Charles Masson was a British adventurer who served science.
For historical At the Faculty of History of Tver State University and at the Institute of Asian and African Countries at Lomonosov Moscow State University, I didn't learn about the discoverer of Harappa, Charles Masson (born James Lewis), despite having become familiar with the Harappan civilization in detail at the Faculty of History.
As a classicist, Edmund Richardson's Alexandria caught my eye, and I bought it, confident it was about my beloved Alexandria in Egypt. Only after opening the book did I realize it was not Alexandria in Egypt, but Alexandria in the Caucasus (today's Bagram), discovered, like Harappa, by Masson.
Having read this wonderful book in one breath, I turned to the work of Masson himself, which reflected the most interesting part of his turbulent life.
So, Charles Masson (1800–1853) is the pseudonym of James Lewis, a soldier-artilleryman in the army of the British East India Company, who became an independent traveler, orientalist, archaeologist-discoverer and one of the greatest numismatist-collectors in history.
Having learned, not without pleasure, that Masson was my fellow artilleryman, I once again came to the conclusion that the joke that circulated in the Russian Imperial Army was also applicable to other armies of the world:
Smart - in artillery,
The dandy is in the cavalry,
Lazy people - in navy,
And the fool is in the infantry.
The dandy is in the cavalry,
Lazy people - in navy,
And the fool is in the infantry.
Having deserted from the Bengal Brigade of the East India Army stationed in Agra, Masson wandered incessantly through Punjab, Afghanistan, and Baluchistan from 1826 to 1838. This enabled him to study local languages and dialects, particularly Pashto, which, in turn, could not but have a beneficial effect on what modern scholars call fieldwork, including archaeological research.
Masson's Map of British India
The result of these adventures was the publication by Masson in 1842 in London of his impressions in 3 volumes under the title “Narrative of various journeys in Balochistan, Afghanistan, and the Panjab: including a residence in those countries from 1826 to 1838”.
Later he wrote another book entitled “Narrative of a journey to Kalat, including an insurrection at that place in 1840; and A Memoir on Eastern Balochistan”, also published in London in 1843. The books were such a success among a wide range of readers that in 1844 they were reissued as a single 4-volume work and continue to be reprinted to this day.
These works still retain their scientific value, as do Masson’s articles on oriental coins and the infamous Bamiyan (let us recall that the Taliban blew up ancient Buddha statues here in 2001).
As mentioned above, Masson became the first European to see the ruins of Harappa, now part of Pakistan, in the then-undivided Punjab. He also discovered the ancient city of Alexandria in the Caucasus, founded by Alexander the Great during his campaign to the East around 329 BC. Alexandria in the Caucasus was located on the site of today's Afghan city of Bagram.
One cannot draw a parallel between Masson's archaeological work and that of adventurers like his contemporary Giuseppe Ferlini: Ferlini blew up and plundered the pyramids of Nubia and should be called a black digger, not an archaeologist. Masson was not seeking treasure. He was driven by the spirit of discovery, not personal enrichment.
Masson is credited with deciphering the now-extinct Kharosthi script, which was spoken in parts of the Indian subcontinent and what is now eastern Afghanistan. In reality, Masson collected samples of this script, and it was deciphered by the British Indologist James Prinsep, a contemporary of Masson.
By the start of the First Anglo-Afghan War, which lasted from October 1, 1838, to October 12, 1842, Masson had spent more time in Afghanistan than any other British official, becoming a unique Afghan expert in his time. He categorically opposed the British invasion, predicting that it would end in failure for the then-mighty Great Britain.
Incidentally, Soviet experts and staff members of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the USSR Academy of Sciences also objected to the introduction of Soviet troops into Afghanistan in 1979, including V.G. Korgun, with whom I had the opportunity to communicate within the walls of the aforementioned institute when he had already become a professor.
We come to the conclusion that the work of Charles Masson is undoubtedly worthy, if not of study, then at least of mention in the history and oriental studies departments of Russian universities, and his scientific works are worthy of translation into Russian.
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