This is a collection of essays originally published between 1978 and 2011 by one of the leading authorities on Christianity in India. They are a tribute to the immensely fruitful dialogue in which the author has been engaged over that time with Christians from all over India, with clergy and mission personnel, and with university-based scholars within and without India who have been taking up the study of Indian Christianity in increasing numbers. Few people are equipped to see their subject from so many sides, and the result is a very useful primer that would particularly suit students and scholars approaching the study of Indian Christianity for the first time. Included here are essays on a wide range of historiographical themes, from the earliest known histories of Indian Christianity through to Dalit, subaltern and post-colonial takes on the topic, along with valuable pieces on methodology covering practical and conceptual concerns – for example how secular ‘social history’ scholars ought to (though often do not) pay sustained attention to the theological dimensions of basic problems such as what constitutes a ‘Church’. In his concluding remarks, Webster wonders at the relative lack of attention paid by general historians of India to that country's remarkable Christian history and population. To this one might add a second concern: histories of Christianity in India tend to share with their general history counterparts a deep satisfaction with the diversity of the subcontinent that renders cross-national comparative work either unnecessary or, frankly, too daunting. The challenge for future work in this area, mirroring contemporary political dilemmas in Indian Christianity, will be more deeply to connect Indian Christianity both with non-Christian India and with the wider Christian world.