Abstract
‘We are fish’ declared Lord Salisbury in 1888, and much of the history of nineteenth century Britain is conveyed in this memorable phrase. The navy in particular and the maritime world more generally were an integral part of British imperial dominance in the Victorian era. The navy secured the pax Britannica of trade and diplomacy, whilst British domination of the world’s shipping lanes created an international traffic in people, goods, flora and fauna, and all the many phenomena that made up an overseas British world of culture. Yet the watery metaphor also points to some of the anxieties which surrounded Britain’s status as a maritime empire in the nineteenth century - the fate of other seaborne empires, the xenophobia and vulnerability of an island nation on the edge of a continent which at times represented an armed camp, and the ever-escalating arms race as other predatory powers sought to catch up. Not since the Wiles lectures of Gerald Graham in 1964, has there been a single volume which attempts to chart the story of the maritime context of the British Empire in the Victorian years.1 Despite the significance attributed to the navy and sea-power by influential synoptic surveys of British imperialism — notably those of Christopher Bayly, Niall Ferguson and Paul Kennedy — it is true to say that it has been the naval warfare of the eighteenth and twentieth centuries which has attracted most attention.2
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© 2013 Miles Taylor
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Taylor, M. (2013). Introduction. In: Taylor, M. (eds) The Victorian Empire and Britain’s Maritime World, 1837–1901. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137312662_1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137312662_1
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