Discuss the scope and nature of Indian ocean trade

Discuss the scope and nature of Indian ocean trade.

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In discussing the history of the coast of East Africa we know that the Phoenicians, Greeks, Indians and Arabs visited the Coast many years before the Christian period. A lot of historical documents were written by Arab geographers. Most of these reports are written by people who actually sailed to the coast of East Africa. They describe the state of affairs when they were set down. In the Indian Ocean, “Zenj” is used to mean black people of the coast. The most important works are those of al-Masudi (900 AD) and Ibn Batuta (1331 AD). There are also chronicles of individuals describing towns and names of their rulers. They were written by Arabs or Kiswahili.
Some institutions have suggested that Egyptians, Phoenicians, Persians, etc may have to East Africa Coast centuries before the birth of Christ. A Greek historian, Herodotus gives a brief account of the navigation of Africa by Phoenicians. The Egyptians on the other hand voyaged to the land they called Punt near the south or east African coast.
The Romans may have also visited Indian Ocean coast. This was because of the early Christian era, Rome was expounding, was a military power and was pushed by a great increase in trade especially in the Indian Ocean. A Greek merchant living in Egypt had written a report, the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea. This was the earliest document that discussed East Africa and the most informative. The Romans and Greeks referred to Indian Ocean as Erythraean Sea. Another document was Ptolemy geography.
According to these documents, the East African Coast was known as Azania or the land of Zanj to the Arabs. Its capital town was known as Rhapta. The site of Rhapta is believed to be near the River Rufiji. Traders from Arabia visited the coastal ports on dhows assisted by north-east monsoon winds. These Arabs knew the language of the Azania and they married with the Bantu people.
We are told that the people of Azania were very tall, that they were pirates and that they had on a chief in each place, since they had boats that were sea travellers. They were negroid and Bantu speaking people but this is in doubt. They could have been Cushitic like the present day Ethiopians or even Indonesians who had come to and settled in Madagascar or in the coast of Kenya and Tanzania.
The Arabs from Yemen came to East African Coast to buy products such as ivory, turtle shell, rhino horns, coconut oil. The main goods that the Arab traders brought to exchange for these commodities were metal tools such as hatchets, daggers and lances from Yemen. All these were made of iron metal, which the people of Azania had no knowledge of how to smelt. They also brought glass vessels, wine and wheat as gifts to get the good will of inhabitants.
Al-Masudi tells us that between 9th and 10th century, ships from the Persian Gulf came to the coast, also from Oman. According to him, the people of Zanj were governed by kings who maintained armies.
It was a religious minded society. The oxen were used as a means to transport and during the war. The people of Zanj cultivated bananas, millet, and coconuts on the islands.
There was a flourishing trade in ivory which was shipped to Oman and China. Al-Masoudi argues that the Zenj people were Bantu speaking negroid. Some of these people were cannibals and sharpened their teeth.

jerop5614 answered the question on December 21, 2018 at 11:55

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Discuss the scope and nature of Indian ocean trade

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