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ON THE
ANCIENT COMMERCE OF INDIA,
|-| F
37%.<>
Oeº-
M A D R A S :
PRINTED BY R. HILL, AT THE GOVERNMENT PRESS.
Óm fºr
3mtitní (ſummtrſt of Śmia.
A LECTURE DELIVERED
BY . . /
…?
2.9eº"
GUSTAV QPPERT, Ph.D.,
*
PROFESSOR OF SANSKRIT, PRESIDENCY COLLEGE, MADRAg.

I
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MADRAS : MESSRS. HIGGINBOTHAM & CO.
LONDON : MESSRS. TRüBNER & CO.
tºmºmºmº
1879.
[All rights reserved. I
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T we
"31–1425–

P R E F A C E.
THE Lecture on the Ancient Commerce of India was
delivered two years ago at the Government Central
Museum in Madras. It has been printed at the
desire of friends. It does not claim originality so
far as facts are concerned, but it aims at containing
in a small compass the most important points
connected with the ancient Indian trade, in a manner
in which they have not been collected before. The
lecture is printed as it was delivered.
GUSTAV OPPERT,
21st December 1878.
Öm the
3ittitut (ſommerce of §mbia.
THE commerce of every country, especially the commerce of
a country so ancient, so cultivated and so renowned as India
is, possesses not only an intrinsic political economic interest,
but is also of considerable geographical and ethnological
importance. By examining the commercial records of a
nation we begin to become more intimately acquainted with
the real inner life of the nation, than by merely studying its
external political history with its wars and treaties. The
commencement of civilization indeed is the starting point of
trade. New and until then unknown wants are first felt and
require to be gratified. This desire can only be realized by
exchange of articles belonging either to persons of the same
community or to different tribes or nations. The demand
for an article creates its supply ; the more intense becomes
this demand, the more refined the taste; the greater the
quantity the better the quality of the object in question.
To promote intercourse between nations and to provide for
the transmission of goods, roads on land and on Sea need to .
be discovered or constructed, and for the conveyance of men
and their chattels vehicles and ships must be built. Thus in
supplying the requisite necessaries of life and improving the
desired commodities, the human mind becomes inventive.
Art and science follow the track of trade.
8 QN THE ANCIENT
It is my intention to give you only a few rude outlines of
Indian commerce in general; the subject is too large, too
intricate, and too difficult to be dealt with, to allow here of a
detailed and circumstantial description. Besides this, the
material for a complete survey of the commercial relations
of India has not yet been gathered, and I am afraid, will
never be satisfactorily collected, not only because much of
the past is irretrievably lost and will remain for ever wrapped
in darkness, but, also because the Hindus, though well aware
of the profitable nature of commerce, have not committed,
and as a rule do not commit, the history of their commercial
pursuits to posterity. Except a few occasional allusions,
here and there, in different works, Indian literature keeps
silence on this subject, and were it not for the writings of
foreigners, or for the remains of olden times, which have sur-
vived and been preserved, our knowledge would be more
limited still. Eminent scholars have done much to throw
light on this important, but very obscure matter, and my
revered teacher, the greatest Indian Archaeologist of our
day, the late Professor Lassen, of Bonn, has striven hard to
explain many prominent occult points.
Before beginning to discourse on the commerce of India,
I must draw your attention to the fact that, long before the
Aryans came to India, that great race which is generally
described as and known under the name of Turanian, had
founded empires throughout the old world. The home of the
Turanians is assumed to have been the country round Lake
Aral. Thence they spread over the greatest part of Asia,
reigning there paramount for at least 1500 years.
It is established now, beyond any doubt, through the
decipherment of the cuneiform inscriptions, that the Turanian
empires had advanced to a high degree of culture. This
civilization, though tainted with strange materialism, proved
itself nevertheless able to develop to a high degree of perfec-
tion certain branches of art and of science. To these Turanians
COMMERCE OF INDIA. 9
who differed much among each other in idiom belong also the
Dravidians of India of our days, who in those times occupied
Ariana and Persia. In Europe, these Turanians appear to
be represented by the Esthonians, and in many places of
Western and Central Asia, they form the substratum of the
population, while they supplied in China the ground work of
the civilization of the Celestial Empire.
A branch of the descendants ascribed to Ham, emigrated
early from Asia to Africa and founded the Empire of Egypt,
while others, remaining in their native continent, established
there famóus kingdoms. In the plains of Shinar there lived
together and became amalgamated to a mixed population, the
Shumir and Akkad. Shumir is the ancient name of Assyria
and the Shumir were the inventors of the cuneiform character.
The old Mesopotamian sovereigns called themselves Kings of
Shumir and Akkad. The Shumir had originally settled in the
north, while the Akkad lived more in the south, their country
being washed by the waters of the Persian Gulf. Their name
is mentioned in Genesis x, 10. “And the beginning of his
(Nimrod) kingdom was Babel and Erech, and Akkad and
Kalneh in the land of Shinar.” They were the neighbours of
those Kushites, who dwelt along the seashore, and whose
abodes extended from the Straits of Babel Mandeb to
Malabar. The Akkad were the first, as far as historical
evidence goes back, to navigate the Persian Gulf and the
Indian Ocean. The coast of the Persian Gulf was also the
ancient home of the Kanaanites, a part of whom became
celebrated in after-time under the name of Phoenicians. The
shores of Arabia, Persia, Beluchistan and Western India were
thus at an early period inhabited by industrious and enter-
prising nations, some of whom, as the Akkadians, and more
so still the Phoenicians, became famous sea-faring people.
About 2500 years after the Egyptain empire had been
established, i.e., 2500 B.C., and after the Akkadian dynasty
b
10 ON THE ANCIENT
had reigned for a long period in Babylon the Aryans invaded
Chaldaea, and pressing at the same time on the Kanaanites of
the Persian Gulf and the Dravidians in Persia, drove the
former towards the North-West and the latter to the South-
East to India. By degrees the Aryan invaders settled in the
conquered country but the history of their conquest, of their
establishment, and of their national adventures, is up to now
a sealed book, while we are well informed of contemporary
and previous Egyptian and Babylonian history.
The Aryan immigration to India proceeded slowly, the
new comers had most probably to overcome the spirited resist-
ance of the old inhabitants. They did not go beyond the
frontiers of the Punjab till the fifteenth century before Christ,
the Brahmanic influence spread gradually to the South, the
Buddhist and Jain immigrants most likely preceding the
Brahmans, whose arrival there it is difficult to fix in the
absence of historical evidence. But when we hear of the
early Indian trade, especially that from and to the Southern
Peninsula, the Deccan, we may assume this commerce to have
been carried on rather by non-Aryan than by Aryan Hindus.
In a discussion on commerce the roads assuredly claim the
first attention, as on them the traffic takes place. As the
roads on land are generally along the beaten paths of nature,
and these are not materially changed in historical times, we
may take it for granted, that as a rule, the great high roads
of yore are also the high roads of to-day. New roads may
be opened, old ones may fall into disuse and be closed, but, as
formerly art was not thus at the disposal of industry and
employed in opening tunnels through mountain ranges or
under the surface of the earth, the most important changes
respecting the direction and the use of roads were rather due to
political complications than to other reasons.
In the second book of the Rāmāyana, we find mentioned,
a road leading from Ayodhya, the modern Oudh, to Rājagriha,
COMMERCE OF INDIA. 11
the capital of the Kekayas, situated in the neighbourhood
of the Himalaya mountains, near the upper Wipāšā, the
Hyphasis of the Greek, and the modern Bias. This highway
passed through Hastinápura, the famous residence of the
Kurus. Greek and Roman writers furnish us with most
valuable information respecting the more frequented roads,
We know through Plinius that Alexander the Great employed
surveyors to measure the Indian roads. One road went from
Pushkalāvatī (Peukelaotis) near Attok through Taksha§ilä,
Bukephala, and crossing the Hyphasis to Pātaliputra (Patna).
We owe a description of this highway to Megasthenes, who
resided 295 B.C. as the Ambassador of Seleukos at the
last-mentioned place, the residence of Candragupta. Parti-
culars of the distance from Patna to the sea Megasthenes
received through sailors. Another road went from Pushkalā-
vati to Indraprastha (Delhi), and then to Ujjayini (Ujain).
Thence over the mountain ranges of the Vindhya crossing the
rivers Nerbudda and Tapty to Pratishthāna and further into
the Dekkan. Near the modern Aurungabad a road turned
towards the north-west to the emporiums of Barygaza (Barok)
and Kambaya (Kambay). These and many other highways,
all which it were too long to mention, crossed the country,
connecting distant places with each other, while a good deal
of traffic followed the course of the rivers, as we know of the
Indus, the Ganges, the Godavery, Kavery and others. The
roads were kept in good repair and order, as it is certain that
the ancient Hindus were well acquainted with the art of
road-making. The Rāmāyana provides us with a pertinent
description. Bushes and trees, which obstructed the way were
first cut down, and the ground then levelled. Impeding
rocks were pierced, and rivers bridged over. To conduct
superfluous water from watery places canals were built, and
in waterless tracts wells were dug. The inscriptions of the
good and wise king Aśoka show us the special care he took
to insure the welfare of travellers. Fig trees and mango
12 ON THE ANCIENT
trees skirted the King's road, wells were found at every
mile’s distance, and resting places were provided not only for
men but even for beasts, as Aéoka, according to his Buddhis-
tic tenets, took care also of the dumb animals. e
Along the coast of India were situated port towns, into
which flowed the export produets of India, as well as the
import articles of foreign countries. The most important
were, Sindhu, the Naustathmos of the Greek, our Karaci,
Barbarikon, Barake, Minnagara (Ahmedpur) in Guzerat,
Barygaza (Barok), Suppara (Šurpāraka, Sibor) on the Tapty
near Surat, Kalliána (Kalyānī), Naura (Honavera), Manga-
ruth (Mangalore), Muziris (Muyiri Kotta or Kranganore),
Tyndis (Tundi), Nilkylda (Kallada) recognized as such by
my learned friend Dr. Burnell, whose researches on the
ancient topography of India have led to so successful results,
Balita (Kalikut), Kollum (Quilon) and Kumāri (Komorin) on
the Western Coast. The Eastern shore not being so favorably
situated for commerce, as it was the off-coast for the Western
nations and not enjoying the advantages which Ceylon
afforded to the East, was less known and frequented, and
consequently contained a smaller number of large sea towns.
