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The terms and conditions under which English trade was transacted with Ṣafavid Persia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 December 2009

R. W. Ferrier
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Extract

The economic state of Ṣafavid Persia has not been extensively studied and much of that which is known is deived from European sources, British, Dutch, and Russian in particular and to a lesser extent from the French, Venetian, Turkish, and Portuguese archives. There is no doubt that among the buildings of the Court at Iṣfahān there were one or more registries (daftarkhāna) in which archives were kept and documentation recorded on a systematic basis. There is internal evidence from royal correspondence to earlier exchanges of letters and in some cases later decrees are modelled on earlier ones. Unfortunately, economic information from Persian sources has scarcley survived and it has to be presumed from circumstantial evidence that following the occupation of Iṣfahān by the Afghans the archives were destroyed or burnt.

Type
Articles
Information
Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies , Volume 49 , Issue 1 , February 1986 , pp. 48 - 66
Copyright
Copyright © School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London 1986

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References

1 Scattered among the 64 volumes of the Original Correspondence and the Factory Records of the East India Company in the India Office Library, there are references to the transactions of its merchants in Persia and information about their activities. Extracts from this correspondence can be found in Danvers, F. C. and Foster, Wm., Letters received by the East India Company from its servants in the East, 6 vols. (London, 1896–1902)6;Google ScholarFoster, Wm. and Fawcett, Charles, The English factories in India, 7 vols. (Oxford, 1906–1955)Google Scholar and Roe, Sir Thomas, The Embassy to the Moghul, ed. Foster, Sir Wm, (London, 1926)Google Scholar. There are also some archival sources amongst the State Papers in the Public Record Office and miscellaneous collections in the British Library such as the Harleian MSS, Egerton MSS and Additional MSS. In the Bodleian Library the Rawlinson MSS, the Carte MSS, MSS. Eng. Hist, and MSS. Polyglot Or. contain some incidental material about Persian economic affairs. The Algemeine Rijks Archief in ‘S–Gravenhage conta ns the records of the Oostindische Compagnie in Persia of which one volume covering the years 1611–1638 has been published, Dunlop, H, Bronnen tot de Geschiedenis der Oostindische Compagnie in Perzie, Rijks Geschiedkundige, ('S-Gravenhage, 1930)Google Scholar. For the mid seventeenth century the diary of ambassador Jan Cunaeus is useful. Journaal der reis van den gezant der O.I. Compagnie naar Perzie in 1651–52 door Cornelis Speelman, ed.Hotz, A, (Amsterdam, 1908)Google Scholar. French sources dealing mostly with the second half of the seventeenth century and later are in the archives of the Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres, Bibliotheque Nationale, Archives Nationales and La Chambre de Commerce et d' Industrie de Marseille. In the Venetian State Archive there are a great number of Armenian documents uncatalogued and untranslated which might reveal much information on the nature and extent of Armenian participation in the international trade of Safavid Persia. Some indication of Persian-Venetian trade in the early seventeenth century in G., Berchet, La Republica di Venezia e La Persia (Turin, 1865)Google Scholar. To my knowledge there has been no systematic search in the Turkish archives but given the volume of trade between the two countries it would not be surprising if some records were found, perhaps Customs accounts from the Erzurum region. A good introduction to the relation between Persia and Portugal including trading aspects is to be found in the commemorative volume, Das Relacoes entre Portugal 6s a Persia 1500–1758, Catalogo Bibliografieo da Exposicao Comemorativa do xxv Centenario da Monarquia no Irao, organizada pela Fundacao Calouste Gulbenkian, (Lisboa, 1972). In many of the descriptions of the travellers there is a certain amount of information on economic subjects, notably Jean Baptiste Tavernier and Jean Chardin and to a lesser extent John Fryer. The best contemporary account of the mid seventeenth century is by the French Capuchin, Pere Raphael du Mans. From the mid fourteenth century to the end of the Safavid period there is a survey of Persian trade by Ferrier, R. W. in The Cambridge history of Iran, VI, (Cambridge, 1985) 412–90Google Scholar. On English trade with Persia in particular see Ferrier, R. W.: ‘The Armenians and the East India Company in Persia in the seventeenth and early eighteenth century’, Economic History Review, 2nd series, xxvi, 1 (February 1973), 38–62Google Scholar ‘The European Diplomacy of Shah 'Abbas I and the first Persian embassy to England’, Iran, xi, 1973, 75–82 and ‘An English view of Persian trade in 1618’, Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient, xix, 2 (May 1976), 182–214. Niels, Steensgaard, Carracks, caravans and companies: the structural crisis in the European-Asian trade in the early 17th Century (Copenhagen, 1973)Google Scholar, is interesting about trade which involved Hurmuz. There is a useful introduction to ‘The social and economic structure of the Safavid state’ in Roger, Savory, Iran under the Safavids (Cambridge, 1980).Google Scholar

