Chapter 8 South and Southwest_Asia, 800 B.C.B.-800 C.B. 199

Schlesinger, Roger and others. Global Passages, volume 1. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2004

An Egyptian-Greek Merchant Describes Commercial Sea Routes

Periplus Maris Erythraei (c. 30-230 C.E.)

Periploi (plural of peri plus) were accounts generally kept by ships' captains. This selection was probably the work of a merchant, since it focuses on prod-ucts available in various ports. He included general information about the routes down the coast of East Africa, across the Arabian Sea to central coastal India, down to Cape Comorin, and up the east coast to the mouth of the Ganges. The content and detail indicate that he wrote from personal experi-ence, producing what was essentially a merchant's handbook for trade be-yond the Red Sea (Maris Erythraet). It is dated from the middle of the first century C.E.

Trade began between Mesopotamia and the Indus civilization possibly as early as the latter part of the third millennium B.C.E., judging from artifacts in each area. These artifacts illustrate common themes. For example, in a scene from the Fertile Crescent, a hero ~are-handedly overcomes two lions, while in a nearly identical piece of art from the Indus Valley, a bare-handed hero con-quers a pair of tigers. Conversely, information about how to benefit from the monsoon was not exchanged between .... cultures. This information, for what-ever reason, was not available to the Greeks until much later, perhaps even as late as the first millennium B.C.E., when a Greek named Hippalos was suppos-edly the first European to discover it. Unfortunately, the Peri plus does not provide information about him, not even when he lived. Before Hippalos, the Greeks had unloaded their goods at a port located in what is present-day Aden, and the goods were trans-shipped to India by natives of the Arabian Peninsula. The knowledge of how to use the monsoon was crucial because it made direct contact between the Mediterranean and India possible.

There are a total of sixty-six paragraphs (sometimes called chapters) in the Peri plus. The part concerning trade with India, from paragraph 38 on, is pre-sented here. The detail is clear and fairly reliable for the times, although the description of the east coast of India is vague and may have come from hearsay. Although much of the information is technical, the writer included fascinating details about peoples, places and customs. A couple of items from paragraph 56 may be emphasized: money and pepper. Merchants from the Mediterranean were advised to bring lots of money because Indians had little desire or use for goods brought from Europe, whereas there was a great de-mand for spices, especially pepper, from India, particularly south India. Mer-chants are described in a Tamil poem as "arriving with gold and departing with pepper." The word pepper itself has a south Indian origin. From ancient times Europeans had been interested in spices and other items from India; this trade drained much of the wealth of Rome and was to be a motivation for the Age of Exploration.

200 Part II Classical Civilizations, 800 B.C.E.-800 C.E.

38. After this region, with the coast by now curving like a horn because of the deep indenta-tions to the east made by the bays, there next comes the seaboard of Skythia [Indus, modern Sind in present-day Pakistan}, which lies di-rectly to the north; it is very flat and through it flows the Sinthos River, mightiest of the rivers along the Erythraean Sea and emptying so great an amount of water into the sea that far off, be-fore you reach land, its light-colored water meets you out at sea. An indication to those coming from the sea that they are alread y approaching land in the river's vicinity are the snakes that emerge from the depths to meet them; there is an indication as well in the places around Persis mentioned above, the snakes called graai. The river has seven mouths, narrow and full of shal-lows; none are navigable except the one in the middle. At it, on the coast, stands the port of trade of Barbarikon [unknown port at the mouth of the Indus}. There is a small islet in front of it; and behind it, inland, is the metropolis of Skythia itself, Minnagar [exact location un-known}. The throne is in the hands of Parthians, who are constantly chasing each other off it.

39. Vessels moor at Barbarikon, but all the cargoes are taken up the river to the king at the metropolis. In this port of trade there is a mar-ket for: clothing, with no adornment in good quantity, of printed fabric in limited quantity; multicolored textiles; peridot (?)*; coral; storax; frankincense; glassware; silverware; money; wine, limited quantity. As return cargo it offers: cos-tus; bdellium; /ykiont; nard; turquoise; lapis la-zuli; Chinese pelts, cloth, and yam; indigo. Those who sail with the Indian [sc. winds} leave around July, that is, Epeiph. The crossing with these is hard going but absolutely favorable and shorter.

40. After the Sinthos River there is another bay, hidden from view, to the north. It is named

• A precious stone, perhaps the yellow sapphire. tprobably a Himalayan medicinal berry.

Eirinon,* with the additional names Little and Big. Both are bodies of water with shoals and a succession of shallow eddies reaching a long way from land so that frequently, with the shore, nowhere in sight, vessels will run aground and, if caught and thrust further in, be destroyed. Beyond this bay a promontory juts out, curving from Eirinon first east and south and then west; it embraces- the gulf called Barake [Gulf of Kutch}, which itself embraces seven islands. Ships around its entrance that blunder in and then pull back the short distance into open wa-ter, escape; those that get closed inside the basin of Barake are destroyed. For not only are the waves there very big and oppressive, but the sea is choppy and turbid, with eddies and violent whirlpools. The bottom in some places has sheer drops, in others is rocky and sharp, so that the anchors lying parallel (i.e., dropped ftom the bows}, thrust out to withstand [sc. the difficult waters}, get cut loose and some even get smashed

"'On the sea floor. An indication of these [sc. dan-gers] to vessels coming from the sea are the snakes, huge and black, that emerge to meet them. In the areas beyond, and around Barygaza [port on the gulf of Cambay, or Khambhat}, snakes that are smaller and yellow and golden in color are met with.