It possessed, moreover, very few good natural harbours, only
Rorkhi (Kolchi), Kayal, the Cael of Marco Polo in the Gulf
of Manaar : Kabir on the mouth of the Kavery, Poduke
(Pulikat) and Palura (Naupura) can be identified with toler-
able certainty, while the position of Kamara and Sopatma
mentioned by Ptolemy, and of Maralla found in the Christian
Topography of Kosmas Indikopleustes is not yet fixed. The
island of Ceylon (Lafikä, Taprobane) formed the centre of
the Western and Eastern commerce.
We glean from the old lawbooks of Manu and Yajñavalkya
that the home or inland trade in India was very considerable.
Merchants travelled over the length and breadth of the land,
and became by an arduous application to their business well
acquainted with the manners, customs and dialects of the
COMMERCE OF INDIA. 13
country, thus getting more able to estimate the value and the
market prices of merchandise. The existence of trading
companies, which is attested by Yajñavalkya, bears witness to
a highly developed state of civilization, the more remarkable,
as such societies were constituted according to legal prescrip-
tion. The State superintended even the transmission of
goods, settling according to a strict scale the amount of freight.
The interference of Government went even further, for the
prime costs and selling prices of wares were fixed by the
authorities, and dues and taxes were levied to the discontent
of rate-payers in orden times as well as now-a-days. The
Indian kings are said to have paid much attention to the use
of proper weights and measures, by ordering an examination
and adjustment of them every six months, and punishing
severely whoever was convicted of using false measures, or
weights. The Hindus became acquainted with the art of
coining from the Greeks, and we find that they used previously
as money, pieces of gold, silver or copper, which were stamped
with a certain mark; this explains the fact why in the law-
books fines were fixed according to weight. Such small pieces
of silver, marked with the sign of the sun, the moon or a star,
are even now here and there found and prove their antiquity
by their rude workmanship, while the name of such gold, silver
and copper pieces themselves, as subarna, nishka, mā8ha,
raktiká and kärshāpana, are evidences of their age. In
Manu's code the former are prevalent, while in Yajñavalkya,
real coins (Nāmaka) are mentioned, yea even the office of an
assayer of the mint is specially recorded.
If we may believe the Indian law codes, the position of a
merchant was regarded to be a very respectable one. They
were acknowledged as belonging to the third caste, the
Vaiśya, who originally shepherds and husbandmen, had in
more refined times devoted themselves to trade. To enhance,
moreover, the social position of a merchant, he was regarded
as originally the son of a Kshatriya by a Vaiśya woman.
14 ON THE ANCIENT
But it is only in comparatively later times, that the merchants
formed a peculiar caste. Manu and Yajñavalkya still allow
Brahmans and Kshatriyas to resort to trade, when in
distressed circumstances. The word Banij denotes in both
codes a merchant, from it is derived the modern expression
Banyan. The merchants who attended fairs or markets
were called Naigamas, from nigama, fair; and Mägadha
for commercial traveller seems to point to the travelling
propensities of the inhabitants of Magadha (South Behar).
The Non-aryan inhabitants of the Western Coast of India
were, as we have seen before, seafaring people; but we have
the authority of the Rigveda to show, that also the Aryan
Hindus were acquainted with the sea; for in one hymn the
Aśvins are praised for having on the immense and bottomless
ocean protected and safely conducted to the shore the
hundred-oared ship of Bhujyu. The Rāmāyana informs us
that merchants travelled together in large caravans to the
seashore and embarked there for foreign countries. We know
of one voyage undertaken by 500 Hindu merchants, who,
according to their custom, took with them one Safigharakshita
to teach and interpret the law while on the voyage. Commer-
cial intercourse by sea took place as well towards the West
as towards the East. Even if we were not informed of the
Indian trade to the Persian Gulf, Arabia and Africa, such a
name as Socotra the Sanskrit Dvipa Sukhatara, the Dioskor-
ides of the Greek, would be evidence of it. The Ceylonese
traffic was very considerable, thence elephants were exported
to Kalińga, and voyages undertaken to the mouth of the
Ganges. Plinius informs us that voyages to the Prasians
which had formerly lasted twenty days, were afterwards made
in six days only. From a harbour near the present Kalińga-
patam, vessels crossed in the time of Ptolemy the Bay of
Bengal and reached Sada in Arakan, South of the island of
Ramri.
COMMERCE OF INDIA. 15
From Ceylon large ships went to Chryse, the modern
peninsula Malacca, where lay the Indian colony Kokkonagra ;
thence to Sindhu in Siam, to Aganagara in Kamboja and to
China, where the names of Bramma, the modern Seminfu,
and of Ambastes, the river Ngan-nan-kiang near Kanton
indicate Hindu origin. The islands of Java and of Bali
were colonized by Indian settlers, and the Greek traveller,
Iambulos, whose observations were used by Diodoros
Sikulos, corroborates this fact.
The ships employed on these voyages were large, had two
prows and could hold 3000 amphoras. They were built of
papyrus, like the ships on the Nile, the ropes were manu-
factured from the coco palm and the sails from the hemp,
which grew in Ceylon. This vigorous display of the Indian
trade is no doubt closely connected with the spread of
Buddhism which instilled for a time fresh energy into the
population.
Having thus far commented on the commerce carried on
by the Hindus, our attention will now be directed towards
those nations who traded with India. As India through its
climatic position and its natural condition, i.e., by the peculiar
distribution of fertile level, plateau and mountainous land,
produces much, which cannot be produced in other countries,
and is moreover not dependent upon others, it became rather
a commercial centre, a sort of entrepot, than a real trading
country. Its intercourse with the neighbouring nations,
depended on its own natural frontiers. These were the sea
for the southern peninsula, the Dekkan; Burmah on the East,
the Himälaya mountains on the North, and Beluchistan and
Afghanistan on the West. Burmah and the south of China
are very rich countries, but their inhabitants have never
shown great signs of civilization or proved themselves able
to use the immense treasures so prodigally bestowed on them.
The mountain passes along the Burmo-Chinese frontier are
16 ON THE ANCIENT
still occupied by uncultivated savages and the recent murder
of Mr. Margary proves that the internal state of the country
is still not favorable to peaceful commercial enterprise.
Though China is only separated from Assam by a mountain
range, and can also be reached by a detour to Bhamo on
the Irawady, we have no authority to state, that this road
was ever used in ancient times. Chinese Emperors tried
afterwards, now and then, to open communications between
India and Southern China, but these efforts proved only
temporarily successful. The frontier on the north is the
highest mountain range on the surface of the earth and the
country immediately lying beyond it, Tibet, is neither very
fertile nor varied in its productions. The Himalaya moun-
tains do not absolutely prevent all intercourse with India,
but their passes have been rather more frequented by pious
pilgrims, than by enterprising merchants. In Kabulistan on
the contrary meet together the roads from the most distant
West with those of the remote East.
Three roads led from China to India, the first went from
the mountain pass of Yumen on the north-western frontier
of China between the Nanshan and Sining ranges in the
valley of the Hoangho, wiá Tibet to Pātaliputra. The second
called Nanlu or South road lay in the south of the Tianshan
mountains, it also started from Yumen, went along the
Rokonor, through the desert of Gobi, by the Lop Nor, crossed
the Tarim river, and remaining on its north side, touched the
towns of Kutche, Yarkand and Kashgar, surmounted the
Belurtag, and following the Yaxartes (Syr), then bent towards
the south towards Bactria (Balkh). The third road com-
mences also at Yumen, inclined then towards the north, there-
fore called the Pelu or Northern Road, reaches Hami or
Khamil, after crossing the Great Desert, goes through Kara-
char and Turfan, passed the Tianshan, and remaining on its
northern side, touches Umritsir, (Bishbalik) and arrives at
Guldja or Ili. The way over Yarkand and Kashgar was well
COMMERCE OF INDIA. 17
****
known to Ptolemy. From Bactria (Balkh) Kabul is easily
reached. Many roads led from the Hindu Kush to Kabul
(Kabura, the Ortospana of the Ancients) though three are only
specially known. The road from Kabul to Kandahar passed
through Ghazna. At Kandahar (Alexandria Arachosiorum)
the high road left the Paropanisos and turned to Herat (Alex-
andria Ariorum). Herat and Balkh were connected by a
separate road. From Herat the road wound through Khorasan
(Margiana) and passing its capital Alexandria, (afterwards
called Antiochia) reached Hekatompylon, the most important
town of the Parthians, thence through the Caspian gates
to Ekbatana in Media and crossing the passes of the Zagros
arrived at Holvan. At this place three roads branched off,
the southern went to Susa, the south-western to Babylon and
thence over Palmyra, (Tadmor,) to Tyros and the northern
ended at Sardes. There was also from Kabul and Balkh
another passage along the Oxus through Khiva to the Caspian
sea, thence after 5 days' overland travel to the mouth of the
Phasis, where the Milesian colonies, Phasis and Dioskurias
were situated, and finally over the Black-Sea to Sinope.
