Quellenbestände der Indienmission 1700-1918 in Archiven des deutschsprachigen Raums

This book is the result of a meeting that took place in Oxford in 1999. It proposed to offer a guide to the material concerning missions in India, which can be found in archives of German-speaking countries for the period from 1700 to 1918.The archives of the Franckesche Stiftung (foundation) in Halle offer rich material concerning the first Protestant missionaries to India; among them were the well-known Bartholomäus Ziegenbalg and Heinrich Plüschke, who served the mission of Tranquebar.

The project intended to include both Protestant mission societies (Basel Mission, Berlin Mission, Danish-Halle Mission, Moravian Church [Herrenhuter Brüder-Unität], Hermannsburg Mission, Leipzig Mission [Dresden Mission Society], Gossner Mission, North German Mission, and Breklum Mission [Schleswig Holstein]) and Catholic religious orders (Sisters of Mercy of the Holy Cross [Hazaribag Bihar]; Jesuit mission in Bombay; Carmelites; Swiss Capuchins; and Sisters of the Holy Cross Travancore, Trivandrum [Sisters of Menzingen]).

Regarding the Protestant societies, Albrecht Frenz rightly emphasizes the importance of the Basel Mission, which united all streams of the Reformation and served as an example and a model for later Protestant mission societies (p. 2). Regarding the Catholic religious orders, special attention is due to the short article about the importance of the Swiss Capuchin Anastasius Hartmann (1803–66), a pioneer of the Roman Catholic Mission in India in the nineteenth century and author of Monumenta Anastasiana.

For each mission society, the address, telephone and fax numbers, e-mail address, and name of the archivist are given. In many cases, the hours and other information about the archives are listed. After these data follow articles of at least five pages that give a short description of the history of the society in India and also the essential bibliography of publications about the society's history. The reader is facilitated by indices on the mission societies, religious orders, individuals, places and countries, abbreviations, and archives. Finally, the publication includes the addresses of the contributing authors.

Individuals who are looking for firsthand material concerning the history of Christian missions in India from 1700 to 1918 will be grateful for this reliable publication. Such studies will throw new light on the Christian mission in India and on the intercultural exchange that took place between Europe and India.