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Page 5 of 9
THE MUSLIM MUGHAL EMPIRE 1526-1739
The great religions of Islam and Hinduism mix and flourish in the
Indian sub-continent.
The Mughal Islamic Empire in India commenced in 1526 when Barbur, a
descendent of Genghis Khan and Tamerlane, invaded the Sultanate of
Delhi from his home in Afghanistan. Control was firmly established by
his grandson Akbar who ruled 2/3 of India by the time of his death in
1605. (The English set up the East India Trading Company in Calcutta in
1600). The Islamic Mughal empire was then sitting alongside the two
other great Islamic empires of the time:-
The Persian/Iranian/Safavid Empire and the adjoining Islamic Ottoman
Empire all controlled by rulers of Turkish/Mongol origin (that is
present day Turkmenistan rather than Turkey).
Art, architecture, trade, religious development and diversity all
flourished under Indian Islamic Emperor Akbar and his grandson
Shahjahan. Art saw a combination of Indian and Persian traditions
particularly in miniatures, architecture climaxed with the building of
the Taj Mahal and non Muslims were given freedom of expression. However
two out spoken Sikh leaders, Gurus, were assassinated in 1606 and 1675.
The tax system was improved and extortion was outlawed.
THE MARATHAS 1674-1800 HINDU
The Islamic Mughals never achieved total domination of southern India
and in 1674 a Hindu leader, Sivaji set up a regional kingdom in an area
north of present day Goa called Maratha. The economy of the Islamic
north declined and in 1739 an army invaded from Persia (Iran) under
Nadir Shah and sacked Delhi but again left no significant standing
army. This enabled the Marathas to expand northwards and by 1800 the
Hindu Marathas controlled Delhi and all of India north of present day
Goa. Meantime an Islamic state called Mysore stopped any Hindu Maratha
expansion further south than Goa. From 1600 onwards European Christian
traders were setting up headquarters in India in the midst of Hindu
Muslim battles. Eventually the Christian English came to rule the whole
of India:-
400 YEARS AGO
The following pages trace the development of the English buccaneering
traders who vastly outnumbered by the Indian indigenous population and
European trading competitors set to establish the biggest empire the
world has ever seen mainly through naval supremacy financed by a Jewish
banking system.
1600 CHRISTIAN EUROPEANS ESTABLISH TRADING POSTS IN INDIA
The foundations of the British Empire and the English-India story.
The English ended up with the largest empire in the world, rather than
the competing and originally more powerful French, Spanish, Portuguese
or Dutch. The "Jewel in the English Crown" was India. How was this
achieved when all of the above listed European countries were trying to
do the same thing and at the time were more powerful than the English.
France in particular, in the crucial years, was economically stronger
and with a much larger population. (England 7 million, France 20
million.) The answer was the British Navy. At the end of the day it
came down to a hundred year dual between England and France and little
England won each key battle. (Not to be confused with the earlier 100
years war, 1337-1453, between England and France when the English tried
and almost succeeded in retrieving much of the land in France which
Norman English Kings had originally ruled but subsequently neglected.)
First steps to Christian world empires
The Americas were the first lands colonised by European Christians,
purely by chance in fact, as the explorers did not know the Americas
existed. They were sailing west to find new routes to China for silks
and porcelain (china) and to Java, Indonesia for spices. The shorter
routes east were blocked by the hated and feared Islamic Ottoman Turks
from about 1400 onwards.
Spain was the first off the mark west, financed by the Christian anti
Jewish fanatics, King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella, commencing of
course with Columbus. (An Italian-Genoese but financed by the Spanish
royal family.) The Spanish at this time were the most powerful nation
in Europe but were barbaric plunderers, not colonialists. They
eliminated the established cultures in Mexico and South America while
they stole their silver and gold. The Role of the English was almost as
barbaric, being "the pirates of the Atlantic". Hiding in the Caribbean,
they high-jacked much of the stolen gold from the Spanish ships. (The
gold from one Spanish ship could double the normal annual income to the
kings purse.) The first colonising ventures of the English (who
followed the Portuguese by 100 years) was the building of sugar
plantations in the Caribbean using slaves as labour bought in Africa.
Virginia in North America followed soon after, with people like Sir
Walter Raleigh creating organised tobacco plantations (1584-89). At
exactly the same time Europeans were following the sea routes
discovered by Portuguese explorer, Vasco de Gamma, to India via South
Africa and were setting up trading posts in the Indian sea ports when
Indians were ruled by the highly sophisticated Islamic Mughals (from
1526) The British East India company was set up in Calcutta, east
India, in 1600 and the Dutch equivalent in 1602.
For the English to achieve simultaneous domination of both North
America and India it was the French who had to be removed from both
countries. In fairness to the French, they had equal interest in land
battles in Continental Europe, (France wanted to conquer both Spain and
the German Austrian Hapsburg Empire) whereas as we have seen elsewhere
on this site, after Henry 8th , the English gave up land retrieval in
Europe and concentrated on keeping European Roman Catholic Christians
at bay by building up a world beating Navy. The Dutch threat was
removed when in 1689, the English asked William of Orange, the
Protestant Dutch Grandson of England's Charles 1st to become King of
England. After this period the Dutch concentrated their South East Asia
efforts in Indonesia.
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