This cultural and political study examines British perceptions and policies on India's Afghan Frontier between 1918 and 1948 and the impact of these on the local Pashtun population, India as a whole, and the decline of British imperialism in South Asia.

William Jervois was a military engineer who rose to prominence as a result of Lord Palmerston's extensive programme of fortification against a feared French invasion in the middle years of the nineteenth century. Ramparts of Empire is a detailed and engaging study of his life and works.

This cultural and political study examines British perceptions and policies on India's Afghan Frontier between 1918 and 1948 and the impact of these on the local Pashtun population, India as a whole, and the decline of British imperialism in South Asia.

In the year 1860, Palmerston's parliament sanctioned the construction of the largest system of fortifications that the British Isles had ever seen, or would ever see again, to defend against a feared French invasion. For William Jervois, then a young major in the Royal Engineers, his appointment as 'design leader' of this programme was a major step in a career in fortress construction that would see his work in Britain, Aden, Bermuda, Burma, Canada, the Channel Islands, Gibraltar, India, Ireland, Malta and later, Australia and New Zealand. --

Fortifications on the scale of these walls are unique in that they are (apart from individual castles) the only known military measure with long-term aims. The military aims sometimes proved of extremely long-term value, the most extreme example being the erection of the Great Wall of China. The aim of this volume is to find out the common denominator (if any) behind the creation of such fortifications, their effectiveness and their influence on a long and short-term basis. Contents include: The Limes * Hadrians Wall and the Antonine Wall * The "Danewerk" * The Frontera: Spanish Defences against the Moors * The Great Wall of China * The French Eastern Border * The Berlin Wall * The Jerusalem Wall