The Colas c30.23

c30.23

From very early times Southern India carried on a flourishing commerce with the nations across the seas on either side of the peninsula. From the fourth century a.d. or thereafter, the Persians, rather than the Arabs, were the most venturesome mariners of the Indian Ocean. In the Chinese annals of the fifth, sixth and early seventh centuries, all the products of Ceylon and India, with others from Arabia and Africa, are classed as 'products of Persia.'⁶⁰ The direct sea-route between China and India is, however, known to have come into common use by the close of the seventh century, and I-tsing mentions no fewer than thirty-seven Chinese pilgrims who took this route to India in his time.⁶¹ At no time had Indian merchantmen ever ceased to frequent the shores of the Malay peninsula and the islands of the archipelago, even Indo-China and China. Mahābalipuram, Kāvirippūmpaṭṭinam, Śāliyūr and Koṟkai on the east coast, and Quilon on the west were great emporiums frequented by the traders of other countries; Ceylon and the Nicobars in the East, the Laccadives and the Maldives in the West furnished good halting places for ships bound on long voyages.