Untitled [Two Photographic Albums of Bombay and the Western Ghats]
Anonymous compiler, possibly Clifton & Co. or Bourne & Shepherd, Bombay, circa 1885–1895
Two albums together comprising twenty-three mounted albumen prints, each approximately 5.5 × 8 in (14 × 20 cm), mounted one to a page and a few back to back on thick cream card leaves within printed double-ruled red borders with geometric corner ornaments and pencil captions in a contemporary hand on the mounts.
Bound in original decorative cloth bindings: one in deep red pebble-grained cloth and the other in olive-green cloth, each gilt- and black-stamped with a geometric and foliate panel to the upper board, blind-ruled to the rear, and sympathetically rebacked in black leather gilt-lettered “BOMBAY PHOTO ALBUM” on the spine.
12 × 9.6 in (30 × 24.5 cm) (each)
Album I (Red binding):-
Departure of Lord Harris, late Governor of Bombay / Untitled / Crawford Market now Mahatma Pule (sic) Market / Queen's Statue, Bombay / King family home post 1884. Harold H Holmes in photo / Duke's Nose, Khandala / Victoria Terminus now Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus / Reversing Station Khandala on the Western Ghats / Untitled / Watson Hotel but erroneously titled as "Crawford Market, Bombay" / A group of natives in the country near Bombay
Album II (Olive-green binding):-
Municipal Offices, Bombay / Watson Hotel near Apollo Bunder, Bombay / Government Secretariat, Bombay / YMCA, Bombay / Khandala on the Western Ghats / University Building, Bombay / Victoria Tower now known as Rajabhai Tower / General Post Office and P W Offices, Bombay / Khandala on the Western Ghats / Khandala on the Western Ghats / High Court, Bombay / Part of Bombay / Part of Bombay looking South
BOMBAY IN TRANSITION: TWO PHOTOGRAPHIC ALBUMS DEPICTING THE CITY’S GOTHIC-REVIVAL LANDMARKS AND THE WESTERN GHATS, C. 1890S
These two companion albums form an exceptional visual survey of late-Victorian Bombay, capturing its newly completed municipal, judicial, and railway edifices in the decades following the city’s transformation into the Empire’s western port capital. Buildings such as the Municipal Corporation Offices (completed 1893), Victoria Terminus (1888), High Court (1878) and Government Secretariat stand as triumphs of Gothic-Revival architecture under British rule, emblematic of civic pride and colonial progress.
The inclusion of leisure excursions to Khandala and the Karli Caves, together with interiors such as the King's family home, extends the albums’ scope beyond architectural documentation into a more intimate record of social and cultural life.
Possibly produced during the governorship of Lord Harris (1890–95), the albums likely commemorate official service or departure, their consistent pencilled inscriptions suggesting a compiler within the administrative or engineering elite. The photographs correspond in style and composition to the work of Bombay’s foremost studios—Bourne & Shepherd, Clifton & Co., and Deen Dayal & Sons—which supplied mounted prints of identical format to stationers and booksellers across the city.
Together, the pair exemplifies the period’s presentation-album tradition, combining commercial topography with private annotation and preserving a coherent architectural portrait of Bombay at the zenith of its nineteenth-century expansion.
(Set of two)
NON-EXPORTABLE
This lot is offered at RESERVE
This lot will be shipped in "as is" condition. For further details, please refer to the images of individual lots as reference for the condition of each book.