Precious Metal Flows and Currency Circulation in the Mughal Empire

Najaf Haider

Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient, Vol. 39, No. 3, Money in the Orient.(1996), pp. 298-364.

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PRECIOUS METAL FLOWS AND CURRENCY CIRCULATION

IN THE MUGHAL EMPIRE*

NAJAF HAIDER (University of Oxford)

Abstract

From the late sixteenth century, the Mughal empire became, with the sole exception of Ming China, the biggest importer of foreign bullion outside Europe. In many modern pub- lications, references to this phenomenon are confined to the context of studying the East-West trade in general, while there is some discussion of its relevance as a factor of change in the Mughal economy. An attempt has been made here to quantify precious metal flows to the Mughal empire and to put them in the perspective of its mint production and silver currency circulation. The significance of India's trade network with Iran and the Ottoman empire is highlighted together with the suggestion that the economic organisation of these regions had a greater influence on the transmission of precious metals to the former than is usually acknowledged. Also, as the level of money supply in medieval monetary economies was inextricably linked with the structure of the bullion market, mint organisation and fiscal measures of the state, the objective here is to point out the importance of this interface in any assessment of a precise relationship between trade and real economic changes.

The Mughal empire (est. 1526A.D.) experienced the co-existence of two domains of economic activities: one of subsistence and inflexibility, where the village community lived by itself, peasants grew and consumed, artisans produced and bartered. The other, in which economic life was buoyant and movements were visible, was indicated by the prevalence of market relations of exchange and the use and flow of money. Money penetrated the agrarian sector of the Mughal empire through the twin process of state driven commerce and direct production for the market. The outstanding state policy to realize the land revenue in money under the zabt system or to commute the collections into cash when the payment was made in kind established a direct line of commerce between the countryside and the local markets.') At the same time peasants grew cash crops and supplied raw materials to the nearby towns fostering another stream of

*) I am grateful for the comments made by Dr. Sumit Guha, Professor Man Habib and Dr. David Washbrook on an early draft of this paper. All mistakes are, of course, mine and not theirs.

1) Habib 1963: 236-40; 1982: 239. A recent study of western Rajasthan clearly brings out the role of revenue demand in monetizing and commercializing the village economy of the region. See Bhadani 1992: 215-25.

O E.J. Brill, Leiden, 1996 JESHO 39,3

299 THE MUGHAL EMPIRE

commercial exchange which had greater implications for the Mughal foreign trade, this being the most important source of precious metals. The two major export items of the Mughal empire in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries- cotton textiles and indigo-originally came from the countryside and were secured by the merchant-contractors for manufacturing centres through a system of money-loans (dadani) advanced to the primary producer^.^) The flow of goods and capital between these centres and the entrepots was further facilitated by the artifices of bills of exchange (hundi) and respondentia (risk-sharing loans), in which the Mughal money-changers (sarrafs) specialized. Merchants also availed themselves the services of a class of people, called adaviyas, who organised caravan traffic and payment of transit dues.3)

The urban centres and entrepots of the Mughal empire were immersed far more deeply into commodity production and monetary exchange. Here, the con- centration of the bureaucracy, mercantile classes and artisans created a perma- nent demand for food supplies organised by the itinerant traders (banjaras) who brought the cash back to the countryside. Urban taxes, such as customs and transit dues and mint seigniorage were always paid in cash and were spent towards meeting the administrative costs and consumptions of the resident rul- ing elites.

The Mughal foreign trade was the product of a larger economic environment and its fortunes were tied to the system of production and exchange in the rural hinterlands, local markets and urban entrepots. At the same time, endowed with limited natural resources to sustain an exchange network based on metallic currencies, the system itself was greatly dependent on the lands beyond its fron- tiers to acquire monetary metal^.^) Political conquests of the state, followed by plunder and tribute, only partially succeeded in meeting this demand, and the development of the Mughal economy demonstrated to a very large extent the complex correlation between long-distance trade, bullion flows and its mon- etary sector.

The purpose of this study is to offer a description and, where possible, a quantitative evaluation of the flow of precious metals to the Mughal empire along the major trade routes. Given the imprecise nature of our data, some of the estimates offered here are at best approximations. However, since there has

2) Haider 1988. 3) Haider 1995. 4) There was no domestic extraction of gold and silver in the Mughal empire, and even

though copper, the third monetary metal, was extracted from the mines of Central India, its demand required that huge quantities had to be imported. The two non-metallic currencies, bitter almond (badam) and cowrie shells (kauri) used respectively in Gujarat and Bengal, were also imported from Iran and the Maldives.

..

300 NAJAF HAIDER

been no work done at all on bullion imports in the Mughal empire and the present state of our knowledge only derives from general features of Indian overseas trade, the estimates do give an idea of specifically Portuguese and Levantine exports of bullion, as well as those of the European Companies, and contribute towards appraising the overall flow of precious metals into the Mughal empire from c. 1550 to c. 1700. For the sake of comparison, and given the overwhelming component of silver in the imports, all estimates of imported bullion are presented here in their silver equivalent though gold imports have also been taken into account. In the subsequent sections, the impact of these flows on the monetary economy is examined with reference to the changes in the volume and pattern of currency circulation and the ways in which these were mediated through the market, mint and fiscal apparatus of the state.

International Trade and Bullion Flows: the Persian Gulf and the Red Sea It is generally accepted that among the factors responsible for a revival of

the Levant trade by the middle of the sixteenth century, perhaps the most impor- tant was the political unification of the trade routes which linked the Levant with the Indian O~ean . ~ ) The Ottoman incorporation of Syria was an underly- ing factor behind the commercial expansion of Aleppo and an increase in the biannual caravan traffic to Hurmuz and Ba~ ra .~ ) A settlement of Indian mer- chants was established at Aleppo, and when the Venetians shifted their facto- ries from Damascus to Aleppo in the mid-sixteenth century, the idea was to get closer to the Basra-Aleppo route in order to obtain Indian merchandise as well as Iranian silk.') A strong Ottoman presence in the Red Sea, the practical limita- tions of the priority set by Lisbon, and the interests of the Luso-Indian officials

-- --- .-

5) In the opening decades of the sixteenth century the volume of commerce passing through the Levant registered a decline following Portuguese attempts to divert the Indian Ocean trade through the Cape route. The decline was reflected in the shortage of spices reaching the Levant and a fall in the trade revenues of the Mamluk Sultan. Consequently, the Venetian supply of precious metals to the Levant fell from 340,000 ducats (equivalent of 13 metric tons of silver) in 1496 to 170,000 ducats in 1503 (equivalent of 5 metric tons of silver). Ashtor 1971: 66; 1983: 477; Magalhaes-Godinho 1969: 306. The gold-silver ratio in the Levant adopted for conversion of ducats into silver weight is given in Ashtor 1971: 49. For an early Venetian response to the Cape voyages see Priuli 1938: 132-4. For the decline and revival of the Levant trade see Lybyer 1915: 584-5; Lane 1968: 33-5; 1968a: 47-54; Magalhaes-Godinho 1969: 736, 751, 756-8, 773; Boxer 1969: 415-28. 6) See Linschoten 1885: I, 47-50 for a detailed description of this route; Masters 1988:

12-14 and Steensgaard 1972: 62 for the rise of Aleppo. 7) Lane 1968a: 50. Ottoman archival documents (c. 1610) testify to the busy caravan

traffic on this route in the early seventeenth century as well. At least ten Indian merchants,

THE MUGHAL EMPIRE 301

in sharing the benefits of an open trade,8) dictated the thrust of the Portuguese policy, which eventually centred round the development of Hurmuz as a com- peting entrepot to Ottoman Aden and Jadda. This was reflected in their control of the Hurmuz customs as well as the imposition of an additional tax (curujo; Ar. kharaj) on Turkish merchants trading at Hurmuz and on all merchandise leaving for Ottoman B a ~ r a . ~ ) With the advantage of the customs figures pub- lished by Magalhaes-Godinho, it is possible to arrive at a rough estimate of the total value of trade passing through Hurmuz in this period.

The estimated value of trade presented in Table 1 suggests that the Portuguese policy was bearing fruit and that there was a real increase in the Indian Ocean trade passing through this point in the second half of the sixteenth century. These estimates, however, exclude the amount of bullion brought to Hurmuz since it was exempt from customs duties.I0) According to contemporary esti- mates, silver exported from Hurmuz in c. 1590 and 1602 amounted to 2 mil- lion [crusades].") This gives us a figure of 41.74 metric tons of silver for each of the two years which exceeds the total estimated value of trade in this period by more than 20 percent.I2) It was not unnatural for the real export of bullion to exceed customs recorded imports, though the status of Hurmuz as a major exporter of horses, the value of which increased the revenue figures used for our calculations, must have correspondingly reduced its trade deficit. The only

out of the 120 in one such caravan, were carrying textiles and indigo. Inalcik and Quartaert 1994: 339.

8) The policy advocated by Lisbon was to blockade and intercept the spice trade pass- ing by the Red Sea. The implementation of this policy required intervention in the complex commercial circuits of the Indian Ocean at the expense mainly of the traders and rulers of Arabia, Gujarat, Malabar and Achin. The military operations imposed serious constraints on the Luso-Indian economy which derived sustenance partly from the trade of the region. Magalhaes-Godinho 1969: 757-8; Braudel 1975: I, 545-6.

"The balance was not always easy . . . between the necessities of the metropolitan econ-omy and Portuguese interests in the Indies. The first imposed. . ., the priority of loading ships destined for Lisbon and rationing of exports to the commercial ports of the Levant. But the Luso-Indian economy, the finances of the Portuguese State of India and the careers of the officials could only profit by overstepping the limits and by eschewing all priority, except that which concerned the biggest benefit." Magalhaes-Godinho 1969: 773-4. It was this precari- ous balance which characterised the variations in the policies of commisioning hostile cruises and issuing concessions and cartazes.

9) Magalhaes-Godinho 1982: 46. 10) Steensgaard 1972: 198. 11) For c. 1590 see ibid. The figures for 1602 are for the bullion exported by the Ottoman

merchants. Magalhaes-Godinho 1969: 772. The document cited by Godinho is dated 1602 on p. 66.

