Indo-China (Geographical Handbook Series)

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It is therefore an essential and probably, for many users, the only source of information about the Geographical Handbooks. Rushbrooke, who replaced J.

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The Oxford centre prepared 17 Handbooks amounting to 28 volumes and the Cambridge centre 14 amounting to 30 volumes. Norway is at an unusual latitude for the Oxford centre, which dealt otherwise with hot regions from the Mediterranean to tropical lands , whereas Iceland is remote from the other countries of Western Europe treated by Cambridge. But these two cases are explained by the origins of both centres, as I will explain in my forthcoming article. But France was done by Cambridge, and here again, the tension appears, visible from the start, of political affiliation vs.

Since some handbooks have more than one map, there are not 31, but 47 folded maps in the 58 volumes. Apart from very rare cases of ochre shading to indicate surfaces above a given altitude on relief maps in few volumes, colour is totally absent.

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A sixteen-page atlas using layer colouring at the end of Norway II is an exception, to be understood as an equivalent of the usual folded map in the pocket present in Norway I. The lists, at the beginning of volumes, of this illustration distinguishes between two categories, defined by the technique of reproduction used: They are reproduced by engraved blocks that can be integrated into the rest of the typographical composition at the printing stage, and they actually stick closer to the text than the photographic illustrations.

Many maps are location maps, and describe what is dealt with in the accompanying text, whether physical regions, climate, population densities, economic sectors, communications, or With the exception of block-diagrams that give three-dimensional images of relief-forms in the introductory general physical description, they are often close to graphic paraphrase. The reference of a publication where the map or diagram had been initially published or from which it has been adapted is sometimes attached to the document. Having said that it does not differ from comparable books of that time in terms of illustration, one must emphasise that photographs, unlike maps and diagrams, do not credit sources, so that one never knows where the pictures come from.

They are reproduced by the half-tone technique that renders shades of grey by small black dots on sheets of glazed paper, which are added between pages. These two exceptions reveal the principle of photographic illustration in the series: More radical and rarer than grouping of chapters that would have been too short, are omissions of topics not relevant for the country dealt with: Rare too, are interpolations, the addition, at the chapter-level, of developments not catered for in the general outline. Here are a few of the dozen or so examples of interpolation encountered in the whole series: If the general sequence [physical background]-[people-administration]-[geography of population — economic geography]-[communications] is always respected, variations of the relative order of topics occur with one exception, it is inside the constructing blocks that they are met.

But generalisation is difficult here, because if we put aside French West Africa where both chapters are merged into one , we see that out of the 30 remaining handbooks, 15 present "The people" before "History" and 15 "History" before "The people": Economic primacy of a sector does seem to have justified a modification of the systematic outline: Such a justification simply in terms of importance applies as well to the chapters on communications of France IV and Germany IV: But behind the fundamentally systematic orientation of their organisation, one must see how the Geographical Handbooks are sometimes tinted by a logic of regional presentation.

Because this chapter is actually a general presentation of the country, one that does not strictly limit its horizon to the relief of the country, but associates questions of physical features and human life of a given territory: But more than that, it should be stressed that some tend to span over hundreds of pages and this is largely why the series weighs so much: This inflation seems intrinsic to the procedure of description: These parts sometimes extend dramatically see volume IV of four-volume handbooks and one has the impression that the Geographical Handbooks are then sinking into topographical description: They are even drier in style than the rest of the handbooks and they tend to appear as crude facts.

I have not picked up significant changes that would have constituted improvements in presentation between the first handbooks and those produced later. Certainly only those who prepared the books could explain the way a great deal of details were settled, but this geographical contingency seems to account for a whole range of variations in the series. Cambridge reinitialises the numbering of chapters at the beginning of each volume, whereas Oxford does not. Italy I has folded maps, but printed on the entire sheet. This introduction gives an elementary vade-mecum, starting with remarks on the limits, position and extent of the territory dealt with, continuing with a summary of the systematic outline, and ending with remarks about transliteration of the language into English and spelling of place names.

This, of course, is to be commented later, but though I do not want to discuss here whether the books have actually been useful this is the subject on which I am calling for comments! These should help in completing the description, and make it, I hope, an incentive for testimonies and discussion As these titles reveal, they give practical advice for travel into unfamiliar environments, which assumes that the reader may travel in these countries.

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But looking more carefully, a practical interest can be detected in other passages: But these books are far from being guidebooks and the overall impression is dominated by the outline and its enumeration of topics, an invitation perhaps rarely accepted The series seems to be driven in by a fundamental desire for completeness. The Geographical Handbooks pretend to be a library in themselves, books to replace books. This must also have limited the extent of diffusion of the series: Appendice 6 lists the interventions I have found about the Geographical Handbooks, from mere allusions to more substantial presentations.

