While the influence of the French East India Company is largely remembered as associated with localised zones of influence in Pondicherry, and sometimes Chandernagore, the enormous importance of the global Anglo-French wars of the 18th century is mostly forgotten, as is the continued presence of French soldiers, adventurers, architects and engineers in crucial areas such as in Awadh and Mysore. At our Online Talk #TheFrenchConnection, author Ira Mukhoty tries to untangle some of the complicated threads that tied this cosmopolitan society together, and the crucial yet forgotten French influence on architecture and art in Awadh and Mysore. About the speaker: Living in one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world, Ira Mukhoty developed an interest in the evolution of mythology and history, and the erasure of women and other marginal voices from these histories. She writes rigorously researched narrative histories that are accessible to the lay reader. She is the bestselling author of Akbar: The Great Mughal, Song of Draupadi: A Novel, Daughters of the Sun: Empresses, Queens and Begums of the Mughal Empire and Heroines: Powerful Indian Women in Myth and History. Her latest book, The Lion and the Lily, examines the rise and fall of Awadh in the context of the global Franco-British wars.