12) Each crusado was valued at 400 reis, and one mark of silver of 229.5 grams was fixed at 4398 reis after the debasement of the Luso-Indian scherafin in 1581. Magalhaes-Godinho 1969: 504.

- -

302 NAJAF HAIDER

explanation which can be offered for an overplus of bullion is that there was a sizeable trade in -silver specie as a commodity in which the role of Hurmuz was just as central as in the sale of non-bullion merchandise.

Table 1. Estimated Value of Hurmuz Trade: c. 1515-c. 1618 (silver equivalent in metric tons)

Year Quinquennial Average Year Annual Total c. 1574 c. 1588 c. 1605 c. 1610 c. 1618

31.93 33.81 34.99 35.93 16.43b)

a) 3 years b, From January to July

Note: The customs duty on the bulk of merchandise (cotton textiles, silk, indigo, sugar and horses) amving at Hurmuz was 10 percent ad valorem. For rice, butter, silk goods and cotton, it was 5 percent. The heaviest duty-16.6 percent ad valorem-was imposed on spices and drugs. Besides, merchants were also expected to pay 2 percent for the per- sonal expenses of the Shah, the governor of the town and customs officials. In addition to that, a tax of I percent was realised towards the maintenance of the Portuguese fleet for protection against piracy in the Persian Gulf. Since no details are available for the amount of taxes received for each item, an average figure of 10 percent is taken to rep- resent the total rate levied on all the merchandise. The choice of this figure would mean that in the two categories relevant for exports to India, the proportion of goods in the one category would be underestimated. However, at the same time, it would partly account for the value which evaded customs receipts because of undervaluations, exemp- tions, smuggling and official corruption. The figures for the customs revenue are available for 1515 to 1588 in the ashrafi of Hurmuz which was equal to 21.5 sadi, while one misqal of gold was valued at 30 to 32 sadi. One Portuguese mark of gold of 229.5 grams (23.125 carat) was equal to 60 misqal. The weight of the ashrafi in fine gold was thus 2.57 grams. Magalhaes-Godinho 1969: 296-7. The gold-silver ratio in Iran at about this time was 1:lO. Fragner 1986: 565. The figure for the year 1605 is converted from pardaos of reis into pardaos of lari, in which denomination figures for the years 1610 and 1618 are given, each valuing 5 silver lari of Hurmuz of 74 grains (98 percent fineness). Rabino 1945: 16. Source: Magalhaes-Godinho 1982: 45-9.

For this to be explained we have to look at the ways in which bullion was exported to India by the Levantine routes. One type of movement was of a

303 THE MUGHAL EMPIRE

purely transitory nature where the European coins, on their outward journey to India, simply passed through the Arab and Iranian territories and evaded the watchful eyes of the monetary authorities. The other and more circuitous way was linked to the international trade and regional economy. In this, European bullion was first restruck into the coins of the respective realms, either to finance the export trade or as a result of bullionist measures,13) brought into circulation and then exported to India in the form of lari, abbasi and shahi against the merchandise which was largely consumed within these regions.I4) Speaking of the Armenian merchants, who were the most active in the bullion trade, Tavernier made the following observation:

From the reign of Shah Abbas I to that of Shah Abbas I1 there has been plenty of sil- ver in Persia than is to be seen now; and the Armenian merchants used to transport it from Europe into Persia and then got them converted into local money (le reduisoit en monnoye du pays). But in these past years they bring nothing but ducats and sequins since these are more portable. They have also invented new ways of hiding the money in their vests and shirts to safeguard against robberies which take place on caravans travelling from Turkey, and also to avoid payments of customs and other dues at places which are not rigorous in searching for what the merchants are ~arrying. '~)

Later, discussing the merchants in general, Tavernier observed that those travelling in caravans between Aleppo and Basra could be allowed at some places to pass with their piastre and to pay toll in the same specie. At other points, however, they were forced to convert these into local currencies at an official rate of exchange.I6) Also, the silk exports from Gilan and Georgia were financed by prototypal Iranian coins struck entirely out of European silver which the Armenian merchants brought to the frontier regions of northern Iran.") Through a system of deposit banking and money-lending, which was quite widespread in Iran and controlled largely by the Indian baniyas,I8) com-

13) Among the measures taken by the Iranian kings to contain the flow of gold and silver out of the country, only one, perhaps not the most significant but nonetheless colourful, has come to our attention. This was the great expedition taken by Shah Abbas to the tomb of Imam Reza where he had a vision of the spiritual founder of Iranian Shiism. On his return journey from Mashhad, he narrated the vision to his subjects and enticed the devotees to undertake regular pilgrimage to the rauza. Foreign observers, almost all of whom knew the story, agreed that the real motive was to drive the pilgrims away from Mecca, Karbala and Najaf since they carried with them "abundance of his gold ducats" in offerings and expenses to the Ottoman territories. Tavernier 1679: I, 588-9; Sanson 1695: 171-2.

14) Ibid.: 589-90. Also see Sahillioglu 1983: 286; Mackenzie 1988: 181-186; Khoury 1991: 65-6.

15) Tavernier 1679: I, 418. 16) Ibid.: 153-4, 169. This was at least one important reason for the merchants on these

routes to avail themselves the services of a class of people who specialised in transporting the goods and money of the merchants on a small payment. Ibid.: 230.

17) Ibid.: 134, 361, 363-4. 18) Tavernier makes it quite clear that the baniyas were mainly bankers (banquiers) who

304 NMAF HAIDER

mercial capital was made available to finance commodity trade and to facili- tate the transmission of precious metals by bills of exchange. It often happened that when the Indian ships called, there was more merchandise than money at Bandar Abbas and word was quickly sent to those who held cash reserves (l'argent contant) at Lar, Shiraz and Isfahan to finance the imports. Credit was then advanced to the merchants buying goods for inland towns and the loans were repaid after the goods reached their destinations.19) Similarly, money taken up by the merchants at Baghdad could be paid at Aleppo or the debts owed at Erzerum could be settled at Bursa, Smyrna and Leghorn. In this process which, according to Tavernier, linked Surat and Golconda to the Mediterranean entre- pots, the remittance of commercial papers was matched by a reverse remittance of cash which was eventually transferred physically from Bandar Abbas to India.20)

At Hurmuz and Basra, the two movements of precious metals were repre- sented by the reale of eight and the lari. There is indeed some evidence to sug- gest that the export of the lari, a unique silver coin of high fineness minted at Lar (the capital of Laristan in Southern Iran, which did not yet belong to the Safavid empire) assumed a very high proportion in the second half of the six- teenth cent~ry.~') The reason for this increase was two-fold: the monetary policy of the authorities at Lar, and the status which lari had acquired as the com- mercial currency of the Indian Ocean. While the Ottoman and the Iranian mints coerced the merchants into changing their reale, Laristan offered an incentive to them by overvaluing the reale against its own lari which suggests that the profit earned here was not so much from silver arbitrage but from seigni~rage.~~) The market for the lari in the Indian Ocean trade, limited by the predominance of Hurmuzi ashrafi in the first half of the century, expanded enormously as a result of the infiux of European silver. The mechanism of this trade was demonstrated by van Linschoten in some detail, and interesting aspects of the pattern of cur- rency circulation, mono-metallic arbitrage and supply of silver can be gleaned from his de~cription.~~)

As a result of regular trade with Hurmuz, the lari had already become an

accepted deposits from the wealthy men of Isfahan on interest. These deposits were then lent out at a higher rate of interest. Ibid. 471, 586-8.

19) Ibid.: 767-8. 20) Ibid. 21) The lari was a double twist of silver purl weighing over 74 troy grains in which 98

percent was pure silver. Rabino 1945: 16. On numerous occasions laris were described by foreign travellers and observers, who took care to note their size and shape and testified to their high degree of fineness. See Barret 1904: 12; Linschoten 1885: I , 18; Pyrard 1888: 11, ii, 239.

22) Barret 1904: 10, 11, 15; Tavernier 1679: 11, 589-90. 23) Linschoten 1885: I , 186-7.

THE MUGHAL EMPIRE 305

established medium of payment on the coasts of Gujarat and western D e ~ c a n . ~ ~ ) But it seems that in the second half of the sixteenth century, it also gained cur- rency in the spice exporting areas of the south-western coast as well, which was predominantly gold based. Whenever spices were paid for in silver at Malabar, it was the lari, and not reale, which was a c~ep t ed .~~ ) The Portuguese merchants bringing reale from Lisbon in September had to exchange them for the lari in order to obtain spices, and such was the demand for this specie that a profit of 12 percent could be earned on this e~change.'~) It is worth remembering that gold coins were very much in use to settle the purchase of spices, and the demand for laris here had grown out of the rising silver influx and the currency they had acquired on the western coast to settle regional trade balance^.^') The reales obtained by the money changers were sold to the China trading mer-chants, against laris, on the eve of the ships' departure in April, and a profit was again earned on this transaction. The circuit which Linschoten describes was completed when the money-changers exchanged the lari once again for reale towards the end of the year.

In another testimony, Gomes Solis, who was a big merchant in Indo-Por- tuguese trade at the turn of the seventeenth century, described how the reales were converted into Turkish and Iranian coins and then taken to India in ever larger quantitie~.'~) By 1602, the annual export of bullion to Hurmuz by the Ottoman merchants was as high as 2 million crusados (41.74 metric tons of sil- ~ e r ) . ~ ~ )Much of this silver (in the form of shahi, lari and reale) was brought not only to the western coasts of India but into the heartland of the Mughal empire as well.30)

The signs of a decline in the Hurmuz trade were visible from 1610 onwards with the estimated value of its trade falling from 35.93 metric tons of silver in that year to 16.45 in 1618.31) In this period, the annual loss of revenue suffered

24) Fredericke 1904: 374; Barrett 1904: 17. In the seasons for making purchases in the markets of Cambay, Diu, western Deccan and Bengal, the lari enjoyed a premium of above 20 percent. Magalhaes-Godinho 1969: 5 13.

