Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2022

DOI

10.1017/S0026749X22000178

Publication Title

Modern Asian Studies

Volume

57

Issue

2

Pages

458-486

Abstract

This article examines the durable, yet largely overlooked, claims of Bahu Begam (1727–1815) to dynastic wealth and authority in the Awadh nawabi (1722–1856), a North Indian Mughal ‘successor state’ and an important client of the East India Company. Chief consort (khass mahal) to Nawab Shuja-ud-Daula (r. 1754–75) and mother to his successor Nawab Asaf-ud-Daula (r. 1775–97), Bahu Begam played a well-documented role in the regime’s tumultuous politics, particularly during Warren Hastings’s tenure as the Company’s governor-general (1773–85) and his later parliamentary impeachment. But despite her prominent political influence, little attention has been paid to the substance of her persistent claims to proprietorship over revenue rights and the immense fortune in her custody, as well as her broader assertions of authority over Awadh’s male rulers. Taking those claims seriously, this article contends that the begam rooted her arguments in notions of natural deference to maternal authority and generational seniority, evolving dynastic traditions of co-sharing sovereignty and fiscal resources, and her particular history as a principal financier of the Awadh regime. In so doing, the article argues that the begam’s claims reflect the shifting conceptual language of late-Mughal Persianate political discourse and the ambivalent position of elite women as dynastic financiers and state-builders in early colonial South Asia.

Rights

© The Author, 2022.

This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) License, which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution and reproduction, provided the original article is properly cited.

ORCID

0000-0003-1466-0352 (Abbott)

Original Publication Citation

Abbott, N. J. (2023). ‘It all comes from me’: Bahu Begam and the making of the Awadh nawabi, circa 1765–1815. Modern Asian Studies, 57(2), 458-486. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0026749X22000178

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