The British East India Company

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I suppose the majority of us have heard of the British East India Company before, but did you know that it was originally called 'Governor and Company of Merchants of London Trading into the East Indies'? That's quite a name, isn't it? Apparently the term British East India Company wouldn't have been formal enough for the Royal Charter in 1600. So now that we have learnt about this significant name we can ask ourselves what precisely the British East India Company was for. What exactly did they trade into the East Indies? As we can already guess due to its name, the company was owned by some London businessmen who specialised in importing goods from South Asia. One of the most interesting facts about the company is that it was supposed to pursue trade with the East Indies but somehow ended up mainly trading with the Indian subcontinent and Qing China. The British East India Company mainly traded with cotton, silk, salt, saltpetre, tea and opium. However, the first thing they imported were spices.

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Nowadays it is said that the company kind of formed the beginnings of the British Empire in India. The company received a Royal Charter by Queen Elizabeth I which made it to one of the most important European East India Companies. Of course those other European companies turned out as competitors, which is why the British East India Company eventually had to assemble its own military and administrative departments. The company was successful for quite a long time, it was very popular and one of the main importers of goods from different countries. However, there were some incidents, like for example the Indian Mutinity in 1857, which led to the fact that the company went out of existence in 1873.



http://www.victorianweb.org/history/empire/india/eic.html