Historical Images of British India Facts and Fantasies

Abstract

When the East India Company’s servants first arrived in Bengal in the beginning of the seventeenth century they portrayed themselves, what Hastings later described as ‘the humble and undreaded character of trading adventurers’ - their sole aim being to earn hefty profits before returning to England. They had brought with them teams of writers to record transactions of their trades as well as to write down details of their adventures in a strange land. With them also came men who would collect specimen of manufactured and agricultural products, local flora and fauna, crafts, costumes etc. They were followed by those who could draw and paint scenes of everyday life in towns and countryside, pictures of native men and women belonging to various races, tribes, professions, trades, their social and religious customs, etc, which could either be exploited for trade by their countrymen or which could be sold in the growing market of curiosities brought to England from foreign lands.