From this brief sketch we learn that there existed communi-
cation by land as well as by sea between the furthest East of
China and the utmost South of India on the one side, the
West of Asia, of Africa and of Europe on the other side.
Though we are unable to fix the time when the commerce
between China and India began, there is no doubt of its
antiquity. At first it was in the hands of middlemen. To
these belonged the ancient Issedones who delivered the goods
of China to the Indian Daradas and to the Turanians in Central
Asia. The AOrsi who communicated to the Greek settlers in
, the Pontus the legends of the one-eyed men and of the gold-
watching griffins, acted in a similar manner. In early times
Chinese silk was a valuable article, and in the Bible we find
allusions to these Chinese traders. Ezekiel (xvi. 13) speaks
of raiments of silk in Jerusalem. The name of India itself
C
18 ON THE ANCIENT
is first mentioned in the Chinese annals in the reign of
the Emperor Wuti, who, belonging to the dynasty of the
Han, reigned from 140 to 86 B.C. The powerful Hiugnu
obstructed the road from China to the west, and he sent in
124, his General Tchangkien against them. Although at first
unsuccessful, Tchangkien gained at last his object through
the assistance of the Usun, and accompanied by ambassadors
of this nation, he returned to China. Since then the Chinese
themselves became acquainted with the road to Balkh and to
India. When the Emperor Wuti was able to annex the
previously independent province of Shensi, the above men-
tioned pass of Yumen became secure, and large caravans
travelled now regularly from China to the West. The first
Chinese caravan reached Bokhara in 114, and the favorable
reception it obtained there, in the country of the Asi, induced
the Emperor to despatch caravans also to other countries, e.g.,
to Tawan or Ferghana. In these days the cultivation of the
vine and of a peculiar kind of excellent clover was introduced
into China, while in Ferghana and Khoten the breeding of
silkworms was inaugurated. In the former country the art
of preparing Chinese varnish and of iron founding was more-
over learnt. The successors of Wuti followed his example,
and extended their empire as well as their commercial system
over Asia, the latter up to the Caspian Sea. During the
reign of the Wei and Tsin dynasties (204-419) the intercourse
between China and India was interrupted, but it revived under
the Song Emperors. Wenti who belonged to this race,
received in 428 an embassy from Candrapriya, King of
Rapilavastu. The travels of the famous Buddhist pilgrim
Hiuentsang furnish us with the most important and complete
information about the relations between China and India in
the 7th century. Having been consecrated a Buddhist priest,
622, he visited many convents, till he started six years later
on his great expedition towards the West. Full of enthusiasm
for the doctrine of Buddha he desired to listen to the
GOMTMERCE OF INDIA. 19
Gurus in the West, to collect the sacred writings and to
refresh his mind by the precious knowledge he hoped to
obtain in the country of Buddha's birth concerning the
founder of his belief. He travelled through the country of
the Uigurs, Songaria, Transoxania, passed Balkh, Bamian
and Kabul, stayed for a long time at Attock and traversing
India, visited Käficivaram and then returned to China via
Kashgar, Yarkand and Khotan. In 645 he reached his
fatherland, retired there into a convent in order to translate
the numerous Buddhistic writings he had acquired on his
travels. He died in 656. Hiuentsang was accompanied by
many other pilgrims, and we may infer from this fact, that
the roads to India were still used for commercial traffic.
Emperor Taitsung despatched an embassy to India between
717 and 720. The conquest of China by the Tatars created
at first a change for the worst, but by Central Asia, and China
being subjected to one nation the political and commercial
relations were otherwise facilitated, as the French and the
Papal embassies to China prove, and as I have previously
shown in one of my monographs on that subject."
About the early sea trade between India and the Eastern
Archipelago and China we have spoken already, but we can
also prove, that it was carried on in later times. The
Chinese pilgrim Fahien arrived in 411 in Ceylon, stayed
there about two years, and embarked on a large vessel, which
was provided with a smaller safety boat, for Java. After
many disasters he had to encounter, he landed again on the
Chinese coast in 414. Kosmas Indikopleustes, who wrote in
547 his Topographia Christiana, gives us an account of the
lively trade in aloe, sandalwood, cloves and other products
carried on between the Philippines, the Sunda Islands,
Kamboja and Burmah on the one part and Ceylon on the
(1) Compare “Der Presbyter Johannes in Sage und Geschichte,” second
edition, page 4.
20 ON THE ANCIENT
other. For a still later period Marco Polo is a trustworthy
reporter.
If we turn our eyes from the East to the West, Egypt
claims our attention, being one of the countries that were
earliest civilized on this globe. Its history goes back as
far as 5000 B.C. It is difficult, if not impossible, to prove a
direct trade between the old Egyptians and the Hindus, but
that a commerical intercourse existed cannot be denied. The
Egyptians, though not themselves a seafaring people, had in
their relatives, the neighbouring Kushite races, the most famous
sailors of the old world, and through their medium kept up their
commercial relations. When in consequence of the Aryan
advance, to which we have already alluded, the Kanaanites were
driven to the West, a part of them entered Egypt, dethroned
the kings of the 14th dynasty residing in Xois, the modern
Sakha, and founded in 2214 the dynasty of the Hyksos or
Shepherd kings. These kings reigned, when Abraham was
staying in Egypt. Altogether they ruled in this country for
511 years and during the reign of the last king of this dynasty,
Apepi, Joseph came to Egypt. The story of Joseph is
moreover a notable evidence of the early caravan trade, which
crossing Arabia, carried the merchandise of India to Egypt,
Syria and Babylonia. A part of this commerce was then in
the hands of the Midianites. By a remarkable coincidence
we possess a proclamation of this very king Apepi, containing
the title Zaphnath, sustainer of the world, a title given by
that king to Joseph (Gen. xli., 45). After the expulsion of
the Hyksos, which took place at the beginning of the 18th
century B.C., (1703), indigenous sovereigns once more ruled
the country of the Nile and great kings like Amosis, Tuth-
mosis, Amenophis, Sesostris (Ramses) carried the glory and
the arms of the Egyptians far beyond the boundaries of their
fatherland, but not so far as the legends want to make us
loelieve; Media, Persia, Bactria and India were never invaded
COMMERCE OF INDIA. 21
by Ramses II., the Sesostris of the Greek. Nevertheless, we
may safely surmise, even if there were no evidence forth-
coming, that in those days, a brisk Commerce united the
different and distant nations. In the tombs dating from
the time of the 18th dynasty, which ended in 1462 B.C.,
there are said to have been found mummies wrapt up in
Indian muslins and containing vases of Chinese porcelain.
Moreover the old Egyptians used indigo for dyeing purposes,
and this vegetable produce can be obtained only from India.
The antiquity of this traffic leads us therefore back to a
period, when the Aryans had scarcely made any progress in
the occupation of India. Many customs and manners which
old and modern non-Aryan inhabitants have in common
with the ancient nations of Arabia and India must be ascribed
as much to the affinity and relationship of those nations as to
the consequences of mutual intercourse. Thus the polyandry
which prevailed formerly in Arabia, as it still does in Malabar,
among the Nairs, was an institution common to the Kushite
tribes. The system of caste, is originally not peculiar either
to Semitic or to Aryan races. The division of a popu-
lation according to profession, art and trade, which often
coincides with racial differences, is a natural result of social
life. These distinctions appear to have assumed in Egypt
at first a certain definite form, and to have developed into
the system of Caste. Access to caste though was in Egypt
not debarred to outsiders, for sons of priests could become
warriors, and those of warriors could become priests, &c. It
is a fact worthy of notice, that Southern India, where Kushite
and Dravidian races preponderate, is also the stronghold of
the institution of caste. Even the legal Hindu prescriptions
about caste, which is now viewed as a religious regulation,
especially through the priestly ascendancy of the Brahmans,
are notwithstanding their comparative antiquity, young when
compared with Kushite institutions. When the knowledge
about Indian science was in Europe still in its infancy, there
22 ON THE ANCIENT
was no doubt prevalent a certain mania to connect India and
Egypt in a most arbitrary manner; but the reaction against
these opinions has also been carried too far, and it is now
time to consider quietly the extent of the relations between
India, especially Southern India, and Egypt. There exists,
no doubt, up to this very day, a singularly striking affinity
between the non-Aryan elements of India, whether Kushite or
Dravidian on the one, and the old Turanian and Kushite
empires on the other part. The eastern nations are conser-
vative in their customs, and ancient fashions may be traced
in proportionally new institutions or structures. How can
we explain, for instance, the striking resemblance that exists
between the famous Pagodas of Tanjore and Madura with
the Pyramids of Egypt without considering those connec-
tions P
The Egyptians not being, as we have seen before
a seafaring nation, employed in their naval expeditions
the Phoenicians. That the latter had been previously
domiciled on the Persian Gulf was a fact, with which
already Herodotos had become acquainted through the
archives of Tyre. Strabo mentions, that the islands of
Tyros and Arados, the Bahrein Islands of our days,
contained temples similar to those of the Phoenicians and
that the inhabitants of these islands regarded Tyros, Arados,
&c., in Syria, as their colonies. When the Kanaanites were
dislodged from the Persian Gulf, a part of them invaded
Egypt and the others settled in Syria. This country they
found in the possession of Semitic tribes, whom they expelled,
but whose language they adopted ;” this explains why the
*---—
(2) The term Semitic applying to Hebrew, Arabic and other kindred
languages was first used by Johann Gottfried Eichhorn, and has been since
adopted generally in this sense. But it can hardly be regarded to be happily
chosen, as many Hamitic tribes spoke languages nearly related to those
so-called Semitic languages. The question as to the relationship between
Hamitic and Semitic languages has to be one day thoroughly investigated.
