482 



NATURE 



[Sept. 



3) 



Red Sea for transmission to Meroe, Thebes, and Memphis. At 

 the same time silks from China, and gems from India, were 

 carried overland to Chaldrea and Assyria; and Bactra (Balkh), 

 "the mother of cities," rose and flourished at the central point 

 of the transit trade. Egypt, with no timber for shipbuilding, a 

 distrust of all foreigners, especially when they came by sea, and 

 a settled dislike of maritime pursuits amongst her people, long 

 neglected the opportunities afforded by her favourable geo- 

 graphical position. Tyre, Sidon, and other Phoenician towns, 

 reached by easy roads from the Euphrates and the Red Sea, 

 and from their situation commanding the Mediterranean, be- 

 came centres of distribution for Indian goods ; and the Phoeni- 

 cians, gradually extending their operations to the Red Sea, 

 traded with the ports of Southern Arabia, and even ventured to 

 the shores of India. It was in this first period that the Jewish 

 kingdom reached its widest extent. During the long wars of 

 David's reign the Jews obtained possession of the land routes 

 over which the rich products of India were carried to Tyre and 

 Sidon ; and Solomon did all in his power, by building Tadmor 

 in the Wilderness (Palmyra), by improving the port of Elath, 

 and by carrying out other great works, to protect and facilitate 

 the transit trade from which such large profits were derived. 

 The Jews do not appear to have been the actual carriers, but 

 many of them no doubt, following the example of their merchant- 

 king, engaged in commercial pursuits, and wealth poured into 

 the kingdom so that silver was made to be as stones in 

 Jerusalem. 



In the early portion of the second period the commercial 

 prosperity of the Phoenicians reached its culminating point. 

 Their colonies dotted the shores of the Mediterranean, and their 

 ships passed the "Pillars of Hercules" to Great Britain and 

 the western shores of Africa, and floated on the waters of the 

 Red Sea, the Persian Gulf, and the Indian Ocean. The sea- 

 borne trade of the known world was in their hands ; wealth 

 flowed into their cities, and in the markets of Tyre tin from 

 Cornwall and amber from the Baltic were exposed for sale with 

 the silks, gems, and spices of the far-distant Easf. The decline 

 of Phoenicia dates from the establishment of the Persian Empire 

 in the sixth century B.C., and after the capture of Tyre by 

 Alexander its commerce gradually passed into the hands of the 

 Greeks. The Persian policy of closing the Persian Gulf to 

 commerce forced the Indian traffic along the land routes. 

 Babylon, which had become the emporium of Eastern trade, 

 declined, whilst Susa and Ecbatana were enriched by the transit 

 trade which passed through them and crossed the whole extent 

 of the empire to the Mediterranean ports. The policy of Alex- 

 ander was to secure the carrying and distribution trade of the 

 world to the Greeks ; and with this object he founded Alex- 

 andria, and intended, had he lived, to restore Babylon to her 

 former splendour. Ptolemy, his successor in Egypt, used every 

 means in his power to draw trade to Alexandria, and the new 

 city soon rose to opulence and splendour. The Greek mer- 

 chants obtained their Indian goods from the Arab traders whom 

 they met in the ports of Southern Arabia ; they landed them at 

 Myos Hormos and Berenice on the western shore of the Red 

 Sea, carried them by camel across the desert, and floated them 

 clown the Nile and by canal to Alexandria, whence they were 

 distributed to the neighbouring parts of Africa and the coasts of 

 the Mediterranean. This trade route remained unaltered until 

 Egypt became a Roman province. Another stream of com- 

 merce passed by way of the Persian Gulf to Seleucia on the 

 Tigris, and thence, partly by water and partly by land, through 

 Aleppo to Antioch and Seleucia at the mouth of the Orontes ; 

 and a third followed the ancient highway from Central Asia to 

 the ports of the Euxine and /Egean Seas. 



After the rise of Rome all trade routes were directed upon the 

 Imperial City, which became a centre of distribution for the mer- 

 chandise of the East. The Greeks still monopolized the sea- 

 borne trade ; and those of Egypt, recognizing the advantage of 

 their geographical position, took the direct trade to India into 

 their hands, and extended their voyages to Kattigara, the port 

 of the Sinae, in the Gulf of Tongking. Alexandria became the 

 commercial capital of the Roman Empire, the distributing 

 centre of the world for Indian and Asiatic goods, and a place of 

 such wealth that one of the merchants is said to have been able 

 to maintain an army. At the same time the old ports of Tyre, 

 Beirut, Antioch, Ephesus, Byzantium, and Trebizonde main- 

 tained their position as termini of the land traffic. The extent 

 of the intercourse between the East and the West during the 

 Roman Empire is shown by the embassy of the Seres (Chinese) 



to Rome in the reign of Augustus, and by the several embassies 

 to China, which followed that sent by Marcus Aurelius in 

 166 A.D., until the Arab Empire interposed ; as well as by the 

 fact that in the time of Pliny the Roman imports from Asia each 

 year were valued at 100,000,000 sesterces (about ;£8oo,oco). 

