Ottoman bureaucrats had proved to be highly skilled administrators, adept at centralising resources and managing the distribution of the population to ensure that harvests and supplies ended up where they were most needed. As the empire swallowed up more territory in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, this had worked efficiently and smoothly. When the momentum of expansion slowed, however, the fragility of the system became apparent, under pressure from the cost of sustaining military action on two fronts – in Europe in the west and with Safavid Persia in the east – but also as a result of climatic change that had a particularly severe impact on the Ottoman world.2
The social structures in the Muslim world, which developed along very different lines to those in western Europe, also proved to be an important factor. Islamic societies generally distributed wealth more evenly than their Christian counterparts, largely thanks to very detailed instructions set out in the Qurān about legacies – including principles that were positively enlightened by the standards of the day when it came to the share women could and should expect from the estates of their father or husband. A Muslim woman could expect to be much better looked after than her European peer; but this came at the expense of allowing large-scale wealth to remain within the same family for a long period of time.3 This in turn meant that the gap between rich and poor was never as acute as it became in Europe because money was redistributed and recirculated more widely. These values to some extent inhibited growth: as a general rule, teaching and stipulations about legacies meant that families found it hard to accumulate capital over successive generations because inheritance was progressive and egalitarian; in Europe, primogeniture concentrated resources in the hands of one child, and paved the way for great fortunes to be built up.4
For some, the fact that Europe – or rather north-western Europe – had never had it so good was a cause of anxiety. Calvinist priests in the Low Countries preached with terrifying conviction about money being the root of evil and about the perils of indulging in luxury.5 Similar sentiments could be found in England, where men such as Thomas Mun, a particularly angry commentator of the early seventeenth century, bemoaned the ‘mis-spending of . . . time in idleness and pleasure’, warning that material wealth would bring poverty of knowledge and ‘general leprosie’ of body and soul.6
Of course, the benefits of growth were not shared evenly. Rising rents were good for landlords, but less good for tenants; exposure to larger markets meant that there was considerable price pressure as domestic production of wool, textiles and other goods was exposed to more competition.7 The fall in moral standards that came with economic and social upheaval was enough to encourage some to take drastic action. The time had come to establish new pastures, concluded the more conservative, to find a place where it would be possible to practise a simple lifestyle that prioritised religious devotion and spiritual purity – a place for a fresh start, and a return to basics.
The Puritans who settled New England did so in protest against the changes that had accompanied Europe’s rise and against the affluence that followed. They were reacting to the strange stream of new ideas and goods that made the world seem a very different place – where Chinese porcelain was appearing on household dining tables, where marriage of people with different skin colour to Europeans was giving rise to questions about identity and race, and where attitudes about the body were prompting what one scholar has recently termed the ‘first sexual revolution’.8
To escape, the answer was to head across the Atlantic. The destination of choice was not the Caribbean, where many had gone to turn the land into sugar plantations using slave labour, but the virgin lands of New England where emigrants could lead an idealised existence of devout simplicity. The only difficulty, of course, was the native population, who ‘delight to tormente men in the most bloodie manner that may be; fleaing some alive with the shells of fishes, cutting of the members and joynts of others by peacemeale and broiling on the coles, eat the collops of their flesh in their sight whilst they live, with other cruelties horrible to be related’.9 But even this lot were worth risking; it would still be better than the world they had left behind. It is easy to forget that the feast of Thanksgiving, first celebrated by Pilgrim Fathers to mark their safe arrival in a land of plenty, was also a commemoration of a campaign against globalisation: it was not only hailing the discovery of a new Eden, but triumphantly rejecting the paradise at home that had been destroyed.10
For those of a different bent, who were not interested in building a bastion of austerity and religious conservatism, but wanted to discover the new, to benefit from and share in the attractions and tantalising delights that were on offer in the world, there was an alternative: go east and head for Asia. Building a platform to enable England to make connections with Asia in a structured and organised way was a slow and often frustrating process. The East India Company (EIC), which was granted a royal monopoly on trade with all lands east of the Cape of Good Hope in 1600, managed to displace the Portuguese from Bandar Abbas in the Persian Gulf and Surat in north-west India through force, thereby establishing footholds that hinted at future opportunities. Nevertheless, competing against the all-powerful Dutch East India Company (VOC) was a challenge.11 Volumes of trade back to England did begin to grow; but the supremacy of the Dutch was such that in the middle of the seventeenth century, they were shipping around three times as much by value as the English.12
The relationship between the English and the Dutch was a complicated one. For one thing, the Low Countries provided customers and credit for English goods, so while there was commercial rivalry between the EIC and the VOC, their successes were not mutually exclusive. For another, the Spanish provided a common enemy and grounds for military and political co-operation between the two staunchly Protestant states. Some leading English figures took great heart from major Dutch naval successes against Spain in the English Channel in 1639 and not long afterwards at Itamaracá off the coast of Brazil, with the result that the pompous Oliver St John, leading one of the many delegations sent to The Hague to cement ties, even made the radical proposal that the two countries should ‘enter into a more intimate alliance and nearer union’ – in other words, that they should merge into one.13