COMMERCE OF INDIA. 23
literary remains of the Phoenicians are written in a dialect
so similar to the Hebrew. When Abraham arrived in
Palestine, he found the Kanaanites already residing there.
The most important and oldest town of the Phoenicians was
Sidon, whose commerce was highly developed, when the
Hyksos were driven from Egypt. Sidon acknowledged in
the Egyptian King its suzerain. It was the policy of the
Phoenicians to propitiate the good graces of their mighty
neighbours, against whom they were not able to contend ;
while they assisted them on their part with their fleet. The
Phoenicians and the Hebrews met first as enemies, but when
both found themselves confronted by a common foe, the
Philistines, they made up their differences and became allies
for nearly two centuries, the temporary weakness of the
Egyptian and Assyrian empires favoring the independence
of both. Thus the kings of Tyre became friends of David
and Solomon. Hiram’s great object was the fortification and
embellishment of Tyrus. David bequeathed to his son
Solomon the building of the temple, which could not be
accomplished without the help of Hiram. Both kings
combined besides in joint commercial expeditions to Ophir.
The Phoenicians wished to get the commerce of India as
much as possible into their own hands. This was the easier
to be obtained, as many Phoenician merchants lived in South
Arabia and on the Persian Gulf, where the ships containing
the valuable Indian merchandize arrived. From South
Arabia caravans carried the precious goods across the desert
to Syria. Previous to Hiram the Phoenicians of Sidon had
only extended their expeditions to Yemen, but this king of
Tyros intended to open direct communications with India.
He was successful in his undertakings, though his attempts
were soon after forsaken. In fact after the reign of Solomon
no Ophir voyages were made, as far as we know. The
Ophir expedition started generally once in three years. The
ships of Tarshish named after the Tarshish in Spain, left
24 ON THE ANCIENT
Elath on the Bay of Elath or Ailah, proceeded to Berenike on
the Egyptian coast, and thence to Okelis at the mouth of the
Arabian Gulf, a voyage which in those times may have lasted
about 100 days, as many stoppages would have been rendered
necessary for sufficiently providing the fleet with victuals and
water. Starting in May the ships arrived in Okelis about the
end of July. From this harbour or from Kane on the
Erythraean sea, the ships sailed to the mouth of the Indus, or
to Barygaza, or to Muziris, or some other southern port.
Professor Lassen has identified Ophir, with the country of
the Abhira, which was situated on the coast of Sindh, north
of the Rinn. But if Ophir was the same as the district of
the Abhira, how can we explain the long duration of such an
expedition “once in three years came the navy of Tarshish,
bringing gold and silver, ivory and apes and peacocks?”
For surely, if the merchants of the allied kings obtained
these articles from Sindh they could even avail themselves
of the east monsoon and be back in a much shorter period.
The custom in these ancient times differed much from ours.
The truth of the saying “Time is money,” has been only
appreciated within the last decades, Old Homer tells us,
that the Phoenicians occasionally stopped a year in one place
(Odyss, 15. v. 455, 456). It is well known, that the ancient
navigators protracted their journeys, they provided themselves
with seed corn which they sowed, and stayed until it was
harvested and then sailed away. But in this particular case,
the mentioning of gold as an export article “ and they came
to Ophir, and fetched from thence gold, four hundred and
twenty talents and brought it to King Solomon ’’ creates
another difficulty. For gold has been always a precious
import article to India, though it is found also here and
there in India. Even if the Abhira were the stupid people,
they enjoy the reputation of being, as we learn from the
Pañcatantram, where they are said to sell the precious moon
crystal (candra-kanta) for three cowries; surely their neigh-
COMMERCE OF INT) IA. 25
bours, the Hindus, who have a thorough appreciation of the
value of gold, would not have let it pass so easily into the
possession of strangers. It is therefore probable that the
Phoenicians got the gold elsewhere, very likely from Malacca,
the golden Chersonesus, and that these voyages were called
after Ophir, the first place in India where they landed.
That the Phoenicians came to Southern India is certain; the
peacocks which are mentioned to have been brought from India
are called in the Bible Tukkiyim, a plural form of Tukki,
in which word scholars have long ago recognized the Tamil
“togei,” as can be seen in old Hebrew dictionaries, especially
in that of Gesenius.” By degrees the Phoenicians lost their
stupremacy on the sea, and they disappear from the field of
action and with them also perished for a while the great
maritime knowledge they had obtained. -
When the Persian empire arises in history, commerce no
longer flourishes as before. The Persians were no traders,
they preferred military fortifications to commercial pursuits.
Fancying it possible to be attacked from the seaside, they,
obstructed the bed of the Euphrates and Tigris throwing at
certain distances embankments across the river, to prevent its
being used for navigation purposes. These abortive measures
induced the Chaldaean merchants who lived near the Pasiti-
gris to emigrate to the opposite Arabian shore, to Gerrha from
whence they continued their commerce with India. Against
this country Darius Hystaspes undertook an expedition. It
was this which brought on the exploits of Skylax of Karyanda,
who in 509 starting from Peukelaotis sailed down the Indus
and reached in 3 months the mouth of the Red Sea. Skylax
induced the Indian nations who lived along the rivers to
acknowledge the Persian supremacy, and in the Persian
(3) Compare with tukki the common Telugu word “toka” tail, used also
for the tail of the peacock.
d
26 ON THE ANCIENT
inscriptions the Gandhāra and Sindhu occur as tributaries to
the Persian empire. They are even mentioned in the army
of Xerxes, and Greek and Hindu met perhaps in that Grecian
war for the first time.
The earliest accounts of India among Greek writers we
owe to Herodotos; but, though he, and afterwards Ktesias,
were tolerably well acquainted with eastern countries, the
Greek nations, as such, did not become initiated into Indian
knowledge until the expeditions of the great Alexander. It
is doubtful, whether, the genius of the Macedonian king
shone brighter on a battle field or in the administration of
his vast empire. The interest he took in science, literature
and arts; the ability he displayed in the foundation of
towns; the sagacity he evinced in his behaviour towards his
newly acquired subjects; all these are objects of praise and
admiration. It was he who removed the mean barriers
placed by the Achaemenides in the grand old river; it was he,
who intended Babylon, which had, in former times, been a
great emporium of the Indian trade from the East and from
the South, to become the commercial metropolis and the
residence of his realm. His untimely death proved fatal to
the execution of his vast designs. His successor in Asia,
Seleukos Nikanor, abandoned Alexander's projects respecting
Babylon, and built a new capital, which he named Seleukeia.
In the course of time, Seleukos ceded the most eastern part
of his empire to Candragupta, and a friendly intercourse
ensued between the Seleukides and the Indian kings.
Megasthenes, the ambassador of Seleukos at the court of
Candragupta wrote at the beginning of the third century
his work on India, but only fragments have reached us,
otherwise it would have proved a most valuable contribution
to our knowledge of India. The same fate shared the
writings of Onesikritos, who, a companion of Alexander the
Great, had been his envoy to the Indian Gymnosphistes.
COMMERCE OF INDIA. 27
The friendship which existed between the Greek and Indian
dynasties was renewed in 216, when Antiochos the Great
and Saubhagasena revived these amicable relations. But
independently of the Seleukidian power, Grecian influence was
growing, for Diodotos, Satrap of Bactria, declared himself in
250 B.C. independent, and established the Greco-Bactrian
kingdom, which in the time of Demetrios (205) comprised
even the country beyond the Jhelum. His successor,
Eukratides, struck coins with Greek and Indian inscriptions,
and though the western provinces of the Greco-Bactrian
kingdom became soon afterwards a prey to Parthian conquests,
it increased in the East, up to the Jumna and embraced even
Gujarat. But it did not last long. Its influence survived,
by introducing Greek thought and Greek civilization, to
which the Hindus through the temporary preponderance of
Buddhistic doctrines proved themselves rather susceptible.
The nicknames Yavanamunda and Kambojamunda, bald-
headed Greek and baldheaded Kamboja are explained from
the fact that those nations patronised Buddhism and that
Puddhist mendicants had their crowns shaven.
Since the days of Alexander the Great and the decay of
their political independence, the Greeks turned cosmopolitans.
They spread everywhere, carrying with them their high
culture, and becoming the pioneers of refinement. Even in
the far East, they founded colonies as the Greek name of
some places proves. Iambulos crossed the Indian Archipe-
lago and Greek merchants resorted even to China. The
works of Strabo, of Plinius, the Periplus Maris Erythraei, the
writings of Dionysios Periegetes, Ptolemy, Arrianos and
others—amply testify to the great activity displayed by the
Greeks in their travels and in their commercial pursuits. In
latter times Alexandria in Egypt, became the great centre
where Western and Eastern nations flocked together, but it
was not until Egypt had become a province of Rome that the
28 oN THE ANCIENT
foresight of Alexander, in choosing this spot for an emporium
was duly appreciated.
The powerful empire of the Parthians was inimical to the
Romans, the transmission of Chinese and Indian goods across
Mesopotamia was inhibited, and though the way along the
Oxus and by the Caspian sea was still open, the direct sea
trade offered now greater advantages. Under those circum-
stances, a bright future dawned on Alexandria, especially
since a steersman, named Hippalos, re-discovered the existence
of the south-west monsoon, the knowledge of which had
fallen into oblivion since the times of the Phoenicians, and
the grateful sailors called henceforth this south-west monsoon
Hippalos.