2 Willan, T. S., ‘Some aspects of Engish trad with the Levant in the sixteenth century’, English Historical Review, 70/3, 1955, 389–410Google Scholar; Wood, Afred c., A history of the Levant Company,(London, 1935)Google Scholar, and Davis, Ralph, Aleppo and Devonshire: English traders in the Levant in the 18th century (London, 1967).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

3 [I£ndia [O£ffice REcords E/3/3/163 Aldworth and Biddulph to [E£ast [I£ndia [co£mpany 19 Auguest 1614.

4 Boxer, C. R. ‘Abglo-Portuguese rivalry in the Persian Gulf 1615–1635’, in G. Prestage., Chapters in Anglo-portuguese relation (Watford, 1935) and Boxer, C. R. Commentaries of Run Freure de Abdrada (London, 1930).Google Scholar

5 Willan, T. S., The early history of the Russia COmpany 1553–1603, (Manchester 1956).Google Scholar

6 Jenkinson, Anthony and other Englishmen, Early voyages and travels to Russia and Persia, Morgan, E. delmar and COote, C. H, Hakluyt Society, (London, 1886), I, 114–20.Google Scholar

7 Hakluyt, Richard, The prinicipal navigation, vouages, traffiques and discoveries of the English Nations Dent edition (London, 1927), II, 3, 4.Google Scholar

8 Early voyages, 145–9.

9 Hakluyt, II. 29, 30. Although this treaty was in fact of limited practical signficance it does predate other such treaty arrangements like those with theOttoman authorities and the Russians and is, therefore, of some comparative historical importance. For a detailed account of the beginnings of Anglo-Ottoman relations with all the relevant accompanying documentary evidence;seeSkilliter, S. A., William Harborne and teh trade with Turkey 1578–1582: a documetary study of the first Anglo-Ottoman relations (london, 1977). Queen Elizabeth's letter t Sultān Murad III of 25 October 1579 is in pp.69–71 and Murad III's grant of privileges is in pp.86–9. The grant of privileges, made by Tsar Ivan to the Russia Company in 1569 is in Early voyagses, 265–75.Google Scholar

10 For the second voyages see Early voyages, II, 276–381.

11 ibid., on third voyage, letter of Arthur Edwards, 26 April 1566, pp. 384–92. Letter of 8 Auguest 1566, pp. 393–402.

12 ibid., letter of Arthur Edwards, 16 June 1567, pp. 403, 404.

13 ibid., on fourth voyage of Arthur Edwards, letter written by Laurence Chapman, 28 April 1569, pp. 407–14 and notes by Richard Willes, pp. 415–18.

14 ibid., 416–17.

15 ibid., 418–19.

16 ibid., 422.

17 ibid., Fifth voyage with observations, pp. 423 ff.

