INDIAN BOAT DESTC4NS. 203 



in the thirteenth century a large Chinese fleet brought to the Malabar coast several 

 hundreds of Chinese immigrants who remained in the country for trade and com- 

 merce. Abder Razzak in the fifteenth century (1442 A.D.) speaks of the seafaring 

 population of Calicut being called China hhachagan (China boys), which can only mean 

 that the Mapilla population had then a strong Chinese strain in it. We know also from 

 Chinese authorities, as well as from the Sinhalese chronicle Rajawaliya, that the Chi- 

 nese sent a large naval force, under the eunuch Cheng Ho, against Ceylon in the begin- 

 ning of the fifteenth century, a venture which resulted in the capture of the Sinhalese 

 king Vijaya Bahu VI and his deportation to China.' 



The best contemporary description of the Chinese vessels trading to India is that 

 of Marco Polo who sailed with a small fleet of junks from China to India and Persia 

 at the end of the thirteenth century. 



Quoting Yule's translation^ Marco Polo says " and first let me speak of the ships 

 in which merchants go to and fro amongst the Isles of India. These ships you must 

 know, are of fir timber.' They have but one deck though each of them contains some 

 50 or 60 cabins, wherein the merchants abide greatly at their ease, every man having 

 one to himself. The ship hath but one rudder,"* but it hath four masts ; and some- 

 times they have two additional masts, which they ship and unship at pleasure. 

 Moreover the larger of their vessels have some 13 compartments or severances in the 

 interior, made with planking strongly framed in case mayhap the ship should spring 

 aleak.^" 



Radhakumud Mukerji falls into the grievous error of claiming these craft as 

 Indian-built vessels. ** The only excuse he has is Marco Polo's occasional habit of 

 calling them "Indian ships" according to Marsden's translation which Prof. Mukerji 

 elects to quote in preference to the more modern one by Yule. But they were no 

 more Indian built and Indian manned than were the " East Indiamen" of English 

 Company days. They were built specifically for the Indian trade, hence the name. 

 In every feature they were typical Chinese junks, a design never adopted by any In- 

 dian builders. Moreover instead of being of teak as they would have been if Indian 

 built, Marco Polo distinctly tells us they were of fir, a fact which shortened their 

 career most materially. Finally Ibn Batuta, whose direct evidence on this subject is 

 ignored by Rahdakumud Mukerji, states distinctly that these ships "were built only 

 at Zaitun and Sin Kilan in China." Nicolo Conti's statement to the contrary is errone- 

 ous and on a par with his story that in Bengal bamboos grow so tall and thick that 

 fishing boats and skiffs are made from them. If he mistook a palm for a bamboo, it is 



1 A memorial stone inscribed in Chinese, Tamil, and Persian was found at Point de Galle in Ceylon, a few years ago, 

 and records the second visit to Ceylon of the Chinese General, Cheng Ho. It is dated 15th February, 1409. 



2 The Book of Sev Marco Polo, Vol. II, p. 195, 1871. 



3 Yule points out that pine is still the staple timber for shipbuilding at Canton and in Fokien, loc. cit., p. 197. 



* The rudder was of the usual deeply immersed Chinese junk pattern, for in Chapter IX the author states that on 

 approaching the island of Pentan (Bintan) off the Straits of Malacca, the sea being " not more than four fathoms in 

 depth, obliges those who navigate it, to lift the rudders of their ships." 



6 According to Yule the system of water-tight compartments " is still maintained by the Chinese, not only in sea- 

 going junks but in the larger river craft." (p. 197). 



6 Indian Shipping, London, 1912. 



