Le vieux Pondichery (1673-1824) revisite d 'apres les plans anciens.

• Position: Book review

Le vieux Pondichery (1673-1824) revisite d 'apres les plans anciens. By JEAN DELOCHE. Collection Indologie, vol. 99. Pondicherry: INSTITUT FRANCAIS DE PONDICHERY - ECOLE FRANCAISE D'EXTREMEORIENT, 2005. Pp. vii + 160, plates. Rs 400.

Jean Deloche has given us a treasure in a detailed study of the development, over 150 years of occasionally interrupted French occupation, of the colonial city of Pondichery (English Pondicherry, recently renamed Puducherry to conform to its Tamil etymology). This work, following up on two preparatory publications. Le paper terrier de la ville blanche de Pondichery, 1777 (2002) and Origins of the Urban Development of Pondicherry according to Seventeenth Century Dutch Plans (2004). includes thirty-eight plans drawn of or for the city, fort, port, hospital, and other major governmental, commercial, religious, and residential buildings. In addition to a bibliography and an index, it provides in an appendix a useful list of current city streets with their prior names (in 1775, 1777, 1820, and 1884, beyond the end date of the period described and documented with plans), and an eight-page English summary.

The study proceeds in nine generally chronological chapters: 1, the period before the arrival of the French; 2, the early implantation of the French (1673-93); 3, the Dutch occupation (1693-99); 4. the French implementation of the Dutch urban plan (1699-1724); 5, the primarily defensive construction era of 1724-41; 6, the apex during Dupleix's tenure and following decline (1741-61); 7. the reconstruction after the British occupation (1765-78); with 8, a particular analysis of the layout of the "white town" as described in a cadastral document of 1777; and 9, the period of fortification and downfall (1778-1824). The narrative situates changes in the urban landscape in the context of contemporary political and other events and devotes much attention to the distribution of caste and other communities on the land, but the intent is primarily descriptive, focusing on successive plans.

Social historians may yearn for a deeper analysis and critique of the evolution of social conditions and attitudes that the plans represented or sought to implement. Unfortunately the index provides insufficient help. It lacks an entry for the Jesuits, who, Deloche points out, long exercised pressure on the civil authorities to destroy native temples and mosques, which bore partial fruit under Dupleix (pp. 48-49, 85), and who undertook...