41. Immediately after the gulf of Barake is the gulf of Barygaza [gulf of Cam bay } and the coast of the region of Ariake, the beginning both of Manbanos's realm and of all of India. The part inland, which borders on Skythia, is called Aberia, the part along the coast Syras-trene {Kathiawar peninsula}. The region, very fertile, produces grain, rice, sesame oil, ghee, cotton, and the Indian cloths made from it, those of ordinary quality. There are a great many herds of cattle, and the men are of very great size and dark skin color. The metropolis of the region is Minnagara, from which great quan-

*The Rann of Kutch, consisting of the Great Rann and the Little Rann, in the modern state of Gujarat (on west central coast); formerly salt-water swamps, now salt and sand flats overrun by tides during the monsoon.

Chapter 8 South and Southwest Asia, 800 B.C.B.-800 C.B. 201

tities of cloth are brought to Barygaza. In the area there are still preserved to this very day signs of Alexander's expedition, ancient shrines and the foundations of encampments and huge wells. The voyage along the coast of this region, from Barbarikon to the promontory near As-takapra across from Barygaza called Papike, is 3000 stades.·

42. Beyond it is another gulf, on the inside of the waves, that forms an inlet directly to the north. Near the mouth is an island called Baiones, and, at the very head, a mighty river called the Mais [the Maki, which empties into the gulf of Cam bay}. Vessels whose destination is Barygaza cross the gulf, which is about 300 stades wide, leaving the island, whose highest point is visible, to the left and heading due east toward the mouth of Barygaza's river. This river is called the Lamnaios [Narmada}. \

43. This gulf which leads to Barygaza, since it is narrow, is hard for vessels coming from sea-ward to manage. For they arrive at either its right-hand side or its left-hand, and attempting it by the left-hand side is better than the other. For, on the right-hand side, at the very mouth of the gulf, there extends a rough and rock-strewn reef called Herone, near the village of Kam-moni. Opposite it, on the left-hand side, is the promontory in front of Astakapra called Papike; mooring here is difficult because of the current around it and because the bottom, being rough and rocky, cuts the anchor cables. And, even if you manage the gulf itself, the very mouth of the river on which Barygaza stands is hard to find because the land is low and nothing is clearly visible even from nearby. And, even if you find the mouth, it is hard to negotiate be-cause of the shoals in the river around it.

44. For this reason local fishermen in the king's service come out with crews [sc. of row-ers} and long ships, the kind called trappaga and kotymba, to the entrance as far as Syrastrene to meet vessels and guide them up to Barygaza.

*300 nautical miles; the distance, however, is incorrect.

Through the crew's efforts, they maneuver them right from the mouth of the gulf through the shoals and tow them to predetermined stopping places; they get them under way when the tide comes in and, when it goes out, bring them to anchor in certain harbors and basins. The basins are'rather deep spots along the river up to Barygaza. ,For this lies on the river about 300 stades upstream from the mouth.

45. All over India there are large numbers of rivers with extreme ebb-and-flood tides that at the time of the new moon and the full moon last for up to three days, diminishing during the intervals. They are much more extreme in the area around Barygaza than elsewhere. Here sud-denly the sea floor becomes visible, and certain parts along the coast, which a short while ago had ships sailing over them, at times become dry land, and the rivers, because of the inrush at flood tide of a whole concentrated mass of sea-water, are driven headlong upstream against the natural direction of their flow for a good many stades,

46, Thus the navigating of ships in and out is dangerous for those who are inexperienced and are entering this port of trade for the first time. For, once the thrust of the flood tide is under way, restraining anchors do not stay in place. Consequently, the ships, carried along by its force and driven sideways by the swiftness of the current, run aground on the shoals and break up, while smaller craft even capsize. Even in the channels some craft, if not propped up, will tilt over on their sides during the ebb and, when the flood suddenly returns, get swamped by the first wave of the flow. So much power is generated at the inrush of the sea even during the dark of the moon, particularly if the flood arrives at night, that when the tide is just beginning to come in and the sea is still at rest, there is carried from it to people at the mouth something like the rumble of an army heard from afar, and after a short while the sea itself races over the shoals with a hiss.

47. Inland behind Barygaza there are numer-ous peoples: the Aratrioi, Arachusioi, Gandaraioi,

20'2 Part II Classical Civilizatiom, BOO B.C.E.-BOO C.E.

and the peoples of Proklais, in whose area Bukephalos Alexandreia is located. And beyond these is a very warlike people, the Bactrians,* under a king .... Alexander, setting out from these parts, penetrated as far as the Ganges t but did not get to Limyrike [the Malabar (southeast) coast} and the south of India. Because of this, there are to be found on the market in Barygaza even today old drachmas engraved with the in-scriptions, in Greek letters, of Apollodorus and Menander, rulers who came after Alexander.

48. There is in this region [sc. of Barygaza} towards the east a city called Ozene,* the former seat of the royal court, from which everything that contributes to the region's prosperity, in-cluding what contributes to trade with us, is brought down to Barygaza: onyx; agate (?); In-dian garments of cotton; garments of molochin...on§; and a considerable amount of cloth of ordinary quality. Through this region there is also brought down from the upper areas the nard that comes by way of Proklais (the Kattyburine, Patropa-pige, and Kabalite), the nard that comes through the adjacent part of Skythia, and costus and bdellium.

