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The present paper attempts to study Amitav Ghosh’s novel In an Antique Land as a work which belongs to more than one academic discipline. As an exploration of a civilization, it traces the existence of a Jewish trader in twelfth century and asserts the claim that there existed trade relations between India and Egypt in that time. Intervention of some “Civilized Europeans” destroyed the harmony that existed between these two nations. The unarmed trade of this route was taken over by Portugal and England.
As a memoir, it records the three visits of the author to Egypt in 1980s and his experience there. This work is also studied as the quest of the author to restore the relationship and practices that used to exist in pre-colonial times. The author has put forward radical questions about the western domain of knowledge. The author went to Egypt as a research scholar and excavated the “preserved” treasure of the Genzia which now lies mostly in European libraries.
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The documents preserved in the Genzia are evidences of the friendly relationship of these two countries. In this work, as an anthropologist, Amitav Ghosh has also studied the human relations and the trade relations between these two countries, in the twelfth century and in the nineteenth century. The influence of the western mode of thinking has also been shown in In an Antique Land.
First published in 1992, In An Antique Land is written by the renowned author Amitav Ghosh. This work of art is a strange sort of creation of the author as it defies the traditional demarcations of academic disciplines.
When asked about the form of this work in an interview, Ghosh said he was writing neither sociology nor history. In an interview Ghosh said: “My book cannot be described anyone of these. It’s a strange sort of work. Within the parameters of history, I have tried a narrative, without to capture a story, a narrative without attempting to write a historical novel.”
In An Antique Land is the exploration of a civilization that existed from about eleventh to sixteenth century. The book tells the story of a research scholar who travelled to the Middle East in search of the roots of a twelfth century Jewish traveller and trader Abraham Ben Yiju and his Indian slave Bomma. The work, unique in its form, depicts the history of the Pre Colonial relationship that India shared with Egypt. A significant number of traders used to come to India from Middle East as early as twelfth century. It is the because of the intervention of the so called “civilized Europeans” that this relationship suffered a serious blow. The western historiographical records have shown this trade without arms and ammunitions as a failure and said that this characteristic of trade “invited intervention of Europe with its increasing proficiency in war”. Gujrati Jains and Vanias played an important role in the peaceful trade on this route as they did not allow any armed man with them. Amitav Ghosh writes in In an Antique Land
"The peaceful traditions of the oceanic trade may have been the product of a rare cultural choice - one that may have owed a great deal to the pacifist customs and beliefs of Gujarati Jains and Vanias who played such an important part in it. The tradition of Jains and Vanias was such that they would not allow armed men in their company."
In An Antique Land can also be read as a memoir. Amitav Ghosh travelled Egypt three times in 1980s and this book was published in 1992. It is also a record of his memories and experiences in a distant country - Egypt. The author never misses a chance to attack the western notions of power as their "folly" and "hunger" left these countries in dilapidated situations. This book presents the details of how the author started his journey for his doctorate thesis excavating the buried treasure of Genzia. This treasure of Genzia is now preserved mostly in the European and American libraries.
This work of Amitav Ghosh should also be studied as the quest of the author to restore the relationship and practices that used to exist in pre-colonial times. Strain of nostalgia runs through every single page of the book. The author has repeatedly tried to bring to the fore the kind of relationship that India shared with Egypt in the eleventh and twelfth centuries. Pre-colonial concerns of the author, e.g. pre-colonial trade, mark the nostalgic strain of the book. Radical questions about the western domain of knowledge have been put forward by the author. Imperial and colonial ventures of some of the European countries destroyed the harmony that existed between Egypt and India. The trade, that was free from any kind of restriction, was taken over by Imperial powers.
