This thesis examines a series of episodes in the history of indirect rule that resulted in rulers being deposed or otherwise removed from power. It does so from the conviction that such episodes provide a valuable opportunity to explore the conceptions of princely character held and articulated by British officials, and to assess to what extent such conceptions informed British expectations of the princes, and thus shaped the daily and local practice of indirect rule in colonial India. The study is intended to contribute to the growing body of work on the history of the princely states, a subject that until recently was considered marginal to understanding colonial South Asia, but whose importance is increasingly being recognised. Its geographical focus – the states of the Central India Agency – attempts to redress the comparative neglect of this region to date; it also seeks to achieve a balance between the relative merits and shortcomings of single-state and 'all-India' studies, by allowing for intensive analysis of an interconnected group of rulers and officials, whilst maintaining a sufficiently diverse sample of situations and individuals to enable broader conclusions to be suggested. Moreover, the approach adopted firmly locates this thesis within the emerging study of the cultural history of empire: the rulers of the princely states occupied a position within the colonial hierarchies of class, race and gender that was uniquely liminal within India and rare elsewhere. They failed to fit neatly any of the pre-ordained categories of colonial society – and consequently had the potential to disrupt the conventions of deference, distance and difference on which such a society was based. Analysis of how the British attempted to characterise the princes, therefore, should complement existing analyses of the operation of such important concepts as race, masculinity, sexuality, sanity, class and tradition in colonial India. This study argues that British ideas and ideals of princely character were neither fixed nor hegemonic: conflict over the meaning and significance of a ruler's conduct regularly arose between the many levels of the imperial bureaucracy. There was not a single, consistent and explicitly defined normative discourse of princely conduct: officials' expectations of rulers shifted over time in response to the changing outlook and interests of the British in India, as well as varying across the significant differences of faith, race, region and status that they perceived to divide the princely order. Furthermore, rulers themselves – whether through negotiation, evasion or contestation – played a significant role in the constant redefinition of such ideas. However, British officials' conceptions and representations of princely character were not wholly constitutive of their power over the princes and their states. Although assessments of a ruler's character as inadequate, even incurably deviant, could be advanced as justification for intervening in a state, the impact of such ideas upon the actual practice of indirect rule was substantially qualified by an array of other considerations. Orientalist conceptions of princely character may have been highly influential in shaping the conduct of 'political relations', but they were often ignored or abandoned by officials when the dividends of a more pragmatic approach to the princes were thought to be higher.

Univ., Diss.--Regensburg, 1997. / Literaturverz. S. 180 - 191.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 1999. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 205-210). Available also in a digital version from Dissertation Abstracts.

Thesis (doctoral)--Stockholms universitet, 1999. / Added t.p. with thesis statement inserted. Discusses Erikskrönikan, Dikten om kung Albrekt, and Bishop Thomas' Frihetsvisan. Includes bibliographical references (p. 264-276).

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 2003. / Typescript. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 132-136). Also available on the Internet.

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 2003. / Typescript. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 132-136). Also available on the Internet.

The thesis sets out to examine the interaction between the British royal family and its 'public' in the period between the Hanoverian succession and the recovery of George in from 'insanity' in 1789. Throughout, emphasis is given to the reception of royal activity by the press, who circulated information around the kingdom. It argues that the emergence of the domestic, popular monarchy in the middle of the reign of George III was the result of longterm considerations which arose from the activities of earlier generations of eighteenthcentury royalty, and were further developed by George III and his siblings. The growth of the royal family, and the physical and social limitations of the eighteenth-century court, led to its members finding avenues for self-expression outside the court and consequently to the expansion of the public sphere of the royal family. The subject is approached through six chapters: the move from traditional - usually sacerdotal - manifestations of royal benevolence, to sponsorship of voluntary hospitals and similar charities; accession and coronation celebrations during the century; royal public appearances in general, including the theatre and the masquerade, as well as visits to the provinces; the royal residences; royal support for scientific endeavour; and the legacy of the seventeenth century on eighteenth-century royalty, including portraiture and the family's martial connections, and the appearance or absence of mythologized seventeenth-century images in relation to the Thanksgiving of 1789. The thesis is intended to complement recent work on the emergence of national consciousness in Britain in the eighteenth century, as well as on royalty itself. It attempts to identify some of the questions concerning the place the royal family had in the society of eighteenth-century Britain, how its public image reflected that context, and how this helped the monarchy to survive as a stronger institution.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Baylor University, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 205-219).

Originally presented as the author's thesis (doctoral)--Universität, Konstanz, 2007. / Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (doctoral)--Stockholms universitet, 1999. / Added t.p. with thesis statement inserted. Discusses Erikskrönikan, Dikten om kung Albrekt, and Bishop Thomas' Frihetsvisan. Includes bibliographical references (p. 264-276).