The Ali Rajas of Cannanore: Status and Identity at The Interface of Commercial and Political Expansion, 1663-1723

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The Ali Rajas of Cannanore: status and identity at the interface of

commercial and political expansion, 1663-1723


Mailaparambil, J.B.

Citation
Mailaparambil, J. B. (2007, December 12). The Ali Rajas of Cannanore: status and identity
at the interface of commercial and political expansion, 1663-1723. Retrieved from
https://hdl.handle.net/1887/12488

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INTRODUCTION

Cultural apartheid was the dominant ideal in medieval Muslim India... 1

This is a study about the Arackal Ali Rajas of Cannanore, the most prominent maritime merchants in
pre-colonial Kerala and one of the very few early-modern Indian maritime merchant groups who
succeeded in carving out a powerful political configuration of their own. The extensive maritime
network of the Arackal House was based at the port-town of Cannanore. From that place, this Mappila
Muslim family came to dominate the commercial networks of various other Mappila families in
Cannanore as well as in its various satellite ports such as Maday, Baliapatanam, Dharmapatanam and
Nileswaram. 2 Before setting out to expound my own analytical starting position, let me begin by briefly
introducing the spatial and temporal co-ordinates of this study as well as the sources and
historiographical antecedents on which it is based.

Kolathunadu, 1663-1723

The ‘kingdom of Cannanore’ or Kolathunadu constitutes roughly what is now called the Cannanore
District of Kerala State in the Republic of India. Traditionally, Kolathunadu is described as the land
lying between Perumba River in the north and Putupatanam River in the south. 3 The elite house of

1 Peter Hardy, quoted in S. Nurul Hassan, ‘Medieval Indian History: Danger of Communal Interpretation and the Need for
Reconsidering Priorities’, in id., edited and introduced by Satish Chandra, Religion, State and Society in Medieval India ( New
Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2005), 27.
2 According to some scholars, ‘Mappila’ is a derivative of ‘Mahapilla’, which means ‘the great child’. According to another
interpretation, the term ‘Mappila’ means ‘son-in-law’. Another denomination by which the local Muslims were referred to in
local Malayalam sources was ‘Jonaka’. This could be derived from ‘yavana’—a Sanskrit term for Ionians. The Mappilas
gradually spread along the coast of Kerala and settled mostly in various ports in the northern part of the region of which
Calicut and Cannanore. They were considered the descendants of pure Arab traders and local women as well as of local
‘converts’ It is probable that this mixed Mappila identity included some Marakkayar Muslim elements from the Coromandel
Coast too. There are indications that few Marakkayar traders from the Coromandel Coast migrated to Malabar for trade
purpose by the end of the fifteenth century and gained prominence in the maritime trade of the region. However, gradually
this ‘Marakkayar’ identity amalgamated into the general ‘Mappila’ identity. For example, in Calicut the title ‘Marakkar’
became an honourary one bestowed by the local king Zamorin upon the prominent Mappilas of the region by the middle of
the sixteenth century. This indicates the flexibility of social identities in pre-colonial South India. C. Gopalan Nair,
Malayalathile Mappilamar (Malayalam) (Manglore: Basel Mission Press, 1917), 2. C. A. Innes and F. B. Evans, Malabar and
Anjengo, I (Madras: Superintendent Government Press, 1908), 26; S. Jayaseela Stephen, The Coromandel Coast and its
Hinterlands: Economy, Society and Political System (AD 1500-1600) (Delhi: Manohar, 1997), 114-15; M. R. Raghava Varier (ed.),
Sthanarohanam: Chatangukal (Malayalam) (Sukapuram: Vallathol Vidya Peedam, 2004), 46-7.
3 M. R. Raghava Varier (ed.), Keralolpatti Granthavari: The Kolattunad Traditions (Malayalam) (Calicut: Calicut University, 1984),
30.
2 INTRODUCTION

