Nick Collins's wide-ranging history of maritime trade around the Indian Ocean and the subcontinent receives a strong recommendation. The network is often overlooked because much relevant scholarship is less accessible in English, rather than because shipping beyond the Red Sea was absent. Chinese shipping appears as one participant within a wider network, avoiding a single-civilization explanation. Trade emerges as a system shared by many societies rather than a story driven by one outside power.
Chapter · 8:15-10:42
Indian Ocean trade beyond the familiar empires
A book review uses Indian Ocean commerce to challenge a narrow, empire-centred view of maritime exchange.