1898.] Annual Address. 83 



himself for about one j^ear, from September 1687 to November 1688; 

 but ultimately, after an abortive attempt at Chittagong in 1689, be bad 

 to witbdraw to Madras. From here lie was recalled by the emperor 

 Auraijgzib, and in August 1690 came back for the third time to Sutanuti, 

 wliere he established the Company once more at tbe place they had 

 occupied in 1688. This was just below the settlement of the Setts and 

 Bysacks, and above their settlement at Govindpur, at a small village, 

 called Kalikata, or in English Calcutta, on the site of the present 

 European commercial quarter and the Bara Bazar. Here the English 

 traders lived at first as best they could in tents, huts and boats ; but 

 very soon " as the result of conciliating the Nawab of Bengal's represen- 

 tatives, and of winning general confidence, Armenian and Portuguese 

 merchants were attracted by the English, and as success followed 

 industry, the settlement extended itself southward along the 

 river's bank, bringing into the spliere of occupation the contiguous 

 villages of Calcutta and Govindpur. When in course of a little time 

 further a factory grew into existence, the Company's servants, who had 

 learned the necessity of possessing some central stronghold, obtained 

 permission, in 1696, from the Nawab's Government to surround it with 

 defensive fortifications."^^ This was the old Fort William which stood 

 on the site now comprised between Koilaghat Street and Fairlie Place. 

 Two years later, in 1698, through the indulgence of Prince 'Azimu-sh- 

 Shan, the grandson of the emperor Auraggzib, they secured the lease- 

 hold rights of the three villages of " Chuttanuttee, Calcutta and 

 Govindpur," which henceforth formed one united settlement. Thirteen 

 years later, in 1717, they obtained from the emperor Farrukhsiyar a 

 further grant of 38 villages, out of which several were added to the 

 three villages already amalgamated. Afterwards others were, from time 

 to time, brought within the bounds of the settlement, till at last these 

 combined localities formed the city of Calcutta almost as it now is. 

 " The designation of Calcutta is now applied not only to our city which 

 has for its component parts many old villages with histories of their 

 own, but to a Parganah which comprehends the city and many villages 

 at various distances from it ; and this Parganah again is one of several 

 which pass under the name of the District of the 24 Parganahs."^* 



The name of " Calcutta," in its English form, first occurs in two 

 Reports submitted in March 1689, by Captain Heath and Job Charnock 

 to the Company's Council in Madras, and refers to the second settle- 

 ment of the English near Sutanuti in 1688.^^ When they returned for 



W See Dr. Busteed's Echoes from Old Calcutta (3rd edition), p. 3, 



62 See Baboo G. D. Bysack's paper, p. 320. 



W See Hodges' Diaries, edited by Colonel Sir H. Yule, pp. Ixxix and Ixxxi. 



