Madras’ first weaver village

The history of our city never ceases to amaze. Each time we think we have reached a satisfactory conclusion on some aspect, we find that there is more to it, and the search continues. The story of the weaving villages that eventually came together to form Madras is one such. That the Europeans came to the Coromandel coast to trade in cloth is well known. The history of the British East India Company is full of transactions with weavers, at least until that point where its Directors and other functionaries realised that there was more money to be made by conquest, much of it through chicanery.

And it was in that early era of cloth trade that weaving villages were so important.