25) In 1582, an Italian merchant reportedly invested 20,000 ducats (here money of ac-count) in laris at Cannanore to buy pepper. Magalhaes-Godinho 1969: 332.

26) See editor's note in Linschoten 1885: I, 186fn. 27) The exchange rate for the Venetian sequin at Goa was "9 tangaes and halfe good

money." But when the ships were to sail for Cochin its value rose to 10 tangas. Barret 1904: 19. 28) Magalhaes-Godinho 1969: 5 13. 29) Ibid.: 772. 30) Abul Fazl 1872: I, 19. 31) The figures for 1618 are available only for seven months, but it should be remem-

bered that this period was the time of the year when much of the trading took place at Hurmuz. Tavernier 1925: I, 4-5; English Factories 1642-45: 87.

306 NAJAF HAIDER

by the Portuguese from this source was estimated at 60,000 p a r d ao~ . ~~ ) The Safavid offensives to regain Hurmuz and the mounting pressure of a hostile Anglo-Dutch presence on Portuguese shipping may partly account for the loss of trade on this route.33) As a result, the currents of trade turned away from Hurmuz to the caravan route linking Agra and Lahore with Isfahan through Qandhar. The annual traffic on this route, eclipsed earlier by the less cumber- some passage to Hurmuz from Sind and Gujarat, had reportedly grown four times in 1615 from the previous The link between the decline in Per- sian Gulf trade and a rise in the caravan traffic was noticed by Portuguese ob- servers as well, who suggested measures to rectify the perceived imbalance by bringing the merchants back to the sea.35) The annual value of the revived car- avan trade has been estimated at 1.4-1.8 million rupees (16-20 metric tons of silver).36)

A recovery in the silver imports by sea seems to have begun around 1630s, following the resumption of regular trade with the Persian Gulf. The settlement of the conflict over Hurmuz and the subsequent rise of Bandar Abbas as an entrepot due to its convenient connections with the Iranian hinterland, may have contributed to its successful rene~al.~') According to a detailed report prepared by a Dutch factor in 1634, the total value of textile, indigo, sugar and gurnlac exported annually from Agra, Lahore, Sind, Gujarat and Daulatabad sold in the markets of Iran was 2,130,350 muharnrnadis or 24.20 metric tons of silver.38)

32) Magalhaes-Godinho 1982: 50. 33) Pelsaert 1925: 39-40 contains a vivid description of the decline in the western Indian

Ocean trade and says that the "Portuguese, Moslems and Hindus all concur in putting the blame for this state of things entirely on us and the English. . ." Also see Boxer 1935: 46- 87; Steensgaard 1972: 206.

34) Purchas 1905: IV, 268-9. In his letter from Isfahan, Richard Steele (1615) mentioned the passing of 12,000 to 14,000 camel loads of merchandise from Lahore to Isfahan every year while, according to him, not more than 3,000 camels travelled on this route in times of peace. Robert Coverte (1609), who travelled with a caravan from Agra to Isfahan, reported that "7 or 8 thousand camels" carried merchandise from Qandhar alone. Coverte 1971: 74. 35) Steensgaard 1972: 207. 36) Moosvi 1987a: 382. 37) English Factories 1618-21: 46; Steensgaard 1972: 398-462. It seems that the decision

to fortify the customs house of Bandar Abbas was part of a comprehensive plan by the Safavids to harness its potentials in developing their overseas trade. See Tavernier 1679: 1, 755-62.

38) Bronnen: 482-94. The exchange rates used here are those given in the source. According to this inventory, the volume of Bayana indigo destined for Iran by sea was 4000 man i Akbari or 25 percent of the total yield of this region estimated by Pelsaert in c. 1626. Pelsaert 1925: 13-4. It seems that this figure represents the total volume of indigo exported to Iran (this variety being exported to the Red Sea and Europe in larger quantities), and its absence from the list of commodities transported by the land route might have something to do with its prohibitive price. The high component of textiles from the inland regions of Agra, Awadh and Lahore in the overland trade and their absence from the goods exported

307 THE MUGHAL EMPIRE

A decade later, it was observed by another Dutch factor, that the amount of bullion annually imported by the merchants of Surat was 22.7 metric tons of silver.39) These figures could provide a basis for the suggestion that, on an aver- age, about 25 metric tons of silver was exported to the Mughal empire from the Iranian ports in the second quarter of the seventeenth century.

In the second half of the seventeenth century, the general pattern of Iranian trade with the Levant and India remained much the same. Ralph du Mans, writ- ing in 1660, summed up the position of Iran as a conduit of European silver:

Persia is like a big caravanserai which has only two doors, one towards the side of Turkey by which silver from the West enters; [in the form of] piastres which come from the New World to Spain, from there to France. . . [and] leaving France through Mar- seilles, they enter into Turkey, from where they arrive here [Iran], where one recasts them into abbasis . . . Some cany their piastres until the Indies . . . The other door of exit is Bandar Abbas . . . for going to the Indies, to Surat, where

all silver of the world unloads, and from there as fallen in an abyss, it does not re- emerge . . .40)

Even though the export of bullion out of Iran was never popular with the authorities, the merchants could always find ways and means to circumvent official prohibitions. But during periods of monetary crisis, itself attributed to bullion exports, these came under the strictest scrutiny. It was reported to Shah Sulayman, while he took measures to regulate the supplies of silver to the mints, that the Armenians were now bringing no more foreign bullion into the country than they were exporting to India. This, in the opinion of the officials, was causing a crisis of silver in the em~i re .~ ' ) Similarly, the popular prejudice against the baniyas (there were 10 to 12 thousand in Isfahan alone) for being usurers and bullion exporters was often reflected in the remarks of the foreign observers when they spoke of the bullion crisis:

These Indians, like true leeches extract all the gold and silver of the country and send them to their own country so that in the year 1677 when I departed from Persia, one could not see there any more gold or silver. These usurers had made it disappear entirely .42)

Ironically, the Iranian monetary policy to overcome the contraction of the cir- culating medium served to worsen the situation and further contributed to the drainage of the specie from the country. After the debasement of silver currency in 1684, foreign coins were greatly undervalued at the official rate of exchange

by sea suggests a shift in the commodity composition of the export trade over the two routes in this period.

39) Van Santen 1982: 75. 40) Du Mans 1890: 192. 41) Sanson 1695: 12-3. 42) Chardin 1811: VI, 164. Also see Tavernier 1679: I, 586-8.

308 NAJAF HAIDER

and it became practically impossible for the merchants to obtain the true value of their bullion in Iran, compelling them to export it directly to India.43) In this, the tightly controlled Bandar Abbas was altogether avoided and Basra was selected for their bullion exports in the last decade of the seventeenth century.") The cargoes of a Dutch ship which sailed from Basra at about this time, and was intercepted by the Iranian authorities when it drifted towards Bandar Abbas, carried over 24 metric tons of silver in Spanish reales owned by the Armenian merchants of Iran.45)

The evidence for Gujarati shipping in the western Indian Ocean suggests that trade with Iran was on an increase in this period. The English reported in 1660 that the number of non-European ships at Surat had gone up "so fast that, wheras in Suratt ten yeares past there were but 15 or 20, there is now 80, and the most pate of greate b~r then."~~) Some of this shipping seems to have been directed towards trade with the Red Sea and Iran as suggested by the alarmed response of the Dutch factors to the possibility of a loss of freight trade to these de~tinations.~~)The figures for the customs revenue derived from Bandar Abbas also suggest an upward trend in the Jianian trade compared to the earlier period. The customs revenue of Hurmuz in 1610 was 3.6 metric tons of silver, but the corresponding figure for Bandar Abbas in 1643 was 5.5 metric tons, which rose to 6 metric tons in 1654 and 7 metric tons in 1657.48) In 1656-57, the average value of goods exported from Surat to Bandar Abbas stood at around 22 met- ric tons of their silver value.49)

An equally important supplier of bullion to western India by the maritime route was the Red Sea region which, owing to the distribution of bullion and

43) Sanson 1695: 159-61.

44) Ibid.: 14. Also Fryer 1909: I, 282-3.

45) Sanson 1695: 14.

46) English Factories 1655-60: 301. Among these ships one may count six large vessels

(groote backen) owned once by Shahjahan, and an equal number of freight ships built for the Surat administrator, Mir Arab, and commissioned by him for coastal trade. Generale Missiven: 11, 624-5. The wealthy merchants of Surat were described in 1663 as "worth over five to six millions and own up to fifty ships which sail every where." Godinho 1990: 49.

47) Generale Missiven: 111, 36. Reporting on the great volume of the trade conducted by the Muslim and baniya merchants of Gujarat, they noted that between May 1654 and April 1655, "40 heavy ships [cloucke schepen] sailed [from Gujarat], mostly to trade with Persia, Basra and Mokha."

48) For Hurmuz see the source cited for Table 1. For Bandar Abbas see Generale Missiven: 11, 207; 111, 107; English Factories 1655-60: 28. All figures are given in toman (= 50 abbasis of 107 grains of fine silver).

49) English Factories 1655-60: 171-2. Since these values are derived from the records of the Surat custom house, the value of bullion in the return cargo would be higher by at least 50 percent to account for, besides the usual undervaluation, the difference in the cost price and sales price of the goods exported by the Gujarati merchants. The Iranian merchants would. however, bring an amount of bullion equal to the value of exported goods.

