How Maritime Trade and the Indian Subcontinent Shaped the World

How Maritime Trade and the Indian Subcontinent Shaped the World PDF Author: Nick Collins
Publisher: Pen and Sword Maritime
ISBN: 152678663X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 541

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Book Description
World-wide maritime trade has been the essential driver of wealth-creation, economic progress and global human contact. Trade and exchange of ideas have been at the heart of economic, social, political, cultural and religious life and maritime international law. These claims are borne out by the history of maritime trade beginning in the Indian Ocean and connecting to Southeast Asia, Japan, the Americas, East Africa, the Middle East especially the Persian Gulf, the Mediterranean and Europe. This development predates the end of the Ice Age with worldwide flooding and stimulated the establishment of land-based civilizations in the above regions with particular effect on the Greek and Roman empires and even China's 'Celestial' empire. The Indian subcontinent was the original major player in maritime trade, linking oceans and regions. Global maritime trade declined with the fall of Mediterranean empires and the 'dark age' in Europe but revived with Indian Ocean and Asian maritime networks. Shipping and trade studies are hugely practical but can be technical, legalistic and even dull for non-specialists. But this history is a broadly based and exciting account of human interaction at multiple levels, for general readers, specialists and practitioners. It is based on huge reading and rare sources and with an attractive writing style, and full of fascinating sidelights illuminating the historical narrative - and from an author with lifelong experience in international shipping.

How Maritime Trade and the Indian Subcontinent Shaped the World

How Maritime Trade and the Indian Subcontinent Shaped the World PDF Author: Nick Collins
Publisher: Pen and Sword Maritime
ISBN: 152678663X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 541

Get Book

Book Description
World-wide maritime trade has been the essential driver of wealth-creation, economic progress and global human contact. Trade and exchange of ideas have been at the heart of economic, social, political, cultural and religious life and maritime international law. These claims are borne out by the history of maritime trade beginning in the Indian Ocean and connecting to Southeast Asia, Japan, the Americas, East Africa, the Middle East especially the Persian Gulf, the Mediterranean and Europe. This development predates the end of the Ice Age with worldwide flooding and stimulated the establishment of land-based civilizations in the above regions with particular effect on the Greek and Roman empires and even China's 'Celestial' empire. The Indian subcontinent was the original major player in maritime trade, linking oceans and regions. Global maritime trade declined with the fall of Mediterranean empires and the 'dark age' in Europe but revived with Indian Ocean and Asian maritime networks. Shipping and trade studies are hugely practical but can be technical, legalistic and even dull for non-specialists. But this history is a broadly based and exciting account of human interaction at multiple levels, for general readers, specialists and practitioners. It is based on huge reading and rare sources and with an attractive writing style, and full of fascinating sidelights illuminating the historical narrative - and from an author with lifelong experience in international shipping.

The Millennium Maritime Trade Revolution, 700–1700

The Millennium Maritime Trade Revolution, 700–1700 PDF Author: Nick Collins
Publisher: Pen and Sword Maritime
ISBN: 1399060147
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 554

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Book Description
Following the series’ first book How Maritime Trade and the Indian Subcontinent Shaped the World, this book continues to demonstrate how maritime trade has been the key driver of the world’s wealth-creation, economic and intellectual progress. The story begins where the first book ends, when following Roman Empire collapse, 7th-century European maritime trade almost ceased, creating population collapse and poverty; the Dark Ages. In 700, stuttering, hesitant recovery was evident with new ports but Viking and Muslim maritime raiding neutered recovery until the 11th century. In Asia by contrast, short and long-haul trade thrived and accelerated from east Africa and the Persian Gulf all the way to China, encouraging Southeast Asian state formation. The book tells the story of slowly rising, gradually accelerating European maritime trade, which until the 15th century was overshadowed by far more voluminous Asian trade in much larger, more complex ships traded by more sophisticated commercial entities, contributing to innovative tolerant wealth-creating maritime societies. In Europe, Mediterranean maritime trade made most progress from about 1000 to 1450. But by 1700, north Europeans dominated Atlantic, American and Mediterranean trade and were penetrating sophisticated Asian maritime networks, a complete reversal. This book explains how and why and how destructive continental influences destroyed Asia’s maritime supremacy. As in the first book, Nick Collins finds similar patterns; maritime inquisitiveness, invention, problem-solving and toleration and continental political suppression of those maritime traits, most dramatically in China, but destructively everywhere, allowing the millennium maritime trade revolution.

