English Private Trade on the West Coast of India, c. 1680–c. 1740

Abstract

This article explores the private trade networks of English East India Company merchants on the west coast of India during the first half of the eighteenth century. Existing studies of English private trade in the Indian Ocean have almost exclusively focused on India's eastern seaboard, the Coromandel Coast and the Bay of Bengal regions. This article argues that looking at private trade from the perspective of the western Indian Ocean provides a different picture of this important branch of European trade. It uses EIC records and merchants' private papers to argue against recent metropolitan-centred approaches to English private trade, instead emphasising the importance of more localised political and economic contexts, within the Indian Ocean world, for shaping the conduct and success of this commerce.