309 THE MUGHAL EMPIRE

merchandise across the traditional routes linking the Levant with the Arab and Iranian ports, handled a volume of merchandise higher than was brought to Basra and Bandar Abbas by the Aleppo-Baghdad route.50) Merchants travelled from Cairo both by land and sea and reached Mokha either directly by Tor (on the southern tip of the Sinai peninsula) or via Jadda. An Ottoman imperial ship sailed every year to Mokha laden with European merchandise and, above all, huge quantities of gold and silver coins. In 1616, exports to Mokha by one such ship reportedly consisted of 350,000 reales of eight and 50,000 Venetian and "Moorsche Ducaten" (~ultani).~') The land traffic was described by an English factor as he saw it in 1629:

There cometh also yearly from Grand Cairo to Mocho a land caphilo of some 800 or 1,000 cammells, who bring but little ladinge save marchants and their estates; which marchants bring greate quantities of monies, as rialls of eight and chekeens of gold to buy commodities; . . . This caphilo aryveth in Mocho every yeare about the latter end of April1 or the beginning of May, and in July following departeth againe for Judda and Grand Cairo, being laden with Indian commodities [a list of textiles and spices].52)

Merchants trading between Aleppo and Mokha took the annual pilgrimage route to Hedjaz. Pedro Texeira mentions that every year after Ramadhan, a big caravan left Aleppo for Mecca which was joined by another at Damascus with more pilgrims and merchants. He himself watched with some amusement the departure of one such caravan, amidst great fanfare and playing of music, of 800 persons travelling with 3,000 camels, many horses and packed animals, mer- chandise and "a great deal of money which passes on to India that way."53) A smaller caravan of about 600 camels which came from Aleppo in 1616 with the intention of buying Indian commodities at Mokha, reportedly brought 200,000 reales of eight and 100,000 Venetian and Hungarian ducats and Ottoman

50) The Red Sea ports of Jadda, Mokha and Aden were visited by the merchants from Cairo and Aleppo, where European bullion came through the ports of Alexandria, Smyrna and Iskenderun. Texeira 1902: 115, 118-21, 130; Tavernier 1679: I, 88; Bernier 1989: 202-3; Supplementary Calendar 1600-40: 69.

51) Broecke 1962: I, 107fn. See English Factories 1624-29: 349-50 for the annual visits of a "great Junck" to Mokha from Cairo. Also see 1637-41: 103 where the cheapness of Indian goods at Mokha was ascribed to the lack of buyers following "a great vessel from Suez having been wrecked on her way thither."

52) English Factories 1624-29: 350. The amval of the caravan at Mokha was timed to match th; calling of the Gujarat ships at the port in spring. Teny 1921: 301-2; Brouwer 1992: 19-20. 53) Texeira 1902: 122. The size of the Aleppo caravan would largely depend on the coin-

cidence of the Islamic calendar with the sailing seasons, and it is likely that smaller cara- vans set on their course strictly with a mercantile objective independent of the hadj traffic. The outward Meccan caravan itself split into two before reaching its destinations, one ter- minating at Jadda and the other travelling all the way to the shores of southern Arabia. Lane 1968: 53-4; Inalcik 1994: 345-6; Meilink-Roelofsz 1962: 223, 388.

3 10 NAJAF HAlDER

sultani. It was believed that the amount actually brought was higher than was declared at the Mokha custom house.54) Judged from the figures of this year alone, the bullion exports to Mokha from the Levant by land and sea came were well above 20 metric tons of silver.

Table 2 . Bullion Exports from Europe to the Levant: Various Estimates Year From To Annual TotaVAverage References

(metric tons of silver) Europe Easta) Morineau 1985: 581 Europe Easta) Parker 1974: 529 Europe Levant Ibid. Europe Easta) Morineau 1985: 581 Venice Aleppo Braudel and Spooner

1977: 448 and n. Venice Aleppo Ibid. Holland Levant Attman 1986: 76 Europe Levant Ibid.: 33, 77 Europe Levant Barren 1990: 251-2 Marseilles Aleppo Texeira 1902: 120 Europe Aleppo Ibid. Venice Levant Spooner 1962: 645-55

a) Includes exports to the Levant b, Cash and goods

Indian ships called at all the three ports of the Red Sea although, in the course of the seventeenth century, Mokha overshadowed the rest by becoming the busiest market for the exchange of European bullion against the spices from Malabar and Achin, textile and indigo from Gujarat and coffee from Yemen.55) Textiles and indigo brought to Mokha were sold to the Arab and Turkish mer- chants mainly for silver and gold.56)

Any direct information on bullion imported by the Red Sea is lacking for the second half of the sixteenth century and its magnitude has been inferred from its overall trade with India. Portuguese sources speak of twelve to fifteen ships going to the Red Sea from Gujarat each year, and a modern estimate has put

54) Broecke 1962: I , 85. 55) English Factories 1637-41: 103; 1661-64: 78; Inalcik 1994: 336; Meilink-Roelofsz

1962: 222-3, 386-7. In the fiscal year 1599-1600, the revenue from the ports of Yemen was 118,851 gold pieces (probably Yemeni dinar) of which the contribution of Mokha was 73 percent. Inalcik 1994: 335-6. 56) Coen 1919: I, 238; Ovington 1929: 269-70; Fryer 1909: I, 282-3.

THE MUGHAL EMPIRE 31 1

the total value of this trade at 20 million rupees (app. 226.6 metric tons of silver) on the basis of duties paid to the Portuguese by these ships.57) This estimate would put the supply of bullion by this route in the proximity of 100 metric tons of silver considering that a little less than half of the total value of trade, allowing for the share of merchandise, was brought back in bullion.

This seems to me to be a high figure for two reasons. If we anticipate our later estimates for bullion imports from the Red Sea, the gap would be sig- nificantly large unless it could be explained that there was a big decline in this trade in the intervening period. The evidence, as it exists, however, is to the contrary. Second, the figures (Table 2) we have for the European exports to the Levant are much too low to allow for such a massive amount of silver pass- ing by the Red Sea alone, even though one could argue that the intermediary regions of Ottoman and Safavid empire were in a position to sustain a net loss of their silver stock to India. For these reasons it is perhaps appropriate to reduce this figure, rather arbitrarily, to 75 metric tons of silver. Even then, this figure would serve as the upper limit for the volume of bullion exports in this period.

In 1622, two ships, the Salamati and Tawakkul i Ali ("Tocolij") brought between them from Mokha an equivalent of 32 metric tons of silver belonging to the merchants of G ~ j a r a t . ~ ~ ) Two other ships arrived from Jadda and Hodeida in the same year, and one of them was described as returning "richly laden" (coostelijck g e l a ~ d e n ) . ~ ~ ) Certainly, the total amount of bullion imported from the Red Sea in that year was higher than the cargoes of the two ships which the Dutch factor came to know about and which he cared to enter in his jour- nal. In 1624, the news of the safe arrival of a Diu ship was received with great joy by the merchants of Ahmadabad, Cambay and Surat since it brought an equivalent of 28 metric tons of silver in bullion and merchandise.") Besides the regular voyages of the merchant ships, an important feature of the Gujarat trade was the annual sailing of the imperial ships to the Red Sea with pilgrims and merchandise. They brought back huge quantities of bullion after distributing a part of it in charity at the holy places on behalf of the emper~r .~ ' ) Such bullion consignments as were recorded for the year 1628 reached the figure of 11 met- ric tons of silver (see Table 3).62) While the annual imports must have varied

57) Pearson 1976: 100-1 and fn.

58) Broecke 1963: 11, 273, 275.

59) Ibid.: 275, 278.

60) Ibid.: 296-7.

61) Moosvi 1990: 308-20.

62) In 1637, Shahjahan's ship, Shahi, which was wrecked on its way to Mokha, had

reportedly lost a cargo worth 7 to 10 lakhs of rupees. Generale Missiven: I, 622.

3 12 NAJAF HAIDER

with the availability of the Red Sea going ships, the supplies which came to Mokha from the Levant and the political climate of southern one can say that on an average they stayed between 35 to 40 metric tons of silver in the first half of the seventeenth century.

Table 3. Bullion exported to Gujarat by the Red Sea (silver equivalent)

Year Amount Fine Silver Remarks (metric tons)

1,200,000 rupees On one imperial ship 2,500,000 rupees On two Gujarat ships 200,000 ducats

Bullion and goods on a Diu ship

1,200,000 fl. On one imperial ship 1,700,000 reales [of eight] On Gujarat ships 1,000,000 reales On one English ship

600 to 700,000 rupees On Gujarat ships 485,000 reales On Gujarat ships and 10,000 ducats one Dutch ship

1,167,853 reales On Gujarat ships 96 1,000 reales On eight Gujarat ships

1,000,000 reales On five Gujarat ships 4,000 ducats

5,000,000 rupees On Gujarat ships 5,000,000 rupees 6,000,000 rupees Total exports to Gujarat

Source: Pearson 1976: 101; Broecke 1963: 11, 273, 275, 341; English Factories 1642-45: 17-8, 61-2, 92; 1646-50: 249; Generale Missiven: 11, 729, 800-1; Fryer 1915: 111, 163; Brouwer 1988: 73, 85; Van Santen 1982: 76, 248fn; Das Gupta 1976: 147fn, 151-2fn.

It is evident from the figures we have for the last quarter of the seventeenth century that there was an increase in the imports of Red Sea bullion to Gujarat. At the turn of the eighteenth century the figure stood at 68 metric tons of

63) Factory Records, Surat: vol. 84, pt. III, 430. The Red Sea ports had suffered inter- mittently as a result of recumng revolts against the Ottoman occupation of Yemen, and when the province finally gained independence in 1635, the Arab authorities at Mokha acted swiftly in reducing customs rates and giving assurances of more liberty in trading affairs to the mer- chants than was granted earlier by the Turks. English Factories 1634-36: 300, 307; Dagh- Register 1637: 266-7.

313 THE MUGHAL EMPIRE

~ i l v e r . ~ )There is some evidence of an expansion in this period in the number and tonnage of Gujarati shipping to the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf. In 1682, an English factor at Surat sent a report to his superiors that "about sixty Junks doe yearly loade from Surat for Mocha, Cudda [Jadda], Persia and Bassora, most of whose loading consists of Callicoes, drugs and Ahmudabad silk bought in the Bazar at Surat."'j5) This was certainly a remarkable increase in the num- ber of ships active on this route compared to the first half of the century.66) It is likely that this increase had something to do with the shift in the commodity composition of the Red Sea trade from spices to textiles, and the ability of the region in handling more products from Gujarat after becoming a net importer of European bullion when coffee began to be exported from Bait a1 Faqih and Luhayya in great quantities.'j7) However, these figures should be treated with care for measuring the supply of bullion silver in individual years. There are indications that in certain years, the component of gold was very high in the total.

