SAMENVATTING Binu Mailaparambil John the Present Study Focuses On

SAMENVATTING Binu Mailaparambil John The present study focuses on the Mappila Muslim trading elites in the port city of Cannanore, particularly the Arackal Ali Rajas, on the south-west coast of India and their response to the shifting power relations in the region brought about by the changes in the Indian Ocean maritime trade scenario during the last quarter of the seventeenth century and the first quarter of the eighteenth century. The introductory chapter, titled ‘The Geo-political Setting of Kolathunadu’, deals with the longue durée history of the region and the influence of geography in shaping its history. A narrow strip of land lying between the Western Ghats and the Arabian Sea, Kolathunadu did not witness the emergence of a thriving agricultural sector. Consequently, a highly stratified agrarian society did not develop in the region. In this context that maritime commerce and trading communities attains greater importance in the regional socio-political life. With a spice-producing hinterland, Kolathunadu hosted a number of small port towns controlled by Mappila Muslims traders. Against this backdrop of a limited agricultural economy and a wider maritime space that one has to analyse the status of the Mappila Muslims in the regional political economy. In the second chapter—‘The Rajas of Kolathunadu’—the particular characteristics of the political organization in Kolathunadu is analysed. The political system developed in medieval Kolathunadu was not significantly influenced by the Brahmanical concept of kingship. Instead, the local concept of sakti (sacred power) remained as the core concept of political power in Kolathunadu. The emergence of the Arackal House of the Ali Rajas as one of the prominent political houses in Kolathunadu by the middle of the sixteenth century was made possible in this regional perception of political power. The Arackal House replicated the local political system (swarupam polity) in which the political power was not the exclusive prerogative of the raja, but disseminated with in the family itself. The Arackal Swarupam attained its political prominence in Kolathunadu owing to its control over a maritime trade network linking distinct trading hubs of the Indian Ocean. The third chapter, ‘Lords of the Sea’, describes the emergence and expansion of the Arackal Ali Rajas’ commercial network against the backdrop of the changing patterns of Indian Ocean trade in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. In spite of our ignorance of the quantitative and qualitative aspects of their commerce, the available evidence shows that the Ali Rajas dominated the maritime trade of Kolathunadu on the eve of the establishment of the Dutch settlement in Cannanore, and despite the Dutch Company’s efforts to rein in the local trade, the Ali Rajas successfully withheld such attempts and continued to play an important role in the maritime trade of the region. The fourth chapter, ‘Jan Company in Cannanore (1663-1723)’, focuses on the history of the Dutch East India Company (VOC) in Cannanore. This chapter analyses how the Dutch Company’s attempts to control the spice trade in Cannanore were compromised by the stiff resistance of the Ali Rajas and their Mappila traders and the growing participation of other European traders, especially the English and the French, in the Malabar spice trade. In spite of the Dutch plan to carry out trade in Cannanore with the help of a group of local traders other than the Ali Rajas, it did not succeed. The maritime control system introduced by the VOC to contain the local trade also did not achieve its aim because of various reasons. Besides the success of the Mappila traders to prevail over such control system, the Malabar Commandement often failed to obtain prompt assistance from Batavia in the form of men and ships. Moreover, the Company’s plan to economize the Cannanore settlement by reducing its man power further weakened the Dutch commercial control system in Cannanore. The fifth chapter, ‘The VOC Trade in Cannanore (1663-1723)’, deals with the commercial transactions of the Dutch Company in Cannanore. Available data show that the trade of the Company in Cannanore pepper became insignificant by the end of the seventeenth century. In spite of this, Cannanore served as an important procurement centre of Cardamom for the VOC in Malabar. The Dutch plan to promote Cannanore as a market for their import goods did not turn out well either. Except for Japanese copper, Cannanore was never been a good market for the VOC merchandise. The Dutch efforts to control the local opium market also failed miserably on account of the competition from the local traders. In addition, the failure of the Dutch to open a trade route between Cannanore and Mysore further diminished the Dutch hope to revive the commercial importance of the Cannanore settlement. Despite the fact that the Company was able to maintain a favourable economic balance in Cannanore between 1685 and 1715, on the whole the settlement was commercially not very important for the Company. The sixth and the seventh chapters analyse the commercial and political struggles between different interest groups, such as the Ali Rajas, the Kolathiri princes, the VOC, and the English East India Company in Cannanore and its immediate repercussions on the socio- political life of the realm. The increasing tension within the socio-political set-up of Kolathunadu was attributed to three factors: the attempt of the Ali Rajas to enhance their politico-economic position within the traditional set-up of the Malabar society; the endeavour of the old political elites to build up a solid economic base by claiming a share in the profit of the maritime commerce; and finally, the attempt of the European powers to exploit the internal power conflicts for their commercial benefit. All these factors led to a showdown between the Ali Raja and the anti-Ali Raja factions in Kolathunadu in 1721. The present study raises doubts about the validity of analysing the history of the Mappila Muslims of Kerala from the ‘frontier’ perspective, suggested by Stephen F. Dale. There is little evidence to interpret the political tensions in Kolathunadu during the last quarter of the seventeenth century and the first quarter of the eighteenth century as ‘religious’ and to argue that there existed a sharp ideological frontier that divided the Hindus and Muslims into two distinct socio-political entities. Instead, the Mappila Muslims of Kolathunadu were very much a part and parcel of the regional socio-political order. Likewise the Arackal Swarupam constituted an intrinsic part of the local political system and legitimized its status in accordance with the regional concept of power (sakti). It is from this perspective that one may satisfactorily analyse and comprehend the history of Kolathunadu in general and the Mappila Muslims in particular during the period under study. .

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