In search of the pre-Portuguese Konkani paper trail TNN | Jul 26, 2016, 03.00 AM IST
Rosalind O'Hanlon of Faculty of Oriental Studies, Oxford, has very succinctly documented the facts and the context of the advent of paper and printing in India, and of the era that preceded them, in her paper titled "Performance in a World of Paper: Puranic Histories and Social Communication In Early Modern India" (O'Hanlon, 2013: 93). Though the focus of her paper is on the social impact of advent of paper and printing, certain facts narrated by her are very relevant to our subject because the scene of action of O'Hanlon's drama is in Konkan. Before paper entered India towards the end of the first millennium, documents were recorded on palm-leaf, birch-bark, cloth, baked clay, copper plate and stone. Paper did not immediately displace older materials. It was vulnerable to insects, dampness and fire in a way that stone and copper plate were not, and it had less potential for public display. But, by the late sixteenth century, paper had come to underpin every important aspect of state activity. As Mughal governments began to demand payment of land revenues in cash, it was on paper that records of village payments were kept. http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/goa/In-search-of-the-pre-Portuguese-Konkani-paper-trail/articleshow/53387670.cms