HIST 388 D: Junior Seminar Mughals, Merchants, and Warriors—South Asia in the 18 th Century

General Goals for the class Learning to analyze primary and secondary sources Weighing the strength and weaknesses of historical evidence Identifying influences, methodological constraints, biases, distortions in historical arguments Formulating solid historical critiques of your own in oral and written work

Trajectory of Class Wks1-2 examine how the myth of the 18 th C as a “Dark Age” was created and why it persisted for so long Wks.3-5: Read new histories that tried to question the old myth and the way in which they read sources in new ways Wks. 6-10: Look at new studies of the 18 th c. and see how our understanding of the lives of warriors, merchants, nobility, and peasants changed over time

Origins of the Myth of the “Dark Age” Had an early origin in the first English histories of India produced by Merchants and officials of the East India Company The most influential was Alexander Dow’s three-volume History of Hindostan (p. 1772)and his essays on Indian Depotism and Bengal (the first British colony) We will read a small portion of the essays for next class

Context of Dow’s writing The English East India Company had just conquered Bengal and was considering expansion into the hinterland of India. News of the Company’s shady dealings in Bengal, corporate malfeasance, and corruption reach Britain Shareholders, the public, and some members of parliament want an investigation of the affairs in Bengal Huge public interest in Indian affairs leads to a demand for new works on Indian history and politics.

Dow’s position in Society Born in Scotland in 1739, but leaves for India in 1757 under mysterious circumstances Participates in Battle of Chunar in 1764, is wounded and returns to Britain Begins to write plays, scholarly works to try to establish reputation as an intellectual Is accused by Company officials/scholars of lack of knowledge of Persian, the court language of the Mughal Empire in India Returns to India to recoup fortune, but dies very young in 1779

State of Colonial society in 18 th C. Early 18 th C. very few colonial officers, most there for only a short time to make forutnes many others adapt to local custom and stay longer Have Indian wives, partners, business connections Their “going Native” is seen in an ambivalent way by other Europeans

Late 18 th C changes in colonial society Growing disapproval of cultural adaptation after Bengal conquest Attempts made to retain a British identity in India—in marriages w/ european women, raising of children, social segregation by race

Impact of these social changes An earlier generation of officials had used their local knowledge of Indian customs to become “experts” in Indian languages These “Orientalists” were valued at first for their skills by the company With the move to a more Europeanized culture in the colony, such knowledge is less valued News of the corruption of older officials of company makes their entire social networks seem suspect and “contaminated” by association Support grows for a more Europeanized style of government as a way of checking moral and social corruption

The Indian Orgins of the “Dark Age:” Not wholly the creation of Orientalist scholars such as Dow The last great Indian Empire was beginning to unravel, the court histories and memoirs of upper nobility exhibit a sense of pessimism and gloom New states created through war and rebellion make the political history of this period seem like one of chaos and violence on the surface

Why Question this? More to the history of a region than the lives of nobility and upper government 18 th c. is also a period of great social mobility for: –Merchants –Peasant soldiers –Specific ethnic groups: Sikhs, Jats, Marathas

Other issues to consider: 18 th c. sees the creation of new literary cultures as the high language of Persian fades—ex. Urdu, Hindi/Braj New states appear, some of which are as efficient and stable as larger empires This period forces us to examine the interconnection between war, social mobility, and our presumptions about the pre-modern period

What presumptions? The global nature of economic relationships in the period The Historical obsession with Empires, Politics, and states versus the life of common people, social change, the possibility of a history not trapped within a “Statist/ National” framework Examining our own pre-suppositions about “modernity” “decadence” “feudal” in studying early periods and non-European cultures

Possible Benefits Making us more skeptical about secondary sources and also more engaged readers of primary sources Seeing the global connections b/w all kinds of histories, rather than studying them as separate developments Learning to examine the presuppositions in others and our own ways of thinking