Cape route and the Carreira voyages: Portuguese exports of silver It was the enormous increase in the supply of bullion by the Carreira voy-

ages from Lisbon which remained perhaps the most distinguishing feature of the Indian Ocean trade in the second half of the sixteenth century. From an aver- age of 2 to 3 metric tons of silver in the first half of the century, bullion exports reached a staggering 44 metric tons in 1580.68) The predominance of silver in these exports is testified to by the sources which explicitly point to the presence of reales of eight and four and no other specie.'j9) Not all silver in the cargo of the Carreira da India was spent in India, and at least a quarter of the total

64) Das Gupta 1976: 147n. 65) Letter Book: vol. 7, la. Of the eight big ships owned by the merchants trading at Surat

and employed on the Red Sea run in 1694, five belonged to Abdul Ghafur (Faizbakhsh of 500 tons, Faiz rasan and Khuda bakhsh of 300 tons each, Fath i Muhammadi of 234 tons and Fazl i Ali of 167 tons). The others were owned by Sulaiman ji (Welcome of 267 tons), Shaikh Ahmad (Ahmadi of 667 tons) and Yusuf Sakhi (Hurmuz Merchant of 500 tons). Factory Records, Surat: vol. 94, 56b; vol. 5, 163b.

66) The number of ships calling at the Red Sea ports are estimated as follows: 22 to 24 in 1616; 7 in 1621; 4 in 1622; 24 in 1623; and 6 in 1628. Brouwer 1991: 128-67; 1992: 29-30.

67) Ovington 1929: 271. At the principal markets of Yemen, coffee could be bought only with cash, preferably reales of eight. Das Gupta 1976: 132-33, 136-7. Also see Tuchscherer 1993: 168, 172-3. 68) Magalhaes-Godinho 1969: 329-32, 491. The figures are given in crusados of 400 reis.

One mark of silver (229.5 grams) was rated in Portugal at 2700 reis from 1578 to 1588. After 1588, each cmsado was rated at 2800 reis.

69) Linschoten clearly states that "the most and greatest ware that is commonly sent into

314 NAJAF HAJDER

exports was taken to China. We have already referred to the mode of this redis- tribution, and Fitch estimated it, in the last quarter of the century, at 250,000 crusados per ann~m.~O) Silver retained in India was employed, along with the capital raised from trade and customs, to finance both the coastal and interna- tional trade.

A sizeable portion of the total capital investment by the Portuguese-over one third-was directed towards trade with the individual regions of the Mughal empire.71) It was organised on the basis of a close coordination between the Carreira and Casado (regional trade of the resident Portuguese) voyages. At varying intervals, a fleet of Portuguese merchant boats ("cafila"), escorted by a galley or two, sailed from Goa to Cambay and Laharibandar to buy textiles and indigo.72) It was this cavalcade which was observed with awe and alarm by English and Dutch merchants from their ships lying off the Surat coast.73) While a part of the cargo brought to Goa, mainly textiles, was meant for the markets of Malacca, a substantial portion of it was reserved for the annual voyages to Lisbon.

It is possible to estimate the size of this trade from the figures of Portuguese imports given by James Boyajian, derived from the descriptions of the Carreira cargo as declared at the Casa da India (Lisbon) or as recorded by independent observers on the arrival of ships from India. Among the two regular items, which covered almost the entire value exported by the Mughal empire, indigo stood out as a high value product in terms of its weight and thus fetched a price higher than pepper in the markets of L i ~bon . ~~ ) But in terms of the total value exported, textiles from Sind and Gujarat, and to a lesser extent Bengal,75) had

India, are rials of eight. . ." Linschoten 1885: I, 11, 186-7. Also see Pyrard 1888: 11, ii, 193, 211; Magalhaes-Godinho 1969: 328-30.

70) Fitch 1921: 41; For the Potuguese exports of silver to China from Goa see Boxer 1959: 7; Atwell 1982: 75. 71) Boyajian 1993: 55, 67, 69. 72) Downton 1939: 113; Moreland 1962: 224-5. 73) Best 1934: 34; Dutch Factories 1617-23: 151. 74) Boyajian 1993: 45-6. The average price of indigo, 45 crusados per quintal given in

the documents and adopted by Boyajian for his calculations, is used here too. The danger of working with a single price quotation is manifest and the only argument one can suggest in favour of this figure is that it does not refer to the prime cost of any particular variety of indigo. Rather, it represents the average cost of transporting indigo from Gujarat, including apparently, the customs paid on both exported commodity and imported bullion as well as other costs of transaction. Hence, despite its apparent shortcomings, it is incidentally more convenient for our purpose in estimating the value of the total outlay. That merchants cal- culated the total cost of indigo shipped from India by including customs payments, interests on loans, costs of remitting cash to the market and transport charges can be seen from the accounts sent by a Dutch factor from Agra. Bronnen 1611-38:513-4. 75) The English reported from Patna in 1620, that the Portuguese imports to Bihar and

Bengal comprised mainly spices and Chinese silk, while from these regions they exported

315 THE MUGHAL EMPIRE

the highest share.76) There will be little doubt that, from the pattern we have observed of India's foreign trade, almost the entire export to Lisbon was paid for in precious metals, mainly silver, and whatever merchandise the Portuguese brought to supplement their bullion capital was likely to have been less than the value of indigo and textiles meant for the regional and South-East Asian mar- kets. Thus, the assumption here is that the estimated value of these imports in silver effectively represents the volume of Portuguese exports of bullion into the Mughal empire.

Table 4. Estimates of Portuguese Exports of Precious Metals

to the Mughal Empire: 1.586-1631

(silver equivalent in metric tons)

Year Gujarat and Sind Bengal Annual Total

-

") Annual Average Source: Boyajian 1993: Appendix A, 247-53

coyyon textiles, silk fabrics and "coarse carpets of Junapoore". Factory Records, Patna: vol. 1, 3. Also see English Factories 1618-21: 213-4.

76) Boyajian 1993: 44 (Table 3). It is harder to analyse the figures available for textiles exported by the Portuguese. The figures refer to total exports to Lisbon in bales of mixed contents, the true value of which can be ascertained only by knowing the exact nature of assortments. The disb-ibution by merchants of high value products such as silk with cotton fabrics in the bales was done not only to minimise risks of loss but also to manipulate cus-toms payments at both ends. Ibid.: 46-7. The documents designated the textiles as "roupas e sedas" (cloth and silk), and at least one source put an average value of 150 crusados on each such bale. Ibid.: 46. In considering this figure as representative of the average value of a bale of textile we are indeed assuming a certain standard in its preparation. About 90 percent of the textiles exported to Lisbon were known to be either Indian cotton or cotton and silk mix- tures. Ibid.: 44, 47, 66, 67 (Table 6). The shares of Gujarat, Sind, Coromandel, Bengal and Orissa in the volume exported from India have been worked out from the figures available

316 NAJAF HAIDER

For corroboration, the estimates based on Portuguese imports from the Mughal empire are compared with the figures of revenue derived by the Habsburg crown from the Cape trade. The results of this comparison, plotted on the graph below, suggest a close correlation between the two sets of figures.

Graph 1. Crown revenue and Portuguese trade

1587 1588 1589 1590 1591 1592 1593 1594 1595 1596 1597 1598 Years

Source: (A) Rooney 1994: 548 (Table 3). (B) Derived from figures used in Table 4 above.

During the quinquennium 1586-90, the hlgh point of Portuguese trade with the Mughal empire, the average annual export of silver was 11.22 metric tons. The amount was considerable enough to upset the gold-silver ratio on the west- em coast as well as the monetary policies of the Estado da India. The demand for reales was so high from Sind and Gujarat on the one hand and Bengal, Malacca and China on the other, that Goa had to regulate the profit on money- changing with a view to favouring the expansion of Luso-Indian coinage.77) However, whenever such restrictions were put up, they had to be withdrawn soon in the face of a huge demand for silver. In 1583, when the outflow of reales to western India was prohibited, local merchants rushed to Goa with an enormous quantity of gold to obtain the specie.78) A decade later, a law estab- lished the compulso~y registration of reales which were exported to Gujarat and a list of persons permitted to participate in this trade was drawn up. Exports to China and Malacca, however, remained entirely free from restrictions during

for their respective contributions to the total value delivered in Lisbon. These calculations provide us with an estimate of 78 percent as the share of Gujarat and Sind, and 10 percent as the share of Bengal and Orissa.

77) Magalhaes-Godinho 1969: 514-5. 78) Ibid.:515.

THE MUGHAL EMPIRE 3 17

the monsoons, and a clash of interests became apparent between those export- ing textiles from Gujarat and Sind to Malacca, who wanted a free flow of reales to western India, and those who were accustomed to carrying the specie directly to Bengal, Malacca and China.79) The impact of the continued influx of reales due to these demands was soon reflected in the gold-silver ratio of the region. Between 1582 and 1624, the price of the reale fell in terms of the saotome and the pagoda by about 30 percent. Even against the lari, which itself came in large quantities, the exchange rate of the reale fell by about 16 percent between the two dates.80)

Following a general decline in the Portuguese exports of silver to India from about 26.71 metric tons in 1585 to 6.55 metric tons in 1615 and 1618,81) there was a fall in the exports to the Mughal empire as well. Compared to the last quarter of the sixteenth century, exports were reduced to almost one third in the first quarter of the seventeenth century (Table 4). A sharp downward trend had set in after 1600, when the exports fell to the lowest level in 1608. Although there were signs of revival in 1616 and 1630, for which figures are available, the annual average now remained well below 3 metric tons.")

