The Recruiter’s Eye on the ‘Primitive’

2020 ◽  
pp. 159-204
Author(s):  
Radhika Singha

(237words) This chapter explores the deepening during World War one of colonial interest in the military, labor and political potential of those it categorized as ‘primitive’ populations. Among these were the ‘hill-men’ of India’s North-East Frontier deployed for militarist border-making both as porters and as informal auxiliaries. But work gangs for road building and expeditionary columns were also drawn from so- called ‘Santhalis’ or ‘aboriginals’, strung along the path of migration eastwards from Bihar and Orissa. Keen to highlight the importance to empire of the North-East Frontier, considered less significant than the North-West Frontier, the Assam government offered to raise ‘primitive hill-men’ labor companies for France. Some ‘hill-men’ chiefs feared the depletion of their retinues, others saw new opportunities unfold. Recruitment set up circuits between local conflicts and new theatres of war, resulting in the prolonged Kuki-Chin uprising of 1917-1919 along the Assam –Burma border. War also intensified the extractive drives of state and capital over forest and mineral resources, as illustrated in a small uprising in Mayurbhanj in Bihar and Orissa in which ‘Santhalis’ were held to be very prominent.. At both sites officials concluded that the resistance of ‘primitive’ populations to war- drives which subjected their persons and re-shaped their environments arose from ‘millenarian’ dreams of autonomy. However ‘primitivity’ also offered rich possibilities for the post-war reconstruction of imperial legitimacy. It was the ground on which certain tracts inhabited by ‘backward populations’ were excluded from the scheme of responsible government introduced in 1919.

1964 ◽  
Vol 44 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-8

Early in 1963 much of the land occupied by the Roman building at Fishbourne was purchased by Mr. I. D. Margary, M.A., F.S.A., and was given to the Sussex Archaeological Trust. The Fishbourne Committee of the trust was set up to administer the future of the site. The third season's excavation, carried out at the desire of this committee, was again organized by the Chichester Civic Society.1 About fifty volunteers a day were employed from 24th July to 3rd September. Excavation concentrated upon three main areas; the orchard south of the east wing excavated in 1962, the west end of the north wing, and the west wing. In addition, trial trenches were dug at the north-east and north-west extremities of the building and in the area to the north of the north wing. The work of supervision was carried out by Miss F. Pierce, M.A., Mr. B. Morley, Mr. A. B. Norton, B.A., and Mr. J. P. Wild, B.A. Photography was organized by Mr. D. B. Baker and Mrs. F. A. Cunliffe took charge of the pottery and finds.


1955 ◽  
Vol 35 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 187-198 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul Ashbee

Halangy Down (fig. 1) is the lower precipitous slope of the decline from Telegraph Hill (Ordnance Survey B.M. 166. 3 ft.) to the sea at Halangy Porth and Point. Halangy Down and the earlier chambered tomb upon the crest are often referred to locally as ‘Bants Carn’. The true ‘Bants Carn’ is a considerable rock outcrop dominating Halangy Point. This escarpment faces Crow Sound, which separates the north-west part of St. Mary's from the neighbouring island of Tresco. The hill-side is sheltered by the mass of Telegraph Hill from inclement weather from the north-east and east, but is fully exposed to the south-west and west.The existence of an ancient village site here has long been known in the islands. At the close of the last century, the late Alexander Gibson cleared away the underbrush from one of the more prominent huts and made a photographic record of its construction. Shortly after, the late G. Bonsor, of Mairena del Alcor, near Seville, in addition to excavating the chambered tomb, noted a considerable midden together with traces, of prehistoric occupation exposed in the cliffs of Halangy Porth just below the village site. Dr. H. O'Neill Hencken noted Bonsor's description of the midden, and, as nothing was known at the time of the material culture of the ‘village’, he associated the two.