18 Hakluyt, II, 171, 172; Willan, 149–50.

19 Jonas, Hanway, An histo rical account of the British trade over the Caspian Sea, 4 (London, 1753).Google Scholar

20 Chaudhuri, K. N., Teh English East India Company (London, 1965).Google Scholar

21 IOE/3/3/225 Commission to Steele and Crowther, Surat Consultation 2 January 1615:IOE/3/4/453 Crowther to Roe 1 March 1615 and IOE/3/3/296, Steele to E.I.Co., 1615.

22 IOE/3/5/519, Connock, Persian Camp to E.I.Co. 4 August 1617.

23 'Capitulatie tusschen Shāh ‘Abbās I en de Engelsche Natie’ in Dunlop, H.,Bronnen tot de Geschiedenis der Oostindische Compagnie in Perzie, ('S-Gravenhage, 1930), 675–6.Google Scholar

24 IOE/3/6/661.

25 LEtters received, vI, 1617, 293–7, from the copy to the Farmān in IOG/29/1, dated Ẕū’l-hijja A.H. (July-August, 1629).

26 IOE/3/526416 Isfahān received overland 3 February 1698.

27 [B]ritish []useum Egerton MSS 2086 f. 81. William Bell, Kuhistack, 24 January 1622, ‘Several copies were drawn in the Persian tongue, the one being signed by the two commanders, Edward Monnox and myselfe for performance on our behalves’.

28 IOG/29/14/ pt. 1. f. 52 Gombroon to E.I.Co., 15 September 17221.

29 Wm. Foster and Chares Fawcett, Teh english fctories in India (1622–23), 13–17 from IOG/30/3 pt. 1 and G/29/1.

30 IOE/3/52/6411 Isfahān 15 July 1697.

31 [Br]itish [L]ibrary Harleian MSS 109.

32 [B]odleian [L]ibrary MSS Polyglot Or.C.3.

33 BrL Harleian MSS 109.

34 BL MSS Polyglot Or.C.3.

35 BL MSS Polyglot Or.C.3; see also BrL Harleian MSS 109.

36 IOE/3/52/642, Isfahān, 1697.

37 BrL Harleian MSS 109.

38 BL MSS Polyglot Or.C.3.

39 BrL Harleian MSS 109.

40 BL MSS Polyglot Or.C.3.

41 BrL Harleian MSS 109.

42 IOE/3/12/1321 8 October–6 November 1630: man Shāh 121/2 Lbs; Sh–hī, 4d, 200 to a tūm–n £36s.8d.: Covett, about a yard.

43 [P]ublic [R]ecord [O]ffice SP 102.40. pt.l. f.105.

44 ibid., f. 99.

45 ibid., f. 107.

46 ibid., f. 101.

47 ibid., f. 113 Details of the contract are in IOE/3/13/1380.

48 ibid., pt. 2.

49 ibid., pt. I f. 54.

50 ibid., f. 109.

51 ibid., f. 111 and E/3/14/1551.

52 ibid., pt. 2.

53 ibid., pt. I, f. 78.

54 ibid., F. 76.

55 BrL Harleian MSS 109.

56 PRO, SPO 102. 40. pt. 1 f. 81.

57 ibid., pt. 2.

58 ibid., pt. 2.

59 ibid., pt. 2.

60 IOE/3/34/3939 Bombay to E.I.Co. 20 March 1674.

61 For more details of the historical content of other treaties and trading arrangements between European and Persian authorities up to 1928 see Lambton, A. K.S.,‘Imtiyāzāt’ in EI (2nd ed.), III, 1189–93. In respect of the reproduction of the documents shown in the figures and plates here I an grareful to the following: original documents in the India Office Library and Records reproduced in this article appear by permission of the Controller of Her Majesty  Stationery Office; by permisson of the British Library, MS Harleian 109; acknowledment made to the Bodleian Library Oxford, MS Or. Polyglot C.3. I ackowledge the assistance of my wife, Badri, in preparation of this article.Google Scholar