The Great Derangement by Amitav Ghosh

Author:Amitav Ghosh [Ghosh, Amitav]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780226323176
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Published: 2016-08-25T16:00:00+00:00

These paragraphs describe Yenangyaung as it was in the latter years of nineteenth century. But the history of Burma’s oil industry goes back much further, possibly even a millennium or more.

Oil from natural springs, sinks, and hand-dug pits has of course been used in many parts of the world since ancient times. But it is quite likely that “the early oil industry of Burma” was “the largest in the world.”

The oil wells of Yenangyaung caught the attention of British travelers as early as the mid-eighteenth century. Major Michael Symes, an East India Company envoy to the court of Ava, published this description of it in 1795:

After passing various sands and villages, we got to Yaynangheoum or Earthoil (Petroleum) Creek about two hours past noon. . . . We were informed, that the celebrated wells of Petroleum, which supply the empire [of Ava], and many parts of India, with that useful product, were five miles to the east of this place. . . . The mouth of the creek was crowded with large boats, waiting to receive a lading of oil; and immense pyramids of earthen jars were raised within and round the village, disposed in the same manner as shot and shells are piled in an arsenal. . . . We saw several thousand jars filled with it ranged along the bank.

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