History

Sir Monier Monier-Williams, appointed the second Boden Professor of Sanskrit at Oxford University in 1860, had a vision to encourage and support greater research into Indian literature and culture.

To this end, in 1875 he presented to Congregation the idea of founding an institution dedicated to Indian studies and scholarship. With a positive response from Congregation Monier-Williams began gathering funds for the foundation of the Institute, much of which came from colonial authorities in India and various Indian princes with high-profile support from Queen Victoria, who adopted the title ‘Empress of India’ in 1876, and the Prince of Wales (later King Edward VII) and Lord Northbrook (Viceroy of India 1872-76).

In 1880, with the funding in place, Congregation approved the plan for the Indian Institute at a site in the University Parks. However, there was an objection to the University Parks site and the next year Merton College’s Broad Street properties were bought to become the new Institute.

£21,772 had been spent to complete the Indian Institute building leaving very little of the funds secured by Sir Monier-Williams for the upkeep and running of the Institute itself. The Indian Institute received an annual endowment of £250, but this proved insufficient and the Institute almost immediately began to face financial difficulties.

The number of Indian nationals studying in Oxford had never been high and did not increase with its opening, leaving the Institute to become almost entirely a training ground for future members of the Indian Civil Service and a museum of curiosities for sight-seers. In 1926 the museum’s collection of (by now rotting) stuffed animals were disposed of and some other items were transferred to the Pitt Rivers Museum. By 1927 the building was managed by the Bodleian Library for an annual fee of £275, which did not come close to meeting its running costs.

In 1939 the museum was closed for the duration of the war and re-opened in 1949 as the Museum of Eastern Art, no longer solely dedicated to India and incorporating the Ashmolean’s Chinese ceramic collection.

India’s independence in 1947 had a significant impact on the Institute given its pre-war role training British officials for India’s colonial administration. In 1955 the Hebdomadal Council incorporated the Indian Institute into a newly formed and broader-focused Oriental Institute and in 1956 the University obtained a High Court order to allow it to use the Indian Institute as general University property despite much opposition. The Oriental Institute’s teaching and operations took occupation of its own purpose-built building on Pusey Lane in 1960.

In a gradual process, the building was inhabited by the central University Offices, some of its collection was disbursed and the rest moved to their present home in the Ashmolean’s Department of Eastern Art in 1962. The Indian Institute’s library was rehoused in the Bodleian in 1968 and was merged with the Bodleian’s own Indian holdings to become what is now one of the finest Indological libraries in the world. When in 1975 the University Offices, including those from the Indian Institute as well as the Clarendon Building, moved into their present home in Wellington Square only the building remained.

The building was then allocated to the Modern History Faculty. Given that the building had been funded almost entirely by private funds, many of which came from Indian donors, it being passed over to a department focussed entirely on European history was met with significant backlash from the press, accusations of racism from the Oxford University Student Union and a formal protest from the government of India. Nevertheless, the move went ahead and along with it significant refurbishment of the building’s interior. The building became the History Faculty Library with the museum space becoming a reading room and History faculty offices occupying the lower floors.