The long joint history of India and England is far from unfamiliar. Much of it is understood through the lens of two centuries of British colonialism, from the mid-18th century to Indian independence in 1947. Colonised first by the East India Company (EIC), India was later celebrated as the "jewel in the crown" of the British empire. In scholarly texts as much as popular writings, England features as imperial master over a subordinated India. Even in the period prior to colonisation, England is seen as a coloniser-in-waiting, with the EIC framed as an empire builder. Yet this understanding is far from accurate, and David Howarth's new book provides a compelling and necessary corrective to that long-held view.
Howarth does what many a historian has failed to do: places a critical lens on the story of England and India that pushes back on colonial narratives, particularly in the early period. He clarifies that the EIC began as an unstable entity focused exclusively on trade. Far from being early proponents of colonial mastery, these first travellers were merchants in pursuit of eastern trade. As Howarth observes of the EIC: "How wrong it is to think there was something inevitable about its socalled rise as a systematic monolith that was somehow predestined to govern India."
Adventurers' 16 chapters follow a broadly chronological arrangement while thematically traversing the history. Howard explores the EIC's foundation and evolution, from its turbulent beginnings as a joint stock company to later struggles with the British crown as the nation headed towards civil war. We are also introduced to England's key European competitors in Asia, the Portuguese and the Dutch. Anglo-European trading efforts across key Asiatic regions are explored, covering the Ottoman, Safavid and Mughal empires, Japan and the "Spice Islands" of Indonesia.
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة February 2023 من BBC History UK.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك ? تسجيل الدخول
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة February 2023 من BBC History UK.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك? تسجيل الدخول
The Long Road Back - The Election Was Tough for the Conservatives but the Past Holds Clues on How Parties Can Return From the Brink
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What a summer it’s been so far, with an astonishing election result. There has been much talk of national renewal, and in due course we’ll see what that means. But it felt like a watershed. The new prime minister’s dad was a toolmaker, his mum a nurse; the cabinet is majority comprehensive-educated, with more alumni of Parrs Wood High School than of Eton. Among commentators – not just on the left – there’s been a growing feeling that 14 years of Tory rule, compounded by Brexit, have undermined what the great medieval historian Ibn Khaldun called asabiyyah: group feeling – the glue that makes societies work. And watching TV on election night, I found myself wondering whether, like sediment settling in a glass, the time has finally arrived for a new national narrative
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According to ancient Roman natural philosopher Pliny the Elder, Apicius was “the most gluttonous gorger of all spendthrifts”. The cookbook attributed to him, known simply as Apicius or as De Re Coquinaria (On the Art of Cooking), is one of the oldest collections of recipes surviving from antiquity. Its author may have been Marcus Gavius Apicius, a Roman gourmet of the first century AD who reputedly travelled all the way from Campania to Libya on the hunt for the largest, juiciest prawns.
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Henry’s wary nature is typically attributed to his shaky claim to the throne. The first Tudor monarch was unable to escape the taunt that he was a usurper with no right to call himself king. In fact, his renowned paranoia was the inevitable consequence of a traumatic youth – a trait ingrained long before he harboured ambitions to wear a crown. If we delve deeper into Henry’s background, we can draw a fuller picture of one of our most circumspect of monarchs – one that might elicit sympathy for a long misunderstood king.
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"People have achieved all kinds of crazy things at the age of 18″
ALICE LOXTON talks to Danny Bird about her book on 18 individuals who left an indelible mark on British history before they were out of their teens
A Pole apart
ROGER MOORHOUSE is absorbed by a little-known but politically significant Polish princess whose life encompassed the major events of the later 18th and 19th centuries
Medieval England's p olitical miracle
From Magna Carta to parliament, taxation to the law courts, the 13th and 14th centuries laid the foundations for the modern British state
THE GENIUS IN THE SHADOWS
Æthelstan is one of the greatest of all Anglo-Saxon monarchs. So why, asks Michael Wood, does the first king of the English remain so fiendishly elusive?
