The archival copy press doubled as a torture instrument in colonial Deli.

Evidence

Even in Dutch it is a long, breathless, run-on sentence. The copy press, that mainstay of archival production, was a preferred weapon of torture. By cranking the two metal surfaces of the press together, the victim’s fingers were initially crushed and eventually broken. — Ann Laura Stoler, Along the Archival Grain_ Epistemic…, 1140

Categorization

• CANDY: A grimly ironic detail - the mundane office tool used for torture - that could open an essay on colonial cruelty’s banality.
• SEED: Angle: the material infrastructure of colonial record-keeping had a violent double life - copy press as both documentation tool and weapon.