The customs, traditions, crops and many other things of Egyptians are common with those of India. This affinity between these two countries has existed from time immemorial. The documents preserved in the Genzia are evidences of the friendly relationship of these two countries. But this reciprocal relationship suffered a serious blow due to the inept actions of the colonizers. This broken strain could easily be observed in the scene when the author visited the Jewish sacred site. He was interrogated by the authorities as he was neither Muslim, nor Christian nor Jewish. When the officer asked the author if he was Muslim or Jewish or Christian, he (officer) became angry. The author says: “When I said no yet again he gave a snort of annoyance and slammed my passport on the desk. Turning to the others, he threw up his hands. Could they understand it? - he asked. Neither Jewish, nor Muslim, nor Christian — there had to be something odd afoot.”
The influence of the western thinking can be observed in the scene when Imam had an argument with Ghosh about the modern weapons. It has, under the influence of the western notions, become the “common sense” that the arms and ammunition a country possesses would show its development and modernization.
'I [Imam] tell you, he's [Ghosh] lying,' cried the Imam, his voice rising in fury. 'Our guns and bombs are much better than theirs. Ours are second only to the West's.'
'It's you [Imam] who's lying,' I [Ghosh] said. 'You know nothing about this. Ours are much better. Why, in my country we've even had a nuclear explosion. You won't be able to match that even in a hundred years.'
This argument between “Imam and the Indian” clearly reflects the hatred that “civilized people” have instilled in the hearts of the people of these two nations.
If we say that In an Antique Land is also an anthropological work, it should come as no surprise. In this work Amitav Ghosh has tried to reach to the roots of the cultures and different practices of two of the oldest civilizations of the world – India and Egypt. The story of the Jewish trader Ben Yiju and Bomma has been used as basis for this operation by the author. The roots of this story lie in the buried treasure of Genzia. Amitav Ghosh has studied the nature of human relationship both in medieval and modern societies. He shows how a medieval Jewish trader came to India and settled in Manglore. After his settlement in Manglore, he married an Indian girl Ashu and had children with her. People in the medieval world were tolerant enough that they allowed a foreigner to settle on their land for business and later allowed him to marry their daughter.
A postcolonial study of In an Antique Land would show how adverse the influences of the colonial ventures of most of the European countries are on the colonized countries. The concept of slave and master was brought to existence by the colonizers who thought themselves as “masters” and the people of countries they colonized as “slaves”. The slave Bomma, in the present text, is not a slave in the modern sense of the term. Rather he was more a sort of assistant in the business dealings of the Jewish trader Abraham Ben Yiju.
Whatever the circumstances of their meeting, the terms under which Bomma entered Ben Yiju's service were probably entirely different from those suggested by the word 'slavery' today: their arrangement was probably more that of patron and client than master and slave, as that relationship is now understood.
Offering this much freedom to the employees was a common practice in that time. We do not see this often in our contemporary world; so it is a matter of surprise for us. Now when some businessmen offer respectable status to their subordinates and give them more freedom than businessmen usually do, we take it as surprise. But this practice has its roots in the twelfth century trade and traders. Bomma in In an Antique Land enjoys the liberty offered to him by his “master” and buys things on credit when he travels to Egypt. Despite his meager salary, he enjoys a lavish life on the business trip as an agent for his master.
Now that we have discussed In an Antique Land from multiple perspectives, we can undoubtedly call it a multidisciplinary work that blurs the borderlines between the traditional disciplines of knowledge. It has been tried by the author of this book to put the practices of the western thinkers to a halt and re-establish the tradition that masters and pupils in ancient India used to cherish. It has continuously been presented to the students all over the world that Vasco de Gama discovered India in 1498, but nobody wrote clearly that there used to be trade relations between India and Egypt in twelfth century and it was only the sea route from Cape of Good Hope to India that Vasco De Gama discovered. He was only the first European to come to India by sea route and opened the gates for more Europeans to intervene into the domestic matters of India on the pretext of doing trade. The book defies the tradition of modern thinkers to attach a literary text to a single genre and shows that all genres are interrelated as all deal with the affairs of human beings.
Amitav Ghosh’s ‘In an Antique Land’ As a Multidisciplinary Work. (2024, Feb 25). Retrieved from https://studymoose.com/amitav-ghosh-s-in-an-antique-land-as-a-multidisciplinary-work-essay
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