- Imperial and Global Forum has a review of the book Medicine and Colonialism: Historical Perspectives in India and South Africa
Self-consciously aiming to be a comparative work and taking material from India and South Africa, it takes its cue from earlier works that aimed to ‘de-centre’ the metropolis-periphery model of conceptualising empire and colonialism.While re-asserting the centrality of medical knowledge and practices to colonial rule, and the importance of the bodies of the colonised as sites for the exercise of colonial power, the book aims to move beyond a model of hegemony, domination and control. Instead, as the introductory essay outlines, the book’s trans-national methodology is intended to highlight ‘policies of European adaptation and resistance to initiatives of the colonized’ and the ‘transfer of ideas and knowledge in mutual engagements.’
- The British Library blog has a post about Atmaram Sadashiva Grandin Jayakar, who was a long serving Medical Service officer based in Muscat at the end of the 19th century.
Described by his one-time Muscat colleague Percy Cox as ‘a man of great industry and scientific bent’, Jayakar dedicated his spare time to the pursuit of scientific exploration and understanding. He collected scores of wildlife specimens from the desert sands, as well from the shores and waters off the Oman coast. The English explorer Theodore Bent, who visited Muscat in 1899, described Jayakar’s house as being ‘filled with curious animals from the interior, and marvels from the deep’. Jayakar sent many specimens not previously collected or studied to the British Museum in London. Numerous species are named in Jayakar’s honour, including the Arabian Sand Boa (Eryx Jayakari), a lizard (Lacerta Jayakari), a species of goat (Arabitragus Jayakari), a scorpion (Hottentotta Jayakari) and several fish, including the seahorse Hippocampus Jayakari. – See more at: http://britishlibrary.typepad.co.uk/untoldlives/2014/08/a-polymath-in-muscat.html#sthash.fGTCyAhw.dpuf
- Prolific Carnival Contributor Fëanor writes about Prem Nem, a book of paintings from the finest arists of Deccan
There are thirty-four illustrations in the Pem Nem, mostly of ink and watercolour and gold and silver, made by three different artists. These paintings had been done on pieces of paper that were then pasted onto the sheets of the manuscript. It’s not entirely clear if these artworks were made at the same time as the manuscript was written. The author of the book was Hasan Manju Khalji. Interestingly, no other books by him are known. The calligraphy is lovely and clear, but as he wrote masnavi couplets in a Deccani Urdu that contains admixtures from Marathi and local dialect, it is difficult to understand today. The text is a narrative poem in rhyme, describing the Sufi’s love of and quest for God.
- There are photographs of India taken a few years after the invention of the technology. The post Picturing India: The Collection of Sven Gahlin has few of of those images
- Maddy writes about the role of camels in the history of trade
The Trans Saharan trade became an important one at the turn of the anno domini or somewhat earlier. The general contention shared by Ilse Kohler and Paula Wapnish is that the 12-15th century BC is when the camel got domesticated. However considering Mason’s theory that it evolved in Arabia around 3,000BC, the period in between needs further analysis. It is also clear that there were three broad classifications of the dromedary, the beast of burden or the baggager, the riding camel and the milking camel. It is also clear that those North African Muslim traders usually set out with their camels well laden, in a fat and vigorous condition; and brought them back in a bad state, that they commonly sold them at a low rate to be later fattened by the Arabs of the Desert (Consider the analogy with second hand cars!).
The next carnival will be up on Nov 15th or the weekend following that.
