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SUMMARY:Opium\, Tea and Cotton: The Rise and Fall of the Sassoon Dynasty i
 n South East Asia - Professor Shalva Weil\, Hebrew University of Jerusalem
DTSTART:20210510T160000Z
DTEND:20210510T173000Z
UID:TALK158719@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Dr Duncan Needham
DESCRIPTION:This seminar will present work-in-progress on the rise and the
  fall of the Sassoon dynasty\, which I am carrying out during a Visiting S
 cholarship at the Centre for Financial History.  \nOriginally acting as an
  intermediary between British textile firms and Persian Gulf commodity mer
 chants\, David Sassoon (1792-1864)\, who reached India from Basra in 1832\
 , established textile businesses and philanthropic institutions in major I
 ndian cities: Calcutta\, Poona and Bombay. In order to expand\, he and his
  sons placed extended family members in key positions throughout the East\
 , and employed dependents from the “Baghdadi” Indian Jewish community 
 in his businesses. After the Treaty of Nanking (1842)\, the Sassoons turne
 d their enterprises into a triangular trade: opium and tea were shipped fr
 om India to China\; Chinese merchandise was sold in Britain\; and Lancashi
 re cotton was purchased in Britain and sold globally. David Sassoon and hi
 s descendants played a crucial role as shippers and consignment merchants\
 , and became the largest mill owners in Bombay employing an estimated 20\,
 000 people in 17 mills. From the mid-nineteenth century to Indian independ
 ence in 1947\, the Sassoons administered one of the largest multinational 
 corporation globally. \nWorking in archives of several Sassoon family memb
 ers (including the poet Siegfried Sassoon who deposited his papers in Camb
 ridge University Library)\, I shall try to trace the economic and politica
 l reasons for the rise and fall of the Sassoon dynasty in South East Asia 
 until the end of the Raj. \n
LOCATION:Zoom
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