British Academy: The UK's National Academy for the Humanities and Social Sciences

Lineages of Empire

Convened by Dr Duncan Kelly, University of Sheffield

Thursday 24 August 2006 to Friday 25 August 2006

ABSTRACT

Beyond the Boundaries of Empire: Nathaniel Wallich (1786-1854) and the Transmission of Botanical Knowledge to Europe
Mark Harrison, University of Oxford

The Danish botanist, Nathaniel Wallich was employed by the East India Company after the capture by the British of the Danish factory at Serampore, near Calcutta, in 1808.  Shortly afterwards he was appointed an assistant to William Roxburgh, Superintendent of the Calcutta Botanical Garden, and later was to become superintendent himself.  His work in this capacity is already relatively well known but in this paper I will examine in more detail his informal correspondence networks with scholars in Europe.  In other words, the paper looks beyond links between India and Britain, at a wider fraternity of botanists who vicariously participated in the work of Wallich and other botanists in the colonies.

The paper seeks to answer a number of questions:

1. How significant was botanical knowledge gained in the colonies to the work of naturalists in Europe, both professional and amateur?
2. By which means was this knowledge acquired?
3. To what purpose was it disseminated?
4. What status was accorded to botanists who worked in the colonies?

Finally, in answering these questions, I suggest some ways in which we might fruitfully re-think – or at least – enlarge, our notions of 'colonial science'.

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