Colbert's Indian Ocean Strategy of 1664-1674: A Reappraisal

Abstract

European expansion to the Indian Ocean has attracted extensive historical research over the past century. Even a cursory review of the secondary literature, however, reveals that the work analyzing the Dutch, English, and Portuguese empires Asia has far outweighed that detailing the French experience in the East from 1600-1800. The reasons for this historiographical imbalance are complex, but one crucial factor is certainly that the French were simply less successful the Asian trade during this period than their European rivals. Colbert's Compagnie des Indes Orientales and Dupleix's career, highpoints an otherwise undistinguished two-century period, were the focus of studies by French historians of the Third Republic like Paul Kaeppelin, Henry Weber, and Jules Sottas. I Nevertheless, very little original work has been done on the topic during the past half-century.2 A reexamination of French policies the Indian Ocean, particularly for the years 1664-74, is merited for several reasons. The integration of hitherto unused manuscript sources into the existing historiography can serve as the basis for a badly needed response to this longstanding dearth of scholarly work. Renewed research on the years