There Were Several
Small Ports In Limurike Frequented By The Country Ships; But The Only Mart
Frequented By Vessels From Egypt Was Musiris:
It was likewise a great
resort of native vessels from Ariake or Concan.
The articles imported were
nearly the same as those at Baragaza, but the exports from it were more
numerous and valuable: this seems to have arisen from its lying nearer to
the eastern and richer parts of India. The principal exports were, pearls
in great abundance and extraordinary beauty; a variety of silk stuffs; rich
perfumes; tortoise-shell; different kinds of transparent gems, especially
diamonds; and pepper in large quantites, and of the best quality.
The port of Nelkundah, which, as we have already remarked, was the limit of
our author's personal knowledge, was a place of very great trade; it was
much frequented, principally on account of the betel and pepper, which were
procured there on very reasonable terms: the pepper is distinguished, in
the list of its imports, as the pepper of Cottonara. Besides this article
and betel, the only exports were, pearls, ivory, silks, spikenard, precious
stones, and tortoise-shell; the imports were chiefly specie, topazes,
cloth, stibium, coral, glass, brass, tin, lead, wine, corn, &c.
The ports to the south of Nelkundah are described in a cursory manner in
the Periplus; they were frequented principally by the country ships, which
carried on a lucrative trade between them and the ports in the north of
India. The exports of the island of Trapobane, or Ceylon, are
particularized as consisting chiefly of pearls, gems, tortoise-shells, and
muslins: cinnamon is not named; an almost decisive proof, if other proof
were wanting, that the author of the Periplus had never visited this
island. That trading voyages were carried on by the natives from the
southern ports of India, not only to the northern ports of the western side
of that country, but also to the eastern ports in the Bay of Bengal, and to
the farther peninsula itself, we are expressly informed, as our author
mentions vessels of great bulk adapted to the voyages made to the Ganges
and the Golden Chersonese, in contradistinction to other and smaller
vessels employed in the voyages to Limurike.
Of the remainder of the Periplus little notice is requisite, the account of
the countries beyond Cape Comorin being entirely drawn from report, and
consequently erroneous, both in respect to geography and commerce. In some
particulars regarding the latter, however, it is surprisingly accurate: the
Gangetic muslins are praised as the finest manufacture of the sort, and
Gangetic spikenard is also noticed; the other articles of traffic in the
ports on the Ganges were betel and pearls. Thina is also mentioned as a
city, in the interior of a country immediately under the north, at a
certain point where the sea terminates; from this city both the raw
material and manufactured silks are brought by land through Bactria to
Baragaza, or else down the Ganges, and thence by sea to Limurike: the
routes we have already described. The means of approach to Thina are
represented as very difficult; some merchants, however, came from it to a
great mart which is annually held near it. The Sesatoe, who from the
description of them are evidently Tartars, frequent this mart with their
wives and children. "They are squat and thick-set, with their face broad
and their nose greatly depressed. The articles they bring for trade are of
great bulk, and inveloped in mats made of rushes, which, in their outward
appearance, resemble the early leaves of the vine. Their place of assembly
is between their own borders and those of China; and here spreading out
their mats, they hold a fair for several days, and at the conclusion of it,
return to their own country in the interior. Upon their retreat the Thinae,
who have continued on the watch, repair to the spot and collect the mats
which the strangers left behind at their departure; from these they pick
out the haulm, and drawing out the fibres, spread the leaves double, and
make them into balls, and then pass the fibres through them. Of these balls
there are three sorts, in this form they take the name of Malabathrum."
On this account Dr. Vincent very justly remarks, that we have here, upon
the whole, a description of that mode of traffic, which has always been
adopted by the Chinese, and by which they to this hour trade with Russia,
Thibet, and Ava.
Many of the particulars which we have given on the subject of the Roman
trade are supplied by Pliny, who wrote his natural history when Rome was in
its most flourishing state under the reign of Vespasian. His works consist
of thirty-seven books, the first six comprise the system of the world and
the geography as it was then known. After examining the accounts of
Polybius, Agrippa, and Artemidorus, he assigns the following comparative
magnitudes to the three great divisions of the earth. Europe rather more
than a third, Asia about a fourth, and Africa about a fifth of the whole.
With few exceptions, his geographical knowledge of the east and of the
north, the parts of the world of which the ancients were the most ignorant,
was very inaccurate: he supposes the Ganges to be the north-eastern limit
of Asia, and that from it the coast turned to the north, where it was
washed by the sea of Serica, between which and a strait, which he imagined
formed a communication from the Caspian to the Scythian ocean, he admits
but a very small space. According to the system of Pliny, therefore, the
ocean occupied the whole county of Siberia, Mogul Tartary, China, &c. He
derived his information respecting India from the journals of Nearchus, and
the other officers of Alexander; and yet such is his ignorance, or the
corrupt state of the text, or the vitiated medium through which he received
his information, that it is not easy to reconcile his account with that of
Nearchus.
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