 Trade followed well-established routes which remained in use, 

 with but slight modification, till the fifteenth century. There 

 were three principal lines of communication through Central 

 Asia, all leading from China across the Desert of Gobi. The 

 northern ran to the north of the Thien-Shan by Lake Balkash 

 to the Jaxartes (Syr Darya] ; the central passed along the 

 southern slopes of the Thien-Shan and crossed the mountains 

 by the Terek Pass to Samarcand and the Oxus (Amu Darya) ; 

 and the southern passed over the Pamir and through Badakhshan 

 to Balkh. The northern route apparently vent on from the 

 Jaxartes, through Khiva, to the Caspian, which it crossed, and 

 then ran on to the Black Sea. Even at this early period trade 

 filtered round the northern shores of the Caspian, and later, 

 during the Middle Ages, there was a well-established trade 

 route in this direction through Khiva to Novgorod and the 

 Baltic, by which the northern countries received Indian goods. 

 From the Oxus region reached by the central and southern lines 

 there were two routes to the West. One passed through Merv, 

 crossed the Caspian, ascended the Araxes to reach Artaxates 

 and Trebizonde, or to descend the Phasis (Rion) to Poti, and 

 then coasted the shores of the Black Sea to Byzantium. The 

 other also passed through Merv, and, running along the northern 

 frontier of Per.da, reached the shores of the Black Sea through 

 Artaxates, or continued on through Mesopotamia, Syria, and 

 Asia Minor to Byzantium. • The land trade from India passed 

 through the Bamian Pass to Balkh, and through Kandahar and 

 Herat to Merv or Sarrakhs lu join the great stream of Central 

 Asian traffic. The greater portion of the carrying trade on 

 these long lines was in the hands of the people dwelling between 

 the Jaxartes and the Oxus, who had their centre at Samarcand ; 

 and these Sogdians, or Asi as they are called in the Chinese 

 annals, fearing lest they should lose the profit on the transit 

 trade, threw every obstacle in the way of direct communication 

 between China and the Roman Empire. The difficulties which 

 thus interrupted the land traffic gave an impetus to the trade by 

 sea, and so benefited Alexandria and the c ties in the Persian 

 Gulf. The sea trade at this time was carried by way of the 

 Persian Gulf and the Red Sea. In the first case the cargoes 

 were landed at some port on the Euphrates or Tigris, whence 

 the goods were carried by river and caravan up the valleys of 

 those rivers and then through Syria to Beirut and Antioch, and 

 through Asia Minor to Ephesus, Smyrna, Constantinople, and 

 Samsun. In the second case the merchandise was landed either 

 near Suez, whence it was conveyed by caravan, canal, and river 

 to Alexandria, and at a later date to Pelusium, or at the head 

 of the Gulf of Akabah for transport to Syria and Palestine. The 

 sea trade was to a great extent a coasting trade, and it appears 

 to have been shared by the Greeks and the Arabs, and perhaps 

 by the Chinese, whose junks were to be seen at Hira, on the 

 Euphrates, in the fifth century. 



On the disruption of the Roman Empire the Byzantines, with 

 their capital situated on the confines of Europe and Asia, 

 naturally became the intermediaries between the East and the 

 West, and they retained this position until the maritime towns of 

 Italy, France, and Spain became sufficiently strong to engage in 

 direct trade with the Mediterranean ports to which the produce 

 of the East found its way. Until the seventh century the Sas- 

 sanians held the lines of communication by land, and they did 

 all they could to prevent Eastern produce from being carried over 

 any other roads than those passing through their territory or by 

 any other hands than theirs. In the sixth century they allowed 

 an exchange of produce between the East and the West to take 

 place at only three points : Artaxates for goods arriving from 

 Central Asia ; Nisibis for those from Central Asia and by the 

 Tigris route ; and Callinicum (Rakka) for those coming by way 

 of the Persian Gulf and the Euphrates. Justinian attempted to 

 free Oriental commerce from its dependence on the Sassanians 

 by opening up new trade routes. The Sogdian silk merchants 

 passed, outside of Persian territory, round the north end of the 

 Caspian to meet those of Byzantium on the shores of the Sea of 

 Azdv and the Black Sea ; the products of India were obtained 

 from Ethiopian traders at Adulis, on the Red Sea ; and Greek 

 navigators, taking advantage of the monsoons, sailed direct from 

 the southern end of the Red Sea to the Malabar coast and 

 Ceylon. 