Kolathunadu, which was known as Kolaswarupam, was one of the major political houses which
sprang up in Kerala after the disappearance of the Kulasekharas or Perumal rulers of
Mahodayapuram by the twelfth century AD. 4 Though the rulers of this house (popularly known as
Kolathiris) were generally credited with a superior political authority over the geographical zone lying
between the kingdoms of Canara and Calicut, their political influence was more or less confined to
Kolathunadu. 5 In spite of its fluctuating political fortunes throughout its existence, the
Kolaswarupam was considered as one of the most prominent political houses in Kerala until the
British occupation of the region by the end of the eighteenth century. At least from the second half
of the fifteenth century, Cannanore occupied the prime position of being the leading port town of
Kolathunadu and, consequently, it was the core area of socio-economic and political dynamics of the
region.
The central theme of the present study is the multidimensional interaction between the main
players in the realm, namely (i) the Arackal Ali Rajas, the most prominent maritime merchants in pre-
colonial Kerala who dominated the Mappila Muslim traders in and around Cannanore, (ii) the
Kolathiris, the traditional claimants to political power in Kolathunadu, and (iii) the European
newcomers, especially the merchants of the Dutch East India Company. While the Ali Rajas
exercised crucial control over the people and the maritime trade activities in the port city of
Cannanore and in other small Mappila ports along the coastal belt of Kolathunadu, the Kolathiris
continued to exercise their influence in the interior of the region. The Dutch East India Company
came into close contact with the region after the Dutch conquest of the Portuguese fort of St Anjelo
in 1663 and subsequently played a major role in the power struggle in the region. Hence, it was from
1663 onwards that these power groups began to interact closely with each other.
Between 1663 and 1723 the socio-political situation in the region was rather shaped by ‘internal’
dynamics than by ‘external’ forces, but the mode of production in Kolathunadu remained focused
primarily on the sea. The Ali Rajas, the Kolathiris, and the Dutch Company were the main
contenders for power in the port city of Cannanore during this period under discussion. The terminal
point of my study is 1723 when the evolution of historical forces which were constantly structuring
and restructuring the relations between these power groups in Cannanore reached a critical juncture.

4 The Kulasekharas ruled over Malabar between c. AD 800 to AD 1124. See for more details M. G. S. Narayanan, Perumals
of Kerala (Calicut: Private Circulation, 1996). Among the political powers which emerged after the disappearance of the
Kulasekharas of Mahodayapuram, Venadu (later the kingdom of Travancore) in the south, Cochin (Perumpadappu
Swarupam), Calicut (Nediyirippu Swarupam) and Cannanore (Kolaswarupam) in the north were considered as the most
prominent.
5 Duarte Barbosa, The Book of Duarte Barbosa: An Account of the Countries Bordering on the Indian Ocean and their Inhabitants, II, ed.
M. L Dames (repr., London: Hakluyt Society, 1921), 79, 85. A. Galletti, J. van der Burg and P. Groot (eds.), The Dutch in
Malabar: Selection from the Records of the Madras Government, No. 13 (Madras: Printed by the Superintendent, Government Press,
1911), 143.
INTRODUCTION 3

Sources

Although I have used both archival and published sources from various archives and libraries of
India and abroad, the main repository of my sources the archival depot of the Verenigde Oostindische
Compagnie (VOC) in the Nationaal Archief (National Archive) situated at The Hague in the
Netherlands. The manuscripts of the VOC, which existed between 1602 and 1795, are of a great
value in reconstructing the history of Kerala in general and of the Malabar region in particular during
the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The hitherto untapped information contained in those
large, dusty bundles of commercial correspondence definitely surpasses, both qualitatively and
quantitatively, the comparatively small number of English and French Company materials on
Malabar during the period under study. I depended mainly on the so-called Overgekomen Brieven en
Papieren (OBP) (Letters and papers received) collection which gives an unbroken account of
developments in Kolathunadu throughout the period under study. In spite of the formal character of
the information provided by the VOC sources and the strong emphasis on commercial details, the
OBP collection offers us valuable insights into the socio-political developments in Kolathunadu.
In addition to these unique VOC sources, due attention should be paid to local sources to
construe a comprehensive and balanced view of the political economy of pre-colonial Kolathunadu.
Although there is nothing of the sort of ‘administrative’ records of the Kolathiris or the Ali Rajas to
counterbalance the information provided by the VOC records, the oral and written sources available
are invaluable for understanding the socio-political system in Kolathunadu in the early modern
period. While the Kolathunadu version of the Keralolpathi (Origin of Kerala) legend gives information
on the Brahmanical perceptions and interpretations of the regional social order, folk sources,
especially the ritual songs (tottams) of the Teyyattam (Dance of God), are also of considerable value
in comprehending and conceptualizing the notion of ‘power’ in Kolathunadu. 6 Thanks to scholars
like M. V. Vishnu Namboodiri, many of these oral traditions are available in published form.
Unfortunately, so far these rich sources have hardly been tapped by historians.

