AIIT’s Flavour of the Month

Jo SalisburyStories from the Collection 1 Comment

When the Trust was invited by Alan Alder, one of the regular presenters on Cambridge105’s Saturday food programme Flavour, to participate in a feature on food-related books in Cambridge libraries, we thought why not. Although we are not known for our gastronomical collections, it was interesting to note how many books we discovered that were not just cookery books, but also included content on the social and cultural aspects of food in Indian, Zoroastrian and Central Asian life and history. From the collection of two of our founding Trustees, Raymond …

Unknown Photographer, Portrait of Major-General Linnaeus Tripe (1822-1902), Madras Army, (?)1880s, British Library, Photo 612(1)

Captain Linnaeus Tripe Exhibition at the V&A

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Once heard, the exotically-named Linnaeus Tripe is difficult to forget. Yet even in his own lifetime and certainly in the century and more since his death in 1902, appreciation of one of the most accomplished photographers in 19th-century India has been restricted to a limited circle of photographic and architectural historians. A comprehensive survey exhibition of his work, to which the British Library was a major lender, has been on show at the National Gallery of Art in Washington and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York over the …

An Unexpected Discovery in the Archives

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Some unexpected recent discoveries at the Ancient India and Iran Trust were two preserved leaves from the bodhi or pipal tree (ficus religiosa). According to Professor Bailey’s note, he discovered the leaf (shown above) on 29 May 1941 in Professor Rapson’s copy of Ausgewählte Erzählungen in Māhārāshṭrī, edited by Hermann Jacobi, Leipzig, 1886 (AIIT A11G 7). The leaf is inscribed, presumably by Professor Rapson himself,  “Bo Tree (Peepul) / Temple of / the Tooth / Kandy / Nov. 1914.” Edward Rapson and Harold Bailey in 1936 (AIIT Bailey Archive) Professor …

Raymond Mercier: ‘Calendars in India and a Problem with Eclipses in Orissa’ Lecture

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Reminder: on Friday 18th March 2016, 5.30pm, Raymond Mercier will lecture on ‘Calendars in India and a problem with eclipses in Orissa.’ Scholar and author Raymond Mercier will explain something of the variety of calendars used in mediaeval India. Each calendar counts years from a certain epoch, and while most epoch years have been established there has remained one, that of the Ganga Era of Orissa, that is still to be fixed. This talk is part of the Cambridge Science Festival. Booking advisable but we will endeavour to accommodate all. …

Arthur Dudney: ‘What Language Did Kiyomars Speak?’ Lecture

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Reminder: on Friday 19th February 5.30pm, Arthur Dudney will speak on ‘What Language Did Kiyomars Speak? Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Theories on the Origins of Persian’ Theories of linguistic origins before modern times were full of mythical people and semi-mythical societies. These could be dismissed out of hand as historical curiosities but this talk argues that pre-modern theories of where Persian came from are worth our attention because even if the conclusions are wildly at odds with our current understanding in historical linguistics, the tools used to reach them were remarkably intricate. …