SILK 



i \l:l.V IM'IAN RECORDS 



further passage he discuMses the cotton Mid silk food* of Ctinbay. In a . 



makos mention <>f th silk being made in largn quantMas at a flans Idantsftsd a* 



having been Mamilipiitam. The** three statement* thus MUipiUy Uw Uum 



centres of the early silk trade of !,,!:, Sir Oor Btrdwood an 



_ bazar* ). a 



village" in the kingdom'of Bengal, furnished about 22,000 bales of silk annually. 

 each bale weighing 100 Ib. " The Dutch." he continues. " generally took, either 

 for Japan or for Holland, 6,000 to 7.000 bales of it and they would have liked 

 to get more, but the merchants of Tartary and of the whole Mogul Empire opposed 

 their doing so, for these merchants took as much as the Dutch, and the balance 

 remained with the people of the country for the manufacture of their own atufls. 

 All these silks are brought to the Kingdom of Gujarat, and the greater part 

 to Ahmedabad and Surat, where they are woven into fabrics." 

 silk of Kasimbazar is yellow.V Bernier B The Dutch have 



seven or eight hundred Natives employed in their silk factory at Kaawm 

 where, in like manner, the English and other merchant* employ a propoi 



There would thus seem m> doubt that long anterior to Jie arrival of tfc* 

 Dutch and English traders in Eastern Bengal, a fairly large silk indu 

 both in rearing the worms, reeling and throwing the silk, and in weaving all 



1019 



\\ Foster published, in 1893, Tto Pint LeUer Rook of I** Ban IwH* 

 <>r a register of the official correspondence from 1600 I . We thai* rand. 

 the Commission granted to the commander of the Company'* ssonod 

 (1605), of provision being made for the purchase of raw Ik. but there is 

 to show that the entry in question denotes that the silk was to be uiusMsd fcwm 

 In.liii. In subsequent commission* of other ship*, such a* of the dale 16OB. 

 special mention was made of the Chinese and Persian lks. The former are 

 spoken of as Lamlting (Nanking) and Canton. Persian silk was aent in 1617 

 to Surat in exchange for sugar and other Indian commodities. It would esem 

 that tin- Company's first effort* at silk manufacture were made hi Burat, though ** 

 everything points to the raw silk having had to be carried to the manufacturer* 

 of that town (see pp. 995, 1017). Mr. W. Foster, in a aerie* of volumes sntirted 

 Letters Received by the East India Company, 1602 to 1619. affords many useful 

 additional historic facts regarding the silk trade of India. We there learn thai, 

 disregarding letters that deal with China, Japan. Malay, 8iam or Strait* silks, 

 one of the earliest mentions of Indian commercial silks occur* in a letter from 

 Cambay, dated 1614. It is there stated that silk used formerly to be brought 

 to that city from the interior. One of the earliest references to Bengal *ilk occur* 

 in a letter from Sir Thomas Roe, written at Ajmir, December 1616, in which he 

 discourses against the proposal then made to found special factories in order to 

 purchase Bengal silks. He says that theso are to be " had cheaper at Agra." 

 ''I am of opinion your residences are sufficient and beet chosen as they are." He 

 then adds that there exists " Silk of Bengal* plenty at reasonable rates " (B.I.C.. 

 I.e. iv., 250). Subsequently, in 1619, a letter was issued from the factors at Surat 

 to those at Masulipatam, in which an acknowledgment is made of " Musters of 

 Bengala eilke." Foster (The English Factories, 1618-21. 153) furnishes a letter 

 from Masulipatam, in which the following occurs, " I am in good hope after 

 small time to furnish you with good quantetyes of that sort of Bong 

 which Lawrence Walso first, and Robert Young after, shewed you 

 of in England." In a further letter, of date 1620, we read of Robert Hughes 

 having been deputed from Surat and Agra to organise a factory at Patna. He 

 purchased a maund of " serbandy " cocoons, for he adds it is " the cheapest 

 and surest dealinge to buye the serbandye and wynde it of myselfe." Further on, 

 doubt is thrown on the advantage of a filature at Patna, seeing that the silk 

 cocoons had to be conveyed from " the cittye of Muckeoudabad (Murahidabad) 

 where it is made, which would bee worth bo the labor and charge, for wee are 

 assured that there it may be provided in infinite quantetyes at least twenty 

 per cent, cheaper than in anye other place of India, and of the ohoysest stale, 

 wounde off into what condition you shall require it, as it comes from tn* worms ; 

 where are also innumerable of silk wyndere*. experte workmen, and labour 

 cheaper by a third than else where " (I.e. 229-30). Bernier (Travel*. 1656-8, 

 439-40) says, " There is in Bengale such a quantity of cotton and silks, that 

 the kingdom may be called the common storehouse for those two kinds of mar- 



