview of the company's general finances, thus providing valuable data for the study of colonial economics.

In Abor Jungles
  • Being an Account of the Abor Expedition, the Mishmi Mission and the Miri Mission
  • Angus Hamilton
  • Published online:
    05 May 2013
    Print publication:
    26 April 2012
    First published in:
    1912
  • This 1912 book by Angus Hamilton (1874–1913), a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, is an account of the British military expeditions to quell uprisings among remote tribes in north-eastern India in 1911–12. Famous for his earlier books on Afghanistan, the problems of the Middle East, and Somaliland, Hamilton gives a full account of the various phases of the 'Abor expedition' which resulted in a crushing defeat of the local tribes. The book begins with a survey of the geography of the area, and a description of the Abor people, explaining the turbulent background to the murder in March 1911 of two British officials. A highly detailed and illustrated account then follows of the murders, and of the punitive response of the government in Delhi, which sent an expedition both to bring the area back under control and also to carry out geographical surveys of a relatively unknown area.

A History of India under the Two First Sovereigns of the House of Taimur, Báber and Humáyun
  • Volume 1
  • William Erskine
  • Published online:
    05 May 2013
    Print publication:
    24 May 2012
    First published in:
    1854
  • This two-volume work by the Scots orientalist and historian William Erskine (1773–1852) was published posthumously by his son in 1854. It describes the history of India under the Mughal rulers Babur and his son Humayun, descendants of Taimur (Tamburlane), and is acknowledged as one of the earliest western scholarly accounts of Mughal rulers in India. Erskine had also translated the Memoirs of Emperor Babar (1826) and completed John Malcolm's biography of Lord Clive (1836). Volume 1 begins with preliminary remarks on Indian history, and a general account of the three great divisions of the Tartar tribes. The history of Babar (Babur) begins with his accession to his ancestral possessions in Central Asia in 1495, aged twelve, describes the rivalry and warfare which ended with him being expelled from his homeland, and ends with his death in 1531 as imperial ruler of Afghanistan and of most of Northern India.

Life and Correspondence of Sir Bartle Frere, Bart., G.C.B., F.R.S., etc.
  • Volume 1
  • John Martineau
  • Published online:
    05 May 2013
    Print publication:
    14 June 2012
    First published in:
    1895
  • Sir Henry Bartle Edward Frere (1815–84) was recognised as one of the ablest colonial administrators of his generation. His service in British India, where he rose to serve on the Supreme Council, was distinguished by his promotion of municipal institutions and his inclusion of the Indian people. In this respect he was ahead of his time. At the outbreak of the Indian Rebellion of 1857, his actions helped limit the spread of the uprising. As Governor of the Cape Colony in South Africa he was directed to confederate the disparate territories there into a single nation, but this mission was marred by his unilateral decision to wage war on the Zulus. In 1894, John Martineau (1834–1910) published this sympathetic two-volume biography. Volume 1 covers Frere's ascent in India from a lowly civil servant to one of its most influential rulers.

A History of India under the Two First Sovereigns of the House of Taimur, Báber and Humáyun
  • Volume 2
  • William Erskine
  • Published online:
    05 May 2013
    Print publication:
    24 May 2012
    First published in:
    1854
  • This two-volume work by the Scots orientalist and historian William Erskine (1773–1852) was published posthumously by his son in 1854. It describes the history of India under the Mughal rulers Babur and his son Humayun, descendants of Taimur (Tamburlane), and is acknowledged as one of the earliest western scholarly accounts of Mughal rulers in India. Erskine had also translated the Memoirs of Emperor Babar (1826) and completed John Malcolm's biography of Lord Clive (1836). Volume 2 deals with the history of Humayun, beginning with his accession upon his father's death, his expulsion from India by rivals and his exile in Persia from 1543. He returned in 1555 to his court in Delhi, with Persian support which had a profound influence on the language, art and culture of India, and he subsequently extended his empire before dying after a fall in 1556.

Principles and Precedents of Moohummudan Law
  • Being a Compilation of Primary Rules Relative to the Doctrine of Inheritance (Including the Tenets of the Schia Sectaries), Contracts and Miscellaneous Subjects
  • W. H. Macnaghten
  • Published online:
    05 May 2013
    Print publication:
    28 June 2012
    First published in:
    1825
  • William Hay Macnaghten (1793–1841), of the Bengal Civil Service, published this work in 1825. It is a compilation of principles and precedents of Islamic law, focusing on family, inheritance and property law, including the status of slaves. Born in India and from a legal family, Macnaghten used his skill in languages as well as his legal training to produce this monumental work, and a similar two-volume treatise on Hindu law (1828–9). Quoting from both Sanskrit and Arabic sources, Part I discusses the principles of family law, inheritance, sales, wills, and slavery, while Part II offers precedents in all these areas, and an appendix gives details of the cases cited. Macnaghten was involved in political as well as legal work, and the disastrous First Anglo-Afghan War was begun largely on his advice. He was killed by an Afghan leader during negotiations outside Kabul in 1841.