Trade, Circulation, and Flow in the Indian Ocean World

Trade, Circulation, and Flow in the Indian Ocean World PDF Author: Michael Pearson
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 1137566248
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 212

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Book Description
Trade, Circulation, and Flow in the Indian Ocean World is a collection which covers a long time span and diverse areas around the ocean. Many of the essays look at the Indian Ocean before Europeans arrived, reminding the reader that there was a cohesive Indian Ocean. This collection includes empirical studies and essays focused on particular area or production. The essays cover various aspects of trade and exchange, the Indian Ocean as a world-system, East African and Chinese connections with the Indian Ocean World, and the movement of people and ideas around the ocean.

Maritime India

Maritime India PDF Author: Pius Malekandathil
Publisher: Primus Books
ISBN: 9380607016
Category : Christianity
Languages : en
Pages : 238

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Book Description
This volume discusses the various socio-economic and political processes that evolved over centuries in the vast coastal fringes of India and out of the circuits of the Indian Ocean, ultimately giving it the distinctive consciousness and identity of Maritime India. The book comments on a wide range of issues, including the nature of maritime trade of the Sassanids with India; the impact of maritime trade on the political processes of Goa; the impact of Portuguese commercial expansion on the traditional Muslim merchants of Kerala and the role of private traders in the structure and the functioning of Estado da India.

The Ocean of Churn

The Ocean of Churn PDF Author: Sanjeev Sanyal
Publisher: Random House India
ISBN: 9386057611
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 324

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Book Description
Much of human history has played itself out along the rim of the Indian Ocean. In a first-of-its-kind attempt, bestselling author Sanjeev Sanyal tells the history of this significant region, which stretches across East Africa, the Middle East and the Indian subcontinent to South East Asia and Australia. He narrates a fascinating tale about the earliest human migrations out of Africa and the great cities of Angkor and Vijayanagar; medieval Arab empires and Chinese ‘treasure fleets’; the rivalries of European colonial powers and a new dawn. Sanjeev explores remote archaeological sites, ancient inscriptions, maritime trading networks and half-forgotten oral histories, to make exciting revelations. In his inimitable style, he draws upon existing and new evidence to challenge well-established claims about famous historical characters and the flow of history. Adventurers, merchants, explorers, monks, swashbuckling pirates, revolutionaries and warrior princesses populate this colourful and multifaceted narrative. The Ocean of Churn takes the reader on an amazing journey through medieval geopolitics and eyewitness accounts of long-lost cities to the latest genetic discoveries about human origins, bringing alive a region that has defined civilization from the very beginning.

The Millennium Maritime Trade Revolution, 700–1700

The Millennium Maritime Trade Revolution, 700–1700 PDF Author: Nick Collins
Publisher: Pen and Sword Maritime
ISBN: 1399060163
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 378

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Book Description
Following the series’ first book How Maritime Trade and the Indian Subcontinent Shaped the World, this book continues to demonstrate how maritime trade has been the key driver of the world’s wealth-creation, economic and intellectual progress. The story begins where the first book ends, when following Roman Empire collapse, 7th-century European maritime trade almost ceased, creating population collapse and poverty; the Dark Ages. In 700, stuttering, hesitant recovery was evident with new ports but Viking and Muslim maritime raiding neutered recovery until the 11th century. In Asia by contrast, short and long-haul trade thrived and accelerated from east Africa and the Persian Gulf all the way to China, encouraging Southeast Asian state formation. The book tells the story of slowly rising, gradually accelerating European maritime trade, which until the 15th century was overshadowed by far more voluminous Asian trade in much larger, more complex ships traded by more sophisticated commercial entities, contributing to innovative tolerant wealth-creating maritime societies. In Europe, Mediterranean maritime trade made most progress from about 1000 to 1450. But by 1700, north Europeans dominated Atlantic, American and Mediterranean trade and were penetrating sophisticated Asian maritime networks, a complete reversal. This book explains how and why and how destructive continental influences destroyed Asia’s maritime supremacy. As in the first book, Nick Collins finds similar patterns; maritime inquisitiveness, invention, problem-solving and toleration and continental political suppression of those maritime traits, most dramatically in China, but destructively everywhere, allowing the millennium maritime trade revolution.