If contributions in the Geographers Biobibliographical Studies Mansell Publishing often allude to the Geographical Handbooks as to something familiar that needs little or no comments, it is only in geography and history of geography literature that the series was substantially presented, its best accounts being found in: Hinsley and published from onward: The only publication dealing with WWII British intelligence where the existence of the series is acknowledged is a biography of John H. Taylor puts it clearly: And two other post-war interventions dealing with regional geography a question affected by the series yield no more results, whether it be K.

I have read Cyril Gosme's article on the Naval Intelligence Handbooks with enormous interest and I made copies for the handful of colleagues I know would be interested. As indicated before, I suspect that there are very few UK geographers who are familiar with the series. I would imagine that anyone under the age of 55 would have no knowledge of the books whatsoever.

By contrast, I suspect that some anthropologists and archaeologists, who need to know about the specific geographical circumstances of particular areas prior to undertaking fieldwork or excavations, may be familiar with them. For example, the complete? Perhaps the complete set is in some distant store off-site, or was it transferred to the University of London Library which does have an almost complete set - minus Albania? I am interested in the series for what it tells us about the history of the discipline of Geography in the UK in the s.

I am fascinated by the teams of researchers, what their interactions were, what their links to Oxford and Cambridge ie. The maps in the Cambridge series, I would judge to be rather more professional than those from Oxford. Darby set up a specialist cartographic unit at Cambridge Scott Polar Research Institute and ran a team of geographical researchers in the way that he would run the Departments of Geography at Liverpool in the late s and at University College London The Naval Intelligence Handbooks research unit at Cambridge was an experiment for Darby in personnel management which was very successfully repeated in the two departments he headed All this interests me greatly because Darby was my 'first professor' and, in fact, the inspiration for me to become an historical geographer and I have spent all my career at UCL.

I am charged to investigate the department's history prior to events in to celebrate years of continuous teaching of Geography at UCL. There was a professor of geography at UCL for a few years in the s, but then there was a gap of almost 70 years, although some geography was still taught by non-geographers.

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I believe that only a very few scholars who contributed to the Handbooks are alive: Professor Sir Raymond Firth the most distinguished social anthropologist of the Pacific islands and Professor Norman Pounds, the historical geographer. I have had conversations with both of them in recent months. Frankly, I suspect that all the other contributors have died I fear that not many UK geographers will have the knowledge or experience to deal with the questions raised by Cyril Gosme.

Nonetheless, his work is fascinating and important since it touches on a forgotten secret? This was because of personal expressions of trust, reliability and professionalism, rather than just because of the knowledge of particular parts of the world that individual geographers possessed. It is a matter of looking at the networks of personal contact and the personal influences, rather than focusing just on the words, the maps and the volumes themselves. British geographers in no way referring to the series, in the immediate post-war years:. Edwards, Land, Area and Region: References where the series is briefly discussed or presented implicitly, before in Britain:.

Beesly, Very Special Admiral. The Life of Admiral J. Godfrey, Hamish Hamilton, London, Lock, Geography and Cartography. Bas relief Angkor Wat. Cham towers at Mi Son near Tourane. Divine dancer Angkor Wat. IndoChina in the second and fifth centuries. IndoChina in the late sixth and twelfth centuries. IndoChina in the early fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.

IndoChina in the late seventeenth century and beginning of the nineteenth century. French acquisition of IndoChina. Palace of the GovernorGeneral at Saigon. Royal palace at Phnom Penh. The states and their capitals. Gate of the Emperor of Annams palace at Hue. Throne room of the Imperial palace at Hue. Density of population in the Tonkin delta. Key to rural settlement maps.

Rural settlement in the Tri Ton district of CochinChina.

Naval Intelligence Handbooks

Hillfoot settlement in the Tonkin delta. Village on piles Tonle Sap. Age groups of the European population. Rice research stations and advisory centres. Embankments in the Tonkin delta.

Irrigation system in the Tonkin delta. Irrigation by sliding scoop. Irrigation by scoop and tripod. Times of rice harvests in the Tonkin delta. Types of rice cultivation in south IndoChina. Rice fields near Cao Bang in northern Tonkin. Silkworm rearing in Annam. Areas covered by agricultural cooperative associations. Irrigation system near Thanh Hoa. Production of timber and firewood. Fishing in a flooded rice field. Fishing by means of a trap. Distribution of mineral resources.

Opencast coal mine near Hon Gay.

Works (26)

Rice exports to various countries Export of rice and maize Direction of foreign trade The ports of IndoChina. Panorama of the coast to the east of Hon Gay Ba Ngoi and the Baie de Cam Ranh. Cam Pha and Port Wallut. The Routes Coloniales and other main roads. The historical development of the railway system. The railway system in Cargo junks at Hanoi.