The unpredictability of the European powers was such that, barely a year after proposing a confederation, England and the Dutch were at war. The casus belli was the passing of the Navigation Act shortly after the St John delegation’s return home, when Parliament enacted a law requiring that all cargoes bound for England be carried into English ports by English ships. Although there was unquestionably a commercial motivation behind this legislation, namely to drive revenues towards an economy that had been ravaged by domestic fighting, it was also significant that there was a growing, vocal and apocalyptic lobby in England that insisted that the Dutch were motivated only by profits, were too materialistic and lacked religious conviction.14
The Act was an indication of England’s sharpening aspirations. Just as rhetoric about the Spanish a century earlier became increasingly poisonous, so too did criticisms of the Dutch, especially when intense fighting broke out at sea as the Dutch sought to keep the sea lanes open to their own ports through the Channel and the North Sea. This provoked nothing less than a maritime revolution in England. The navy had been well funded even during Tudor times; now, however, it was systematically overhauled. In the course of the second half of the seventeenth century, considerable resources were lavished on a large-scale shipbuilding programme. Expenditure on the navy rose so sharply that it soon consumed nearly a fifth of the entire national budget.15 The process was overseen by Samuel Pepys, whose very personal diaries give little sense of the military and geopolitical shift that was taking place – or of the scale of the change running through shipyards up and down the country.16
* * *
Pepys gathered the most up-to-date manuals by Dutch specialists – including that of Nicolaes Witsen, the master theorist of shipbuilding – and set about applying rigou
r and discipline to everything from setting up schools that taught the ‘art of navigation’ to commissioning written doctrines that set out the latest techniques for an ambitious and well-funded new generation of designers.17
The maritime revolution was based on three separate observations. The first was that specialised, heavy vessels were more effective than light cruisers. Success hung on being able to deliver concentrated firepower – and being able to resist it. Ship design was modified accordingly, with the emphasis on large, powerful ships that were like floating castles. The second observation was that experience could teach better lessons. Encounters with the Dutch fleets in the 1650s and 1660s resulted in devastating losses, both in terms of ships lost or captured and in terms of senior officers and captains lost in battle: in 1666, nearly 10 per cent of the navy’s senior commanders were killed in a single engagement. As a result of such bruising encounters, naval tactics were systematically re-evaluated. Training manuals such as Fighting Instructions by Admiral Blake, one of the great naval leaders of the age, were disseminated and digested. Sharing knowledge and learning from the past was crucial in making the navy the best in the world: between 1660 and 1815, combat fatalities among English (British) captains fell by an astonishing 98 per cent.18
The third and no less important observation was how the navy functioned as an institution. In order to become a lieutenant, it became necessary to spend three years at sea and to pass an exam conducted by superior officers. Subsequent promotions were based strictly on ability rather than on patronage, which meant not only that the ablest rose to the top, but that they did so with the endorsement of their peers. The incentivising transparency of this meritocratic system was further enhanced by a system that rewarded those who had served for longest in the most important capacities. It was broadly identical to the organisation put in place in the earliest days of Islam and which had proved so effective during the Muslim conquests. In England now too, spoils were shared according to a pre-set allocation, with officers and sailors rewarded in proportion to seniority and length of service. This made promotion highly desirable and lucrative, which again served to propel the most able to the top, especially as the process was overseen by the Admiralty board, whose aim was to filter out favouritism and partiality. These were optimum labour contracts, in other words, designed to reward and incentivise performance; furthermore, they were fair.19
It was not long before the reforms brought rewards. Heavy investment in the navy extended England’s reach substantially, giving it the chance to take advantage of any European rivalries, outbreaks of war or other openings in the Caribbean and elsewhere that presented themselves.20 It also dovetailed with the long and slow process of trying to build up a stronger trading position in Asia, where the fruits of hard work were finally ripening. As well as Surat, the East India Company established an important centre in the south-east of the subcontinent at Madrasapatnam (now Madras), where in the first half of the seventeenth century a concession was negotiated with the local ruler to trade free of customs. As modern corporations would quickly recognise, generous tax breaks were a major boon, enabling long-distance rivals to be undercut – and, in due course, locals too. And as modern corporations would also recognise, as settlements became larger and more successful, the Company was perfectly placed to renegotiate better and better terms. Over the course of seventy years, Madras was transformed into a thriving metropolis. The pattern was replicated in other locations, most notably in Bombay and Calcutta, the jewel of Bengal, and the fortunes of the East India Company rose steadily upwards.21
As was the case with the VOC in Holland, the lines between England’s government and the EIC were blurred. Both companies had the right to behave as a quasi-branch of the state – granted the right to mint coins, form alliances and not just maintain armed forces but also use them. Taking service with these highly commercialised organisations, which benefited from both government protection and very powerful investors, made for an attractive career path. Men were drawn from all over England and indeed from other parts of the world too – including the bastion of conservatism that was New England. There were rich rewards for the ambitious and the quick-witted who rose through the ranks of the Company.22
