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ISTKODUCTION. 3
that far), — or that Chinese traders had visited Ceylon, or India, let alone
the ports of Arabia or the Persian Gulf.
At a very early date Ceylon had become a flourishing country and en-
tertained important commercial relations not only with India but with the
5 countries of the East, the Malay Peninsula, and probably Indo-China. Its
pearls and precious stones, its ebony, muslins and tortoise-shell were carried
to Nelkunda and Barugaza (Bharoch) in the first century of our era, and
probably centuries before. The tortoise-shell from the Malay Peninsula (the
island of Chrys6) reached those ports through it. In all likelihood the traders
10 of southern Arabia founded establishments in Ceylon at a very early date;
however this may be, the commercial importance of Ceylon in the trade
between the East and the West was coeval with the 'opening of this trade,
and it retained its preponderance down to modern times.
The pilgrim Fa-hi6n. the first Chinese who has left a record of a voyage
15 from India to China (A. D. 413), came from Tamlook at the mouth of the
Ganges to Ceylon to sail for Sumatra, and when in Ceylon he noted the signs
of wealth of the «Sa-po traders» on the island, and it does not seem unlikely
that these foreigners were Arabs from the Hadramaut and Oman coasts.
Cosmas in the sixth century says of Ceylon: «The Island being, as it is,
20 in a central position, is much frequented by ships from all parts of India and
from Persia and Ethiopia and it likewise sends out many of its own. And from
the remotest countries, I mean Tzinista (China) and other trading places, it
receives silk, aloes, cloves, sandalwood and other products, and these again are
passed on to marts on this side, such as Male, where pepper grows, and to
25 Calliana, which exports copper and sasame logs and cloth for making dresses,
for it also is a great place for business. And to Sindu (Diul Sindh at the
mouth of the Indus) also where musk and castor is procured, and cmdro-
stachys (possibly spikenard), and to Persia and the Homerite country (Yemen)
and to Adule (Zula on the African coast of the Red Sea). And the island
30 receives imports from all these marts which we have mentioned, and passes
them on to the remoter ports, while, at the same time, exporting its own
produce in both directions^
1) Cosmas Indicopleustes, Christian Topography, 365 (Hakluyt Soc. edit.). Among the
products which Cosmas mentions as coming from China, the only real Chinese product is silk.
35 The ships which came to Ceylon from China got the eaglewood, cloves, sandalwood, etc., at the
various ports in Indo-China and the Malay Archipelago at which they stopped. Edrisi (I. 51
Jaub art's transl.) makes a similar loose statement about the products of China brought to Aden.
He says «The town of Aden is small but renowned on account of its port, whence sail the ships
1*