Credit: The Alkazi Collection of Photography The London Printing and Publishing Company Limited ‘Capture of a Gun at Banda’ from the book The History of the Indian Mutiny by Charles Ball, 1857. Indians were not shown as particularly villainous, but as well-armed men killing British men and women. Of course no-one was sitting on the bank of the Ganges with a sketchbook, but these pictures seeped into the British subconscious. It wasn’t possible at the time to print magazines with photographs, so they were copied by lithographers.īut two books published in England in 1858 used a mixture of lithographed photographs and some wildly imaginative sketches, in particular of the Cawnpore (now Kanpur)massacres, which have often been reproduced as genuine pictures of what actually happened. Many of the lithographs published in Britain, particularly those in the Illustrated London News, a weekly magazine, were accurate because they were engraved from photographs. How far did the lithographs and British accounts circulated in the UK deviate from the truth? To what extent were the Indians portrayed as villains and the British as knights in shining armour? Who were the consumers? Previous books have included the work of Raja Deen Dayal, the Delhi Coronation Durbars, and my earlier book Lucknow, City of Illusion. I was commissioned by Ebrahim Alkazi to edit the book, the last in a series showcasing various aspects of his large collection (over 90,000 images). Of course, the 1957 book was poorly produced… There are paintings of the Rani of Jhansi in the battlefield and of the arrest of Bahadur Shah Zafar and of the death of his sons. Great book and great images, but why did you choose to work with the Alkazi collection of photographs alone? The book, titled 1 857: A Pictorial Presentation published by the Indian government in 1957 to mark the centenary of the Uprising has a wider range of images culled from diverse sources. In an interview conducted via email, the historian talks about the fascinating images: It examines the upheaval from multiple perspectives. The book, The Alkazi Collection of Photography: The Uprising of 1857, edited by London-based historian Rosie Llewellyn Jones, examines the infamous “sepoy revolt”, which was the second war – after the Crimean war – to be fully photographed anywhere in the world. The East India Company arrived in India in the 17th century, and by the 19th century had appropriated the entire sub-continent “through treaties, trade, through war, and latterly, as in the case of Awadh, through annexation”. Courtesy: Alkazi Collection of Photography We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.Felice Beato took this photograph of Humayun’s Tomb in Delhi in 1858. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |