(1808 - 1886)
Architectural historian James Fergusson was born in Scotland and worked with a merchant firm in Calcutta before establishing an indigo factory in Bengal. He travelled widely in India during the 1830s and ‘40s, drawing architectural sites. He produced books and papers on Indian architecture, studied Islamic architecture in North Africa and the Middle East and wrote the first survey of architecture as an art form in English. His expertise was sought on projects, including the decoration of St Paul’s Cathedral, and in 1867 he curated the Indian court display at the Paris Universal Exhibition. He sat on the council of the Royal Geographical Society, was awarded an RIBA gold medal and was a vice president of the Royal Asiatic Society.
