Abstract
AbstractSaltpetre (KNO3) manufacture was a principal monopoly industry in early Modern India when the United Kingdom governed the social and economic systems. The process represented microbial transformation of excrementitious livestock and human wastes deposited around habitats, resulting in formation of salt efflorescence at an economic scale. Low caste people collected these wastes for extraction and production of rough saltpetre under the administrative control of British India. Stable isotope composition (δ15N and δ18O) was used to trace details of the microbial transformation processes, often involving the isotopic fractionation of nitrogen and oxygen. Marked elevation in δ15N and δ18O values for nitrates in soils and deposits, relative to those of primary organic nitrogen in diets and water sources, characterizes the unique processes of historic saltpetre manufacture in British India.
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