The voyage to India was generally undertaken from Kane,
the modern Hadramaut, or perhaps from a harbour nearer to
Cape Gardafui. The more the commerce increased between
India and the Roman Empire, the greater progress was also
made in the art of navigation. The Western trade was
viewed in India with favorable eyes, and the occasional
embassies which were sent from India to Roman Emperors
show this fact plainly. Thus we hear of Indian envoys
with precious presents being sent to Augustus, Claudius,
Antoninus Pius and Julianus.
With respect to the knowledge concerning India, it is
certain, that the author of the Periplus did not double Cape
Komorin, but Plinius was acquainted with the Koromandel
Coast and Ptolemy's knowledge embraced Burmah and even
China. This country was visited by a Greek merchant
Alexandros, who stopped at Kanton, Markianos of Heraklea
and Ammianus Marcellinus provide on these points still
more accurate accounts. We may perhaps be allowed to call
Naustathmos (Karaci), Theophila (Suradara) in Gujarat,
Dyzantium on the Malabar Coast and other places Grecian
colonies,
COMMERCE OF INDIA. 29
As long as Rome was the sole capital of the Empire, Indian
goods went from Alexandria mainly to Rome, but when the
Empire became divided, Byzantium, or as it was now called
Constantinopolis, participated in the receipt of the eastern
articles. Among the merchants who met in Alexandria,
many Hindus were to be found; though the statue of the
river god Indus, in that town, was probably the gift of a
Greek and not of a Hindu. The presence of Brahmans is
even reported from Constantinople. But the Byzantine
Emperors had to encounter the opposition of the new Persian
dynasty, which wanted to monopolize the Indian trade. This
happened also in Yemen, whence Justinianus tried to get
Chinese silk through an alliance with the Homerites, until at
last in 536 some monks succeeded in bringing silkworms to
Europe.
The Persian seaports, Teredon and Charax, whose position
near the mouth of the Tigris was not far distant from
Rtesiphon and Dastagard, the residence townsofthe Sassanides
received directly the merchandize of India. This trade was
very lively, and being lucrative, the Persian kings did not
brook any rivalry. From the description of the spoil found
by the Emperor Heraklios in the palace of King Khosru
Perviz, we gather, that a great many Indian articles were
consumed in Persia. The relations between these two
countries were friendly. Bahram Gor of Persia visited the
King of Kanyakubja, and married one of his daughters. He
became, it is said, so fond of Indian music that as his
country did not possess any accomplished musicians, he sent
for 12,000 Indian musicians. One of his successors, Khosru
Anushirvan, the Conqueror of Beluchistan despatched his
learned physician Barzuyeh to India, to obtain a plant which
could restore to life again murdered persons, and which was
reported to grow in that country. His search was, as can
well be guessed, in vain. At last he was informed that that
plant was meant to denote the science contained in a book
30 ON THE ANCIENT
deposited in the Royal Treasury. Barzuyeh demanded and
received a copy of the precious work which he brought home
and translated into the Huzvaresh language. The book in
question was the Pañcatantram.
The commerce of the Greeks of the Byzantine empire
sustained a severe blow from the Arabs, to whose conquests
the Sassanides had succumbed still earlier. The sea road, vià
Alexandria, was now blocked to the Greek merchants, who
received Indian goods mostly by the way along the Oxus and
through the Caucasus. Trapezunt profited by this dislocation
of the trade.
(Soon after Mahomet's death and four years previous to the
destruction of the Persian Empire, Khalif Omar with an
eye on the Indian sea trade, founded the harbour of Bassora,
but his expeditions from the coast of Oman to Thana, near
Dombay, and to the mouth of the Indus, were undertaken
rather more from political than from commerical reasons.
The intercourse between both nations remained then suspended
for some time, the wars in the West and internal dissensions
preventing the Arabs from devoting themselves much to the
peaceful pursuits of commerce, but the subjects of the
Khalif still continued their traffic with the Ceylonese. The
island of Ceylon was, as is well known, regarded by the
Mussulmans to have been the Garden of Eden, the earthly
paradise, in which Adam had resided, Muhammedam pilgrims
migrated every year to the mountain called Adam’s Peak, in
order to worship the steps seen on the rock and ascribed to
the father of mankind. In fact the bad treatment which
an Arab ship, returning from Ceylon, experienced at the
western mouth of the Indus by the marauding inhabitants of
Dipal, induced Khalif Walid to despatch an army against the
king of Sindh, and in 712 this kingdom was conquered by the
Arabs. From that time the Indo-Arabian trade steadily
increased; and as we are well informed by contemporaneous
COMMERCE OF INDIA. 31
Arabian travellers, whose valuable descriptions have come
down to us, we are enabled to form a pretty correct idea of the
commercial relations between both nations.
The Arabs were next, to the conquest of Sindh, indebted
to a lucky incident for a favorable turn in their connection
with India. It was at the commencement of the ninth
century that an Arabian ship, full of pilgrims on their way
to Ceylon, was driven to the Malabar Coast. The then reigning
Zamorin of Kalikut, Ceruman Perumal, received them kindly,
and becoming acquainted through intercourse with the ship-
wrecked people with the tenets of Islam, turned Mahomedan
himself and went on a pilgrimage to Mekka. There he died.
But before his death, he enjoined his successor to treat with
hospitality the Arabian merchants, to allow them to erect
mosques and to be under the jurisdiction of their own judges.
This request was granted, and a regular intercourse and
commerce between both parties ensued. The Mussulmans
who settled in the domains of Ceruman Perumal, were called
Mapilla or Moplai by the Hindu inhabitants, and many of
these immigrants, and their descendants, became in after times
industrious husbandmen.
The extent of the Arabian trade is best illustrated, by their
geographical system, and as our attention is now directed, to
the sea trade, a few remarks respecting the former will be
appropriate. The Arabs divided the Eastern Ocean into seven
seas, the first was called the Bahr Faris (Persian sea), our
Persian Gulf. On its coast lay the harbour Siraf, which was
visited by Chinese vessels. These Chinamen were much
stronger built than the ships of the Arabs. The latter were
built with the planks of cocoapalms which were fastened
together by wooden nails, as iron nails were considered to be
unsuitable for the Indian Ocean. For in the Middle Ages it
was generally believed that at the bottom of that sea a large
magnet attracted the iron floating on it, and that as soon as
32 ON THE ANCIENT
ships with iron nails came near that magnet, the iron nails
would be drawn from the ship's planks and the vessel with
its unfortunate crew sink to the bottom. From Siraf the
ship sailed first to Maskat in Oman at the southern end of
the Persian Gulf and reached then the second sea Larevi
which represents the northern part of the Indian Ocean.
Kulam Mali (Quilon) was the next harbour to be visited ;
from there a month's journey took them to the Nicobar
Islands. The sea between Ceylon and the Nicobars and
Andamans was called Harkand. The Andamans were not
omitted in their voyage and from there they steered to Kalah
(Kalahbar) then the great emporium of Malacca, which the
Arabian traveller, the famous prince Abulfeda (1331) men-
tions as the most important trading place between Arabia and
China, and where many foreigners, as Mahomedans, Persians,
Hindus and Chinese flocked together. Malacca itself was
then dependent on the king of Java, whose riches and splend-
our are described in the most glowing terms. Java, or Zabej
as it was then called, is said to have been so densely inha-
bited, that when a cock began to crow in one village, the cry
was taken up by the cocks in the next, and was soon heard all
along the Island. The fourth and fifth seas, named Shalahat
and Kidrang are the next, but their position is difficult to fix,
as the reports are so confused. The sixth sea Senef compre-
hending the Gulf of Tonquin and a part of of the Sunda sea
lay on the east of Kochin-China and was separated from the
seventh sea Sanji, by the Straits of Hainan, which were
regarded to be the gate of China. The last named sea
washed the East coast of China and there was situated that
famous Arabo-Chinese harbour, Gampu. We see, therefore,
that however limited was the knowledge of the Arabs of the
real nature and position of the lands and seas they visited,
their participation in the Eastern, and especially in the Indian
trade was very considerable." -
TOMMERCE OF INDIA. 35
made of fruit. The Sudra, a border people near the desert
of Sindh, showed their submission by coming to Yudhish-
thira with skins of goat and Ruru stags and with Kabul
horses. The eastern kings brought precious seats, beds and
armour adorned with jewels, gold and ivory, as well as varie-
gated elephant covers, tiger and elephant skins, iron arrows
and excellent arms. The nations living near the Brahma-
putra and the mouth of the Ganges arrived with gold,
perfumes, with precious woods, with rare birds, animals, and
skins. The Cola and Pändya carried fragrants, sandal-oil in
golden tankards, sandalwood, gold, jewels, and fine textures.
From Ceylon eame precious pearls, and dyed cloths. This
extract yields only scanty information, the products of large
countries are omitted, yet we are able to ascertain those of a
few.
In enumerating the different articles of trade, the Indian
export articles will be given first, and followed by the
foreign import articles. The principal sources of information
respecting the ancient export trade are the account written by
an Alexandrian merchant and perused by Plinius the Elder
and the Digesta or orders issued between the years of 176
and 180 by the Roman Emperors for the purpose of fixing
the duties, which were to be levied from those articles.
Though ekephants, tigers, leopards, panthers and other
large beasts were occasionally exported from India, one can
hardly inelude them in the list of merchandise. Rome
especially was the place where they found a good market, as
they were wanted in the amphitheatres for the Circensian
plays. King Solomon received from India apes and peacocks,
as we have seen before; the Dravidian name of the peacock
in the Bible intimating the presence of Drawidian traders.
