This is an 1875 spice market somewhere in India. Spices have always been at the heart of

Indian cuisine and the women of the home often had morning meetings with their cooks to

discuss the spices required for the day’s cooking. Spice merchants were important and

often wealthy businessmen of the community. One of the main characters in my work in

progress is a spice merchant who has contracted leprosy. The 1870’s through the 1890’s were

a significant time period in the development of treatments for the dreaded disease. Leper

colonies were formed and various treatments including chalmoogra oil were used both topically and as injections. This

and other ayurvedic treatments were used with some success in treatment of leprosy until sulfa drugs were available in

the 1940’s I’m finding that the research required to write about India in the 1800’s is just as much fun as writing the

story.