Chart of the Mouths of the Hoogly River and of the Roads of Balasore and Piply, from Point Palmiras to Lacam‘s Channel, with the course of that river up to the town of Hoogly

1794

Copper engraving on paper

Print size: 26.25 x 27 in (66.5 x 68.5 cm)
Sheet size: 28.25 x 29.5 in (71.5 x 75 cm)
Large engraved map on two sheets of laid paper joined as one to a size of 28.25 x 29.5 in (71.5 x 75 cm)

The Hooghly Delta Charted — An East India Company Hydrographic Survey of Bengal’s Maritime Approaches

Published by James Whittle & Richard Holmes Laurie, Fleet Street, London; compiled from the surveys of John Ritchie and Benjamin Lacam (cartographer uncredited on the plate).

This large and highly detailed hydrographic chart depicts the hazardous maritime approaches to the Hooghly River, extending from the Bay of Bengal at Point Palmyras through the shifting channels and sandbanks of the delta and upriver to the town of Hooghly. Compiled from the surveys of John Ritchie, Marine Surveyor to the Honble East India Company, and Benjamin Lacam, the chart represents one of the most sophisticated navigational documents produced for British operations in Bengal during the late eighteenth century.

Designed for practical use rather than display, the engraving prioritises navigational intelligence. Soundings are densely recorded, shoals and banks carefully delineated, and tidal channels traced with precision. A complex rhumb-line network and multiple compass roses reinforce its function as a working sea chart intended for pilots and company vessels navigating one of Asia’s most dangerous river mouths.

The Hooghly was the principal maritime artery through which Calcutta—then the commercial and administrative heart of British India—was supplied and defended. Accurate hydrographic knowledge of its approaches was therefore critical to the East India Company’s commercial dominance and strategic security. This chart belongs to the mature phase of British survey activity in Bengal, when accumulated field surveys were synthesised into authoritative navigational instruments.

Large-format Hooghly charts of this calibre are scarce. They are valued today for their technical sophistication, documentary importance, and central place in the maritime infrastructure that underpinned Britain’s rise to power in eastern India.

NON-EXPORTABLE

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