Berenike and the Ancient Maritime Spice Route

Berenike and the Ancient Maritime Spice Route

Author: Steven E. Sidebotham

Publisher: Univ of California Press

Published: 2011-02-02

Total Pages: 456

ISBN-13: 0520244303

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

“For almost a millennium, from its foundation in the third century BCE to late antiquity, the Red Sea port of Berenike was a key part of the sea route that linked the Mediterranean to South Asia. The excavations conducted by Professor Sidebotham and his international team have provided unprecedented detail about the urban history of Berenike, the lives of its inhabitants, its role in the spice trade, and the products that passed through its port. Berenike and the Ancient Maritime Spice Route is a major contribution to world historical scholarship that will fundamentally change our understanding of ancient trade in the Red Sea and Indian Ocean.” —Stanley M. Burstein, California State University, Los Angeles “With singular focus and an indefatigable spirit, Sidebotham has pursued the remote and difficult site of Berenike. After ten excavation seasons, only a portion of the site has been excavated, but the dividends have been magnificent, yielding exciting new archeological evidence that illuminates the flourishing maritime sea trade in antiquity beyond any reasonable expectation. Sidebotham places Bernike in the larger contextual framework and considers it from every possible angle, including the transportation lattice that connected Berenike with the Nile, its relations with other emporia, the merchant ships used, the exotic trade items it received, and a fascinating explanation of the demise of Berenike and ‘global’ trade in the sixth century. This engrossing analysis is destined to become the standard source for all who are interested in the international trade of antiquity.” —David F. Graf, author of Rome and the Arabian Frontier: from the Nabataeans to the Saracens


Empires of Ancient Eurasia

Empires of Ancient Eurasia

Author: Craig Benjamin

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2018-05-03

Total Pages: 317

ISBN-13: 1107114969

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Introduces a crucial period of world history when the vast exchange network of the Silk Roads connected most of Eurasia.


Imperial Rome, Indian Ocean Regions and Muziris

Imperial Rome, Indian Ocean Regions and Muziris

Author: K.S. Mathew

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2016-11-25

Total Pages: 517

ISBN-13: 1351997513

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The battle of Actium waged in 31 BC and the annexation of Egypt in 30 BC to the Roman Empire opened up avenues for increased commercial contact between the Roman Empire, South Asia in general and India in particular and the port of Muziris was the premier trading post of India. In this volume, eminent international scholars from the USA, Switzerland, United Kingdom, France, Italy as well as India provide detailed analysis of maritime trade in the Indian Ocean region in the early historic period.


An Introduction to the Archaeology of Ancient Egypt

An Introduction to the Archaeology of Ancient Egypt

Author: Kathryn A. Bard

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2015-01-07

Total Pages: 511

ISBN-13: 1118896033

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

This student-friendly introduction to the archaeology of ancient Egypt guides readers from the Paleolithic to the Greco-Roman periods, and has now been updated to include recent discoveries and new illustrations. • Superbly illustrated with photographs, maps, and site plans, with additional illustrations in this new edition • Organized into 11 chapters, covering: the history of Egyptology and Egyptian archaeology; prehistoric and pharaonic chronology and the ancient Egyptian language; geography, resources, and environment; and seven chapters organized chronologically and devoted to specific archaeological sites and evidence • Includes sections on salient topics such as the constructing the Great Pyramid at Giza and the process of mummification


Stories of Globalisation: The Red Sea and the Persian Gulf from Late Prehistory to Early Modernity

Stories of Globalisation: The Red Sea and the Persian Gulf from Late Prehistory to Early Modernity

Author: Andrea Manzo

Publisher: BRILL

Published: 2018-11-26

Total Pages: 661

ISBN-13: 9004362320

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

This book contains a selection of papers presented at the Red Sea VII conference titled “The Red Sea and the Gulf: Two Maritime Alternative Routes in the Development of Global Economy, from Late Prehistory to Modern Times”. The Red Sea and the Gulf are similar geographically and environmentally, and complementary to each other, as well as being competitors in their economic and cultural interactions with the Mediterranean and the Indian Ocean. The chapters of the volume are grouped in three sections, corresponding to the various historical periods. Each chapter of the book offers the reader the opportunity to travel across the regions of the Red Sea and the Gulf, and from the Mediterranean to the Indian Ocean from prehistory to the contemporary era. With contributions by Ahmed Hussein Abdelrahman, Serena Autiero, Mahmoud S. Bashir, Kathryn A. Bard, Alemsege, Beldados, Ioana A. Dumitru, Serena Esposito, Rodolfo Fattovich, Luigi Gallo, Michal Gawlikowski, Caterina Giostra, Sunil Gupta, Michael Harrower, Martin Hense, Linda Huli, Sarah Japp, Serena Massa, Ralph K. Pedersen, Jacke S. Phillips, Patrice Pomey, Joanna K. Rądkowska, Mike Schnelle, Lucy Semaan, Steven E. Sidebotham, Shadia Taha, Husna Taha Elatta, Joanna Then-Obłuska and Iwona Zych


The Slow Fall of Babel

The Slow Fall of Babel

Author: Yuliya Minets

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2021-12-09

Total Pages: 435

ISBN-13: 1108833462

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Explores how early Christianity sought to define its relationship to speakers of foreign languages.


