ABSTRACT
‘Qui procul hinc’, the legend’s writ,– The frontier-grave is far away – ‘Qui ante diem periit: Sed miles, sed pro patria.’ Henry Newbolt ‘Clifton Chapel’ (Selected Poems ) 1 In this chapter the influences upon British tribal policy which were briefly discussed in chapter two are explored in more depth. The point was made in the earlier discussion that the fact that tribes were dispersed across a vast and difficult terrain meant that to control them by military means would probably have required greater resources than are possessed even by contemporary governments. So, by contrast with the Sind border, along which John Jacob had been able to mount frequent strong patrols and attack bands of robbers regularly and effectively, the tribes on the Punjab border had to a greater or lesser extent to be managed rather than repressed. 2 There were four major influences here. Firstly, there were the strategic considerations arising from the fact that the tribes were located along a critical frontier; these were closely linked with judgements about how far it was desirable to extend British rule. Secondly, there were decisions about how much could be spared in terms of administrative, military and financial resources. Thirdly, frontier policy had an ideological or cultural dimension, which meant that policies were influenced by beliefs about ways in which it was or was not appropriate for an empire to handle tribes. Finally, it had a sociological one too. Ideas about how the tribes were organised, how the tribe ‘worked’ so to speak, were also important. Whether it was a matter of responding to particular incidents, or influencing the behaviour of the tribe as a whole in the longer term, British officials had to try and establish, in the absence of any formal tribal political structures, where authority lay and how decisions were made, and what values underpinned tribal organisation. I look at each of these major influences in turn.
