| Publication |
2013.
|
| Summary/Abstract |
In 1861, Nawab Sikandar Begum, the female ruler of Bhopal, toured Northern India for six months. The journey and its narration in the Taj al-iqbal (1873) were part of a broader project of princely self-fashioning aimed at both indigenous and British audiences. Taking the example of the Begums of Bhopal, this article engages with debates about travel and its relevance to the emergence of a nationalist imaginary, but also of its continuity with alternative visions in the latter half of the nineteenth century. The paper draws upon the insights of revisionist literature on princely states, which stress that princes at the mercy of British power nevertheless remained figures of indigenous authority, retaining a precarious autonomy in their territories. The Begums of Bhopal were able to turn their status as 'loyalists' towards consolidating a 'Mughal' aesthetic by recruiting artists, scholars and poets to underscore the state's autonomy.
|