Toponymy on the Periphery

Toponymy on the Periphery

Author: Julien Cooper

Publisher: BRILL

Published: 2020-08-03

Total Pages: 736

ISBN-13: 9004422218

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

"In Toponymy on the Periphery, Julien Charles Cooper conducts a study of the rich geographies preserved in Egyptian texts relating to the desert regions east of Egypt. These regions, filled with mines, quarries, nomadic camps, and harbours are often considered as an unimportant hinterland of the Egyptian state, but this work reveals the wide explorations and awareness Egyptians had of the Red Sea and its adjacent deserts, from the Sinai in the north to Punt in the south. The book attempts to locate many of the placenames present in Egyptian texts and analyse their etymology in light of Egyptian linguistics and the various foreign languages spoken in the adjacent deserts and distant shores of the Red Sea"--


The Indo-Roman Pepper Trade and the Muziris Papyrus

The Indo-Roman Pepper Trade and the Muziris Papyrus

Author: Federico De Romanis

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2020-04-15

Total Pages: 408

ISBN-13: 0192579746

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

This volume presents a systematic and fresh interpretation of a mid-second-century AD papyrus - the so-called Muziris papyrus - which preserves on its two sides fragments of a unique pair of documents: on one side, a loan agreement to finance a commercial enterprise to South India and, on the other, an assessment of the fiscal value of a South Indian cargo imported on a ship named the Hermapollon. The two texts, whose informative potential has long been underexploited, clarify several aspects of the early Roman Empire's trade with South India, including transport logistics, financial and legal elements in the loan agreement funding the commercial enterprise, the trade goods included in the South Indian cargo, and the technicalities of calculating and collecting Roman customs duties on the Indian imports. This study also considers imperial fiscal policy as it related to the South Indian trade, the overall evolution of Rome's trade relations with South India, the structure and organization of South Indian trade stakeholders, and the role played by private tax-collectors. The in-depth analysis sheds new light on this important sector of the Roman economy during the first two centuries AD in two innovative ways: through a balanced consideration of South Indian sources and data, and by drawing comparisons with the pepper trade from late antiquity, the Middle Ages, and early modernity, resulting in a longue durée perspective on the western trade in South Indian pepper.


The Archaeology of Knowledge Traditions of the Indian Ocean World

The Archaeology of Knowledge Traditions of the Indian Ocean World

Author: Himanshu Prabha Ray

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2020-11-18

Total Pages: 289

ISBN-13: 1000220672

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

This book examines knowledge traditions that held together the fluid and overlapping maritime worlds of the Indian Ocean in the premodern period, as evident in the material and archaeological record. It breaks new ground by shifting the focus from studying cross-pollination of ideas from textual sources to identifying this exchange of ideas in archaeological and historical documentation. The themes covered in the book include conceptualization of the seas and maritime landscapes in Sanskrit, Arabic and Chinese narratives; materiality of knowledge production as indicated in the archaeological record of communities where writing on stone first appears; and anchoring the coasts, not only through an understanding of littoral shrines and ritual landscapes, but also by an analysis of religious imagery on coins, more so at the time of the introduction of new religions such as Islam in the Indian Ocean around the eighth century. This volume will be of great interest to researchers and scholars of archaeology, anthropology, museum and heritage studies, Indian Ocean studies, maritime studies, South and Southeast Asian studies, religious studies and cultural studies.


By Steppe, Desert, and Ocean

By Steppe, Desert, and Ocean

Author: Barry Cunliffe

Publisher: OUP Oxford

Published: 2015-09-24

Total Pages: 541

ISBN-13: 0191003352

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

By Steppe, Desert, and Ocean is nothing less than the story of how humans first started building the globalized world we know today. Set on a huge continental stage, from Europe to China, it is a tale covering over 10,000 years, from the origins of farming around 9000 BC to the expansion of the Mongols in the thirteenth century AD. An unashamedly 'big history', it charts the development of European, Near Eastern, and Chinese civilizations and the growing links between them by way of the Indian Ocean, the silk Roads, and the great steppe corridor (which crucially allowed horse riders to travel from Mongolia to the Great Hungarian Plain within a year). Along the way, it is also the story of the rise and fall of empires, the development of maritime trade, and the shattering impact of predatory nomads on their urban neighbours. Above all, as this immense historical panorama unfolds, we begin to see in clearer focus those basic underlying factors - the acquisitive nature of humanity, the differing environments in which people live, and the dislocating effect of even slight climatic variation - which have driven change throughout the ages, and which help us better understand our world today.