An Account of the Kingdom of Nepal (Hamilton 1819)
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| Author | Francis Hamilton (formerly Buchanan) |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Composed | From fourteen months in Nepal, 1802–1803, and two years on the frontier |
| Published | 1819 |
| Publisher | Archibald Constable and Company |
| Place | Edinburgh |
| Volumes | 1 |
| Pages | pp. 213, 226, 231–232 |
|---|---|
| Regions documented | Nepal; the Tariyani (Terai); Tibet |
| Preparations | Charas (extract); Gangja (the dried plant); Subje (the expressed juice) |
| Uses documented | Smoked as an intoxicant; traded from Tibet to Kathmandu |
| Digital facsimile | View on the Internet Archive |
|---|
An Account of the Kingdom of Nepal, and of the Territories Annexed to This Dominion by the House of Gorkha is a description of Nepal and the lands conquered by the Gorkha state, written by the physician Francis Hamilton (formerly Buchanan) and published at Edinburgh in 1819. It describes the country as it stood before the war with the British that began at the end of 1814, from Hamilton's fourteen months in Nepal in 1802 and 1803 and two further years of inquiry on the frontier.[1]: 1 Its pages on hemp and charas in the valley of Nepal answer the earlier account of William Kirkpatrick, whose method of making the drug Hamilton disputed. As the work of a man who gathered his information under the authority of the British Resident, the book is evidence of how the East India Company's servants saw Nepal as much as it is a record of cannabis there, and it is read in that double light.
Origins
Hamilton states in the introduction that he spent fourteen months in Nepal in 1802 and 1803, mostly near Kathmandu, with Ramajai Batacharji, a Brahman from Calcutta whom he employed to gather information "without alarming a jealous government, or giving offence to the Resident, under whose authority I was acting". He then spent two years on the frontier, with the same man, questioning the Company's subjects and refugees and travellers from the Gorkha dominions, and he names his chief informants for each region.[1]: 1–2 The book is dedicated to Richard, Marquis Wellesley.[1]
The book
Part one gives a general account: the tribes of the Gorkha territories, the country in four regions by elevation, from the plain, or Tariyani, to the Alpine region, and its laws and government. Part two describes the states that had made up the Gorkha dominions, those east of the Kali river, including Nepal Proper, and those west of it. A supplement covers the independent chiefs to the west, followed by a register of the weather from February 1802 to March 1803 and a table of the heights of snowy mountains seen from the valley, by Colonel Crawford.[1]: v–vii
Hamilton writes that he will often differ from Kirkpatrick's account of Nepal, while acknowledging its merits, and warns readers to put little trust in its place names, whose errors he puts down to the printer.[1]: 5–6
Cannabis in the book
In his account of the trade of Nepal Proper, Hamilton lists charas, "or extract of hemp", among the drugs that merchants from Bhot, or Tibet, brought to Kathmandu.[1]: 212–213 On the wheat fields of the valley he writes that most were "quite choked with hemp, (Cannabis sativa,) which in Nepal is a troublesome and useless weed".[1]: 226
His main passage says that hemp was a common weed in Nepal, not cultivated there but much used for intoxication. The dried leaves came from the Tariyani but were reckoned heating and were used less than the extract, charas, of which Tibet produced the best. The proper way to make charas, he writes, was to cut the stem and collect the juice, as with opium; a coarser kind came from the expressed juice of the plant. He sets this against Kirkpatrick's account of resin rubbed from the leaves of the Jeea, which he takes to be the same plant, and calls Kirkpatrick's informant "inaccurate" for deriving ganja from the flowers and subje from the leaves, when in his own account gangja was the dried plant and subje the expressed juice. A dose of charas was ten to twelve grains, made into a pill and smoked like tobacco, and the dried leaves were taken the same way. He adds that a shopkeeper who followed the camp in Nepal died of smoking too much charas.[1]: 231–232
Recorded terms
Terms from the book are recorded on the pages about them:
| Term | Meaning | Place | Year | Where in the book | Recorded on |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Charas | the extract | Nepal | 1,819 | p. 231: "not so much used as the extract, which is called Charas: of this Thibet produces the best." | Nepal charas trade |