Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Introduction: Islam in a plural Asia
- PART I THE IMPACT OF THE STEPPE PEOPLES
- PART II THE GUNPOWDER EMPIRES
- PART III THE MARITIME OECUMENE
- 9 Islamic trade, shipping, port-states and merchant communities in the Indian Ocean, seventh to sixteenth centuries
- 10 Early Muslim expansion in South-East Asia, eighth to fifteenth centuries
- 11 Follow the white camel: Islam in China to 1800
- 12 Islam in South-East Asia and the Indian Ocean littoral, 1500–1800: expansion, polarisation, synthesis
- 13 South-East Asian localisations of Islam and participation within a global umma, c. 1500–1800
- 14 Transition: the end of the old order – Iran in the eighteenth century
- PART IV THEMES
- Glossary
- Bibliography
- Index
- References
9 - Islamic trade, shipping, port-states and merchant communities in the Indian Ocean, seventh to sixteenth centuries
from PART III - THE MARITIME OECUMENE
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 March 2011
Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Introduction: Islam in a plural Asia
- PART I THE IMPACT OF THE STEPPE PEOPLES
- PART II THE GUNPOWDER EMPIRES
- PART III THE MARITIME OECUMENE
- 9 Islamic trade, shipping, port-states and merchant communities in the Indian Ocean, seventh to sixteenth centuries
- 10 Early Muslim expansion in South-East Asia, eighth to fifteenth centuries
- 11 Follow the white camel: Islam in China to 1800
- 12 Islam in South-East Asia and the Indian Ocean littoral, 1500–1800: expansion, polarisation, synthesis
- 13 South-East Asian localisations of Islam and participation within a global umma, c. 1500–1800
- 14 Transition: the end of the old order – Iran in the eighteenth century
- PART IV THEMES
- Glossary
- Bibliography
- Index
- References
Summary
Introduction
This chapter consists of surveys of the following regions: the Swahili coast, the Maldive islands, Malabar, Coromandel and Sri Lanka (see Map 7). The period to be covered is from the seventh to the sixteenth centuries. The concern will be to describe the arrival of Islam in these areas, the process of conversion and the state of Islam towards the end of this period. First, however, it is necessary to provide an overall sketch of trade, shipping and seafaring in the Indian Ocean, in the period from before Islam to the end of the sixteenth century, and then, before getting to specific areas, to consider some area-wide themes.
Pre-Islamic Indian Ocean trade
The sea, more precisely the Arabian Sea, plays a large role in the story. Travel by sea, facilitated or sometimes circumscribed by the monsoon wind pattern, has a very long history in this area. The earliest boats were canoes made of reeds, still to be seen today in the marsh areas of the Tigris–Euphrates delta. Wooden boats, which gain their buoyancy from enclosed air, mark a major technological step forward. They go back at least some 5,000 years, to the time of the Indus Valley Civilisation.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The New Cambridge History of Islam , pp. 315 - 365Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2010
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