Herodotos praises the good qualities of Indian dogs, which
were highly esteemed by King Darius, and which most
probably would not claim any relationship with the ill
36 ON THE ANCIENT
used Pariah dogs of our days. Indian tortoises also found a
good market. But not only living animals, valuable skins
and horns also were exported.
Pearls were another article, highly prized alike by ancient
as by modern nations. One of the most renowned pearl-
fisheries was on the coast of Ceylon, especially at Perimula
(Perimuda) on the island of Manaar. We know that the
Medes, Persians and other eastern people paid immense sums
for pearls, and Plinius tells us, that the Romans, especially
the Roman ladies, were very fond of them. The Roman
ladies adorned nearly every part of their body with pearls,
even down to the straps of their sandals, making their presence
known by the clinking of pearl-strings as do to this day the
Indian dancing girls. The sumptuousness displayed in those
times exceeded all bounds, thus we read, that Lolla, the wife of
the Emperor Caius Claudius, appeared often publicly covered
with smaragds and pearls, worth 40,000,000 sesterces or
£300,000 sterling. The story about the wager between Queen
Cleopatra of Egypt and the Triumvir Antonius is well known.
She possessed two large pearls, used as pendents of the ear,
which had been previously the property of other eastern
monarchs and were valued very highly. She dissolved one in
strong vinegar, drank it, and was only prevented by an atten-
dant of Antonius from dissolving the other pearl. The
draught thus swallowed was esteemed to be worth 10,000,000
sesterces, or a little more than £80,000 sterling.
Though Silk is indigenous in China, and Kattigara (the
modern Kanton) was in ancient days the great silk market,
silk may be mentioned here, as the western nations received
it wiá, India, and it is mentioned as Sericum Indicum in the
Roman Digesta. Moreover there exist also in this country
12 species of silk spinning worms. Indian-made silk articles
were bought by Greek and Roman merchants. In the latter
times of the Roman Empire silk dresses became more
COMMERCE OF INDIA. 37
fashionable and many were the strictures in which some Sober
writers indulged, when complaining about the luxury and
wantonness of the Roman ladies, in dressing themselves in
precious and thin silks. It is remarkable, that the real origin
of silk remained a long time unknown. Pausanias who wrote
his archaeological work on Hellas is the first classical author
whose ideas about silk and silkworms are pretty correct, for
the general notion was, that the silk was combed from the
leaves of trees. If we enumerate now the Indian export
articles derived from the vegetable kingdom, we shall soon
observe, that both in number and in value they are superior
to those belonging to the animal world.
Of grains Rice formed an important commodity. The
cultivation of rice extended in ancient times only so far West
as to Bactria, Susiana, and the Euphrates valley. The Greeks
most likely obtained their rice from India, as this country
alone produced it in sufficient quantity to be able to export
it. Moreover the Grecian name for rice Oryza, for which,
there exists no Aryan or Sanskrit root, has been previously
identified by scholars with the Tamil word arisi, which denotes
rice deprived of the husk. This was exactly the state in which
rice was exported. The Greeks besides connected rice gene-
rally with India. Athenaeos quotes Oryza hephthe, cooked
rice, as the food of the Indians, and Aelianus mentions a
wine made of rice as an Indian beverage. If now the Greek
received their rice from India, and the name they called this
grain by is a Dravidian word, we obtain an additional proof
of the Non-Aryan element represented in the Indian trade.
The Cotton cloths (sindones of Herodotos) show by their name
their Indian origin. It occurs also afterwards in the Periplus
where a distinction is made in the cotton goods according to
quality, and cotton thread is mentioned as a separate article.
The Roman Digesta call the cotton thread carpasium, and
the cotton cloth carbasia, which name for the latter is also
used by the Alexandrian merchant, the Sanskrit name being
38 'ON THE ANCIENT
Kärpäsa. Up to the first century after Christ the cotton tree
was, except in India, only cultivated in the small islands of
Tyros and Arados in the Persian Gulf.
Ebony and teakwood, sugar-cane and bamboo-cane were in great
demand, the medicine Tabashir was derived from the latter.
Asafoetida in Sanskrit Bhūtāri, the enemy of evil spirits, was
a well known physic to the Alexandrian merchant and to
Hippokrates under the name of Butyros. This was after-
wards erroneously taken for Butyron, butter. Pliny (XII,
16 and XXIV, 77) mentions that the best Lycium, a medicine
prepared from a certain boxtree (Pyxacanthon), and the
reddish bark of the root of the Macir tree, which was consi-
dered as a specific for dysentery, came from India.
India is rich in vegetable dyes, but its most famous is, no
doubt, Indigo, the Indikon of the Greek. Already Vitruvius
mentions the Indicus color, and Plinius distinguishes between
two different sorts of Indicum. The frequent attempts made
to adulterate it, show how highly it was appreciated. At
Selinos in Sicily surrogates of this description were manu-
factured. One pound of good Indigo fetched about 10 dinars
or 3 rupees. Among the Indian spices Pepper, pippali in
Sanskrit, was much in demand. It grows wild in Malabar.
Muziris and Nelkylda were the most frequented pepper
markets. Old Pliny could not understand why people should
take so great a fancy to such a hot article. A pound of white
pepper was sold at 7 dinars or 2 rupees, and a pound of black
pepper for a little more than 1 rupee. The collection of
pepper was associated in the medieval legends with wholesale
burning of venomous Snakes, which infested the pepper
plantations.
Another spice of great value and request was the Cassia.
The Laurus Cassia grows in Malabar and Canara, on the
Himalaya, in Bhutan and Nepal. The tree attains a height
of 60 feet, has white flowers, and its inner bark produces a
COMMERCE OF INDIA. 33
This is also the place to mention that, besides the Arabs,
Jews, Nestorians, and in later times Parsis settled in India.
From a commercial point of view the last deserve attention
as some of them became most prosperous merchants.
While the Arabs extended thus their commerce, of which
India was the centre, as far as Gampu in China, the Italian
cities Venice and Genoa, also got a fair share of the Indian
traffic. Many citizens of those famous towns travelled far
in the East and entered into commercial transactions with
Oriental princes and nations. The crusades though originally
undertaken for religious purposes and unsuccessful in the
attainment of their principal object, proved of the greatest
importance in removing many prejudices which existed
between Occident and Orient, and in causing friendly relations
to arise out of deadly religious strife. The Venetians possessed
a factory in Alexandria, still the centre of the commerce
between Europe and Asia. The Genoese founded Kaffa in
the Crimea and Tana, being favoured by the Palaeologian
Emperors. Augsburg in Germany lay on the highroad,
which having crossed the snowy Alps, formed the passage
for the Eastern and Indian products to the centre of Europe.
The Hanseates participated in the Levant trade, and Bruges,
in Flanders, became opulent by its factories, which manufac-
tured the raw materials of the East. Spain, France and the
British Islands had their fair portion in the Indian commerce,
though the real traffic in those days was more in the hands
of Italian and German towns or confederacies.
This state of things lasted, until the Portuguese, roused by
the reports of the existence of that mighty but mysterious
potentate the Prester John of India, whom I have identified
as the powerful Emperor of Central-Asia, the Korkhan of
Rarakhitai, despatched Bartholomeo Diaz and later Vasco da
Gama in search of him. The latter did not find the renowned
priestly king but instead the seaway to India. The landing
6
34 ON THE ANCIENT
of Vasco da Gama at Kalikut, together with the discovery of
America, a few years earlier, altered the whole direction of
commerce, until by the reinstitution of the Overland mail, and
more so still by the successful termination of the Suez canal,
the old time-honoured road to India and China viá, the
Mediterranean and Red Sea has been again revived.
Modern inventions have done much to lessen the distance
between the East and the West, but apart from this, the
nature of the trade is not materially changed. Though it is
now a matter of no difficulty to perform the sea-voyage from
any part of the world to India, the Central Asian caravan
trade which beginning in China, passed to India, and went
to Babylon, to Egypt and so forth, is, owing to the depre-
dations and wars of the barbarous hordes, and the existence
of half barbarous states in regions which were formerly the
sites of flourishing realms, no more of the importance it once
enjoyed, even in the remotest times.
Having in the above commented on the commerce of the
Hindus with foreign nations up to the appearance of the
Portuguese in this country, we must now turn our attention
to the integrant part of commerce, to the merchandise
itself.
With respect to the inland trade of India our information
is again very scarce. Indian sources supply only scanty
reports. The second book of the Mahābhārata contains in the
description of the Rājasūya sacrifice a list of the presents
received by king Yudhishthira ; other accounts can be
derived from some Buddhistic Sūtras. Thus we read in the
former, that the king of Kamboja brought horses, for which
that country was very famous, female camels, woollen cloaks.
embroidered with gold, and skins of Kabul cats and antelopes.
The Paradas, who inhabited Gedrosia (Beluchistan) and the
Abhira of Ophir fame presented cows, goats, sheep, donkeys
and camels, woollen coverings, and an intoxicating beverage
COMMERCE OF INDIA. 39
spice, which though in flavour and taste similar to, is coarser
than cinnamon. The real cinnamon is indigenous to the
country of Somali on the eastern coast of Africa, and was
afterwards introduced to Ceylon, whence the Arab traveller
Ibn Batuta reports on it. It grows about 30 feet, has like-
wise a white flower and a small berry, which yields a useful
oil. Its inner bark produces the famous cinnamon, the bark
contains the precious cinnamon oil, its leaves furnish the
mace oil, and its roots camphor. The Bible (Exod. xxx.
