The Indian Ocean - Michael Pearson [42]
Much of this data confirms the centrality of India in the whole trading system. In these centuries either side of the beginning of the Common Era the rise of centralised states in north India fostered trade, as also did the important Buddhist sangha, which provided a certain identity and cohesiveness for trading groups. We are assuming that there is a connection between centralised states and an increase in trade, the notion being that large states produce more demand for the luxuries which were, given constraints of technology, the main items which it was cost effective to carry over long distances.
The role of fisherfolk as pilots in the Gulf of Cambay may point to some direct state involvement in oceanic trade. In the case of the Tamil country, in southeast India, in the early historical period, from 300 BCE to 300 CE, cities were located on the coast, and were closely connected with overseas trade. When trade declined so did these port cities. The rulers of the time promoted this trade: they themselves were consumers of luxury goods, they developed ports and collected tolls and customs at them.30 So also Kautilya's famous Arthasastra, while concentrating its prescriptions relating to water matters mostly to the conduct of river passages – fords and ferries and such like – also shows a very substantial state interest in arranging to provide assistance to those in distress at sea, along with the collection of customs duties.31 True that this normative account may have little connection with actual practice, yet at the least this and other Hindu texts, such as the Laws of Manu and the various Sastras, show a state awareness of maritime matters in India.
Apart from trade with the Gulf and the Red Sea, there were other connections across the western Indian Ocean. From very early on Sri Lanka acted as a hinge between the western and eastern oceans, as indeed one would expect given its location. On the other side, Ethiopia and India had contacts before the beginning of the Common Era. The first hard evidence comes from the Periplus, which also found Indian traders in Socotra, some of them permanently settled. Arabs also traded and settled on this island, and it is revealing that its name comes from Sanskrit.32
Further down the East African coast, we have described local maritime connections from very early on. By around the last century before the Common Era this local trade was integrated, to an extent, into the wider Indian Ocean world. This integration spread from north to south, that is starting in Somalia and incrementally spreading right down the coast. The focus of this trade was with the Red Sea, and while proto-Swahili people acted as mediators and collectors of goods in the embryonic port cities of the coast, the actual trade was handled by Arabs. Again then, if we look at Arab activity we get a useful corrective to the older notion of 'Roman' domination. Arabs traded extensively over the whole western ocean long before Islam, as indeed the Periplus noted. The author wrote, 'The Arab kings sent thither [to East Africa] many large ships, with Arab captains and agents. These are familiar with the inhabitants, and both dwell and intermarry with them; they know all their villages and speak their languages.'33
What products attracted traders to the Swahili coast? It seems that ivory was always important, finding ready markets in India and China. Trade in wood for Arabia probably also goes back far into history. In certain later times slaves for the Middle East were a major export, but this trade seems to have become important only around the eighth century when the Muslim empire centred on Baghdad needed them to drain the Tigris-Euphrates marshes. Roman pots have been found on Zanzibar island, dating from around the fifth century CE, though they were almost certainly carried not by Romans but by Persians. Other finds on the island confirm an extensive trade, with goods originating in India, China and the Middle East.34
In the third to