Historiographical antecedents

The first attempt to compile a comprehensive history of Malabar was the result of the British colonial
exigency to understand the local history of the region in order to improve its administrative
performance. 7 William Logan, who was the collector of the British Malabar in the last quarter of the

6 Teyyattam is a ritual performance that is prevalent in the northern part of British Malabar.
7 The term ‘Malabar’ was used by the early Arab travellers to denote the western coast of India, but in later centuries it came
to denote the pepper-producing south-western coast of India which roughly corresponds to the modern Kerala State of the
Indian Union. Under the British colonial administration, only the northern part of Kerala, except for the modern Kasaragod
District, came to be known as Malabar. In this study the term ‘Malabar’ will be used to denote the entire state of Kerala,
because the region was popularly known as ‘Malabar’ during the pre-colonial period.
4 INTRODUCTION

nineteenth century, should be credited with the preliminary attempt to write a comprehensive history
of the region. Though handicapped in many ways, his three-volume Malabar Manual, published in
1879, was the first scholarly attempt to compose a history of this region based on both legendary and
other available source materials. 8 Unfortunately, after this magnum opus, no other serious attempts
were made to study the pre-colonial history of this region for quite a long time. Although the first
half of the twentieth century witnessed further progress in the field of historical research in Kerala,
the focus was mainly on ‘court histories’. 9 K. V. Krishna Ayyar’s The Zamorins of Calicut is a fine
example of this trend, yet it falls short of becoming a history of the region. 10 The growing influence
of the Indian independence movement and the pervasion of Marxist-Socialist ideas in Malabar had
their reflections on Kerala historiography too. Keralam: Malayalikalude Matrubhumi (Keralam: The
Motherland of Malayalees), a Malayalam work written by E. M. S. Nambutirippadu in 1948, was an
endeavour to analyse the history of Kerala from a Marxist perspective. However, his limited access to
source materials compelled him to concentrate more on the history of modern Kerala. O. K.
Nambiar’s, Portuguese Pirates and Indian Seamen (1955), was obviously inspired by the spirit of Indian
nationalism. 11 K. M. Panikkar’s works on both the Portuguese and the Dutch powers in Kerala were
innovative attempts to make use of other European source materials than the usual English ones to

