The Political Economy of Commerce: Southern India 1500–1650

Many debts have been accumulated over the last six years, which this preface makes no pretence of repaying. This book is based in large measure on a doctoral thesis, submitted to the University of Delhi in 1986. In the course of writing it, and in collecting the documentary material on which it is based, I have received a good deal of encouragement from many (but, alas, not all!) of the scholars whom I have consulted, whether personally or through correspondence. It would not be possible to list all those who have helped me in one way or the other, lest this prefatory note become as long as the text itself. I shall content myself therefore with recording my more important debts, and hope that the others will consider themselves most warmly thanked.

I should begin perhaps by thanking the staff of the archives and libraries where I have worked: in particular, the Vidya Jyoti Library, Delhi, the Historical Archives, Panaji (Goa), the Algemeen Rijksarchief, and the Koninklijk Bibliotheek in the Hague, the British Museum Manuscript Section in London, the Biblioteca Pública e Arquivo Distrital at Évora, the Biblioteca da Ajuda, Biblioteca Nacional, Torre do Tombo, and the Arquivo Histórico Ultramarino at Lisbon. In particular, I owe a debt to the late Dr M.E. van Opstal, who was of immense help while I was at the Hague archives.

In the course of my archival research, I have also been privileged to receive the help of Shri R. Gopal at Panaji, Dr George Winius at Leiden, and Jan Wicher van Heerde at Lisbon, which I would like to acknowledge.