Bernier and the 'degenerate' East

Bernier presented India as the opposite of Europe, and as inferior to it: a 'binary opposition', in which Europe was everything good and India the reverse.

His main argument: in India, the crown (the emperor) owned all the land. So landowners could not pass land to their children, and had no interest in improving it. The result, he said, was ruined agriculture, oppressed peasants, and a society with only rich rulers and poor masses, 'no middle state'.

But Mughal official documents never claimed that the state owned all land. Abu'l Fazl, the court historian of Akbar, described land revenue as 'remunerations of sovereignty': a claim by the ruler on his subjects for the protection he provided, not rent paid to an owner.

Bernier's view was very influential in Europe. The French philosopher Montesquieu used it to develop the idea of 'oriental despotism', and later Karl Marx built on it his idea of the 'Asiatic mode of production'.

Yet Bernier's own account shows a more complex picture: he admitted that Bengal was fertile, that crafts flourished, and that gold and silver flowed into India in exchange for its goods. He called Mughal cities 'camp towns', dependent on the court; but about 15 per cent of people lived in towns, more than in Western Europe then. His account was really a warning for Europe, dressed up as a description of India.