49. In this port of trade there is a market for: wine, principally Italian but also Laodicean and Arabian; copper, tin, and lead; coral and peridot (?); all kinds of clothing with no adornment or of printed fabric; multicolored girdles, eighteen inches wide; storax; yellow sweet clover (?); raw glass; realgar; sulphide of antimony; Roman money, gold and silver, which commands an ex-change at some profit against the local cutrency; unguent, inexpensive and in limited quantity. For the king there was imported in those times precious silverware, slave musicians, beautiful girls for concubinage, fine wine, expensive cloth-ing with no adornment, and choice unguent. This area exports: nard; costus; bdellium; ivory;

*Kushans, an Iranian or central Asian people with territorial power in northwest India. tThis is a fable. Alexander got as far as the Beas, a tributary of the Indus. *Modern Ujjain, which is north, not east. §Probably another type of cotton.

onyx; agate (?); lykion; cotton cloth of all kinds; Chinese [sc. silk} cloth; molochinon cloth; [sc. silk} yarn; long pepper; and items brought here from the [sc. nearby} ports of trade. For those sailing to this port from Egypt, the right time to set out is around the month of July, that is Epeiph.

50'. Imme.~iately beyond Barygaza the coast runs from north to south. Thus the region is called Dachinabades,11 for the word for south in their language is dachanos. The hinterland that lies beyond towards the east contains many bar-ren areas, great mountains, and wild animals of all kinds-leopards, tigers, elephants, enormous serpents, hyenas, and a great many kinds of monkeys, as well as a great many populous na-tions up to the Ganges.

51. Of the trading centers in the region of Dachinabades, two are the most outstanding: Paithana, twenty days' travel to the south from Barygaza; and, from Paithana, about ten days to

""the east, another very large city, Tagara. From these there is brought to Barygaza, by conveyance in wagons over very great roadless stretches, from Paithana large quantities of onyx, and from Tagara large quantities of cloth of ordinary qual-ity, all kinds of cotton garments, garments of molochinon, and certain other merchandise from the coastal parts that finds a market locally there. The voyage as far as Limyrike is 70'0'0' stades in all, but most vessels continue on to the Strand.

52. The local ports [Sc. of Dachinabades}, ly-ing in a row, are Akabaru, Suppara, and the city of Kalliena; the last, in the time of the elder Saraganos,# was a port of trade where everything went according to law. [Sc. It is so no longer} for, after Sandanes** occupied it, there has been much hindrance [Sc. to trade}. For the Greek ships that by chance come into these places are brought under guard to Barygaza.

53. Beyond Kalliena other local ports of trade

liThe Deccan, plateau of south India. "There were several south Indian kings with a variation of this name ** A south Indian Saka (Hun) official. The Sakas were in con-flict with the Andhras (south Indians).

Chapter 8 South and Southwest Asia, 800 B.C.E.-800 C.E. 203

are: Semylla (near modern Bombay}, Mandagora, Palaipatmai, Melizeigara, Byzantion, Toparon, Tyrannosboas. Then come the Sesekreienai Is-lands (off the Malabar Coast} as they are called, the Isle of the Aigidioi, the Isle of the Kaineitoi near what is called the Peninsula, around which places there are pirates, and next White Island. Then come Naura and Tyndis, the first ports of trade of Limyrike, and, after these, Muziris and Nelkynda, which are now the active ones.

54. Tyndis, a well-known village on the coast, is in the kingdom of Keprobotos (modern Ker-ala}. Muziris, in the same kingdom, owes its prosperity to the shipping from Ariake that comes there as well as to Greek shipping. It lies on a river 500 stades distant from Tyndis by river and sea, and from (? the river mouth} to it is 20 stades. Nelkynda is just about 500 stades from Muziris, likewise by river and sea, b~t it is in another kingdom, Pandion's. It too lies on a river, about 120 stades from the sea.

55. Another settlement lies at the very moudf-of the river, Bakare, to which vessels drop down-river from Nelkynda for the outbound voyage; they anchor in the open roads to take on their cargoes because the river has sandbanks and channels that are shoal. The kings themselves of both ports of trade dwell in the interior. Vessels coming from the open sea in the vicinity of these places get an indication that they are approach-ing land from the snakes that emerge to meet them; these are also black in color but shorter and with dragon-shaped head and blood-red eyes.

56. Ships in these ports of trade carry full loads because of the volume and quantity of pep-per and malabathron (type of cinnamon}. They offer a market for: mainly a great amount of money; peridot (?); clothing with no adorn-ment, in limited quantity; multicolored tex-tiles; sulphide of antimony; coral; raw glass; copper, tin, lead; wine, in limited quantity, as much as goes to Barygaza; realgar; orpiment*; grain in sufficient amount for those involved

"Arsenic trisullide, a yellow mineral used as a medicine and extensively as a pigment in the ancient world.

with shipping, because the (Sc. local} merchants do not use it. They export pepper, grown for the most part in only one place connected with these ports of trade, that called Kottanarike. They also export: good supplies of fine-quality pearls; ivory; Chinese (i.e., silk} cloth; Gangetic nard; mala-bathron, brought here from the interior; all kinds of -transparent gems; diamonds; sapphires; tor-toise shelf, both the kind from Chryse Island and the kind caught around the islands lying off Limyrike itself. For those sailing here from Egypt, the right time to set out is around the month of July, that is, Epeiph.

57. The whole coastal route just described, from Kane (an Arabian port} and Eudaimon Arabia,t men formerly used to sail over in smaller vessels, following the curves of the bays. The ship captain Hippalos, by plotting the loca-tion of the ports of trade and the configuration of the sea, was the first to discover the route over open water .... In this locale the winds we call "etesian" blow seasonally from the direction of the ocean, and so a southwesterly makes its ap-pearance in the Indian Sea, but it is called after the name of the one who first discovered the way across. Because of this, right up to the present, some leave direct! y from Kane and some from the Promontory of Spices, and whoever are bound for Limyrike hold out with the wind on the quarter for most of the way, but whoever are bound for Barygaza and whoever for Skythia only three days and no more, and, carried along (?) the rest of the run on their own proper course, away from the shore on the high seas, over the (? ocean} off the land, they bypass the aforemen-tioned bays.

