Maritime Silk Road
Ancient and medieval maritime trade route / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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The Maritime Silk Road or Maritime Silk Route[2] is the maritime section of the historic Silk Road that connected Southeast Asia, East Asia, the Indian subcontinent, the Arabian Peninsula, eastern Africa, and Europe. It began by the 2nd century BCE and flourished until the 15th century CE.[3] The Maritime Silk Road was primarily established and operated by Austronesian sailors in Southeast Asia who sailed large long-distance ocean-going trade ships (like the jong).[4]: 11 [5] The dhows of the Tamil merchants in South Asia,[4]: 13 and the Persian and Arab traders in the Arabian Sea and beyond, also sailed the route.[4]: 13 China also started building their own trade ships (chuan) and followed the routes in the later period, during the Song and Yuan dynasties from the 10th to the 14th centuries CE.[6][7]: 17
The network followed the footsteps of older maritime networks in Southeast Asia,[8][9][10][11] as well as the maritime spice networks of Southeast Asia, Sri Lanka, India, and the Indian Ocean, coinciding with these ancient maritime trade roads by the current era.[12][13]
Despite the modern name, the Maritime Silk Road involved exchanges in a wide variety of goods over a very wide region, not just silk or Asian exports.[7]: 17, 20, 149, 168 These goods include ceramics, glass, beads, gems, ivory, fragrant wood, metals (both raw and finished goods), textiles, food (including grain, wine, and spices), aromatics, and animals, among others. The goods carried by trade ships varied by region and port.[7]: 132–133, 186, 216