Bullion exported by the English East India Company

The early voyages of the English merchants in the seventeenth century were directed towards the spice markets of South-east Asia. Even though they learnt about the great demand for Indian textiles in these markets, when Lancaster (1602) successfully bartered them for Sumatran pepper after plundering a Portuguese carrack in the Straits of Malacca, the trade with India took at least a decade to develop. In all the twelve early voyages to this region (1602-1613) the total sil- ver exported was about 30.7 metric tons.83) Of this only a very small portion was brought to the Mughal empire by way of trade.84) It was with the first joint

79) Ibid. 80) Ibid.: 522-3. 8 1) Magalhaes-Godinho 1969: 329-32, 491. 82) General statements by contemporaries also support the quantitative estimates of the

decline in the Portuguese trade with the Mughal empire. It was reported in 1621, that the number of Portuguese vessels on the Cambay run was reduced from approximately 200 in previous years to 50 or 60, and the observer considered it a veritable sign of their declining trade. Dutch Factories 1617-23: 151; Broecke 1963: 11, 302-3. Also see Pelasert 1925: 19-20; Van Dam: 11, iii, 8; Winius 1981: 120-1; Ahmad 1991: 90. A decline in the Portuguse trade of Sind is alluded to in English Factories 1637-41: 137.

83) Home Misc: vol. 39, 124; Supplementary Calendar: 4, 6; Marine Records Misc: vol. 4, 13.

84) English merchant ships called at the port of Surat respectively in 1607, 1609 and 1612, in an attempt to seek favourable terms and commence regular trade with the Mughal empire. These were Hector, which brought William Hawkins to the court of Jahangir, Ascen-

Table 5. English Exports of Precious Metals to Gujarat (silver equivalent)

Year Quinquennial Total Quinquennial Total Annual Average (1 (metric tons) (metric tons)

4 years b, 3 years 4 years

Source: Home Miscellaneous: vol. 15,15-30,39-61,70-6,107-33,135-48,167-208;General Ledgers: vol. 9, 121-6; vol. 10, 137, 139; Court Book: vol. 4, 96-7; vol. 16, 149; vol. 17, 41, 46, 65; vol. 18, 78; vol. 19, 246, 438, 443-4; vol. 20, 151b, 250a, 253a; Letter Book: vol. 1, 78, 170, 231, 339; vol. 2, 55, 90, 174, 183, 216-7, 295; vol. 3, 6b, 57a-b, 127a, 195a, 206b, 238b; vol. 4, 5,101, 147-8, 221, 231-2, 320-1, 431-2, 530-1; vol. 5, 15b-16a, 52b, 53b, 58a, 64b, 88a-b, 134a-135b, 208a, 209a, 271b-272a, 280a; vol. 6, 12b-13a, 50a, 51b, 53a-b, 70b, 178b, 179a, 208a, 256a-b, 282b, 291a; vol. 7, 24a, 69b, 71a-b, 75b, 183b, 198a; vol. 8, 67b; Factory Records, Surat: vol. 1, 18, 114; vol. 5, 68a; vol. 92, 2; ibid., Rajapur: vol. 1, 31b, 37a-b, 47a; ibid., Miscellaneous: vol. 25, 34-9; Downton: 170, 200; Supplementary Calendar: 69, 70, 83, 86, 88-9, 90, 92, 136, 138, 139, 151, 152; English Factories, 1618-21: 29, 53-4, 64-5, 130, 185, 190, 202-3,206-7, 218, 282, 310-11; 1622-3: 166, 167, 182; 1624-9: 55, 103, 111, 213, 235, 295; 1630-3: 5-6, 32-3, 123, 205, 246, 262-3, 286, 291, 323; 1634-6: 68-9, 318; 1637-41: 62, 103, 204; 1642-5: 28, 61, 175, 209-11; 1646-50: 327-8; 1651-4: 28-29, 31; 1655-60: 59, 152, 207-8, 320; 1661-4: 22, 23n., 95-6, 99, 171, 198-9, 326; 1665-7: 169, 280; 1668-9: 13; English Factories (NS): I, 230 and n.; 111, 239-40, 280-81; Letters Received: VI, 164; Dutch Factories: 123; Moreau 1825: 5; Bruce 1810: I, 213, 234; Wylde: 3-8; Calendar of State Papers: 373-4; 0.C. 1543 A: 16; Court Minutes: 304; Generale Missiven: 11,628.

sion, which was wrecked off the Gujarat coast, and the fleet captained by Thomas Best which successfully repelled a Portuguese onslaught.

319 THE MUGHAL EMPIRE

stock voyage of 1614 that regular shipment of bullion from England began to arrive in Gujarat which continued almost without interruption till the middle of the eighteenth century. Tables 5 and 6 are based on the figures collected from invoices of the bullion ships and the correspondence of the recipient factories.

English exports of bullion to Gujarat fluctuated between 1.5 and 6.4 metric tons from 1614 to 1672 with an average of 3.3 metric tons per year.85) The exports were virtually suspended during the second Anglo-Dutch war, and a total of less than half a metic ton of silver was sent during 1665-67. There was a significant rise in the exports from 1675 and the annual average touched the maximum mark of 11.8 metric tons during 1680-89, an important reason for which was to drive the "interlopers" out of the market.86)

Table 6. English Exports of Precious Metals to Bengal (silver equivalent in metric tons)

Year Quinquennial Total Annual Average

") 3 years b, 4 years

Source: Ibid.

Precious Metals Exported by the Dutch East India Company

The Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie (VOC) entered Asian waters with the objective of trading in the Indonesian archipelago and the spice islands, and in the first two decades of the seventeenth century never considered it oppor- tune to divert its investments to the Gujarat-Malacca textile trade on any sig- nificant scale.87) It was only in the third decade, following a sharp reduction in

85) The figures are inclusive of the supplies received from Iran, Mokha and Bantam by the English. 86) English Factories (NS) , 1678-84: 111, 292. 87) Dutch Factories 1617-23: 1 1 1-2, 114-5. The problem of obtaining suitable trading

privileges, including the establishment of a factory at Surat, may have deterred the Company in the beginning from commiting itself fully to this branch of trade. The Portuguese were still dominant on the western coast, and the Mughal officials were not forthcoming in granting the Dutch a carte blanche for fear of upsetting the existing arrangements. But once certain rights were granted by an official decree, the problem of availability of adequate capital soon

320 NAJAF HAIDER

the bullion supply from Amsterdam due to renewed conflicts with Spain, that the Company's search for an alternative source of capital began in great earnest to finance its spice trade.88) The expansion in the Dutch trade with the Mughal empire from 1622 came at a time when the Company had discovered a new source of silver in Japan, obtained in exchange for Chinese raw silk and gold, which supplemented to a very large extent the bullion sent from Batavia to finance its investments in the textiles and indigo of Agra and G~ j a r a t . ~~ )

Table 7. Dutch Exports of Precious Metals to Gujarat (silver equivalent)

Year Annual Total Metric tons Year Annual Total Metric tons fl. fl.

Note: The conversion into fine silver is based on the following values: 1 tael = 30 grams fine silver = 3.125 fl. before 1636 and 2.85 fl. thereafter. 1 reale of eight = 2.5 fl. (till 1656). 1 abbasi = 0.8 fl . Dagh Register 1641: 376; Generale Missiven: 11, 207, 215; Uytrekening 1691: 28; Boxer 1959: Appendix, 338.

Source: Coen: 111,96;V, 588; Broecke 1963: 11, 312-3, 347; Bronnen: 122, 124, 126, 130, 133-4, 143-4, 264-5, 269, 548-51; Generale Missiven: I, 280, 509; 11, 94, 202, 215, 224, 264, 273, 292, 316, 336, 364, 567; Dagh Register 1624-29: 64; 1636: 205; 1637: 264-5; 1640-41: 175, 376; 1641-42: 74, 184, 192; 1643-44: 163, 178, 188, 191, 193; 1644-45: 229, 239, 241-2; English Factories 1618-21: 325; 1637-41, 215; 1642-45: 22, 167; Sup-plementary Calendar 1928: 143; Radwan 1978: 68; Van Santen 1982: 37; Alam 1993.

became apparent. Ibid.: 59-61, 73, 79, 81-3, 90, 95. For a lucid description of the Company's early years in Gujarat see Radwan 1978: 21-51. Also see Winius and Vink 1994: 23-4. 88) Dutch exports of precious metals from the Netherlands declined from an average of

1.48 million guilders between 1621 and 1623 to 0.47 million guilders between 1624 and 1626. Bruijn, Gaastra, and Schoffer 1979: 228 (Appendix IV, Table 46). 89) Israel 1989: 124, 130, 177-9. Israel also attributes a rise in the Dutch exports of indigo

from western India to the Spanish embargo which caused a soaring in the price of Gua- temalan indigo at Amsterdam. The export of Japanese silver to Gujarat was first reported in

321 THE MUGHAL EMPIRE

During 1621-1626, the average annual export of precious metals to Gujarat the Dutch was under 2 metric tons of silver. The exports rose dramatically 162790) and thereafter remained, on an average, at around 6 metric tons till

about 1651. The pattern of Dutch trade with Gujarat changed significantly from the late 1650s. Now, the Company was largely financing its exports with spices, Japanese copper (occasionally gold), tin and gold imported from Iran.91) Not only was the supply of bullion discontinued, coined silver from Surat was exported in large quantities to the Dutch factories of Ceylon, Bengal and Ba t a~ i a . ~~ )

Table 8. Dutch Exports of Precious Metals to Bengal (silver equivalent)

Year Total Total Annual Average fl. metric tons metric tons

") 4 years

Note: The conversion into fine silver is done at the rate of 1 reale of eight = 25.7 grams fine silver = 3 fl. Bruijn, Gaastra and Schoffer 1979: 225. Since coins were reckoned at a premium in the money of accounts, this conversion would slightly underestimate the bullion component of the exports as opposed to specie.

Source: Prakash 1988: 66 (Table 3.2).

1624. Dagh Register 1624-29: 64. Following the Bakufu's ban on Japanese participation in overseas trade in 1635, the VOC succeeded in obtaining the lion's share of the Sino-Japanese trade. Its annual exports of Japanese silver surged from 2.37 metric tons in 1622-26 to 11.71 metric tons in 1632-36 and 14.93 metric tons in 1642-46, which was maintained till at least 1661. Figures calculated from Kato 1981: 224 (Table 2); Nachod 1897: CCVIII (Table E. Silber-Ausfuhr).

