This photograph of the Fisherwomen of Bombay is by William Johnson. The Kolis (fishing community) are oldest known inhabitants of the seven islands that make up this city, they have lived here for centuries—some say since 600 BCE. This community may not be as visible on the city’s bustling streets as they once were, but… Read more »
The first wave of European immigrants included sailors, emissaries, merchants, and the armed forces, people who could seize the land; the next wave included physicians, cartographers, botanists, and naturalists, people who could research it. In the hope of finding new medicines and new sources of revenue, they studied Indian plants, and created or commissioned thousands… Read more »
Flowers of the Bombay Presidency offers fascinating insights into the botanical beauty of the western states of India in the 1880s, with 202 illustrations of Indian flowers and plants in watercolour painting. Nearly all of the paintings are supplemented by a handwritten pencil inscription with the name of the flower (often in Latin with the… Read more »
The Khada Parsi statue, or the Standing Parsi Statue, is a memorial fountain dedicated to Seth Cursetjee Manockjee Shroff (1763-1845), a Parsi businessman and educational reformer. He founded the Alexandra’s Girls English Institution which is considered to be one of the first schools dedicated to educating women in 18th century Bombay . His son Judge… Read more »
This is a photograph of an unidentified nautch party in Bombay. It was taken by a French photographer Eugene Auguste Taurines who was active in Bombay from the mid-1880s to around 1901 and ran a studio in the city. Starting around the Mughal era, entourages of dancing girls performed for rulers and chieftains, not only… Read more »
A sometimes quaint, sometimes bizarre view of 18th-century Bombay and its flora and fauna through our rare books collection
This city is older than most of us would imagine and evidence of its ancient heritage is scattered through its bustling suburbs
In the late 19th century, the port town of Bombay began to gain economic and cultural cred, thanks to British imperialism fighting to assert its power. This is the story of a city finding its voice