Chapter 4 examines the origins of modern territoriality in British India and surrounding regions. The cause was a shift in the disposition of colonial governance towards information, as officials dealt with a crisis of knowledge about Indian society and politics. The ryotwari settlement is a well-studied example of this shift in dispositions as reflected in revenue policy, but the rapid expansion of surveying activity starting in the 1790s in the Madras Presidency, especially including Colin Mackenzie’s survey of the state of Mysore (1799–1810), is another example. This explanation is contrasted with other possible explanations based on the diffusion of practices from Europe, or on the maximization of revenue. Finally, it is shown how, once the surveying of boundaries was well established in India, the British began using this practice outside of India proper, and how the emergence of modern territoriality from Persia to Siam depended on the Anglo-Indian surveying practice.