The Erotics of Mercantile Imperialism: Cross-Cultural Requitedness in the Early Modern Period

This article explores the early modern vogue for intermarriage narratives, arguing that cross-cultural unions served as both a crucial instrument of and a privileged metaphor for European imperialism. Adapting medieval precedents to the exigencies of colonial governance and mercantile penetration, plots of interracial requitedness exorcized the specter of European “degeneration” abroad and legitimized the subordination of countries from which enormous profits could be extracted. At the same time, these popular narratives bolstered a regime of domestic heterosexuality that increasingly confined eroticism within the bounds of marriage. With their exotic backdrops and amorous exploits, they celebrated heteropatriarchy while racializing practices and behaviors that Europe was progressively marginalizing. In this manner, the interracial romances of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries discriminated not just between Europeans and non-Europeans, but also among members of each group—thereby problematizing facile dichotomies of difference and identity.