Lubaaba al-Azami’s meticulously researched book recounts the relationship between England and the Indian subcontinent dating back to the 16th century and even earlier
In 1570, when John Felton, a wealthy resident of Bermondsey affixed a Papal Bull, entitled ‘Regnans in Excelsis’ (Reigning on High), to the door of the Bishop of London’s Palace, he would not have imagined that his actions would go on to impact the Indian subcontinent. The Bull declared Queen Elizabeth a heretic, effectively cutting off the Island nation politically from Catholic Europe, forcing the Queen to look for trade beyond Europe towards the wealthy states of the East — the Ottomans, Moroccans, Persians, and states in Asia.
However, it would take years before the English reached the shores of India and when they finally arrived they would find fellow Europeans, especially the Portuguese, already having a settlement in the subcontinent, sitting cosily with the powerful rulers of Mughal India. India was not on the primary radar of early English traders, nor were they ever thinking of ruling the nation, writes Lubaaba al-Azami in her book, Travellers in the Golden Realm: How Mughal India Connected England to the World (Hachette India), which looks at how Mughal India captured the attentions of European traders and travellers looking for lucrative markets to tap into for trade.
England-India relationship through trade
The author’s meticulous and deep research into previously overlooked historical sources —notes left behind by an English sea captain about his voyage to India in the early 17th century, an observation on the preference for tobacco in the subcontinent, historical chronicles and maps of the world, besides the more visible autobiographies of the rulers, writings by East India Company officials and other sources — brings to readers a relationship between England and the Indian subcontinent dating back to the sixteenth century and even earlier.
Al-Azami, a cultural historian specialising in the Global Renaissance, who teaches Shakespeare and Early Modern Literature at the University of Manchester and is a research fellow at the University of Liverpool, highlights how the earliest travels by the English and the other Europeans were for the sake of trade and religion. For the people of England, grappling with religious instability, poverty, crime, unsanitary cities, the idea that their country would one day rule the wealthy subcontinent — Mughal India with its GDP in the 1600s rivalling only that of Ming China — would have been a far-fetched one.
Also read: The Golden Road review: William Dalrymple’s bold new take on ancient India’s global power
One of the first arrivals in India was that of the Bishop of Sherborne who arrived as early as the ninth century, long before even the arrival of the Portuguese who were the first Europeans to reach the land for trade. The Bishop took with him gifts to Christian communities in India and returned with “brilliant exotic gems and aromatic juices in which that country abounds,” giving a glimpse of the treasures available in the country.
Eight centuries later, in 1579, another man of religion, Father Thomas Stephens, arrived to join the Portuguese settlement of missionaries who had since arrived, committed to convert the people of the region. Stephens eventually wrote the story of Christ in an epic poem in Marathi/Konkani, titled Kristupurana, which is read even today. Following him, an English merchant, Ralph Fitch, reached India in 1583 carrying a letter from Queen Elizabeth 1 requesting safety for Englishmen coming for trade and travel. Fitch journeyed throughout the region, recording his experience of travel in Mughal India, providing a blueprint for future travellers. Al-Azami also recounts the life of the first English tourist to India, Thomas Coryate, who mostly walked across Europe and Asia, then joined a caravan in Persia to reach India in 1615. He travelled throughout India and died of dysentery at the age of 40 in Surat.
The decline of the Mughal India
The overarching premise of the book is to highlight how the Indian subcontinent had never been under the lens of the English for the purpose of colonisation. Rather they stumbled upon the subcontinent in their quest to explore lucrative areas of business for which their initial target was the spice islands of Moluccas. But once they landed on the shores of the country, the rich land ruled by the Mughals bedazzled them and led them on to get a share of the treasures through trade. But the Mughals did not find the firangs to have anything of value worth engaging in business. They certainly did not have much use for the woolen broadcloth unsuited to the warm climate of the region, an item the English carried for trade along other articles.
Also read: Everything There Is review: A novel limns the life of Pakistan’s first Nobel-winning physicist
Al-Azami charts the early tribulations of the East India Company, as it struggled to compete against the well-established Portuguese and the better-financed Dutch. Also, she details how the English seemed to have a penchant to create problems for itself, adding to those caused by the Portuguese and the Dutch in their efforts to shake the English off. There was the case of William Finch outbidding an agent of the powerful Queen mother, Maryam al-Zamani, prompting Jehangir to rebuke the English to “not looke for any thinge att the Kings hands”, William Hawkins, East India Company representative and the first Englishman to meet Jehangir, fell out of his hard won favour when he arrived in the court of the emperor in a drunken state.
The English were finally able to establish trade in India when they realised there was a high interest in the region for ivory, gold and silver. For this, they tapped the markets of East and West Africa and Persia, mines of Americas and Japan to get the materials that were in demand in the region. Victories in the Anglo-Dutch wars and the declining powers of the Portuguese further allowed the Company to manoeuvre itself into a place of more authority.
The book puts focus on the early history of the interactions between the English and India, and how the empire of the British in India was not a preplanned one but that which came about due to the occurrence of many incidences, not the least being the decline of the Mughal Empire after the death of Aurangzeb.
Al-Azami’s narrative seeks to dislodge the popular perception of a vibrant colonial power that strode in to rule the native people of the Indian subcontinent. By mapping out incidents and anecdotes, she shows instead how the early arrivals had to work very hard to gain the attention and patronage of the Mughal emperors, often to no great advantage to themselves, till the tides turned in their favour.