23-24) knows both Cassia and Cinnamon, so does also Hero-
dotos and Theophrastos. The real cinnamon came originally
from Ethiopia, and cassia from Malabar. The Roman
Digesta distinguished between Cinnamomum, Xylocinnamo-
mum, Cassia tantum and Xylocassium. The price of cinna-
mon fluctuated much between 25 and 300 dinars or between
7% and 90 rupees the pound; and of cassia between 5 and 50
dinars or 1% to 15 rupees. Cinnamon and cassia were also
esteemed physics. The leaves of the eassia and other laurel
trees yielded the highly esteemed Malabathron, the Tamalapa-
tra of the Indians. The Alexandrian merchant tells us a
peculiar story how this precious spice was obtained. There
exists, he says, a barbarous race of men with short figures,
broad faces and flat noses, who are ealled Sesatai (Besadai).
Every year they come, together with their wives and children,
to the frontiers of the Thinae. There they encamp, resting
on mats made of rushes, tendrils and leaves, which they
carried from their home with them. As soon as they are gone
away people, who have watched them, gather the mats,
which these Besadai had left behind, extract the fibres from:
the reeds, and collect the leaves. Out of these they gain the
Malabathron, of which exist three varieties, and bring it to
the harbour Gange on the mouth of the river of that name.
It came also from Further-India and was as highly valued as
cinnamon.
40 ON THE ANCIENT
Cardamum and Clove, indigenous in the Philippines, came
vià India and were regarded as Indian articles. Ginger was
imported as well from India as from Ethiopia.
Among perfumes and scents Aloe was very highly esteemed
in ancient times. Aloe is the wood of the Aghil tree, which
is turned in consequence of a disease into a dark brownish,
veined resin. If it is heated it spreads a very agreeable smell.
The best sort is called Ghark, and sinks when placed in water;
the next best, Nimghark, is still lighter and nearly floats;
the third least valuable, Semeleh, is the lightest. It is indi-
genous in Kochin-China, Kambojah, Siam, and also in Assam.
Its name is generally Aguru (Agaru) in Sanskrit, which
word denotes in this language not heavy, but as the best species
is really the heaviest, it seems clear, that the name was not
originally Sanskrit. In the Bible it is mentioned as Ahâlîm,
which resembles more the word aghil, in Tamil, and which
being identical with the Sanskrit word suggests that the latter
was derived from the former, while the Tamil word itself is
probably derived from the name by which Aloe was called in
its native country. The Burmese name for Aloe is Akyan,
it resembles Aghil and Ahâlûm and seems to contain the
original root of the word. In the Mahābhārata Bhima
receives presents of aloe. The word Aghila was through
ignorance turned into Aquila by the Portuguese, and thence
comes the erroneous name Aquilaria or Eagle-wood. It is
still very dear, in Kochin-China the pound sells between 18
and 55 rupees, and in Japan even at 650 rupees.
The fragrant sandal wood grows in Malabar and in Mysore,
in the zone above the teaktrees, it is also found in the Sunda
Islands, but the most precious sandal wood comes from the
first country. The middle of the trunk contains the odori-
ferous innerwood, and the darker its colour the more sweet-
scented it is. Three kinds, red, yellow and white, are
distinguished. Its use and qualities are well known, as
{ {}MMERCE OF INIDIA. 41
incense it is burnt in temples and private houses; as a powder
it produces a refreshing effect and becomes also a cooling
Salve, its oil is used as a cooling remedy. Its beneficent
qualities are praised by Indian poets; in the Bible it is
repeatedly mentioned, but it was not much patronized by the
Greeks and Romans, who applied it more as a purging
medicine.
The costus of the ancients is the Sanskrit “kushtha,” one
species came from the neighbourhood of Multan, another
from Kabul and Kashmir. The Romans had a great predi-
lection for this root, they used it at sacrifices, its oil was
turned into a salve, and they mixed their wines with costus
and availed themselves of it as a medicine. One pound sold
at 6 dinars or 1; rupees. The nard, in Sanskrit Nalada,
grows on the banks of the Upper Indus, in Nepal, and along
the Ganges. The reputation of this Waleriana had already
spread in early times, the singer of the song of Solomon
praises its fragrance. The spikenard possessed at one and
the same time leaves and ears, the sweetness of its flavour
and its fine red colour were equally esteemed. Its value
depended on the size of the leaves and a pound of the best
leaves was worth 100 dinars or 30 rupees, the smallest leaves
fetching the highest price.
Bdelſium is the gum of a tree, ascribed to Arabia, Media,
Bactria and India. The tree from which this resin flows,
grows still in Eastern Bengal and in Assam. Most probably
it was exported from India, the Bible mentions it in different
places. Like costus it was also used to temper wine, though
its medicinal application prevailed.
Having thus far mentioned the most important plants
which the ancients received through their trade with India,
we have now to turn our attention to the minerals.
The first and most important mineral which is said to have
been exported from India, is gold. That there were goldmines
f
42 ON THE ANCIENT
in India is a fact beyond doubt, and some rivers contain gold
dust. Even the second chapter of Genesis according to the
generally accepted explanation attributes gold to India.
Gold was found in the Himälaya in the north and in the
Western Ghat in the south ; and in the rivers, which
spring from the Himalaya, especially in Ladakh and Iskardo.
Herodotos relates (111. 102) the story, that in the country
of Daradas, ants smaller than dogs but larger than foxes
collect gold in their dens, that the inhabitants of these
regions take the gold out from the holes and bring it to
Darius, the king of Persia. The old Hindus were acquainted
with this story, called the gold collected thus pipilika, from
pipila a black ant, Megasthenes and Nearchos saw the skins
of these ants, and the former describes them as equal in size to
those of foxes and in outward appearance similar to those of
panthers. Later investigations have shown that those black
ants are marmots which live in Tibet, and whose annularly
marked skins are a great export article to India and China.
These marmots heap up the shining gold dust in their dens,
and their mode of life resembles that of ants. This is the
reason why they were called ants. Alexander von Humboldt
observed that the ants in northern Mexico carried to their
ant-hills a certain shining substance which sparkled like
Hyalith. It may be, that the Daradas remarked a similar
habit among the ants. However that may be, and though
gold is found evidently in India, it is extremely unlikely
that gold was ever in any considerable quantity exported
from India. We had an opportunity of speaking about this
subject when discussing Solomon’s expeditions to Ophir.
India has long been regarded as the richest country in the
world, and though this is far from being true, the greater
the ignorance, the greater was also the exaggeration. The
geographical ideas of the extent of India were very indefinite,
and the uncertainty attaching to the limits of India in the
Ancient and the Middle Ages creates a great difficulty in
COMMERCE OF INDIA. 43
explaining old writings. At times the whole south-eastern
part of Asia is called India, and it comprises often Ethiopia
in Africa. There is no reason then, why Further-India,
especially the Chersonesus Aurea, Malacca, should not be
included in the India of the Ancients, and if so, there is no
difficulty in ascribing the gold of Ophir to have been found
in Malacca. From the nature of the Indian commerce, gold
was essentially an import article to India, as it is also now.
Iron was found in India, and the old Hindus knew the
secret of making good steel, the sword-blades of Gujarat
especially enjoying a great reputation.
Though the tin trade goes back to far remote times, India
itself is not rich in this metal. It is more abundant in
Tenasserim, Malacca and the island of Banca. The Phoeni-
cians were the earliest tin merchants, in fact, it is owing to
this metal that their commerce became so extended. Neither
Egypt nor Babylonia possessed tin mines, the nearest
countries to these which possessed tin were Caucasia, India
and Spain. If we now find bronze implements in Egyptian
tombs, whose age goes back as far as 4000 before Christ,
surely one is bound to admit that a widely expended com-
mercial intercourse existed already in very distant days.
Whether the Greek word for tin kassiteros is derived from
the Sanskrit Kastīra, or whether the Hindus got it from the
Greeks, is still doubtful. That it was originally not much
found in India but in Further-India is immaterial, as it was
early known in India, and the fact of the word Kastira,
occurring in Pānini's Sūtras is important.
Perhaps hardly any country can equal India and Ceylon
in the possession of precious stones. Parts of India, foremost
Golkonda, have always been considered as mines of gems.
From India the ancients received the famous Diamond.
Between the 14th and 25th degrees of northern latitude, mostly
on the eastern side of the Dekkan and the Amarakantaka
g
44 ON THE ANCIENT
plateau, near Kadapa, Nandyāla, Rävalkonda, Ellora,
Sambhalpur and Panne lie rich diamond fields. The best
diamonds were retained for the adornment of Idols and Kings,
others were hoarded up in royal treasuries. Their number
can hardly be guessed, if we consider only the enormous
quantities of diamonds taken by foreign conquerors out of
this country. Plinius contains a great deal of information
about the diamond, whose pounding, by which they were
reduced to atomic dust, he declares to be one of the grandest
discoveries ever made by the human mind. That to the
diamond thus pounded were ascribed some absurd powers,
we were lately again reminded of in an important State trial.
According to Plinius diamonds could not be pounded unless
in the fresh and still warm blood of a buck.
Crystals too were exported from India, for the Indian
crystal was highly esteemed. The Rājapippali mountain
range between the lower Narmada and Tapty yielded Onya:
and Sardonya stones in large quantities, hence Ptolemy called
it the Sardonyx-mountain, Indian Hyacinths, Amethysts,
Smaragds, Carbuncles, Beryls, Sapphires, Chrysolites and Opals
were sent in large quantities, to the great western empire,
and this export trade in gems must have been very consider-
able. How highly precious.stones were valued at Rome, one
example out of many will clearly show. The Roman Senator
L. Nonius, the son of Struma Nonius, and the brother-in-law
of P. Quinctilius Varus was proscribed by the Triumvir
Antonius, for the sake of an Opal, the former possessed.
