Prof. dr. Jos J.L. Gommans (1963) a historian with expertise on the early modern history of South Asia in its global interactions with the outside world of Central Asia, Southeast Asia and the European colonial empires. He studied history in Nijmegen and Leiden. Since July 2011 Gommans occupies the Chair of Colonial and Global History at Leiden University. He publishes primarily on the medieval and early-modern history of South Asia, global intellectual history and Dutch colonial history.
Grants and awards
Throughout the years Gommans supervised major academic projects. From 2011-2016 he was co-leader of the NWO-G Horizon Project on “Eurasian Empires: Integration Processes and Identity Formation”. Since 2012, he is the director of the “Cosmopolis Programme” which offers intensive academic training to (mainly Asian) historians who study the rich Dutch archives on Asia (and Africa). In 2022, he initiated a regional extension of that programme called “Cosmos Malabaricus” which focuses more specifically on to the early modern history of Kerala.
Major publications
The Rise of the Indo-Afghan Empire 1710-1780 (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1994) Reprint Pbk: (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1999).
Mughal Warfare: Indian Frontiers and Highroads to Empire 1500-1700 (London: Routledge, 2002). Hbk, Pbk, E-book.
Edited with Harriet Zurndorfer, Roots and Routes of Development in China and India: Highlights of Fifty Years of The Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient (1957-2007) (Leiden: Brill Academic Publishers, 2008).
The Unseen World: India and the Netherlands from 1550 (Amsterdam: Rijksmuseum and VanTilt, 2018).
The Indian Frontier: Horse and Warband in the Making of Empires (Delhi: Manohar Publishers, 2018).
The Dutch Overseas Empire, 1600–1800 (Cambridge University Press, 2020)
The Dutch Overseas Empire, 1600–1800 (Cambridge University Press, 2020)