58. After Bakare comes Red Mountain, as it is called, and another region extends ... called the Seaboard, directly to the south. Its first stop-ping place, called Balita, is a village on the coast with a good harbor. After this comes another stopping place called Komar, where there is a little settlement and a port; in it men who wish

tTown on the coast of modern day Aden sacked by the Ro-mans about a century previous to the writing of the Perip/us.

204,l Part II Classical Civilizations, 800 B.C.E.-800 CE.

to lead a holy life for the rest of their days re-main there celibate; they come there and they perform ablutions. Women, too, do the same. For it is said that at one time the goddess re-mained there and performed ablutions.

59. Beyond Komar [Cape Comorin, or Kan-niyakumari} the region extends as far as Kol-

REVIEW QUESTIONS

choi: where diving for pearls goes on; it is car-ried out by convicts. The region is under King Pandion.

'Gulf between Tamil Nadu and Sri Lanka; specifically, pearl-diving area at the mouth of the Tamraparni river.

1. Why do you think spices were so important to Europeans? 2. What features of the document indicate that it was written "by a merchant for the use

of merchants"? 3. What do you see as the value of the Peri plus for ancient traders?

A Moorish Magistrate Describes Regulations for the Markets of Seville (early twelfth century)

\ IBN 'ABDUN, Hisba Manual

In 711 a Muslim army from North i\frica crossed the Straits of Gibraltar, conquering and occupying much of the Iberian Peninsula. This conquest, the most significant encounter between Islam and Christianity on European soil, changed the course of Spanish history and that of western Europe as well. The Muslim invaders established large, culturally and economically advanced urban centers (compared to those of northern Europe) that included hospi-tals, libraries, civic centers, and educational institutions. Cordoba, for exam-ple, was said to have some three thouand mosques and three hundred public baths. Moreover, the Muslim conquest allowed Spanish Christians and Jews to have access to the literature of the ancient Greeks, although it was in Ara-bic translation. In this indirect way, much of the wisdom of Plato and Aris-totle entered medieval Europe. Muslim rulers also transformed the existing Visigothic practices by establishing rules of social behavior for women and men and enacting legislation to regulate economic life and protect citizens from crime. The selection presented here offers an example of these kinds of regulations in early twelfth-century Seville.

Ibn 'Abdun, the author of these regulations, was either a judge or a market inspector. He had the power to enforce these rules and to "promote good and prevent evil." As a result of this far-ranging charge, Ibn 'Abdun had the op-portunity to eliminate or reduce conflict among Muslims, Jews, and Chris-tians. In addition to his authority in the marketplace, he was responsible for people's moral conduct, public decency, and segregation of the sexes.

Shopkeepers must be forbidden to reserve regu-lar places for themselves in the forecourt of the great mosque or elsewhere, for this amounts to a

usurpation of property rights and always gives rise to quarrels and trouble among them. In-stead, whoever comes first should take his place.

The mu~tasib must arrange the crafts in order, putting like with like in fixed places. This is the best and most orderly way.

There must be no sellers of olive oil around the mosque, nor of dirty products, nor of anything from which an irremovable stain can be feared.

Rabbits and poultry should not be allowed around the mosque, but should have a fixed place. Partridges and slaughtered barnyard birds should only be sold with the crop plucked, so that the bad and rotten can be distinguished from the good ones. Rabbits should only be sold skinned, so that the bad ones may be seen. If they are left lying in their skins, they go bad.

Egg sellers must have bowls of water in front of them, so that bad eggs may be recognized.

Truffles should not be sold around the mosque, for this is a delicacy of the dissolute.!

Bread should only be sold by weight.l Both the baking and the crumbs must be supervised, as it is often "dressed up." By this I mean that they take a small quantity of good dough ana. use it to "dress up" the front of the bread which is made with bad flour. A large loaf should not be made up out of the poya2 rolls. These should be baked separately and as they are.

The glaziers must be forbidden to make fine goblets for wine; likewise the potters.

The rar/ weights for meat and fish and ~rlsa3 and fritters and bread should be made of iron only, with a visible seal on them. The rar/ weights of the shopkeepers should always be in-spected, for they are bad people.

The cheese which comes from al-Mada'in4

should not be sold, for it is the foul residue of the curds, of no value. If people saw how it is made, no one would ever eat it. Cheese should only be sold in small leather bottles, which can be washed

[Apparently a common view. A Spanish Arabic proverb in-cludes the large consumption of truffles among the signs by which the dissolute may be recognized. 2 A roll given to the baker as payment for baking bread in his oven. In modern Spanish the word denotes the money paid to the baker for this service. 3 A dish made with meat, cracked wheat, and sour milk, re-garded as a great delicacy. 4A term applied to the fertile islands in the lower Guadalquivir, below Seville.

Chapter 10 Europe,800-1500 243

and cleaned every day. That which is in bowls cannot be secured from worms and mold.

Mixed meats should not be sold on one stall, nor should fat and lean meat be sold on one stall. Tripe should only be sold dry on boards, for wa-ter both spoils it and increases its weight. The entr;ails of sheep must be taken out, so that they should not be sold with the meat and at the same price, which would be a fraud. The heads of sheep should not be skinned, except for the young. The guts must always be removed from the bodies of animals, except lambs, and should not be left there, for this too would be an occa-sion for fraud.

