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2 - Surveys and Maps

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 January 2021

Thomas Simpson
Affiliation:
University of Cambridge
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Summary

Frontiers became increasingly central to colonial spatial sciences as the nineteenth century progressed. Examining surveyors’ activities in the field along with the material processes by which maps were produced and circulated, this chapter analyses three broad junctures of frontier surveying based on distinct techniques of seeing and representing space. Route surveys of the 1820s to 1840s mostly gave way to triangulation from the 1850s on, and trigonometrical survey parties increasingly ventured into frontier regions from the later 1860s. By this later period, surveyors and ‘men of science’ in metropole and colony alike deemed comprehending frontier locales a key goal of imperial science. Agents of empire considered these regions as providing unparalleled opportunities, but also substantial challenges to established modes of spatial knowledge and representation. The chapter shows how this ambiguity reached a peculiar resolution, as many surveyors and geographers came to celebrate and to uphold the elusive quality of India’s frontiers.

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The Frontier in British India
Space, Science, and Power in the Nineteenth Century
, pp. 70 - 115
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2021

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  • Surveys and Maps
  • Thomas Simpson, University of Cambridge
  • Book: The Frontier in British India
  • Online publication: 07 January 2021
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108879156.003
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  • Surveys and Maps
  • Thomas Simpson, University of Cambridge
  • Book: The Frontier in British India
  • Online publication: 07 January 2021
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108879156.003
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Surveys and Maps
  • Thomas Simpson, University of Cambridge
  • Book: The Frontier in British India
  • Online publication: 07 January 2021
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108879156.003
Available formats
×