Tang Dynasty Shipwreck – A 1,200 year old glimpse at the Maritime Silk Road

July 10, 2009 · Filed Under History, Lore of the Sea, Ships 

Earlier this month we posted about the 800 year old,  “Nanhai No.1 boat,” the oldest and largest Chinese merchant vessel yet to be discovered, demonstrating the existence of an ancient maritime trade route linking China and the West.  Recently the National Geographic featured an article about a newly excavated 1,200 year old ship that provides an even older glimpse of trade along the “Maritime Silk Road” that ran from the Chinese Tang Dynasty to Baghdad, capital of the Abbasid dynasty, by way of Indonesia, India and the Persian Gulf.  Click here for a chart of the Tang Dynasty Maritime Silk Road.   

What is being referred to as the Tang Shipwreck was an Arab dhow loaded with more than 60,000 handmade pieces of Tang dynasty gold, silver, and ceramics, suggesting that Tang dynasty China mass-produced trade goods and exported them by sea.

A 1,200-year-old shipwreck opens a window on ancient global trade

From the National Geographic article:

The world economy in the ninth century had two powerful engines. One was Tang dynasty China, an empire stretching from the South China Sea to the borders of Persia, with ports open to foreign traders from far and wide. The Tang welcomed diverse people to its capital, Changan, the site of modern-day Xian, and multiethnic groups lived side by side in a city of a million-a population unmatched by a Western city until London in the early 19th century. Then, as today, China was an economic powerhouse-and much of that power was built on trade.

The other economic engine was Baghdad, capital of the Abbasid dynasty from 762 onward. That dynasty inherited the Muslim world in the Middle East; by 750 it had spread as far as the Indus River to the east and Spain to the west, bringing with it trade, commerce, and the religion of Islam (the Prophet Muhammad himself had been a merchant).

Linking the two economic powerhouses were the Silk Road and its watery counterpart, the Maritime Silk Route. The overland road gets all the attention, but ships had likely been plying the seas between China and the Persian Gulf since the time of Christ. In tune with the cycle of the monsoon winds, this network of sea-lanes and harbors bound East and West in a continuous exchange of goods and ideas.

Tang China was hungry for fine textiles, pearls, coral, and aromatic woods from Persia, East Africa, and India. In return, China traded paper, ink, and above all, silk. Silk, light and easily rolled up, could travel overland. But by the ninth century, ceramics from China had grown popular as well, and camels were not well suited for transporting crockery (think of those humps). So increasing quantities of the dishes and plates that held the meals of wealthy Persian Gulf merchants arrived by sea in Arab, Persian, and Indian ships.

It was a long and perilous journey. And some­times a ship just vanished, like a plane off a radar screen.

Since time immemorial, ships have come to grief in the Gelasa Strait, a funnel-shaped passage between the small Indonesian islands of Bangka and Belitung, where turquoise waters conceal a maze of submerged rocks and reefs. Despite the dangers, sea cucumber divers were working the area a decade ago when, 51 feet down, they came across a coral block with ceramics embedded in it. They pulled several intact bowls from inside a large jar, took them ashore, and sold them.

Read the rest of the article

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