8 William Logan, Malabar, 2 vols. (Madras: Superintendent Government Press, 1951). However, this is not to suggest that
the there was no historiographical tradition in Kerala prior to the British. Composed in the eleventh century, Athula’s
Sanskrit kavya, Mushikavamsam, was an attempt to construct the history of the Mushika royal family of Ezhimala in a
chronological order. Sheikh Zain-ud-Din’s Tuhfat-ul-Mujahidin, which describes the historical developments in Kerala during
the sixteenth century, was another important example of the local historiographical tradition. Various Keralolpathi (Origin of
Kerala) traditions of Kerala can be considered attempts to interpret the history of Kerala from a Brahmanical perspective.
Although Portuguese and Dutch officials and other foreign travellers wrote ‘histories of Malabar’ prior to the British, most
of their works turned out to be observations of contemporary Kerala culture and polity with a brief introduction narrating
the story of either Parasurama or Cheraman Perumal. An important example of this category is Historia do Malavar written
by Diogo Gonçalves. K. Raghavan Pilla (ed.), Mushikavamsam (Malayalam) (Trivandrum: University of Kerala, 1983);
Velayudhan Panikkassery, Keralam Pathinanchum Pathinarum Noottandukalil (Malayalam) (Kottayam: Current Books, 1997); M.
R. Raghava Varier (ed.), Keralolpatti Granthavari; Diogo Gonçalves, Historia do Malavar, ed. Josef Wicki S. I (Münster,
Westfalen : Aschendorff, 1955).
9 This trend was already visible in P. Shungoonny Menon’s A History of Travancore (1878). It was followed by Travancore State
Manual (1906) after the fashion of Malabar Manual of Logan by V. Nagam Aiya and Cochin State Manual (1911) by C. Achyuta
Menon. Another Travancore State Manual was compiled in 1940 by T. K. Velu Pillai. Although ‘state manuals’ attempted to
present the histories of those respective princely states in a broader framework, the analytical framework remained that of
dynastic eulogies. P. Shungoonny Menon, A History of Travancore (First published 1878; repr., Thiruvananthapuram:
Government of Kerala, 1983). V. Nagam Aiya, The Travancore State Manual, 3 vols. (First published 1906; repr.,
Thiruvananthapuram: Government of Kerala, 1999). C. Achyuta Menon, Cochin State Manual (First published 1911; repr.,
Thiruvananthapuram: Government of Kerala, 1995). T. K. Velu Pillai, The Travancore State Manual, 4 vols. (First published
1940; repr., Thiruvananthapuram: Government of Kerala, 1996).
10 K. V. Krishna Ayyar, The Zamorins of Calicut (First published 1938; repr., Calicut: University of Calicut, 1999).
11 Later this work was published under the title ‘The Kunjalis: Admirals of Calicut’. O. K. Nambiar, The Kunjalis: Admirals of
Calicut (London: Asia Publishing House, 1963).
INTRODUCTION 5

construct the pre-colonial history of the region. Panikkar’s studies should be considered as
pioneering works in this field in Kerala historiography. 12 P. K. S. Raja’s Medieval Kerala (1953) was a
unique attempt to write a comprehensive pre-colonial history of the region in a single narrative
framework by using both indigenous and European sources. 13 The formation of a separate state of
Kerala on a linguistic basis in 1956 gave a new impetus to historical research in Kerala. Especially the
works of Elamkulam P. N. Kunjan Pillai made a breakthrough in understanding the pre-colonial
history of the region. 14 His conceptualization of a ‘second Chera Empire’ and the evolution of ‘Janmi
system’ after the twelfth century AD, albeit with various pitfalls, gave a solid conceptual framework
for later historians to expand on. 15
Post-Independent Kerala historiography, in spite of its accomplishments in various fields of
research, still falls short on the study of the early modern period. This is particularly true in the case
of the northern part of Malabar, including Kolathunadu. Except for a few attempts, this region still
remains in the periphery of the early modern historiography of Kerala.
Among the scholarly works dealing with the early modern history of North Malabar, the
monographs of Geneviéve Bouchon and, to an extent, Margaret Frenz deserve special attention.
Bouchon’s ‘Mamale de Cananor: Un Adversaire de L’Inde Portugaise (1507-1528) can be considered the
first major attempt to reconstruct the history of pre-colonial Cannanore based on European source
materials. 16 Bouchon’s expertise in Portuguese archival materials enabled her to throw new light on
the growth of Mappila Muslim Merchant groups as decisive elements in the socio-political life of
Kolathunadu. The monograph gives a well-documented account of Mamale, a grand Muslim
Merchant magnate of Cannanore, also the predecessor of the first Ali Raja of Cannanore.
The monograph of Margaret Frenz, although mainly dealing with the early phase of British
colonialism in the principality of Kottayam in North Malabar, presents the historical developments
there as a significant break from the early modern socio-political matrix in the region. Frenz’s
discussion of the state structure in pre-colonial Kottayam constitutes an attempt to analyse the local
political culture within the general framework of discussions on the nature of state in pre-colonial
South India. 17 Dilip M. Menon’s seminal contribution, ‘Houses by the Sea’, also analyzes the