The Dutch East India Company and British East India Company

The Dutch East India Company and British East India Company PDF Author: Charles River Editors
Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
ISBN: 9781981344772
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 176

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Book Description
*Includes pictures *Includes contemporary accounts of the companies *Includes a bibliography for further reading From classic grilled meat to exotic and savory 5-star dishes, pepper has long been the ultimate staple spice. While bulk pepper may be readily stocked in supermarkets and convenience stores today, there was once a time when the common spice was considered one of the most valuable commodities in the world. Merchants tripped over one another to get their hands on the tiny black beads, which live in colorful clusters of berry-like shells reminiscent of Christmas lights. They were so precious that an uncountable number of men crossed the turbulent and uncharted seas for them. In fact, the tropical spice was so highly sought after that blood was shed over the edible gold. To many, the mention of maritime merchants evokes an imagery of growling pirates donned in their stereotypical hats and a colorful parrot perched upon their shoulders. These nautical rascals wander the high seas in search of treasure and adventure. Though that imagery may be inaccurate, the real life companies that once dominated international waters operated on a similar thirst for conquest and riches. Perhaps the most famous - or as many would put it, infamous - of these naval corporations was the Dutch East India Company, also known as VOC. Established around the beginning of the 17th century, this nautical behemoth of a corporation was determined to squeeze everyone else out of the market. Vested with the power to wage war and exterminate any who dared stand in their way, the rest of the world stood by as the unstoppable force took over the whole of international maritime trade. The company would crush its opponents on the way to the top, establishing a monopoly on the global spice trade that would not only rock the world but forever change the course of modern business history. The British East India Company served as one of the key players in the formation of the British Empire. From its origins as a trading company struggling to keep up with its superior Dutch, Portuguese, and Spanish competitors to its tenure as the ruling authority of the Indian subcontinent to its eventual hubristic downfall, the East India Company serves as a lens through which to explore the much larger economic and social forces that shaped the formation of a global British Empire. As a private company that became a non-state global power in its own right, the East India Company also serves as a cautionary tale all too relevant to the modern world's current political and economic situation. Beyond its obvious influence in areas like trade and commerce, the East India Company also served as a point of cultural contact between Western Europeans, South Asians, and East Asians. Quintessentially British practices such as tea drinking were made possible by East India Company trade. The products and cultural practices traveling back and forth on East India Company ships from one continent to another also reconfigured the way societies around the globe viewed sexuality, gender, class, and labor. On a much darker level, the East India Company fueled white supremacy and European concepts of Orientalism (See Said, Orientalism). One of the major reasons that the East India Company remains the subject of intense interest is that the consequences of its influence remain visible in India, Britain, and other parts of the world to this day. While the British Crown eventually replaced the East India Company as the governing authority of India, the systems of production they had established remained intact. More than half a century after India declared independence from the British Empire, the economic and cultural effects of this colonial system of production remained apparent. The disparities in wealth and power between the Global North and the Global South may not stem from the East India Company alone, but the company played an indisputable role in imperial processes.

Ships and the Development of Maritime Technology on the Indian Ocean

Ships and the Development of Maritime Technology on the Indian Ocean PDF Author: Ruth Barnes
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317793420
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 392

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Book Description
Recognising the fundamental role both of shipping communities and the technologies crafted and shared by them, this book explores the types of ships, methods of navigation and modes of water-borne trade in the Indian Ocean region and the way they affected the development of distinctive settlements against a changing but strong sense of regional consciousness and identity.

Empires of the Sea

Empires of the Sea PDF Author:
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9004407677
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 371

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Book Description
Empires of the Sea brings together studies of maritime empires from the Bronze Age to the Eighteenth Century. The volume aims to establish maritime empires as a category for the (comparative) study of premodern empires, and from a partly ‘non-western’ perspective. The book includes contributions on Mycenaean sea power, Classical Athens, the ancient Thebans, Ptolemaic Egypt, The Genoese Empire, power networks of the Vikings, the medieval Danish Empire, the Baltic empire of Ancien Régime Sweden, the early modern Indian Ocean, the Melaka Empire, the (non-European aspects of the) Portuguese Empire and Dutch East India Company, and the Pirates of Caribbean.

Maritime History as Global History

Maritime History as Global History PDF Author: Maria Fusaro
Publisher: Liverpool University Press
ISBN: 1786948923
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 296

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Book Description
This study aims to provide new insights into the connections between maritime history and global history. It demonstrates the significance of maritime activity as a conduit of global exchange by examining local, national, and international interdependencies and trade networks, and a broad range of time periods, geographical areas, and various sub-divisions of maritime historical research. It is composed of ten essays, with an introductory chapter and concluding chapter. The first five essays discuss the effects globalisation on shipping in the early modern period; the following three discuss maritime transportation and the economics of industrialisation from the nineteenth century to the present day; the next discusses the impact of global entrepreneurialism on maritime history; the penultimate discusses the connections and variables between maritime and global history; and the concluding chapter examines the theoretical assumptions surrounding the two disciplines, using the globalisation of Early Modern Spain as a case study to do so. The study demonstrates that the core strength of maritime history is its essential place in global history, and that the process of globalisation began at sea.