Francois Bernier

Francois Bernier

François Bernier, a Frenchman, was a doctor, political philosopher and historian. He came to the Mughal Empire in search of opportunities. He was in India for twelve years, from 1656 to 1668,

He was closely associated with the Mughal court, as a physician to Prince Dara Shikoh, the eldest son of Emperor Shah Jahan, and later as an intellectual and scientist, with Danishmand Khan, an Armenian noble at the Mughal court.

Bernier travelled to several parts of the country, and wrote accounts of what he saw, frequently comparing what he saw in India with the situation in Europe.

He dedicated his major writing to Louis XIV, the king of France, and many of his other works were written in the form of letters to influential officials and ministers.

In virtually every instance Bernier described what he saw in India as a bleak situation in comparison to developments in Europe. This assessment was not always accurate.

Bernier and the “Degenerate”East- Travels in the Mughal Empire

The question of land ownership (crown ownership of land)

Bernier, one of the fundamental differences between Mughal India and Europe was the lack of private property. He thought that in the Mughal Empire the emperor owned all the land and distributed it among his nobles, and nobles to the peasants. According to Bernier, the Crown’s ownership of land is harmful for both the state and its people because landholders could not pass on their land to their children. So they were demotivated to any long-term investment in the land and expansion of production.

Bernier saw the Mughal Empire – its king was the king of “beggars and barbarians”; its cities and towns were ruined and contaminated with “ ill – air”; and its fields, “overspread with bushes” and full of “pestilential marshes”.

None of the Mughal official documents suggest that the state was the sole owner of land. Abu’l Fazl, the sixteenth-century official chronicler of Akbar’s reign, describes the land revenue as “remunerations of sovereignty”, a claim made by the ruler on his subjects for the protection he provided rather than as rent on land that he owned. It is possible that Bernier and other European travelers regarded such claims as rent because land revenue demands were often very high. However, this was actually not a rent or even a land tax, but a tax on the crop.

A more complex social reality (No care for artisans)

Bernier’s descriptions occasionally hint at a more complex social reality. Artisans had no incentive to improve the quality of their manufactures, since profits were appropriated by the state. Manufactures were, consequently, everywhere in decline.

At the same time, he conceded that vast quantities of the world’s precious metals flowed into India, as manufactures were exported in exchange for gold and silver.

He also noticed the existence of a prosperous merchant community, engaged in long-distance exchange.

Mughal Cities (Camp towns) – Compare with Ibn Battuta’s descriptions

In fact, during the seventeenth century about 15 per cent of the population lived in towns. This was, higher than the proportion of urban population in Western Europe in the same period.

Bernier described Mughal cities as “camp towns”. He believed that these cities came into existence and grown when the imperial court moved in and rapidly declined when it moved out.

There were all kinds of towns: manufacturing towns, trading towns, port-towns, sacred centres, pilgrimage towns, etc. Their existence is an index of the prosperity of merchant communities and professional classes.

Merchants often had strong community or kin ties, and were organised into their own caste-cum occupational bodies. In western India, these groups were called mahajans, and their chief, the Seth or Nagarseth.

Urban groups included professional classes such as physicians (hakim or vaid), teachers (pundit or mullah), lawyers (wakil), painters, architects, musicians, calligraphers, etc. While some depended on imperial patronage, many made their living by serving other patrons,

Sati and women Labourers

European travellers and writers often highlighted the treatment of women as a crucial marker of difference between Western and Eastern societies. Bernier chose the practice of sati for detailed description.

He noted that while some women seemed to embrace death cheerfully, others were forced to die. However, women’s lives revolved around much else besides the practice of sati.

Women labour was crucial in both agricultural and non-agricultural production.

Women from merchant families participated in commercial activities, sometimes even taking mercantile disputes to the court of law.

Therefore, it seems unlikely that women were confined to the private spaces of their homes.

Other Travelers who wrote detailed accounts regarding Indian social customs and religious practices

Jesuit Roberto Nobili- He translated Indian texts into European languages

Duarte Barbosa- , He wrote a detailed account of trade and society in south India

Jean-BaptisteTavernier- He was particularly fascinated with the trading conditions in India, and compared India to Iran and the Ottoman Empire.

Italian doctor Manucci- He wrote detailed accounts regarding Indian social customs and religious practices and settled in India.

How did François Bernier’s accounts influence policy-makers and the intelligentsia in Europe?

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How did François Bernier’s descriptions influence Western theorists from the eighteenth century?

Bernier’s descriptions influenced Western theorists from the eighteenth century onwards.

The French philosopher Montesquieu used this account to develop the idea of oriental despotism (Absolutism or Dictatorship of King), according to which rulers in Asia enjoyed absolute authority over their subjects, who were kept in conditions of subjugation and poverty.

This idea was further developed as the concept of the Asiatic mode of production by Karl Marx in the nineteenth century. He argued that in India surplus was appropriated by the state. This led to the emergence of a society that was composed of a large number of autonomous and egalitarian village communities. However, this picture of rural society was far from true. In fact, during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, rural society was characterised by considerable social and economic differentiation and stratification.