Courting India: England, Mughal India and the Origins of Empire

I enjoyed the detailed research and flow of this book. The book brought the overlapping of cultures to life and Master Roe. Well worth the read.

This is something of a micro history, focusing as it does on a three year period from 1616 to 1619; the years of the ambassadorship of Thomas Roe from the Court of King James 1 of England to Mughal India. There he found challenges aplenty - the lack of cooperation of the employees of the fledgling East India Company, the sometimes direct challenge from other European powers seeking to develop their commercial interests there, and the lack of any real interest shown by the Mughal court in granting the trading privileges Roe sought.Although a micro history, this book shines a clear light on the wider times including on the mores and politics of the leaders the Mughal Court, including Shah Jahan, who would go on later to commission the Taj Mahal.All of this makes for a fascinating book - the wealth and power of the Mughals, their interest in novelty and luxury, and the failure at that time by the East India Company to provide Roe with the support he needed to secure favour with them. It does seem however that Roe was greatly concerned with avoiding paying obeisance to the Mughal royals, and continuing to dress in hot English style clothing, neither of which made his job any easier. From the point of this time it must have seemed highly unlikely that Britain would go on to any significant level of interest, never mind to rule, in India.The writing of this book is fluid, fascinating and enjoyable to read. I shall watch out for future works by this author, Nandini Daz

Fascinating and comprehensive account of Thomas Roe’s embassy from the impoverished James I to the opulent Mughal Court of Jahangir. Courting India provides great insight into the political and economic context. It also highlights the complex relationships and power structures at Jahangir’s court, and the open way he conducted much government business, as well as sharing court gossip and intrigue.There are some great anecdotes about the discomforts and indignities suffered by Roe, in part self-inflicted (such as refusing to learn the language or give up wearing British-style clothes in the extreme heat) but also due to the penny-pinching ways of the East India Company. In the face of a lavish court where relationships were built on exchange of gifts, Roe had to resort to handing over his most prized personal possessions to get a hearing.Roe’s time in India apparently had little impact on the Mughals (he is barely mentioned in Jahangir’s own comprehensive writings). It’s a useful reframing of the beginnings of British colonisation in India.*Copy from NetGalley

Courting India is an interesting account of the British arrival in India in the early 1600's from the perspective of Thomas Roe, James I’s first ambassador to the Mughal Empire, who arrived there in 1616. It explored the beginning of Britain's imperial and colonial as well as the goings on and culture of Elizabethan England. It's a great read for anyone who wants to learn more about the origins of Britain's link with India.

I'd not come across Thomas Roe before but I'm glad to have encountered him in this book. Informative, educational and beautifully written, with hints of the absurdity of the merchant life, this has been one to savour.Very enjoyable.

Brilliant and thoroughly researched discourse of the story of Thomas Roe, the first “ambassador” of the British Crown to Mughal Empire in India. Kudos to the author for her painstaking research. Alas, with somewhat misplaced priorities, authors aren’t still able to shake off their colonial hangover and one gets tired of reading these narratives again and again in some form or other from so many authors. The false superiority complex, snobbery and complete ignorance of the land that he was visiting make Roe a pathetic figure in Jahangir’s court and elsewhere in India, but a hero in colonial chronicles. One invader magnanimously leasing a trading permit to a land forcibly occupied by them to another invader, entering like a needle and coming out like a plough, is the irony that further extended our misery and slavery. Continuity of the empires of that era in one form or other from India to Constantinople, almost upto European foothold, their religion, lifestyle appeared somewhat familiar to the European visitors, but they had no desire or intellectual capability to learn about the majority inhabitants of this land, their lifestyle, rich cultural heritage with thousands of years history and civilisation that was possibly alien to them. Sincerely hope that in future some authors would come up with an equally extensively researched chronicle on the lifestyles of the natives of this land of yesteryears who survived against all odds the atrocities inflicted on them by the invaders for over a millennium.

A wonderfully insightful book brilliantly written!

Good book

An amazing record of Thomas Roe’s trip to India to get exclusive rights for trading in India. A failed attempt stonewalled by Shah Jahan. Great read of the times of Jahangir era

Cannot enjoy a new book in a damaged condition looking previously browsed through extensively