Inventing Empire in Twentieth-Century India and Britain

Abstract

It was in the twentieth century, during the reign of Queen Victoria’s three successors, the King-Emperors Edward VII, George V, and George VI, that the concept of imperial India, Britain’s most important colony, was invented and promoted by means of architecture, ceremonial, and a new capital city. This chapter discusses the Victoria Memorial Hall, the Gateway of India, the building of New Delhi and the 1903 Durbar. George V’s Coronation Durbar of 1911 was accompanied in London by the Festival of Empire, the Pageant of London, and the Masque Imperial. Between the wars, the British Empire Exhibition and the Pageant of Empire of 1924 were designed to convince the British of the imperial project.