Dimensions
211 x 272 x 23mm
This book breaks new ground in exploring the trade and social links between Australian and India and China, and surveys the rich legacy of furniture, silver, ceramics, textiles and costume, fancy goods and curiosities unearthed in a travel of museums and private collections in New South Wales and Tasmania.
This is a story peopled by a diverse cast of characters in exotic settings: shrewd merchants from Calcutta, lascars and coolies, peripatetic army officers and civil servants; aspiring settlers and landed gentry in verandahed bungalows hung with cane blinds and paper lanterns; ladies in dresses of fine Chinese silk and convicts in coarse Indian cotton; Anglo-Chinese sliver and Chinese ceramics on Anglo-Indian tables; tea, rice and preserved ginger served in colonial houses with gardens bright with China roses and shaded with sweet-fruited loquats.
The trade with Indian and China was substantial and complex, the social links to India as strong and subtle as family allegiances or as pragmatic as immigration necessitated by ill-health or ill-fortune. The surviving goods speak loudly of the tastes and sophistication, or lack of sophistication, of colonial society. They are the material culture of early Australia and a significant part of our heritage.
