By Lianne Kolirin<\/p>\n
A huge hoard of precious manuscripts which has been sitting in storage at the Wellcome Collection for more than a century has been given back to Britain\u2019s Jain community.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The majority of the documents were purchased in 1919 at a vastly deflated price from a Jain temple in Punjab that no longer exists. They were shipped to Britain to join the huge collection amassed by pharmaceutical entrepreneur Sir Henry Wellcome, but have largely been left undisturbed for over 100 years.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Now, after years of negotiating with the Institute of Jainology \u2013 which represents around 65,000 Jains in the UK \u2013 the prestigious cultural institution has returned them at an \u201chistoric\u201d ceremony in the Houses of Parliament.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The collection, which is believed to be the largest of its kind outside of India, features many varied artefacts \u2013 from 15th century illustrated manuscripts to unique texts from the 19th century, covering a broad range of topics including religion, medicine and culture in languages including Prakrit, Sanskrit, Gujerati, Rajasthani and early Hindi.\u00a0<\/p>\n
One of the most noteworthy is a text which heavily criticises the foundations of British rule in India. It lays out the ethical principles that Gandhi later drew on in his efforts to secure Indian independence.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Sir Henry Wellcome, who was a prominent figure in the growth of the modern pharmaceutical industry from the late nineteenth to early twentieth century, travelled extensively as part of his work. During his lifetime, he aimed to advance knowledge of human health and disease and when he died in 1936 his will set out terms for a trust to be set up in his name \u2013 and that would include his collection of historical medical items.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Wellcome Collection, which opened in 2007, is a free library and museum in London which encompasses thousands of items related to health, medicine and \u201cthe human experience,\u201d and encompasses rare books, artworks, personal archives and a lot more.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Dr Adrian Plau, Wellcome\u2019s Collections Information Lead, explained that Sir Henry employed numerous \u201cagents\u201d around the world to secure interesting \u201cacquisitions\u201d. Speaking to the RMC ahead of the ceremony hosted by the Jain All-Party Parliamentary Group, Dr Plau said the remit was \u201cquite broad in terms of gathering material that would enlighten the history of medicine, health and science\u201d and that what fell into this category could be considered as \u201cquite flexible\u201d.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The restituted collection comprises about 2,000 items \u2013 1,200 of which came from the temple, according to Dr Plau. \u201cIt was the entire holding of a Jain temple library,\u201d he said, adding that there is much correspondence about the sale between the agent and London.\u00a0<\/p>\n
He said the agent explained to his employer that he had \u201ccome across this opportunity to make an absolute bargain deal\u201d. Dr Plau added: \u201cThe feedback he gets from London is to try to get it cheaper still, and in the end he gets it at what appears to be the price of around five rupees for manuscripts, which was low even by the time.\u201d<\/p>\n
Another 800 or so documents in the collection were acquired from other sources, and yet almost none of them have been on display since they arrived in Britain, Dr Plau said. They will now be\u00a0 moved to the Dharmanath Network in Jain Studies at the University of Birmingham, which will open the collection to those researchers and faith communities who are \u201cbest placed to read, interpret and translate their content for a global audience,\u201d according to a press release issued by Wellcome ahead of the ceremony.\u00a0<\/p>\n
It comes at a time when cultural organisations across the UK, and indeed globally, have been reckoning with the historical legacies of their collections. But while other restitutions might be fuelled by a sense of righting the wrongs of the past, the Jain community has opted to look at things differently, according to Mehool Sanghrajka, managing trustee of the Institute of Jainology.\u00a0<\/p>\n
He told the RMC: \u201cAlthough restitution and repatriation are very emotive subjects, we really don\u2019t know what we don\u2019t know. In other words, we really don\u2019t know the circumstances under which this [the collection] was acquired.\u201d<\/p>\n
Also important to consider, he said, is the \u201chuge amount of turmoil, loss of life and destruction\u201d that occurred during partition which led to Indian independence in 1947.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWe look at that and think perhaps if Wellcome hadn\u2019t acquired them, they may not actually be here anymore,\u201d he said, adding that Wellcome has \u201cincredible\u201d storage facilities which has meant the collection has been \u201ctreated with care and respect\u201d.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cNow, rather than looking back and worrying about whether that was ethical, moral, legal and so on, we\u2019re looking forward to saying \u2018how can we make a real impact?\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cAcademics, researchers and the community [will now] have access to them and have them within the community, because that\u2019s the place they belong.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mr Sanghrajka signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on behalf of the Institute of Jainology in Westminster, alongside representatives of the Wellcome Trust for Wellcome Collection and University of Birmingham. A full legal agreement will subsequently be drawn up in accordance with the MoU.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Dr Marie-Helene Gorisse, who is the Dharmanath Network in Jain Studies Lead said: \u201cBy working together, we will make sure that the return of the manuscripts by Wellcome Collection to the Jain community has maximum impact for students, researchers, members of the community, and for the general public. <\/p>\n
\u201cBy securing access to this rich Jain heritage, we aim to raise awareness of Jain philosophy and culture, which can benefit the common project of living well in a diverse society.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Lianne Kolirin A huge hoard of precious manuscripts which has been sitting in storage at the Wellcome…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":967734,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5018,3,4],"tags":[748,393,4884,225066,1144,712,270113,16,15,1764],"class_list":["post-967733","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-britain","category-uk","category-united-kingdom","tag-britain","tag-england","tag-great-britain","tag-jain","tag-northern-ireland","tag-scotland","tag-scripture","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-wales"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116593027085429553","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/967733","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=967733"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/967733\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/967734"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=967733"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=967733"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=967733"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}