The Land Revenue of Bombay
  • A History of its Administration, Rise, and Progress
  • Volume 2
  • Alexander Rogers
  • Published online:
    05 May 2013
    Print publication:
    24 May 2012
    First published in:
    1892
  • This two-volume work by Alexander Rogers (1825–1911), a retired officer of the Bombay Civil Service, first published in 1892, describes the land revenues of the Bombay Presidency (the province which at its greatest extent encompassed much of West and Central India) and also gives a history of the rise and progress of the British administration in the region. The work is organised into eighteen sections, each bearing the name of the Collectorate described therein. It provides an overview of the changes in land revenue administration which culminated in the Bombay Revenue Survey Settlements. Using government records as its sources, the book is meticulously researched and is illustrated with tables, charts and maps. Volume 2 provides descriptions of the land revenue system of a further ten Collectorates (Ratnagiri, Nasik, Sholapur, Puna, Ahmadnagar, Bijapur, Sattara, Belgam, Dharvar, Kanara), and achieves the author's aim of providing an up-to-date survey of the province.

Considerations on the State of British India
  • Embracing the Subjects of Colonization; Missionaries; the State of the Press; the Nepaul and Mahrattah Wars; the Civil Government; and Indian Army
  • Adam White
  • Published online:
    05 May 2013
    Print publication:
    12 July 2012
    First published in:
    1822
  • In this 1822 work, Lieutenant Adam White (1790–1839) of the Bengal Native Infantry reviews the state of India under British rule, presenting arguments for and against colonisation, the activities of missionaries and the freedom of the Press. He also discusses the Indian Army and its recent activities in Nepal and against the Mahrattas, as well as the civil government. He explains in his preface that, having spent twelve years in India, he had no plans to write a book and had not collected any material for it, but a chance reading of Prinsep's account of Warren Hastings' administration changed that. White set out to 'amuse his leisure on board ship' back to Europe by refuting Prinsep's account, and attempting to offer the British public an alternative view of Hastings' rule. White was posted as political agent to Upper Assam, and was later killed in action at Sadiya.

The Land Revenue of Bombay
  • A History of its Administration, Rise, and Progress
  • Volume 1
  • Alexander Rogers
  • Published online:
    05 May 2013
    Print publication:
    24 May 2012
    First published in:
    1892
  • This two-volume work by Alexander Rogers (1825–1911), a retired officer of the Bombay Civil Service, first published in 1892, describes the land revenues of the Bombay Presidency (the province which at its greatest extent encompassed much of West and Central India) and also gives a history of the rise and progress of the British administration in the region. The work is organised into eighteen sections, each bearing the name of the Collectorate described therein. It provides an overview of the changes in land revenue administration which culminated in the Bombay Revenue Survey Settlements. Using government records as its sources, the book is meticulously researched and is illustrated with tables, charts and maps. Volume 1 begins with a general sketch of the condition of the Bombay Presidency; Rogers then provides detailed descriptions of the land revenue system of eight Collectorates (Ahmadabad, Kheda, Panch Mahals, Bhauch, Surat, Thana, Colaba and Khandesh).

History of Upper Assam, Upper Burmah and North-Eastern Frontier
  • Leslie Shakespear
  • Published online:
    05 May 2013
    Print publication:
    26 April 2012
    First published in:
    1914
  • Soldier and military historian L. W. Shakespear (1860–1933), published this book on the north-eastern frontier of India and its tribes in 1914. He had served in the Assam Military Police Force, and this book, which is illustrated with photographs taken by the author, is 'an attempt to produce something useful and readable at least for those who care about that little known but very interesting corner of India'. The work begins with a review of the archaeology and history of the area, and is particularly concerned with the ethnography of the various border tribes, such as the Kachari, Ahom and Naga. The small beginnings, in 1823, of the tea industry, which still forms an important part of the region's economy, are described, and the work ends with a consideration of the strategic importance of the area, in the context of a widely expected 'awakening' and modernisation of China.

Life and Correspondence of Sir Bartle Frere, Bart., G.C.B., F.R.S., etc.
  • Volume 2
  • John Martineau
  • Published online:
    05 May 2013
    Print publication:
    14 June 2012
    First published in:
    1895
  • Sir Henry Bartle Edward Frere (1815–84) was recognised as one of the ablest colonial administrators of his generation. His service in British India, where he rose to serve on the Supreme Council, was distinguished by his promotion of municipal institutions and his inclusion of the Indian people. In this respect he was ahead of his time. At the outbreak of the Indian Rebellion of 1857, his actions helped limit the spread of the uprising. As Governor of the Cape Colony in South Africa he was directed to confederate the disparate territories there into a single nation, but this mission was marred by his unilateral decision to wage war on the Zulus. In 1894, John Martineau (1834–1910) published this sympathetic two-volume biography. Volume 2 covers Frere's successful attempt to halt the Zanzibar slave trade as well as his service in South Africa, from which he returned home in disgrace.

Page 2 of 5