Mughal port officials and European company-men: The dynamics of a commercial relationship in the seventeenth century

Abstract

The description of the Mughals as a land-driven power that remained largely inert to maritime opportunities and challenges does not sufficiently explain their increasing reliance on the seaborne delivery of strategic goods such as horses, bullion and specialised military labour. In this context, the article focuses on the office of mutasaddi, which operationalised Mughal authority at the port of Surat. By analysing the interactions of mutasaddis with European trading companies, it is shown that the Mughal presence was central to the shaping of the maritime trajectory of the region. As long as the Mughal oversight was vigilant, the port officials dominated the Europeans. But once the Mughal presence came to be hollowed out, new forces set in that ultimately enabled the Europeans to turn the tables on the port officials.