No slaughtering should take place in the mar-ket, except in the closed slaughterhouses, and the blood and refuse should be taken outside the market. Animals should be slaughtered only with a long knife. All slaughtering knives should be of this kind. No animal which is good for field work may be slaughtered, and a trustworthy and incorruptible commissioner should go to the slaughterhouse every day to make sure of this; the only exception is an animal with a defect. Nor should a female still capable of producing young be slaughtered. No animal should be sold in the market which has been brought already slaughtered, until its owner establishes that it is not stolen. The entrails should not be sold to-gether with the meat and at the same price. A lamb weighing six rar/s with its offal shall not be sold at the same price as a lamb the meat of which alone is of that weight.

Fish, whether salt or fresh, shall not be washed in water for this makes it go bad. Nor should salted fish be soaked in water, for this also spoils and rots it ....

Left-over and rotten fish should not be sold. Sausages and grilled rissoles should only be

made with fresh meat and not with meat coming from a sick animal and bought for its cheapness.

Flour should not be mixed with the cheese used for fritters. This is fraud, and the mu~tasib must watch out for it.

The cream must always be pure and not mixed with cheese. The leftovers of the cooks and fry-ers should not be sold.

244 Part III Expanding Civilizations, 800-1550

Vinegar should only be bought from a trust-worthy merchant, for it can be mixed with much water, which is a fraud. The vinegar maker should be ordered not to use too much water when he makes vinegar for someone, for this spoils it.

The copper pots used by the I;arTsa makers, as also the spans of the fritter makers and the fry-ers, should be lined with tin only, since copper with oil is poisonous.

Women should be forbidden to do their wash-ing in the gardens, for these are dens for forni-cation.

Grapes in large quantities should not be sold to anyone of whom it is known that he would press them to make wine. This is a matter for supervision.

Fruit must not be sold before it is ripe for this is bad, except only for grapes, which are good for pregnant women and for the sick. Large cp-cumbers which can be counted should not be sold by weight UJ ....

Wild figs may only be sold in pairs. The seller of grapes should have baskets and

nets in which to arrange them, as this is the best protection for them.

Cakes should be properly baked and should only be made wide, as thin ones are good only for the sick.

If someone assays gold or silver coins for a person, and later it emerges that there is base metal in them, the assayer must make good, for he deceived and betrayed the owner of the coins, who placed his trust in him. Swindlers when detected must be denounced in all crafts, but above all in assaying coin, for in this case the swindler can only be a person who is expert in matters of coin.

Women should not sit by the river bank in the summer if men appear there.

No barber may remain alone with a woman in his booth. He should work in the open market in a place where he can be seen and observed.

The cupper. He should only let blood into a special jar with graduation marks, so that he can see how much blood he has let. He should not let blood at his discretion, for this can lead to sickness and death.

The water wheel. Most of the holes for the spindles should be wedged, as this is best for its working.

No one may be allowed to claim knowledge of a matter in which he is not competent, espe-cially in the craft of medicine, for this can lead to loss of life. The error of a physician is hid-den by'the earth. Likewise a joiner, Each should keep ·to his own trade and not claim any skill of which he is not an acknowledged master-especially with women, since ignorance and er-ror are greater among them.

Only a skilled physician should sell potions and electuaries and mix drugs. These things should not be bought from the grocer or the apothecary whose only concern is to take money without knowledge; they spoil the prescriptions and kill the sick, for they mix medicines which are unknown and of contrary effect.

The sale of tame pigeons must be prohibited, for they are used only by thieves and people of no religion. The sale of cats should also be banned. Any broker who is known to be treacherous and dishonest should be excluded from the market, for he is a thief. He must be watched and not employed.

The lime stores and [other} empty places must be forbidden, because men go there to be alone with women,

Only good and trustworthy men, known as such among people, may be allowed to have deal-ings with women in buying and in selling. The tradespeople must watch over this carefully. The women who weave brocades must be banned from the market, for they are nothing but harlots.

On festival days men and women shall not walk on the same path when they go to cross the river ....

The heads of sheep, the meat of which is brought to the market, must be washed clean of blood. Otherwise, in narrow or crowded places it would not be possible to secure passersby from pollution by the blood. The ends of the stalls which protrude from the shops must be sawn off, since the meat hanging there would soil the clothes of passersby and make the way narrow.

The bakers must be ordered to wash their

pans every day and to scrape and polish their boards to prevent vermin from entering them. They must not make large loaves with the dough for poya rolls. These must be cooked sep-arately and sold by weight.

Graves should be slightly lengthened and widened. I saw a corpse which was exhumed from the grave three times; graves should allow for this. I saw another which had to be forced into the grave. The first concern of the mu~tasib should be to demolish buildings erected in the cemetery and to watch over this for reasons I have already explained above.

Paper should be of somewhat larger format, with more glazing.

Raw bricks should be thicker and smoother. The basins in the public baths should be cov-

ered. If they are left uncovered, they cannot be protected from pollution, yet this is a place of purity. The bath attendant, the masseur, and the barber should not walk about in the baths with-out a loincloth or drawers. ....

A Muslim must not massage aJew or a Chris-tian nor throwaway his refuse nor clean his latrines. The Jew and the Christian are better fitted for such trades, since they are the trades of those who are vile. A Muslim should not attend to the animal of a Jew or of a Christian, nor serve him as a muleteer, nor hold his stirrup. If any Muslim is known to do this, he should be de-nounced.

Muslim women shall be prevented from en-tering their abominable churches, for the priests are evil-doers, fornicators, and sodomites. Frank-ish4 women must be forbidden to enter the church except on days of religious services or festivals, for it is their habit to eat and drink and fornicate with the priests, among whom there is not one who has not two or more women with whom he sleeps. This has become a custom among them, for they have permitted what is forbidden and forbidden what is permitted. The priests should be ordered to marry, as they do in the eastern lands. If they wanted to, they would.

4fhat is, Christians from outside Spain and from those parts of Spain not under Muslim rule.