12 K. M. Panikkar, Malabar and the Dutch (Bombay: Taraporevala, 1931). Id., Malabar and the Portugese: Being a History of the
Relations of the Portuguese with Malabar from 1500 to 1663 (Bombay: Taraporevala, 1929).
13 P. K. S. Raja, Medieval Kerala, 2nd ed. (Calicut: Nava Kerala Cooperative Society, 1966).
14 Some of his important articles have been published in English. Elamkulam P. N. Kunjan Pillai, Studies in Kerala History
(Kottayam: National Book Stall, 1970).
15 M. G. S. Narayanan, later, has modified the conceptualisations of Elamkulam Kunjan Pillai in several aspects, including
those of the Chera ‘empire’ concept and the ‘hundred year war’. Narayanan, Perumals of Kerala.
16 Oxford University Press has published an English translation of this book in 1988. Geneviéve Bouchon, Regent of the Sea:
Cannanore’s Response to Portuguese Expansion 1507-1528 (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1988).
17 Margaret Frenz, From Contact to Conquest: Transition to British rule in Malabar, 1790-1805 (New Delhi: Oxford University
Press, 2003).
6 INTRODUCTION

character of the ‘state’ in pre-colonial Malabar. 18 Chirakkal T. Balakrishnan’s Malayalam work


Teranjedutta Prabandangal and M. P. Kumaran’s Kolathupazhama throw light on some specific issues
pertaining mainly to the pre-colonial history of this region. However, neither of them proposed a
broader analytical structure for understanding the history of the Kolathunadu region. 19
The Islamic community in Kolathunadu has also received some attention from scholars. The Ali
Rajas of Cannanore, written by K. K. N. Kurup, is particularly important among those works dealing
with the history of the regional Islamic communities. 20 Yet, this short monograph describing the long
history of the Ali Rajas, rarely uses documents dating from the pre-colonial period and hardly takes
into consideration the wider aspect of socio-political changes in the region. The article by Ruchira
Banerjee, ‘A Wedding Feast or Political Arena?: Commercial Rivalry between the Ali Rajas and the
English Factory in Northern Malabar in the 18th Century’ provides interesting information on the
political interactions of the Ali Rajas of Cannanore in the latter half of the eighteenth century. 21
Roland E. Miller’s Mappila Muslims of Kerala: A Study in Islamic Trends looks at the history of this
community in Kerala during the colonial period. 22 Stephen Frederic Dale’s attempt to write the
history of this people also falls in the same category. 23 Against Lord and State: Religion and Peasant
Uprisings in Malabar (1836-1921)—an excellent study on the Mappila peasant resistance to the colonial
regime by K. N. Panikkar— concentrates on a later period. 24 All these three scholars have chosen the
Mappila peasantry in the paddy-growing wet-land in South Malabar as their main subject matter of
study, but overlook the case of the Mappila trading communities.
The works dealing with the ‘Dutch period’ in Kerala history, also contribute to an understanding
of early modern Kerala history, but do not go beyond the recital of the political narrative. Such
monographs as The Dutch Power in Kerala by M. O. Koshy, 25 The Dutch in Malabar by P. C Alexander 26
and Malabar and the Dutch by K. M. Panikkar, 27 give descriptive accounts of the political
developments in Kerala during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The two books by T. I.