90) The value of total cargo, including bullion, sent in 1626 to Gujarat and Iran was fl. 177, 347. In 1627, the value was fl. 930, 115. Dagh Register 1624-29: 276, 326.

91) Generale Missiven: II, 707; 111, 39, 173; IV, 548; English Factories 16.55-60: 56. In 1674, for instance, the Dutch at Surat sold spices and other commodities for more than 9 lakhs of rupees. Generale Missiven: IV, 15.

92) Generale Missiven: 111, 744, 764, 775; IV, 75-6, 593, 739. In 1666, the Dutch carried Surat rupees to the value of 60,000 to Ceylon. Historical Manuscripts 1913: 306-7.

322 NAJAF HAIDER

Conclusion

After having surveyed, admittedly with discontinuous data, one and half cen- turies of bullion exports to the Mughal empire, we can now bring all our esti- mates together to suggest a range of figures for the total supplies at intervals for which we are better served by information: 1588-1602, 1630-45 and 1679- 85. During the first interval, the export of bullion from Hurmuz was 41.7 met- ric tons, and if we assume that two thirds of this amount was brought to the Mughal empire (not an implausible assumption in view of the enormous impor- tance of Gujarat and Sind in this network), we get a figure of 27.8 metric tons of silver. To this can be added a figure of 10 metric tons of silver annually exported from Iran by the land route at the turn of the century.93) For the Red Sea, we have accepted a figure of 75 metric tons of silver based on a down- ward revision of Pearson's estimates of its total value of trade with Gujarat in the second half of the sixteenth century. The average amount of bullion annu- ally exported by the Portuguese to the Mughal empire from 1586 to 1590 is estimated at 11.2 metric tons. Together, these estimates yield a cumulative figure of 124 metric tons of silver annually exported to the Mughal empire dur- ing the last quarter of the sixteenth century.

For the second interval, we have the figures of 40 and 30 metric tons of sil- ver imported respectively by the Red Sea and from Iran (land and sea route).94) The annual average of the English and Dutch exports in this period was 5.2 and 6.6 metric tons respectively. The Portuguese trade with Gujarat, and with Bengal, till the destruction of their factory at Hugli in 1632,95) was still opera- tive and though it is not possible to quantify it for the entire phase we are dis- cussing, from the last two figures in Table 4 we can put their bullion supply at around 3 metric tons of silver per year. The total supply of bullion in this period would thus be around 84.8 tons of silver per annum.

The choice of the last interval for our calculations is dictated by the figures available for the Red Sea. The figure for both 1679 and 1685, being 56 metric tons of silver, lower than the last quarter of the sixteenth century, was still higher than the first half of the seventeenth century. This, as we saw, was primarily

93) This is derived by reducing the value of land trade to Iran (16 to 20 metric tons of silver) estimated for the years when it registered a four-fold increase following a decline in the sea trade. The volume of this trade seems to have been naturally affected by the renewal of the Hurmuz trade judging from the figures we have for c. 1634 (1 1.6 metric tons of sil- ver). The latter figure has been rounded off to 10 metric tons.

94) There is abundant evidence that trade on the land route had declined due to the Mughal-Safavid conflicts over Qandhar. See Moosvi 1987: 66.

95) Lahori 1867-8: I, 433-9 has a detailed description of the Mughal expedition against the Portuguese.

323 THEMUGHAL EMPIRE

due to an increase in the Indian Ocean trade of the Mughal empire. No figures are available for Iran and we have to adopt the earlier estimates with an upward revision (to take into account the rise) to 40 metric tons. For the same period, the calculated annual average of English and Dutch exports to the Mughal empire is 25.1 and 9.7 metric tons of silver respectively. The cumulative esti- mate for this phase can be set at 130.8 metic tons of silver.

Table 9. Bullion Imports of the Mughal Empire (silver equivalent in metric tons)

Source 1588-1602 % of the % of the 1679-85 % of the total total total

Persian Gulf 30.0 22.9 Isfahan-Agra 10.0 7.6 Red Sea 56.0 42.8 Portuguese - -English 25.1 19.2 Dutch 9.7 7.4 Total 130.8 100.0

The Gold Imports

Our evidence for gold imports is too scanty to offer even the type of quan- titative estimates we have been able to make for silver, and there can only be a general idea regarding the periods in which these imports were more signifi- cant. The first half of the sixteenth century was a period of the dominance of gold in the Indian Ocean trade, and the "river of gold" which flowed through the Red Sea brought to the Indian Ocean markets a multitude of gold coins (Egyptian ashrafi, Ottoman sultani and Yemeni dinar), all modelled originally on the Venetian zechhino (sequin; ducat) which itself came in large quanti- ties.96) Unlike the inland regions of northern India, foreign gold coins circulated with greater freedom on the coasts of the western Deccan and Malabar, made possible by the organisation of the regional currency systems in order to accom- modate not only imported gold coins but also to facilitate trade and exchange within the region.97) The gold of Africa was exported to Gujarat either from

96) Barbosa 1989: I, 100-1; Pires 1967: I, 13, 17, 21, 43-4; Bacharach 1973: 77-96; 1987: 171; Pamuk 1994: 954. For the Red Sea gold plundered by the Portuguese on its way to India, see Magalhaes-Godinho 1969: 293-4. 97) Both Conti and De Gama found in the fifteenth century Venetian sequins and gold ash-

rafis among the coins circulating in Malabar. Conti 1857: 30; Cabral 1938: 194; Magalhaes-Godinho 1969: 294.

324 NNAF HAIDER

Cairo or the Indian Ocean ports of Malindi and S~fa la .~ ' ) It was out of this gold, acquired from both trade and tribute from the Deccan, that Sultan Mu- zaffar Shah of Gujarat and his successors were able to strike the muzaffarshahi (185 grains), which was the heaviest gold coin ever issued by a medieval Indian ruler with the sole exception of Jahangir.99)

In contrast, as we saw, the imports in the second half of the sixteenth cen- tury were dominated by silver, and gold seems to have been brought, at least in the Mughal empire, in very small quantities. Abul Fazl's description of the foreign coins delivered to the Mughal mints does not list any gold coins, while his account of gold minting gives an impression that gold had to be drawn by the sarrafs from private hoards."')

In the seventeenth century, gold was brought both by the Europeans and the Asian merchants. The exports from Iran until 1660 were mainly in silver, but after 1666 gold began to replace silver in greater quantities.'O1) However, from 1684 onwards, silver exports to the Mughal empire were revived once again.Io2) As for the Red Sea shipments of gold, evidence for this is desultory. From our discussion of this trade, it can be seen that in the first half of the seventeenth century, gold ducats were carried on the ships and by the merchant caravans between the Levant and Gujarat in varying proportions (4 to 27 percent). For the second half, the evidence suggests that gold came to Gujarat in increasing quantities from this region between 1665 and 1682.Io3)

Silver was the principal item in the shipments of the English Company to Gujarat and Bengal and gold made its appearance for two short durations. In the first phase (1627-1637), the share of gold was around 50 percent of the total value of bullion, while in the second (1674-85) it was about 20 percent. Inci- dentally, both these phases coincided with a fall in the silver price of gold in the Mughal empire, and the losses suffered by the Company in exchanging gold for rupees forced it to return to silver on both occa~ions . '~~)

Dutch exports of gold to Gujarat depended very largely on the availability of Chinese gold as well as supplies from the Netherlands, a major portion of which

98) Ethiopian Itineraries 1958: 173; Cabral 1938: 65. 99) For tribute from the Deccan in a gold coin called "Ibrahimi du baiti" (do buti!) see

Khan 1927: I, 24, 76. 100) Abul Fazl 1872: I, 31-2. In 1604, European exports to the Levant were mainly in sil-

ver (Texeira 1902: 120), and in the Venetian exports for 1610-14, gold was only 0.29 per-cent of the total bullion (Spooner 1962: 645-55).

101) Du Mans 1890: 192; Tavernier 1679: I, 418; English Factories 1665-67: 95. 102) Sanson 1695: 12-4, 159-61. 103) English Factories 1665-67: 95; Factory Records, Surat: vol. 3, 83-4; vol. 90,93b-94a. 104) Factory Records, Surat: vol. 4, 116a; vol. 102, 525; English Factories, 1624-29: 221,

230, 235, 270, 295; 1630-33: 262-3; English Factories (NS ) , 1678-84: 111, 240, 270; Lawrence 1677-9: 54a, 63b; Generale Missiven: IV, 8.

THE MC'GHAL EMPIRE 325

was however meant to be exported not to Surat but to the regions, such as Coromandel, where gold was in currency.Io5) The periods of high prices of gold in the Mughal empire might have provided an inducement to increase the share of gold exported there but its availability at the point of shipment was still the all important factor in deciding the composition of the bullion con~ignrnents.'~~) Until 1668, the VOC exports of bullion to Bengal mainly consisted of silver.Io7) Following a ban on the export of Japanese silver in that year, gold, in the form of Japanese kobans, was substituted.lo8) Between 1670 and 1673, the VOC's average annual export of kobans from Japan was 948 kgs of fine gold,Iw) and it was in these years that the share of gold in the exports to Bengal reached very high proportions (75 to 80 percent)."O) However, the decision taken by the Japanese authorities to contain the outflow of koban by overvaluing it by 21 percent in 1670-72"') soon resulted in a decline in its export to an average of 353 kgs of gold per annum between 1675 and 1679.Il2)

It seems that, while on an average gold imports may have fluctuated between an estimated 10 to 15 percent every year, there are two phases which stand out as years of high imports: 1627-37 and 1670-82. Recently, Spanish records have revealed that there was indeed a drop in the American silver arriving in Spain in the 1670s, and that the "annual plata fleet was importing gold in surprisingly large scale . . ."lk3)

105) Generale Missiven: I, 709; 11, 323, 394; 111, 30. 106) In 1625, when gold appreciated greatly in Gujarat and North India, Dutch exports

consisted exclusively of gold ducats. Broecke 1963: 11, 312-3. In 1638, when gold price was low, the Dutch exported 300,000 fl. worth of Chinese gold which was an impressive figure by their standard. Generale Missiven: I, 709; Supplementary Calendar: 139. Gold began to rise again in value after 1640, having fallen in the intervening period. Habib 1987: 148 (Table 3). Between 1641 and 1647, Dutch exports from Batavia and Japan were entirely in silver. The reference to gold in Generale Missiven: 11, 202 is clearly a mistake as other sources only mention silver in the cargo of the ship Pauw. See the sources cited for Table 7. Also see English Factories 1642-45: 100, 145.

