ABSTRACT
After a survey of the early but inadequate production of saltpetre in England, and the search for supplementary supplies in western Europe and northwest Africa, the establishment of links with India will be explored and the validity of the distinction between the saltpetre produced artificially in western Europe and that thought to occur naturally in India will be examined. Described in 1793 as being ‘very abundant and very cheap at Bengal, indeed in no other part of the world so cheap’,4 saltpetre was to become a significant ‘commodity of empire’.