Chapter 10 Europe,800-1500 245

No women may be allowed in the house of a priest, neither an old woman nor any other, if he refuses marriage. They should be compelled to submit to circumcision, as was done to them by al-Mu'ta

246 Part III Expanding Civilizations, 800-1550

their work. They make the felts slack, with lit-tle wool, and useless. The wool must be shaken free of lime.

The furriers must be advised not to use pi-geons' dung to disguise worn out furs. This is a deceit which they practice.

Dyers must be forbidden to dye green with passerine or to dye light blue with brazilwood. This is fraudulent, since these dyes lose their color quickly. Some grocers use lycium leaf to make the henna green. This gives the henna a bright and nne green color. This is fraud.

A garment belonging to a sick man,s a Jew, or a Christian must not be sold without indicating its origin; likewise, the garment of a debauchee. Dough must not be taken from a sick man for baking his bread. Neither eggs nor chickens nor milk nor any other foodstuff should be bought from him. They should only buy and sell among themselves.

The sewer men must be forbidden to dig holes in the streets, as this harms them and causes in-jury to people, except when they are cleaning the entire street.

Itinerant fortune-tellers must be forbidden to

BProbably lepers are meant.

REVIEW QUESTIONS

go from house to house, as they are thieves and fornicators.

A drunkard must not be flogged until he is sober again.

Prostitutes must be forbidden to stand bare-headed outside the houses. Decent women must not bedeck themselves to resemble them. They must be stopped from coquetry and party mak-ing among themselves, even if they have been permitted to do this (by their husbands}. Danc-ing girls must be forbidden to bare their heads.

No contractor, policeman, Jew, or Christian may be allowed to dress in the costume of people of position, of a jurist, or of a worthy man. They must on the contrary be abhorred and shunned and should not be greeted with the formula, "Peace be with you," for the devil has gained mastery over them and has made them forget the name of God. They are the devil's party, "and in-deed the devil's party are the losers" (Qur'an, lvii, 22}. They must have a distinguishing sign by which they are recognized to their shame ....

When fruit or other foodstuffs are found in the possession of thieves, they should be distrib-uted in prisons and given to the poor. If the owner comes to claim his goods and is recog-nized, they should be returned to him.

1. What does this selection reveal about religious tolerance in Seville? 2. What does it reveal about relations between women and men in Seville? 3. Would you feel comfortable buying something in this marketplace? Why or why not? 4. What single piece of information in this selection surprised you the most? Why?

Ibn Battuta, The Travels of Ibn Battuta, "Ibn Battuta in Mali"

The traditional trade centers of the Indian Ocean and Mediterranean Sea slowly accumulated more areas into their economic spheres. East Africa readily participated in the Indian Ocean trade, its coastal cites booming. West Africa also benefited with connections to the wealthy Islamic areas along the Mediterranean. Rich kingdoms like Mali grew rich from acting as intermediaries in the trans-Saharan trade. Ibn 8attuta's account is a reminder of the centrality of Arabic traders to many of these trade routes.

Source: Ibn Battuta, Ibn Battuta in Mali

Focus Questions: 1. What are the modes of transport? 2. What goods are in demand? 3. What is Ibn 8attuta's attitude towards the inhabitants?

(pp. 309, 310)

.. .1 set out on the 1st Muharram of the year seven hundred and fifty-three (18 February, 1352 C.E.) with a caravan including amongst others a number of the merchants of Sijilmasa [present day MoroccolAglerian frontier region). After twenty-five days we reached Taghaza, an unattractive village, with the curious feature that its houses and mosques are built of blocks of salt, roofed with camel skins. There are no trees there, nothing but sand. In the sand is a salt mine; they dig for the salt, and find it in thick slabs, lying one on top of the other, as though they had been tool-squared and laid under the surface of the earth. A camel will carry two of these slabs. No one lives at Taghaza except the slaves of the Masufa tribe, who dig for the salt; they subsist on dates imported from Dara and Sijilmasa [Morocco], camel's flesh, and millet imported from the Negrolands. The Negroes come up from their country and take away the salt from there. At Walata a load of salt brings eight to ten mithqals; in the town of Mali it sells for twenty to thirty, and sometimes as much as forty. The Negroes use salt as a medium of exchange, just as gold and silver is used elsewhere; they cut it up into pieces and buy and sell with it. The business done at Taghaza, for all its meanness, amounts to an enormous figure in terms of hundred-weights of gold dust...

Thus we reached the town ofWalata after ajourney of two months to a day. Walata is the northernmost province of the Negroes, and the Sultan's representative there was one Farba Husayn, Farba meaning deputy (in their language) ...

... It was an excessively hot place, and boasts a few small date-palms, in the shade of which they sow watermelons. Its water comes from underground water beds at that point, and there is plenty of mutton to be had. The garments of the inhabitants, most of whom belong to the Masufa tribe, are of fine Egyptian fabrics. Their women are of surpassing beauty, and are shown more respect than the men. The state of affairs amongst these people is indeed extraordinary. Their men show no sign of jealousy whatever; no one claims descent from his father, but on the contrary from his mother's brother. A person's heirs are his sister's sons, not his own sons. This is a thing which I have seen nowhere in the world except among the Indians of Malabar. But those are heathens; these people are Muslims, punctilious in observing the hours of prayer, studying books of law, and memorizing the Koran. Yet their women show no bashfulness before men and do not veil themselves, though they are assiduous in attending prayers. Any man who wishes to marry one of them may do so, they do not travel with their husbands ...

