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Bengali raw silk, the East India Company and the European global market, 1770–1833

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  • Davini, Roberto

Abstract

In 1769, the East India Company decided to transform the Bengali silk industry, and introduced Piedmontese reeling technologies and spatially concentrated working practices into the area. Although Bengali raw silk reeled with the new methods never reached the standards of Piedmontese silks, the Company was able to produce huge quantities of low-quality raw silks, and to gain market share in London from the 1770s to the 1830s. By investigating the reasons behind this partial success, this article shows that some features of Piedmontese technologies had a crucial impact on peasants who specialized in the mulberry cultivation and the rearing of silkworms. The Company had to cope with resistance from some rural economic agents in late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century Bengal, but other elements in local society were able to profit from the Company's interest in producing raw silk.

Suggested Citation

  • Davini, Roberto, 2009. "Bengali raw silk, the East India Company and the European global market, 1770–1833," Journal of Global History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 4(1), pages 57-79, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:cup:jglhis:v:4:y:2009:i:01:p:57-79_00
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    Cited by:

    1. Hutková, Karolina, 2017. "Transfer of European technologies and their adaptations: the case of the Bengal silk industry in the late-eighteenth century," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 69819, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    2. Jagjeet Lally, 2015. "Trial, error and economic development in colonial Punjab: The Agri-Horticultural Society, the state and sericulture experiments, c. 1840–70," The Indian Economic & Social History Review, , vol. 52(1), pages 1-27, January.

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