COMMERCIAL RELATIONS IN THE MIDDLE EAST 27
employed to guard the jobs of the fort of Madura”. [1] Numismatic evidences also bear out the intimate commercial relations between India and Rome.
(Half page of the M.S. is left blank—ed.)
This intimate commercial intercourse between Rome and India is very readily accounted for by the fact that “from the time of Mark Antony to the time of Justinian i.e. from B. C. 30 to A. D. 550, their political importance as allies against the Parthians and Sassanians, and their commercial importance as controllers of one of the main trade routes between the east and the west, made the friendship of the Kusans or Sakas, who held the Indus Valley and Bactria, a matter of highest importance to Rome” [2]
With this short sketch of the trade relations of India with foreign countries we will now consider the articles of commerce and trade routes and the important ports of India.
The Periplus, Ptolemy’s Geography and the Christain Topography are the chief sources that furnish with information on the articles of commerce and the ports of India.
The Periplus mentions the following as articles of export:
(1) Spikenard, (2) Cortus, (3) Bdellium, (4) Ivory, (5) Qugate,
(6) Lycirem, (7) Cotton cloth of all kinds, (8) Silk cloth, (9) Mallow-cloth, (10) Yarn, (11) Long pepper, (12) Diamonds, (13) Sapphiris, (14) Tortoise shell, (15) Transperent stones of all kinds, (16) Pearls, . (17) Malabathrum,(18) Incense, (19) Indigo.
Under imports it mentions: (1) Wine,(2) Copper,(3) Tin,(4) Lead, (5) Coral, (6) Thin clothing and Inferior sorts of all kinds,
(7) Sweet clover, (8) Flint and crude glass, (9) Antimony, (10) Gold and Silver coins accruing from the favourable balance of trade.
The Periplus or the marine guide book to the Indian ocean mentions the following trading ports of India :
(1) Barygaza or the modern Baroach the principle trading centre of western India. It mentions two inland towns connected with Baroach, Paithan and Tagara.
(2) Souppara—modern Supara near Bassein.
(3) Kalliean—the present Kalyan.
(4) Semulla—presumably modern Chembur.
1 Quoted Ibid, p. 128.
- Quoted in Mukerjee—“ Indian Shpping ” , p. 139.