The women have their "friends" and "companions" amongst the men outside their own families, and the men in the same way have "companions" amongst the women of other families. A man may go into his house and find his wife entertaining her "companion", but he takes not objection to it. One day at Walata I went into the qadi's [Muslim judge] house, after asking his permission to enter, and found with a young woman of remarkable beauty. When I saw her I was shocked and turned to go out, but she laughed at me, instead of being overcome

by shame, and the quadi said to me, "Why are you going out? She is my companion." I was amazed at their conduct, for he was a theologian and a pilgrim to boot. I was told that he had asked the sultan's permission to make the pilgrimage that year with his "companion" (whether this one or not I cannot say) but the sultan would not grant it.

(pp. 313,314)

... On feast-days, after Dugha [the interpreter} has finished his display, the poets come in. Each of them is inside a figure resembling a thrush, made of feathers, and provided with a wooden head with a red beak, to look like a thrush's head. They stand in front of the sultan in this ridiculous make-up and recite their poems. I was told that their poetry is a kind of sermonizing in which they say to the sultan: "This pempi [throne} which you occupy was that whereon sat this king and that king, and such were this one's noble actions and such and such the other's. So do you too do good deeds whose memory will outlive you." After that the chief of the poets mounts the steps of the pempi and lays hid head on the sultan's lap, then climbs to the top of the pempi and lays his head on first on the sultan's right shoulder and then on his left, speaking all the while in their tongue, and fmally he comes down again. I was told that this practice is a very old custom amongst them prior to the introduction of Islam, and they have kept it up .

... The Negroes possess some admirable qualities. They are seldom unjust, and have a greater abhorrence of injustice than any other people. The sultan shows no mercy to anyone who is guilty of the least act of it. There is a complete security in their country. Neither traveler nor inhabitant in it has anything to fear from robbers or men of violence. They do not confiscate the property of any white man [Arab trader} who dies in their country, even if it be accounted wealth. On the contrary, they give it into the charge of some trustworthy person among the whites, until the rightful heir takes possession of it. They are careful to observe the hours of prayer, and assiduous in attending them in congregations, and in bringing up their children to them. On Fridays, if a man does not go early to the mosque, he cannot fmd a comer to pray in, on account of the crowd. It is a custom of theirs to send each man his boy (to the mosque) with his prayer-mat; the boy spreads it out for his master in a place befitting him and remains on it (until his master comes to the mosque). They pray-mats are made of the leaves of a tree resembling a date-palm, but without fruit.

Another of their good qualities is their habit of wearing clean white garments on Fridays. Even if a man has nothing but an old worn shirt, he washes it and cleans it, and wears it at the Friday service. Yet another is their zeal for learning the Koran by heart. They put their children in chains if they show any backwardness in memorizing it, and they are not set free until they have it by heart. I visited the quadi in his house on the day of the festival. His children were chained up, so I said to him, "Will you not let them loose" He replied, "I shall not do so until they learn the Koran by heart". Among their bad qualities are the following. The women servants, slave-girls, and young girls go about in front of everyone naked, without a stitch of clothing on them. Women go into the sultan's presence naked and without coverings, and his daughters also go about naked. Then there is the custom of their putting dust and ashes on their heads as a mark of respect, and the grotesque ceremonies we have described when the poets recite their verses.

Anonymous descriptions of the Cities of Zanj

The Indian Ocean was, long before the Atlantic was opened by European navigators, one of the world's major maritime commercial arteries. The east coast of Africa was a prime component of this trade, and ships from Egypt, Arabia, India, and as far afield as China plied their way to the Swahili Cities of the Zanj (Africans). These cities, chief among them: Kilwa; Mogadishu; Mombasa; Tanga; Malindi; Sofala, and Zanzibar, developed the language from whose name they are collectively known (Swahili was originally conceived as a commercial language). The cities were known to travelers of varied backgrounds, as evidenced in the following selections.

Source: G. S. P. Freeman-Grenvillem, The East African Coast: Selected Documents from the 1st to the 19th Century (London: Rex Collins, 1975), pp. 19-24.

Focus Questions: 1. Do the three accounts agree on anyone (or more) points? Explain. 2. How do the three accounts shed light on the religious life of the Eastern Africans? 3. What are the chief products for trade and consumption?

AL-IDRISI: THE FIRST WESTERN NOTICE OF EAST AFRICA

The Zanj of the East African coast have no ships to voyage in, but use vessels from Oman and other countries which sail to the islands of Zanj which depend on the Indies. These foreigners sell their goods there, and buy the produce of the country. The people of the Djawaga islands go to Zanzibar in large and small ships, and use them for trading their goods, for they understand each other's language. Opposite the Zanj coasts are the Djawaga islands; they are numerous and vast; their inhabitants are very dark in colour, and everything that is cultivated there, fruit, sorghum, sugar-cane and camphor trees, is black in colour. Among the number of the islands is Sribuza, which is said to be 1,200 miles round; and pearl fisheries and various kinds of aromatic plants and perfumes are to be found there, which attract the merchants.

Among the islands of Djawaga included in the present section is Andjuba [Anjouan-Johanna], whose principal town is called Unguja in the language of Zanzibar, and whose people, although mixed, are actually mostly Muslims. The distance from it to Banas on the Zanj coast is 100 miles. The island is 400 miles round; bananas are the chief food. There are five kinds, as follows: the bananas called kundi; fill whose weight is sometimes twelve ounces; omani, muriani, sukari. It is a healthy, sweet, and pleasant food. The island is traversed by a mountain called Wabra. The vagabonds who are expelled from the town flee there, and form a brave and numerous company which frequently infests the surroundings of the town, and which lives at the top of the mountain in a state of defence against the ruler of the island. They are courageous, and feared for their arms and their number. The island is very populous; there are many villages and cattle. They grow rice. There is a great trade in it, and each year various products and goods are brought for exchange and consumption.

