Discovering the mercantile city in South Asia: the example of early nineteenth-century Calcutta

Abstract

After examining the various geographical models of land use for the colonial port cities of Asia and the mercantile cities of North America, this paper argues that Bowden's mercantile triangle model has much to offer our understanding of the European part of Asian port cities. The model is applied to Calcutta and found to have considerable predictive value. Nevertheless, the Calcutta example suggests that the colonial state played a more important role in land use decisions than Bowden allows, and that the retail and hotel districts were considerably smaller than in North American cities. Furthermore, Bowden's ideas about a «city of the mind», based on London, influencing the naming and layout of colonial cities have little or no relevance to Calcutta.