Join Hasanna Moosa (University of Cape Town) in conversation with Lubaaba Al-Azami (University of Manchester and Medieval and Early Modern Orients) as they discuss Al-Azami's landmark book, Travellers in the Golden Realm.

When the first English travellers in India encountered an unimaginable superpower, their meetings would change the world.

Before the East India Company and before 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, attempting to sell coarse woollen broadcloth along the silk roads; playing courtiers in the Mughal palaces in pursuit of love; or simply touring the sub-continent in search of an elephant to ride. 

Into this golden realm went Father Thomas Stephens, a Catholic fleeing his home; the merchant Ralph Fitch looking for jewels in the markets of Delhi; and John Mildenhall, an adventurer revelling in the highwire politics of the Mughal elite. It was a land ruled from the palatial towers by women – the formidable Empress Nur Jahan Begim, the enterprising Queen Mother Maryam al-Zamani, and the intrepid Princess Jahanara Begim. Their collision of worlds helped connect East and West, launching a tempestuous period of globalisation spanning 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.

Dr Lubaaba Al-Azami is a cultural historian specialising in the Global Renaissance. She is a lecturer in Shakespeare and Early Modern Literature at the University of Manchester and a research fellow at the University of Liverpool. She is also founding editor of Medieval and Early Modern Orients (MEMOs, memorients.com), a leading digital platform on premodern encounters between England and the Islamic Worlds.

Hassana Moosa is a Lecturer in English Literature at the University of Cape Town. Her research is in premodern critical race studies, and focusses particularly on the racial formation that occurs in early modern English theatre, and in premodern European literature more broadly. She received a Commonwealth Scholarship from the UK government to undertake her doctoral studies in English Literature at King’s College London. She is an editor on the digital project Medieval and Early Modern Orients, and is a founding member on the Early Modern Scholars of Colour Network steering committee.

This is a Medieval and Early Modern Orients book launch celebrating radical, rich and scholarly interventions that challenge  our understanding of Britain and how early modern culture shaped  Britain’s place in the world.