From Medouna [on the Somali coast] to Malindi, a town of the Zanj, one follows the coast for three days and three nights by sea. Malindi lies on the shore, at the mouth of a river of sweet water. It is a large town, whose people engage in hunting and fishing. On land they hunt the tiger [sic] and other wild beasts. They obtain various kinds of fish from the sea, which they cure and sell.

They own and exploit iron mines; for them iron is an article of trade and the source of their largest profits. They pretend to know how to bewitch the most poisonous snakes so as to make them harmless to everyone except those for whom they wish evil, or on whom they wish to take vengeance. They also pretend that by means of these enchantments the tigers and lions cannot hurt them. These wizards are called al-Musnafu in the language of the people.

It is two days' journey along the coast to Mombasa. This is a small place and a dependency of the Zanj. Its inhabitants work in the iron mines and hunt tigers. They have red coloured dogs which fight every kind of wild beast and even lions. This town lies on the sea shore near a large gulf up which ships travel two days' journey; its banks are uninhabited because of the wild beasts that live in the forests where the Zanj go and hunt, as we have already said. In this town lives the King of Zanzibar. His guards go on foot because they have no mounts: horses cannot live there.

CHAO JU-KUA: ZANZIBAR AND SOMALIA IN THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY

Zanguebar (Ts'ong-Pa)

The Ts'ong-pa country is an island of the sea south of Hu-ch'a-Ia. To the west it reaches a great mountain. The inhabitants are of Ta-shi [Arab] stock and follow the Ta-shi religion. They wrap themselves in blue foreign cotton stuffs and wear red leather shoes. Their daily food consists of meal, baked cakes and mutton.

There are many villages, and a succession of wooded hills and terraced rocks. The climate is warm, and there is no cold season. The products of the country consist of elephants' tusks, native gold, ambergris and yellow sandal-wood.

Every year Hu-ch'a-Ia and the Ta-shi localities along the sea-coast send ships to this country with white cotton cloth, porcelain, copper and red cotton to trade.

Berbera Coast (PI-P' A-LO)

The country ofPi-p'a-lo contains four cities; the other places are all villages which are constantly at feud and fighting with each other. The inhabitants pray to Heaven and not to the Buddha. The land produces many camels and sheep, and the people feed themselves with the flesh and milk of camels and with baked cakes.

The other products are ambergris, big elephants' tusks and big rhinoceros' horns. There are elephants' tusks which weigh over 100 carries and rhinoceros' horns of over ten catties weight. The land is also rich in putchuk, liquid storax gum, myrrh, and tortoise-shell of extraordinary thickness, for which there is great demand in other countries. The country also brings forth the so-called 'camel-crane' [ostrich], which measures from the ground to its crown from six to seven feet. It has wings and can fly, but not to any great height.

There is also in this country a wild animal called tsu-Ia [giraffe]; it resembles a camel in shape, an ox in size, and is of a yellow colour. Its fore legs are five feet long, its hind legs only three feet. Its head is high up and turned upwards. Its skin is an inch thick.

There is also in this country a kind of mule [zebra] with brown, white, and black stripes around its body. These animals wander about in mountain wilds; they are a variety of cameL The inhabitants of this country, who are great huntsman, hunt these animals with poisoned arrows.

ABU-AL-FIDA: MALINDI, MOMBASA, AND SOFALA

Malindi is a town of the land of the Zanj, 81 1/ 2° long., 2° 50' lat. West of the town is a great gulfinto which flows a river which comes down from the mountain of Komr. On the banks of this gulf are very large dwellings belonging to the Zanj; the houses ofthe people ofKomr are on the south side. East of Malindi is al-Kerany, the name of a mountain very famous among travellers; this mountain runs out into the sea for a distance of about 100 miles in a north-east direction; at the same time it extends along the continent in a straight line north for a distance of about fifty miles. Among other things which we might say about this mountain are the iron mine which is on the continental side and the lodestone in the part which is in the sea, which attracts iron.

At Malindi is the tree ofzendj (the ginger tree) (or at Mallndi there are many Zanjian sorcerers). The King of the Zanj lives at Malindi. Between Mombasa and Mnllndi is about a degree. Mombasa is on the coast. On the west is a gulf along which buildings stand as far as 300 miles. Nearby to the east is the desert which separates the land of the Zanj from Sofaia.

Among the towns of the country ofSofala is Batyna (or Banyna). It is situated at the end of a great gulf, away from the equinoctial line, under 21/2° lat., 87° long. According to Ibn Said, on the West of Batyna is Adjued, the name of a mountain which projects into the sea towards the north-east for a distance of 100 miles. The waves of the sea make a great noise here. The people of Sofala live to the east of this mountain: their capital is Seruna, under 99° long., 21/2 lat. [south]. The town is built on a large estuary where a river, which rises in the mountain of Komr, flows out. There the King of Sofala resides.

Then one arrives at the town of Leirana.Ibn Fathuma, who visited the town, said that it was a seaport where ships put in and whence they set out. The inhabitants profess Islam. Leirana is on long. 102°, lat. 0° 30' [south]. It is on a great gulf.

The town of Daghuta is the last one of the country of Sofala and the furthest of the inhabited part of the continent towards the south. It is on long. 109°,lat. 12°, south of the equator. Sofala. According to the Canon it is on 50° 3' long., 2° lat., south ofthe equator. Sofala is in the land of the Zanj. According to the author of the Canon, the inhabitants are Muslims. Ibn Said says that their chief means of existence are mining gold and iron, and that they dress in leopard skins. According to Masudi, horses do not reproduce in the land of the Zanj, so that the warriors go on foot or fight from the backs of oxen.