Nonius escaped leaving all his treasures behind, but took
away with him his opal ring, which was valued at 200,000
sesterces or about £8,000 sterling.
We must not forget the famous Murrhinian vases, which
though really not of Indian origin, were exported from
Barygaza together with onyxes. They were manufactured of
a mineral Murrha, composed of felspar, fluorspar and calcare-
ous spar, which was found in the mountains on the Caspian
COMMERCE OF INDIA. 45
sea, in Armenia and Persia, and were remarkable for their
hardness and beauty. Drinking and eating vessels were
generally made out of them. Pompeius Magnus brought
in 63 B.C. the first murrhinian drinking vessels to Rome,
this happened at his third triumph against Mithridates.
A small piece of murrhinum just enough for a small goglet,
containing the 48th part of an amphora, was sold at 70
talents. The Consul Petronius possessed a large number of
such vessels, the Emperor Nero coveted them and took them
from the children of Petronius. Nero was able to furnish a
whole theatre with them. Among these pieces of vertu was
a magnificent scoop, for which Petronius had paid 300 talents;
suspecting the designs of Nero, he broke it to pieces, before
he died.
We mentioned above that Indian articles were in request
among other nations, but that these could not supply in
return anything which met with an equal demand from the
Hindus, as their wants were moderate, and easily satisfied.
In a country where the three necessaries of life food, drink
and clothing (Annapānavastrāni) amount to so little, where
a few grains of rice, some draughts of water and a few
yards of cotton suffice for existence, this could not be other-
wise. Thus foreigners were obliged to pay in coin for the
goods they bought and as precious metals are the universally
acknowledged means of interchange, gold and silver coins
were imported in great quantities into India. In fact the
annual drain of these metals from Europe to India was an
object of great anxiety in ancient times. Pliny complains
most bitterly about this state of affairs, and is highly
indignant that 50 millions of sesterces or two millions
sterling were year after year swallowed by India, to pay for
Eastern goods, by the selling of which the Western merchants
gained at least 100 per cent. Besides gold and silver, copper,
lead, and tin also were imported to India.
46 ON THE ANCIENT
The old Hindus were very fond of corals, and attached to
them a similar value as foreigners to pearls; in consequence
many corals were imported to India, as were also some
varieties of Sards and Sardonyares. Glassware found a good
market in India. The Hindus have never up to this very day
made much progress in the manufacture of an article, whose
invention was known in the dawn of historical days to the
ancient Egyptians.
Frankincense and meliloton, perhaps an Egyptian kind of
lotus, whose stalks have a sweet taste and were a favorite dish
in Egypt, were brought to India. From the frankincense a
valuable oil and salve were prepared. The importation of
wine mostly from Laodikea in Syria and from Italy is an
undoubted fact. The Alexandrian merchant mentions
specially the presents of wine, he made to an Indian prince.
As in those times comparatively few Europeans lived in
India, the wine must have been drunk nearly exclusively
by natives, and considering the variety of race, and of
caste, there is no reason to wonder. Even now-a-days more
wines and spirits than the combined thirst of the European
community can digest, land in India, and what is more, are
consumed in this country. On the other hand, the stories of
inebriety among Hindus which Greek writers, as Chares of
Mytilene, record, are to say the least exaggerated.
If we add to this list of import articles linen cloth, we
have mentioned the most common and valuable ones.
Comparing the two lists of import and export goods with
each other, we see that, while the latter is very considerable
in number and differing in variety, the former contains only
a few articles. The reason of this striking difference has been
already explained. The nature of the Indian trade is even
now not materially altered. We meet, with a few exceptions,
the same goods in ancient times as in our days. After all,
men and countries do not change much, and the nature of
COMMERCE OF INDIA. 47
both remains the same. The greater number of European
inhabitants in this country has produced a large influx of
European merchandise, which originally intended for the use
of Europeans has found its way also into the household of
natives. As one of the most valuable new import articles
we may mention stationery, while the list of the export
articles is not materially altered, after including in it cotton,
coffee, tea and tobacco.
That the most numerous and useful articles of Indian
products belong to the vegetable kingdom is, from what has
been mentioned before pretty clear, and this fact at once
assigns to India its proper position, i.e., India is essentially
an agricultural country.
The great European discoveries in science have also affected
Indian commerce, but here it is not our intention to discourse
on this topic.
The exchange of material goods, though being the obvious
object of commerce, cannot take place without causing a
material change in the habits and ideas of those who come
thus in contact with each other. Paltry prejudices are
abandoned, the human mind expands in toleration, as it does
in knowledge. The great historian of ancient Greece
ascribes the civilization of Greece and the rapid growth of
Greek literature to the free trade which existed between
Egypt and Greece since the days of the Saidic dynasty.
If we apply these observations to India, we shall find that
though the Hindus supplied to other nations the most precious
products of their native country, they received back not only
their money’s worth in gold and silver, but also, and what
is more valuable, a knowledge of the great scientific researches,
made by their more advanced neighbours.
When the Aryans began to stir in their old home near the
Hindu-Kush, about 2,500 years before Christ, Turanian,
48 ON THE ANCIENT
Cushite and Semitic empires had already along history behind
them.
To Egypt and to Babylonia the Aryan Hindus owe a great
debt of gratitude. How far they were influenced by the
Cushites, and Dravidians of India it will be difficult to
determine. To the former they owe directly or indirectly
their astronomical or rather astrological science, the philoso-
phical systems on cosmogeny and atomism, the art of writing,
at first so detested by the Brahmans, who feared to lose
their ascendancy, if the knowledge of writing became general;
as in after years the invention of printing was opposed
by the Obscurantes in Europe.
To the intercourse with the Greeks they are indebted among
other things most probably to the drama, to the art of minting
coins, and to an increased knowledge of astronomy. The
Hindus had a high appreciation of Grecian science in
general, and they acknowledge specially the Yavanas as their
masters in astronomy. Many astronomical terms in Sanskrit
are derived from the Greek. We observed before, that the
Greeks were favourable to Buddhism, which owed its success
in India most likely to the support of the non-Aryan popu-
lation. To what an extent at a later period the cultus of
Krishna was modified by Christian legends, which found
their way to India, is beyond our power to say. -
On the other hand, the Hindus contributed, when their
turn came, much to the advancement of science, whose
depositors they had become. Whether it is owing to the
enervating heat or to some other climatic reason, the Hindu
though gifted with a sharp, discerning intellect, is on the
whole not gifted with the genius of originality. Very
few inventions or discoveries have been made by Hindus.
The study of astronomical and mathematical science was
prosecuted with great zeal and success in India, but the first
influence of the Hindus on the West was through the medium
COMMERCE OF INDIA. 49
of philosophy. Buddhism and other philosophical or reli-
gious systems, originated in India, biassed to a great extent
the doctrines of early Christianity. This we perceive in the
doctrines of Emanation, in that of the Migration of the
Soul and others. The gnostic Bardesanes of Edessa, a friend
of the Indian Ambassadors at the court of Antoninus Pius
(138-161) was well acquainted with Indian philosophy. The
same can be said of Clemens of Alexandria and Origines.
The heretic Mani was a great admirer of Buddhism which
proselytizing religion was centuries ago already known to
the Greeks.
The Mahomedan invasion was the means of introducing the
sparks of Indian wisdom to the West, which began just then
to recover from the violent convulsions, into which it had
been thrown by the immigration of the barbarians. The
same Arabs who acted at that very period as disseminators
of Indian science and as instructors of the West, were trying
to destroy and to root out the people who were the represen-
tatives of that civilization. Indian Arithmetic together with
the Indian figures, which the Europeans call Arabian, as
they obtained them through the medium of Arabs, Indian
Astronomy, with its nomenclature, Indian Medicine, Indian
Philosophy, all these were eagerly studied by the Arabs, then
the most civilized and learned people of the world. But
though the Mussulmans were thus striving to cultivate these
Indian studies and to reintroduce them into the very West,
from whence that civilization had originally started, they
reduced India to that unhappy condition, in which it was
found when the first Europeans put their foot on this
country.
It were untrue to contend that the immediate result of
European intervention could be considered to have been
beneficial to India. The first and most important reason
which directed the eyes of the Western people to this country
50 ON THE ANCIENT COMMERCE OF INDIA.
was the desire of acquiring wealth and power, for the idea of
the enormous riches of India had strangely taken hold of the
mind of foreign nations. Rank egotism can never act
benevolently, and the newcomers showed only benevolence
towards themselves and malevolence against all others. The
behaviour of the Portuguese towards the Natives; the intro-
duction of the Inquisition; the jealousy of Dutch, English
and French against each other, and the means to which they
stooped to conquer, could not but create a prejudice against
the Europeans. ' But as soon as India was fairly in the
hands of a European nation, the English, that nation did try
to obliterate the traces of the bloody conflicts, and the bless-
ings of peace began to manifest themselves in this country,
as they have never been experienced before.
And this prosperous state originated from the commercial
intercourse between the West and the East, which, though at
the beginning, fraught with disastrous events, was the means
of introducing to this country, when at its lowest prostration,
the arts, sciegoes and culture of the West.
Let us hope, that they will remain here for the good of
this country and its inhabitants and that the previous oscilla-
tions of civilization will cease and one high and moral culture
comprise and unite us one and all !
M A D R A S :
PRINTED BY R. HILL, AT THE GoverNMENT PRESS.
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