The Ocean of Churn: How the Indian Ocean Shaped Human History

by Sanjeev Sanyal

The impact that South East Asia had on cultural and historical events in India is less appreciated. The evidence, however, suggests that the influence flowed both ways. There are many examples, including the famed university of Nalanda in Bihar, that attracted students from around the Indian Ocean rim as well as from China and Central Asia. Few people realize that the university was partly funded by the Sri Vijaya kings of Sumatra.

Indian soldiers and mercenaries have often fought wars from Europe to China. Once one begins to notice them, they seem to pop up everywhere in the historical record. In ancient times, one finds them fighting for the Persians against the Greeks and a little later, driving war elephants for the Macedonian general Seleucus against his rivals in the Middle East. During the medieval period, one finds Indian mercenaries fighting for Sinhalese rulers in Sri Lanka, dying for the Shiite cause in Karbala and protecting commercial interests of Tamil corporatized guilds in South East Asia. Later still they would serve the British in the Opium Wars in China, the Boer Wars in South Africa and across the globe during the World Wars.

Matrilineal societies, in contrast, are those that mark lineage through the mother and female ancestors. In such societies, men still run the show, although, in general, the status of women tends to be higher than in societies that are purely patriarchal and/or patrilineal.

an Indian father’s determination to protect his beloved daughter led to the demise of the Portuguese in Oman.