Typical was a man born in Massachusetts in 1649, who moved with his family back to England as a small boy before entering the service of the East India Company. Initially holding the lowly position of writer, he eventually rose through the ranks to become governor of Madras itself. He did well for himself there – too well, in fact, for he was removed from his position after five years, with rumours swirling about how much he had gained personally during his tenure. That he returned home with five tons of spices, large quantities of diamonds and innumerable precious objects suggests that the accusations were well founded – as does his own epitaph in Wrexham in North Wales where he was buried: ‘Born in America, in Europe bred, in Africa travell’d and in Asia wed . . . Much good, some ill, he did; so hope all’s even and that his soul throu’ mercy’s gone to Heaven.’ He spent his money liberally back in England, though he did not forget the land of his birth: towards the end of his life, he gave a generous sum to the Collegiate School of Connecticut, which recognised his gift by renaming itself after a benefactor who might make further donations in the future: Elihu Yale.23
Yale had been in the right place at the right time. In the 1680s, the Qing court in China lifted its restrictions on foreign trade, leading to a surge in exports of tea, porcelain and Chinese sugar. As a result, ports like Madras and Bombay were not only important trade centres in their own right, but became staging posts in a new and vibrant global trading network.24 The late seventeenth century marked the start of a new era of contacts between Europe and China. These were not confined to commerce. The mathematician Gottfried Leibniz, who developed the binary system, was able to hone his ideas thanks to texts about Chinese arithmetic theories sent to him by a Jesuit friend who had gone to live in Beijing towards the end of the seventeenth century. Those who were in a position to take advantage of the new commercial or intellectual connections that were being made could do very well for themselves.25
By the time of his endowment, Yale himself was sensitive to the way that the east and India in particular were being increasingly seen as a short cut to great wealth. ‘You must not be impatient in your progress nor make haste for riches,’ he wrote to his godson, Elihu Nicks; ‘my fortune cost me near 30 years’ patience.’26 As one of the first wave of Englishmen to fill his boots, it was a bit rich to be giving such stern advice to the next generation. And as it happened, the prospects of becoming unfeasibly rich in Asia were just about to get even better. The Golden Age was dawning in England.
That an island in the North Atlantic came to dominate international affairs, to be the heart of an empire that controlled a quarter of the globe and had influence far beyond, would have astonished historians and empire-builders of the past. Britain was an inhospitable place, wrote one of the great historians of late antiquity, where the air was so poisonous in some places that it could kill if the wind changed direction.27 It was inhabited by Britons – whose name, speculated one author not long afterwards, came from the Latin brutus, that is, irrational or stupid.28 Separated from the rest of Europe by the Channel, it was distant, isolated and peripheral. These weaknesses now became formidable strengths – and underpinned the rise of one of the greatest empires in history.
There were many reasons for Britain’s ultimate success. Scholars have noted, for example, that levels of social and economic inequality were lower than in other countries in Europe, and that the bottom tiers of the population had noticeably higher levels of calorie consumption than their continental peers.29 Recent research has also emphasised that changes in lifestyle played a role, as work rates and efficiency rose sharply thanks to the rewards on offer from the growing economy. Britain’s surging success also owed much to the fact that it was home to so many innovators.30 Fertility levels, which appear to have been lower in Britai
n than in most other European countries, also had an important correlation with per capita incomes, as resources and assets passed into fewer hands than on the continent.31
But the trump card that proved unbeatable was that of geography. England – or Britain after the union with Scotland in 1707 – had a natural barrier protecting it from its rivals: the sea. This was helpful in terms of dealing with military threat, but it was a godsend when it came to government expenditure. With no land frontiers to defend, Britain’s military expenditure was a fraction of its continental rivals’. It has been estimated that, while England’s armed forces were approximately the same size as those of France in 1550, by 1700 the French had almost three times more men in service. These needed equipment and pay, meaning spending was proportionately far greater in France than in England; revenues were also proportionately lower in France as soldiers and sailors – each a potential generator of taxable income and indirect taxes through consumption – were removed from fields, factories and other employment to serve their country.32
It was as though Britain was vaccinated from the contagious problems of Europe that saw seemingly never-ending warfare as states on the mainland squabbled and fought in almost every possible permutation in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The British learnt to intervene judiciously, taking advantage of circumstances that were in their favour, but staying out of it when the dice were loaded against them. It was also becoming clear that what happened in Europe could determine one’s fate on the other side of the world. Intense arguments about who would inherit the throne of Austria could have consequences that led to fighting and exchanges of territory in European colonies all over the world: the issue of the legitimacy of Maria-Theresa’s succession in the 1740s provoked outbreaks of fighting from the Americas to the Indian subcontinent that lasted nearly a decade. The result when matters were finally settled in 1748 was that Cap Breton in Canada and Madras in India changed hands between the French and the British.
The Silk Roads: A New History of the World Page 34