18 Dilip M. Menon, ‘Houses by the Sea: State Experimentation on the Southwest Coast of India-1760-1800’, in Neera
Chandhoke (ed.), Mapping Histories: Essays presented to Ravinder Kumar (New Delhi: Tulika, 2000), 161-86.
19 Chirakkal T. Balakrishnan Nair, Theranjedutha Prabandhangal (Malayalam) (Thrissur: Kerala Sahitya Academi, 1996). M. P.
Kumaran, Kolathupazhama (Malayalam) (Thrissur: Kerala Sahitya Academi, 1998).
20 K. K. N. Kurup, The Ali Rajas of Cannanore (Trivandrum: College Book House, 1975).
21 Ruchira Banerjee, ‘A Wedding Feast of Political Arena?: Commercial Rivalry between the Ali Rajas and the English
Factory in North Malabar in the 18th Century’, in Rudrangshu Mukherjee and Lakshmi Subramanian (eds.), Politics and Trade
in the Indian Ocean World: Essays in Honour of Ashin Das Gupta (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1998), 83-112.
22 Roland E. Miller, Mappila Muslims of Kerala: A Study in Islamic Trends (Madras: Orient Longman, 1976).
23 Stephen Frederic Dale, Islamic Society on the South Asian Frontier: The Mappilas of Malabar, 1498-1922 (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 1980).
24 K. N. Panikkar, Against Lord and State: Religion and Peasant Uprisings in Malabar, 1836-1921 (Delhi: Oxford University Press,
1989).
25 M. O. Koshy, The Dutch Power in Kerala, 1729-1758, (New Delhi: Mittal Publications, 1989).
26 P. C. Alexander, The Dutch in Malabar (Annamalai Nagar: Annamalai University, 1946).
27 Panikkar, Malabar and the Dutch.
INTRODUCTION 7

Poonen; A Survey of the Rise of the Dutch Power in Malabar (1603-78) 28 and Dutch Hegemony in Malabar and
its Collapse (1663-1795) also deal with the political history of Cannanore as a part of this broader
narrative. 29 M. A. P. Roelofsz’s early work, De Vestiging der Nederlanders ter Kuste Malabar, gives a
detailed description of the early relationship between the Dutch East India Company and the Kerala
Coast and explains how the VOC gradually developed an interest in Malabar affairs. 30 The more
recent monographs by Hugo K. s’ Jacob on Cochin and Mark de Lannoy on Travancore give an in-
depth insight into the complex character of political formations in the central and southern parts of
Kerala during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. 31

Analytical framework

Among various scholarly works dealing with the Mappila Muslims of Kerala, in South India, Dale’s
monograph deserves to be paid particular attention on account of its attempt to locate and analyse this
regional Islamic community within the broader pan-Islamic framework of Asia. 32 In a sweeping
endeavour to summarize the dynamic history of the Mappilas from the sixteenth century to the second
half of the twentieth century in a thematic narrative framework, Dale insists on the existence of
Mappilas as a ‘frontier’ people, situated on the fringe of the local ‘Hindu’ social order throughout this
period. His argument is that Islamic ideology perpetuated a distinct socio-political identity which
invariably put the Mappilas in the position of a distinctive ‘religious community’ opposed to the
‘Christian’ Europeans and the ‘Hindu’ locals. He adduces ‘religiously defined militancy’ as one of the
characteristic features of the Mappilas, initiated by the Portuguese atrocities committed in the latter’s
ruthless attempts to control the spice trade in the region and perpetuated by the subsequent European
commercial competition in the region. Consequently, he perceives the Mappila rebellions of the
nineteenth and twentieth centuries merely as the culmination of events which commenced in the
sixteenth century, regardless of the political and economic changes which have occurred in the region,
especially after the establishment of the colonial rule. In a nutshell, he attempts to comprehend such
developments as a sort of ‘clash of civilizations’. 33 In line with this somewhat anachronistic perspective,

