Job Charnock - Mausoleum

Mausoleum

Charnock died in Calcutta on 10 January 1692 (or 1693 according to an exhibition at the Victoria Memorial which points out that the 1692 date on his gravestone refers to an old calendar system by which the new year began in March), shortly after the death of his son. His three surviving daughters all remained in Calcutta: Mary (d. 19 Feb 1697), Elizabeth (d. August 1753), and Katherine (d. 21 Jan 1701); all found wealthy English husbands. Mary married the first president of Bengal, Sir Charles Eyre.

A mausoleum was erected over Charnock's simple grave by Eyre, his son-in-law and successor, in 1695. It can still be seen in the graveyard of St. John's Church, the second oldest Protestant church in Calcutta after John Zacharias Kiernander's Old Mission Church (1770), and is now regarded as a national monument. His tomb is made from a kind of rock named after him as Charnockite. It is inscribed with the Latin epitaph:

D.O.M. Jobus Charnock, Armiger Anglus et nup. in hoc regno. Bengalensi dignissimum Anglorum Agens Mortalitatis suae exuvias sub hoc marmore deposuit, ut in spe beatae resurrectionis ad Christi judicis adventum obdormirent. Qui postquam in solo non suo peregrinatus esset diu reversus est domum suae aeternitatis decimo die 10th Januarii 1692. Pariter Jacet Maria, Iobi Primogenita, Carole Eyre Anglorum hicci Praefecti. Conjux charissima. Quae Obiit 19 die Februarii A.D. 1696–97.

Translation:

In the hands of God Almighty, Job Charnock, English knight and recently the most worthy agent of the English in this Kingdom of Bengal, left his mortal remains under this marble so that he might sleep in the hope of a blessed resurrection at the coming of Christ the Judge. After he had journeyed onto foreign soil he returned after a little while to his eternal home on the 10th day of January 1692. By his side lies Mary, first-born daughter of Job, and dearest wife of Charles Eyre, the English prefect in these parts. She died on 19 February AD 1696–7.

The inscription omits any mention of Charnock's Hindu wife Maria. Eyre may have hoped to make the public image of his predecessors and in-laws seem more respectable to the growing Anglican community in Calcutta. Even so, the monument was built by Bengali craftsmen, and its incorporation of Indo-Islamic design reflects the intersection of two cultures their union personified.