Chapter 3 focuses on the final years of Shah Jahan’s rule, including the princely rivalry between Aurangzeb and his brothers for their father’s throne. Through local evidence, I demonstrate that during moments of crisis when members of the state needed ready capital, they relied on the Jhaveris to provide cash loans. The timeliness of loans was the most important factor, since battles for the imperial throne were fought quickly and decisively. Such loans were deployed by princely retinues to muster additional troops and resources. Even the slightest advantage in resources could catapult a prince to emperorship. This chapter traces how the Jhaveri family entered into the risky business of political financing. We learn that their services as merchants, bankers, and financiers were highly valued by Mughal elites, and even bad bets placed on a losing prince did not compromise their exalted positions as preeminent merchants of Gujarat. I characterize this phase of Mughal-Jhaveri relations as political commensalism, for the Mughals benefited immensely from emergency loans, while the Jhaveris neither benefited nor were decisively harmed in any manner.

Chapter 2 focuses on the founding patriarch Shantidas Jhaveri’s activities in the early seventeenth century at the courts of Jahangir and his successor Shah Jahan. Jahangir was accustomed to the luxuries of the court, and grew fond of rare jewelry and other precious items. Shantidas established a formidable reputation as a fantastic jeweler and diamond dealer, one with the wealth and knowledge to procure rarities from around the world. Ships carrying such goods docked at the ports of Gujarat, and Shantidas and his agents purchased coveted items to then sell to high-ranking officials and Mughal emperors. The business activities of Shantidas took off after 1610. Given his close relationship with two successive Mughal emperors, I call this phase of Mughal-Jhaveri relations courtly mutualism since both sides gained from the interaction. This chapter identifies a range of sources including Persian chronicles, royal orders, religious praise poems in Sanskrit and Gujarati, and European travelogues to establish that Mughal-Jhaveri relations were initially symbiotic, setting the vantage point from which subsequent developments are analyzed.

Khushhal Khan ‘Gunasamudra’ was the most feted court singer of the mid-seventeenth century. Great-grandson of the most famous Mughal musician of all time, Tansen, and chief musician to the emperors Shah Jahan (r.1627−1658) and Aurangzeb (r.1658−1707), he was written about extensively in his lifetime as a virtuoso of exceptional merit. Yet this was not how he was memorialised in the 1750s, when legends of the great Mughal musicians of past and present were first compiled into biographical collections. Rather, he was remembered as the instigator of a shocking political scandal that supernaturally sealed Shah Jahan’s downfall. In this chapter I retell Khushhal’s story from the vantage point of the 1750s, in the light of the canonical Mughal music treatises of Shah Jahan’s and Aurangzeb’s reigns. I consider what they together tell us about the role and power of music in the Mughal empire, just before everything began to unravel.

Chapter seven examines cultural production and religious institutions in seventeenth-century royal courts, both Muslim and Hindu. Beginning with art and architecture commissioned by Jahangir and Shah Jahan, we then discuss elite lifestyles of both men and women. The opulence of court life attracted international visitors and led to cultural exchange leading to the introduction of chilis and other American plants. Next we examine non-Mughal cultural production in Rajput kingdoms whose attitudes toward the Mughals varied. Lifestyles of elite Rajput and Nayaka women are examined next, before we consider the courtly skills and sciences, such as letter-writing and astrology, that were admired in the Deccan sultanates, where literature with Sufi themes flourished. Royal patronage of three religious sites concludes the chapter.

Chapter six examines developments from 1550 to 1650, with attention paid to aspects of early modernity. We begin with the careers of the Mughal emperors Jahangir and Shah Jahan and then to a consideration of trade during their reigns, especially the maritime textile trade that brought Europeans to Gujarat’s ports. Active merchant-traders, both Indian and European, illustrate the diversity of Mughal commercial activity. We then turn to the Bahmani successor states in the Deccan, Bijapur and Golconda, focusing on their artistic production, multicultural nobility, and flourishing trade. Following this is an overview of the post-1565 Vijayanagara kingdom and its successor states. An account of the textile production, European enclaves, and maritime trade along India’s southeastern coast concludes the chapter.

Chapter eight probes changes between 1650 and 1750, emphasizing developments that contributed to Mughal decline. The Islamic cast of Aurangzeb’s reign was not a dramatic change, but a gradual trend that had been building under his two predecessors. We then move to Aurangzeb’s vision of Islam in his multicultural, multiethnic state and his prolonged effort to subdue the Deccan Sultanates and the Marathas under Shivaji, as well as their political and economic consequences. Next the Maratha’s martial roots, Shivaji’s political ideology, and the growth of Maratha power outside the Deccan along with their cultural contributions are addressed. Finally, we examine the shifting balance of power in the subcontinent where former imperial territories emerged as successor states with flourishing political centers.