Report 17 of June 2011, by Hanna Hodacs

Estimation of hours I spent on the project/on sick leave between the 5th of January and the 10th of June (including the four bank holidays). According to my estimations of the work reports I have given to Robert Horton I worked approximately 50% this spring (319 hours). I have also taken four days off (29.2 hours) so all in all I can account for 348 hours. If I am right, a full time work load for this period (37.5 hours a week for 22.5 weeks) would have been 792 hours.

Research

Archive work

  • I have visited the British Library (early May) to work on the order lists of the EIC (E/3) together with Chris and Felicia. This work will form the basis for a short paper which we will present at Ashmolean workshop. Also, working jointly on this (very accessible) material is helping us think about how to do cross-company comparisons and establish ways in which we can assemble and data and what we can do with it.
  • I worked on source material available on-line (relating to the Swedish company). I am doing a test analysis of a sales catalogue from 1748 *) to see how this material can be used. (Another 20 catalogues are available in Riksarkivet, Stockholm). The document specify quantities of goods for sales, short descriptions of the goods, units, how much it sold for and the name of the buyer. I am two thirds through the catalogue. The work will hopefully illuminate how goods was presented and arranged (size of lots etc.) at the point of purchase, the range of buyers (relatively few people buying the majority of lots), the names of the buyers (can be used to trace re-export).
    *) to see
  • I worked on newspaper material available on-line, particularly a Gothenburg local newspaper, Göteborgs Weckotidning, from the 1750s. This newspaper contains lists of arrivals and departures of ships around the times of the auctions, and gives some indication as to where goods were re-exported (as well as of the name of the captain and the ship, although this information is very likely better studied in a different material, e.g. custom documents). Most importantly, the newspaper lists people arriving to Gothenburg to attend the auctions. This work can hopefully form part of a paper I am planning to write about auctions as events; where lots of people regularly gathered together(a bit of spectacle); when “a pulse” of the market for East Indian goods was being set and how it changed over time. Ultimately (of course) this pulse was determent by the arrival of the ships (the goods on the ships that arrived first from Asia sold for the highest prices) butthe regularity of the auctions (e.g. if they were yearly, quarterly or more frequently) and the development of increasingly bigger warehouse were also important. I am also interested in how the auction catalogues and the sales helped to establish a pan-European (or not) notion of the value of the East Indian goods, as well as how this goods should be defined and described.

Planned Archive visits and new archives

  • I have indentified an archive in the John Ford Bell (JFL) Library in Minneapolis (the Irvine collection). The (very detailed 60 page) guide to this collection I got suggest it has great potential for researching the mid 18th century understanding of the market for East Indian goods in Europe (particularly goods imported by the Swedish company). This material has hardly been used by historians interested in the Scandinavian trade, partially because it’s location. The library allows photos to be taken and I my intention am to take try and capture most of the documents in the collection. I am planning to go to Minneapolis in the autumn to this work together with Meike, who also is very interested in working on this collection. Between us we should be able go over the archive and photograph the bulk of it. We are planning to go for two weeks, probably in November. I have established contact with Margaret Borg, archivist at the JFB Library, and made preliminary arrangement for this visit. Pending on the quality of the material I might use this in the teaching to, i.e. get the students to read (and transcribe!) sections of the correspondence.
  • Another new archive (to be added those I listed in the previous report) is the on-line Sound Toll archive. Currently the years available are 1783 – 1799. However the whole series (1497 till 1857) will eventually be available (2013). I am looking into how this can be used but one obvious way is to look further into how East Indian goods were diffused in the Baltic area.
  • Due to sickness I have not been able to travel abroad this spring. I have been advised by my doctors that I can start flying from the end of September. I am planning to go to Sweden and Denmark during the autumn to visit the archives listed in my previous report.

Written work in progress, planned papers

  • “Scandinavian Charted Companies” for Oxford bibliographies on-line, almost finished!
  • Short paper, co-written with Felicia, Chris and Meike on the out-going orders of the British East India Company.
  • Literature Review/Survey (well behind!) but I am hoping to use the Scandinavian Charted Company article as a starting point.
  • Two joint papers (with Felicia and Chris) on how the quantity and quality of goods ordered and received from Asia (maybe the first present at the Economic History Conference in Oxford).
  • Paper on the auctions, see above (long term plan)
  • Paper on exchange of information across Europe on East Indian goods (see discussion under Irvine paper)

Workshops/Conferences I amattending

  • The Global Dimensions of European Knowledge, 1450-1700
    (Location: Birkbeck, University of London, Date: 24-25 June, 2011)
  • Workshop Uppsala, Marie-Christine Skuncke (October 2011)
  • ESSHC in Glasgow 2012 11-14 of April 2012,
    Session: Global History: Methods, Practices, Problems

Administration & Teaching

Preparation for next year’s teaching (World of Consumption):

  • Helped develop the web page for the course
  • Arranged room bookings for lectures and seminars
  • Helped present the course to prospective undergraduates and recorded a video of the presentation

Workshop in the Ashmolean Museum 1-2 of July

  • Invited speakers from Scandinavia to the Workshop (took some effort!)
  • Helped develop the web page for the workshop
  • Co-written an introduction to the workshop
  • Liaison with Helene on all sorts of issues relating to the workshop

Workshop in Warwick 27th and 28th of October

  • Helped make initial plans for the workshop “New questions for historians of overseas trade”
  • Has invited speaker from Scandinavia, Leos Müller who has agreed to come, and Erik Gøbel (awaiting response).

Project’s Intranet web

  • Helped adding pages, documents, pictures and links to the intranet