Part of the "Connections: Key Themes in World History "series, "The Globe Encompassed "combines the most recent secondary work in the field with the author's own personal archival work to present a updated synthesis of the topic. "The Globe Encompassed" lays out in clear narrative form a series of connected stories that simultaneously instruct and fascinate the reader. Beyond that, the author-guide provides carefully chosen excerpts from primary sources that enable the reader to enter the mindsets of such notable personalities (and driving forces in Europe's profound impact on the early modern world) as Vasco da Gama, Hernan Cortes, and Samuel de Champlain, and to see first-hand such widely separated and profoundly different colonial enterprises as Dutch-held Batavia (Jakarta) and Puritan New England. In so doing, Ames allows the reader to encompass the globe as it existed between 1500 and 1700.

This examination of French trade with Asia analyzes France's attempt to establish a mercantile empire in the East by breaking into the lucrative market of the Indian Ocean. Between 1664 and 1674, France advanced a vigorous strategy of commerce and colonization. It founded the powerful East India Company and constructed a large royal fleet as the principal instrument for entrenching French power in Asia. Drawing on archival sources, Ames offers a new interpretation of France's mercantilism in the context of the rise of the world market economy of the early modern period. This study sheds new light on the reign of Louis XIV, the mercantilist theories of Colbert, the origins of the Dutch War, and the Asian trading empires of the French, Dutch, English, and Portuguese during the late seventeenth century.  

This revisionist examination of French trade with Asia analyzes the concerted attempt of France under Louis XIV to establish a mercantile empire in the East by breaking into the lucrative market of the Indian Ocean. Drawing on archival sources from Paris, Lisbon, London, The Hague, and Goa, Ames offers a new interpretation of Bourbon France's mercantilism in the context of the rise of the world market economy of the early modern period. In addition to illuminating the politics behind Colbert's establishment of the East India Company and his creation of the royal fleet, Ames details France's efforts to reach an alliance with the English and Portuguese and the eventual failure of this enterprise. He further analyzes the significance of such a setback for French political and economic aspirations in Asia for the remainder of the seventeenth century. Evidence presented in this study sheds new light on the reign of Louis XIV, the mercantilist theories of Colbert, the origins of the Dutch War, and the Asian trading empires of the French, Dutch, English, and Portuguese during the late seventeenth century.