28 T. I. Poonen, A Survey of the Rise of the Dutch Power in Malabar, 1603-78 (Trichnopoly: St. Joseph’s Industrial School Press,
1948).
29 T. I. Poonen, Dutch Hegemony in Malabar and its Collapse, 1663-1795 (Trivandrum: University of Kerala, 1978).
30 M. A. P. Roelofsz, De Vestiging der Nederlanders ter Kuste Malabar (’s-Gravenhage: Martinus Nijhoff, 1943).
31 Hugo K. s’Jacob, The Rajas of Cochin: Kings, Chiefs and the Dutch East India Company, 1663-1720 (New Delhi: Munshiram
Manoharlal, 2000). Mark Erik Jan de Lannoy, The Kulasekhara Perumals of Travancore: History and State Formation in Travancore
from 1671 to 1758 (Leiden: Research School CNWS, 1997).
32 Dale, Islamic Society on the South Asian Frontier.
33 The interpretation of ‘Hindu’ and ‘Muslim’ societies as distinct ‘civilizations’ in the Indian Sub-Continent still exerts a
definite grip on scholars. For a recent discussion of such a view see, Andre Wink, Perspectives on the Indo-Islamic World: The
Second Annual Levtzion Lecture (Jerusalem: The Nehemia Levtzion Center for Islamic Studies, 2007). Also see, J. F. Richards,
‘The Islamic Frontier in the East: Expansion into South Asia’, South Asia, 4 (October, 1974), 91-109. Likewise, Theodore
8 INTRODUCTION

other scholars have often one-sidedly stressed the importance of a particular ‘Hindu’ form of ritual
kingship as informed by the Brahmin textual tradition. Too often, this all-Indian perspective has been
rather uncritically applied to South India in general and to Kerala in particular.
Considering the weak presence of Brahmins in Kolathunadu, the present study seeks to highlight a
more regional perspective that nuances what seem to be highly essentializing approaches which
exclusively stress the 'great traditions' of both Islam and Brahmanism. I shall not dismiss these voices
for the pre-colonial period, but merely intend to restore the neglected and also often far more
important regional agencies of the important phenomenon of royal power. As such, the present study
has drown much inspiration from comparable, ‘autonomous’ histories of Southeast Asia which have
also successfully challenged such ‘greater’ Indian and/or Islamic viewpoints. Hence, it is my contention
that any study of Islamic communities without a concomitant analysis of their regional context will
offer only a flawed historical view of Islamic communities in South India. 34 It is from this
emphatically regional point of view that I propose to analyse the political status and social identity of
the Mappila Muslim trading community in pre-colonial Cannanore.
In this monograph I intend to make, with the help of new, so far neglected sources, an additional
contribution to the already available body of knowledge about the Mappila Muslim trading community
in the pre-colonial Kerala. Instead of following a simple chronological analysis, a thematic approach has
been adopted. The work is divided into three main parts. In the first part an attempt will be made to
analyse the formation of a distinct socio-political structure in Kolathunadu by giving due attention to
the geographical setting (Chapter One). This provides the proper regional context in which we should
understand the emergence and the operations of the Arackal Ali Rajas (Chapter Two). Having
established the crucial importance of maritime trade, the following section (Chapters Three, Four and
Five) examines the history of the most prominent rival maritime trading groups in Cannanore: the
Mappila traders of Cannanore under the Arackal Ali Rajas and the Dutch East India Company. The last
section (Chapters Six and Seven) demonstrates in more historical detail how both the regional
conditions and extra-regional trade relationships affected the destinies of the various political co-
sharers of the Kolathunadu realm. In the concluding chapter, a balance of my research findings will be
presented.

Gabriel’s monograph on the Mappila Muslims of Malabar reiterates the argument that there has been an essential tension
between the Muslims and Hindus in Malabar running along communal lines ever since the sixteenth century. Theodore
Gabriel, Hindu-Muslim Relations in North Malabar, 1498-1947 (New York: The Edwin Mellen Press, 1996).
34 In South Asian studies also, scholars now tend to stress the ‘syncretic’ aspect of Islam. Among them Susan Bayly’s works
are particularly notable. Susan Bayly, Saints, Goddesses and Kings: Muslims and Christians in South Indian Society, 1700-1900
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989). This is also stressed by Richard M. Eaton. Richard M. Eaton (ed.), India’s
Islamic Traditions, 711-1750 (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2003), 1-34. Also see, Ronald B. Inden, Imagining India
(Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1990).

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