1926 ◽  
Vol 54 (2) ◽  
pp. 467-489 ◽  
Author(s):  
T.J. Jehu ◽  
R.M. Craig

Benbecula signifies “the hill of the fords,” and the island was so designated owing to the fact that there is on it only one hill of any prominence, and that it is connected with the larger islands to the north and south by fords passable only at low water. The origin of the name “Uist” is referred to in a previous communication.These islands occupy a central position in the Outer Hebrides, lying between South Uist and Harris. They are bounded on the west and north-west by the Atlantic Ocean; on the north-east by the Sound of Harris; on the east by the Little Minch, which at its narrowest part is about 16 miles broad; and on the south by a narrow channel separating Benbecula from South Uist. The area embraced in this communication extends from the Isle of Shillay in the north to the Isle of Wiay at the south-east corner of Benbecula, and includes not only the main islands of North Uist and Benbecula but also a number of smaller isles adjoining the main ones. Including the intervening channels, the total length from Shillay in the north to the southern extremity of Benbecula is about 28 miles.


1959 ◽  
Vol 53 ◽  
pp. 292-294
Author(s):  
R. Hope Simpson

The site to be described lies on a low hill a little to the north of the small village or suburb of Nemesis, about 150 metres to the west of the main road from Patisia to Koukouvaounes, and 1 kilometre to east-south-east of the Mycenaean tholos tomb at Λυκὸτρυπα, which was excavated by the German Institute in 1879, and is usually called the Menidi Tomb. The site at Nemesis is visible from the tholos tomb, and is separated from it by a gentle valley through which run, in a southerly direction, two streams with steep banks. The eastern stream is the river Kephissos, whose name goes back at least as far as the classical period.The hill of Nemesis stands about 15 to 20 metres above the level of the surrounding land, and measures about 160 m. north-west to south-east × 120 m. north-east to south-west. The hill is an isolated outcrop of conglomerate rock, thinly covered with stony brown earth. It has been eroded over an area about 250 m. north-south × 50 m. east-west, so that its original size was considerably larger than at present, in all about 30,000 square metres. Mycenaean sherds were found over the whole of this area, though mainly in the eroded part, among the lumps of fallen earth and rock. Remains of rubble walling together with several Mycenaean sherds were found here, and also in the steep cliffs formed by the erosion on the west and south sides (this part of the hill has been undermined by recent excavation of the beds of grey clay, which here lie at between 2 and 3 metres below the original ground level). The ancient remains are particularly noticeable in the south-west angle of the cliffs (roughly in the centre of the part of the hill shown on Plate 71a), where there is a greater depth of earth above the rock than is visible elsewhere on the hill.


1977 ◽  
Vol 43 ◽  
pp. 31-129 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ken Smith

Winklebury Camp (SU61355290), an Iron Age 'plateau fort’, now of some 7.6 hectares (19 acres), is situated in the parish of Basingstoke, approximately 1 mile north-west of the town centre of Basingstoke, (fig. 1), though it is now surrounded by housing estates. It occupies a hill of Upper Chalk which has been isolated from the main mass of the North Hampshire Downs by two dry river valleys, one trending south-east, the other north-east. Both are tributary to the R. Loddon. The hill rises to a maximum height of 126 m a.s.l., near the projected line of the western rampart and slopes off gradually to north and south, and more steeply to the south-east. About half a mile to the south of the fort, a tributary of the R. Loddon, now culverted, would have provided the nearest source of water.Winklebury Camp has suffered from gradual encroachment by the surrounding housing estates, losing the ditch and rampart face to the north and east, and ditch, rampart and a small part of the interior, to the west. Only to the south does any of the bank and ditch survive. In the south-west corner of the fort, in an area protected by the remains of a small copse, a 90 m length of eroded rampart remains to an approximate height of 2 m. There is no ditch fronting this rampart now, but immediately east of the end of the stretch of rampart is the only remaining length of ditch. This extends for some 200 m along the remainder of the south side of the fort, averaging 2 m deep and 5 m wide. It rises in the south-east corner at a causeway, beyond which is another short stretch of ditch which is rapidly lost in house gardens. This causeway is faced by rampart, but there are indications, for example a slight change in the direction of the rampart at this point, that this is in fact a blocked entrance.


2017 ◽  
pp. 52-60
Author(s):  
Kshetrapal Singh ◽  
Om Prakash

The Thar Desert extends between the Aravalli Hills in the north-east, the Great Rann of Kutch along the coast and the alluvial plains of the Indus River in the west and north-west. The "Thar" has rich mineral resources. The peninsular plateau is rich in minerals and forests and marked off the plains by a mass of mountain, flanked by the Eastern and Western Ghats.


