TRAVELLERS IN THE GOLDEN REALM PB – LUBAABA AL-AZAMI

Spellbinding . . . a remarkable book JOSEPHINE QUINN, author of How the World Made the West A compelling, highly readable account NANDINI DAS, author of Courting India Before the East India Company and the British Empire, England was a pariah state. Seeking better fortunes, 16th and 17th century merchants, pilgrims and outcasts ventured to the kingdom of the mighty Mughals, a land ruled from the palatial towers by women – Empress Nur Jahan Begim, the Queen Mother Maryam al-Zamani, and Princess Jahanara Begim. Into this golden realm went Father Thomas Stephens, a Catholic fleeing his home; the merchant Ralph Fitch seeking jewels in the markets of Delhi; and John Mildenhall, an adventurer revelling in the highwire politics of the Mughal elite. This collision of worlds connected East and West, launching a tempestuous period of globalization from the Chinese opium trade to the slave trade in the Americas. Drawing on rich, original sources, Lubaaba Al-Azami traces the origins of a relationship between two nations – one outsider and one superpower – whose cultures remain inextricably linked to this day.