107) Generale Missiven: 11, 394, 707; 111, 1, 30, 61, 101; Prakash 1988: 65, 67 and n. 108) Glamann 1981: 58, 63; Gaastra 1986: 103. For the exports of koban to Bengal see

Generale Missiven: 111, 714; IV, 91, 144, 197. 109) Nachod 1897: CCVII (Table D). The original figures are given in number of kobans,

each of which contained 15.64 grams of pure gold. Van Dam 1929: I, ii, 92. 110) Prakash 1988: 6711. 11 1) Glamann 1981: 63. 1 12) Nachod 1897: CCVII (Table D). 1 13) Chaudhuri 1986: 70-1.

326 NAJAF HAlDER

Bullion Market and Mint Production

There is enough contemporary evidence to suggest that much of the bullion and foreign specie obtained through trade was brought to the mints of the empire to be struck into rupees (Mughal silver coins of 179 grains) and muhrs (gold coins of 169 grains).l14) Cognisant of the growing importance of precious metals for sustaining currency circulation, commodity trade and taxation, the Mughal state policy towards bullion imports and minting was shaped by both fiscal and mercantile consideration^.^^^) The customs duties on silver and gold (1 to 2.5 percent) were always kept lower than those on merchandise (2 to 5 percent) and were increased to 3.5 percent, probably under fiscal pressure, only towards the end of the seventeenth ~entury."~) The mints had an open coinage system in which freedom to obtain Mughal coins was granted to bullion sup- pliers on payment of minting cost (brassage) and seigniorage. The Mughal cur- rency itself was usually of a very high degree of fineness and was accepted at a premium over and above its weight in fine metal. The thrust of the policy was thus to allow the merchants access to a market free from currency manipula- tions and administrative interventions. In actual practice, however, merchants had to face one important problem.

The coining in the mint was done by officials assigning fixed days to the mer- chant suppliers, which often clashed with the timetable set by them to make investments in the hinterland markets and to keep commodities ready for ship- ment in the right season^.^'^) While some merchants working with adequate capital could organise the supply of commodities through their factors and correspondents well in time, and a privileged few would be granted access to the mint out of their turn as a favo~r ,"~) the majority would have to cope with

114) Teny 1921: 302; Bernier 1989: 202-3; Ovington 1929: 132; Khan 1928: I, 304, 408; Tavernier 1925: 1, 8-9; Van Twist 1937: 72-3; Thevenot 1949: 25-6; Roques 1678: 246. There were however, certain notable exceptions to the rule. In Gujarat, foreign bullion was also coined into mahmudis, a regional coin, which circulated in certain parts of the province. In the north western part of the empire, a part of the bullion coming from Iran and Central Asia was minted into khanis of Balkh and Badakhshan. Lahori 1867-8: II, 562-3. In addi- tion, foreign coins did circulate quietly in the coastal areas to settle immediate transactions. Careri 1949: 253; Ovington 1929: 132.

115) Abul Fazl 1872: 1, 12-3; Khan 1928: I, 340. 1 16) Finch 1921: 134; Oxenden Papers 40702: 22b; English Factories 1655-60: 243-5;

Tavernier 1925: I, 7; 11, 21; Ovington 1929: 132; Factory Records, Surat, vol. 96: 20b; Letter Book, vol. 8: 24b. Compare this with the levy of 5 percent on imported silver in Safavid Iran. Chardin 181 1: V, 356.

117) Factory Records, Surat: vol. 4, 101b-102a; vol. 5, 145a; ibid., Miscellaneous: vol. 24: 22, 24, 31; Bodleian Rawlinson MS. A 302: 250b-251a; English Factories (NS): II, 390.

118) Letters Received: V, 86-7. See Surat Documents: 3 and 4 for permission granted to

THE MUGHAL EMPIRE 327

delays in the availability of cash to serve their investment plan^."^) It was this particular problem which made the presence of the money-changers (sarraj~) in the bullion market extremely important as buyers of imported bullion. In their capacity as bullion buyers they were in a unique position to assay precious met- als and coins (hence the name sarraf from Arabic sayraj, money-testing) as well to fix their value in the market.Iz0)

The sarrafs' profession brought them close not only to the merchants but also to the mint. They were often appointed in the latter as assayers,12') and as a professional group outside the mint helped the administration in re~0inage.I~~) All this granted them ready access to the mint, and several sarrafs had their places reserved for them in the mint from where they supervised their busi- ness.Iz3) Apart from dealing in currency, the sarrafs also organised commercial credit, and their position as deposit bankers and discounters of bills of exchange (hundi)enabled them not only to supply the bullion seller with the cash he immediately required but also to provide the facility to transfer funds from one place to another.124) It thus became quite natural for a merchant who had just cleared his bullion out of the custom house to look for a sarraf who could be approached either directly or through a broker. The sarrafs made their profits out of the wholesale buying of all kinds of bullion, foreign and regional coins which they took to the mint as and when they found it suitable. Their ability to strike a good bargain depended on the timings at which the sale of the bullion took place as well as the competitive price they offered to the ~el1ers.l~~)

two reputable merchants (umdat ut tujjar) of Surat to coin money. The English too were exempted from taking turns in the mint towards the end of the seventeenth century. Factory Records, Surat: vol. 5, 188a-b.

119) Factory Records, Surat: vol. 4, 102a; Letter Book: vol. 8, 24b; English Factories, 1661-64: 22; Das Gupta 1979: 46.

120) Van Twist 1931: 73; Roques 1678: 245, 248. 121) Factory Records, Surat: vol. 5, 179a. 122) Abul Fazl, Akbarnama, OIOC MS. Add. 27247: 332b. In the reign of Aurangzeb, the

sarrafs of Ahmadabad were ordered to bring to the mint all the silver coins which had lost in weight up to 3 surkha (a little over 3 percent) for reminting. Khan 1928: I, 327-8.

123) This was a privilege rarely extended to the merchants, and the success of the English in securing one such place for themselves in 1694, amidst strong opposition from the sar- rafs, was worth all the efforts they had put up working for it in previous decades. For the Surat mint see Factory Records, Surat: vol. 94, 50a, 52b, 68b, 71a. For Rajrnahal see ibid., Hugli: vol. 10, 185. The factor appointed here to look after the Company's bullion however pleaded to be transferred away from "the unwholesome fumes & the unreasonable heat."

124) "The merchants that buy gold and plate [silver] pay allwayes ready rnony when it is weighed to them, then they presently sent it up to Rajmaul (where the mint is) to be coined". B. L. Add. MS. 34123: 42a-b. Also see Factory Records, Surat: vol. 6, 112-3. For the use of bills of exchange in bullion transactions see Supplementary Calendar: 89; English Fac- tories, 1655-60: 120. For an appreciation of the various branches of the sarrafs' business see Habib 1990: 391-6.

125) Factory Records, Surat: vol. 3, 108; Tavernier 1925: I, 12-3. Occasionally big mer-

328 NAJAF HAIDER

Bullion sales usually took place when the returning fleet of Indian ships brought huge quantities of silver and gold from the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf. The abundance of precious metals lowered the price of bullion relative to specie as a result of the demand for Mughal coins for up-country investments or the settlement of debts.'26) The sarrafs fixed the bullion price and exchange rates of the foreign coins by skilfully evaluating the extent of precious metal content and adding the cost of minting and seigniorage.'*') They charged inter- est on all cash payments made to the bullion sellers, the duration of which was determined by an assessment of the time taken by the mint to coin a particular consignment.128)The deals were never concluded without tough bargaining, and the major points of contention were the market price of bullion and the dura- tion of payment.129) The latter, agreed upon after careful calculations, was indeed central to notions of the liquidity of capital among mercantile groups. For the sarrafs,an early payment made to the bullion seller meant a loss of interest on the capital locked up in the mint. The merchant on his part counted the extra days for which interest would be due to the sarrafs,in case the mint- ing time exceeded his own calculation^.^^^) Sales synchronising with the sea-sonal flow of bullion from the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf normally needed a longer duration of payment for the reason that the pressure on the mint dur- ing this time was greater and the output slower for each individual money changer or merchant.131) Referring to the sale of silver dollars to the sarrafs,the English once observed:

chants, like Virji Vora, driven apparently by the need to invest surplus cash, would compete with the sarrafs by offering a higher price for the bullion. English Factories, 1630-33: 262-3; 1646-50: 281.

126) Factory Records, Surat: vol. 4, 180b-181a; vol. 90, 93b-94a; Terpstra 1918: 210; Van Twist 193 1 : 73; Supplementary Calendar: 88-9; English Factories, 1618-21: 7-8; 1646- 50: 240; 1655-60: 21111.; Tavernier 1925: I, 21-2; Roques 1678: 246.

127) English Factories, 1646-50: 185, 316; Factory Records, Surat: vol. 5, 157a; Master 1911: 11, 303-5. A qualitative method of assaying by touch-needles was used for silver and gold in the mint and the bullion market. Quantitative testing was done mainly for uncoined bullion by melting and refining it to the standard of the Mughal coins. Abul Fazl 1872: I, 14-5, 16-9; Roques 1678: 247; Tavernier 1925: I, 28-9; Factory Records, Dacca: vol. 1, 80b; ibid., Surat: vol. 5, 17Oa-b.

128) Factory Records, Surat: vol. 105, 133a. "They [the sarrafs] take 15 to 20 days to pay you in rupees and discount on the same day in order to make good the interest at 314 and 112 percent. It is a custom that one can not shake them from.. . I have seen up to 90 days of term when the mint is well supplied and the less it works the more shorter the dura- tion of payment." Roques 1678: 246-