1969 ◽  
Vol 49 (2) ◽  
pp. 222-243 ◽  
Author(s):  
P. D. C. Brown ◽  
Alan D. McWhirr ◽  
D. J. Smith

SummaryExcavations in 1967–8 took place on the defences, the military rampart at Watermoor, and a number of sites within the town of Corinium. The defences on the north-west were found in the station yard and in a garden 400 feet further south. Two thicknesses of wall were noted, but no evidence survived to prove whether there had been a pre-wall rampart or not. During the restoration of the north-east defences another bastion was found only 78 feet from the site of bastion 3. Sites examined within the town were in Insulae I, II, VII, XIV, XXVI, and XXX. In the latter, another section of the possible theatre wall was found, whilst in XIV a house with four mosaics was excavated. The significance of the mosaics is fully discussed.


Author(s):  
Peter R. Dawes ◽  
Bjørn Thomassen ◽  
T.I. Hauge Andersson

NOTE: This article was published in a former series of GEUS Bulletin. Please use the original series name when citing this article, for example: Dawes, P. R., Thomassen, B., & Andersson, T. H. (2000). A new volcanic province: evidence from glacial erratics in western North Greenland. Geology of Greenland Survey Bulletin, 186, 35-41. https://doi.org/10.34194/ggub.v186.5213 _______________ Mapping and regional geological studies in northern Greenland were carried out during the project Kane Basin 1999 (see Dawes et al. 2000, this volume). During ore geological studies in Washington Land by one of us (B.T.), finds of erratics of banded iron formation (BIF) directed special attention to the till, glaciofluvial and fluvial sediments. This led to the discovery that in certain parts of Daugaard-Jensen Land and Washington Land volcanic rocks form a common component of the surficial deposits, with particularly colourful, red porphyries catching the eye. The presence of BIF is interesting but not altogether unexpected since BIF erratics have been reported from southern Hall Land just to the north-east (Kelly & Bennike 1992) and such rocks crop out in the Precambrian shield of North-West Greenland to the south (Fig. 1; Dawes 1991). On the other hand, the presence of volcanic erratics was unexpected and stimulated the work reported on here.


In this paper the author investigates the periodical variations of the winds, rain and temperature, corresponding to the conditions of the moon’s declination, in a manner similar to that he has already followed in the case of the barometrical variations, on a period of years extending from 1815 to 1832 inclusive. In each case he gives tables of the average quantities for each week, at the middle of which the moon is in the equator, or else has either attained its maximum north or south declination. He thus finds that a north-east wind is most promoted by the constant solar influence which causes it, when the moon is about the equator, going from north to south; that a south-east wind, in like manner, prevails most when the moon is proceeding to acquire a southern declination ; that winds from the south and west blow more when the moon is in her mean degrees of declination, going either way, than with a full north or south declination ; and that a north-west wind, the common summer and fair weather wind of the climate, affects, in like manner, the mean declination, in either direction, in preference to the north or south, and most when the moon is coming north. He finds the average annual depth of rain, falling in the neighbourhood of London, is 25’17 inches.


1951 ◽  
Vol 31 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 132-148 ◽  
Author(s):  
K. M. Richardson ◽  
Alison Young

In 1946 a visit to the barrow, which lies on the edge of the western scarp of Chinnor Common, and a cursory examination of the adjoining area, cultivated during the war, resulted in finds of pottery and other objects indicating Iron Age occupation. The site lies on the saddleback of a Chiltern headland, at a height of about 800 ft. O.D. Two hollow ways traverse the western scarp, giving access to the area from the Upper Icknield Way, which contours the foot of the hill, then drops to cross the valley, passing some 600 yards to the north of the Iron Age site of Lodge Hill, Bledlow, and rising again continues northwards under Pulpit Hill camp and the Ellesborough Iron Age pits below Coombe Hill. The outlook across the Oxford plain to the west is extensive, embracing the hill-fort of Sinodun, clearly visible some fourteen miles distant on the farther bank of the Thames. The hollow way at the north-west end of the site leads down to a group of ‘rises’ hard by the remains of a Roman villa, and these springs are, at the present day, the nearest water-supply to the site.


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