Da Gama found a way for Portuguese ships to reach India round Africa. The sea route across the Arabian Sea was centuries old, and he crossed it from Malindi to Calicut with a pilot taken on in East Africa, reaching the coast near Kappad on 20 May 1498.
The proof
- The Periplus of the Erythraean Sea (1st century CE) describes Muziris and the ports of the Malabar coast and the monsoon voyage to them.
- Portuguese chroniclers describe the pilot hired at Malindi as a man of Gujarat; his exact identity is still debated.
- Chinese fleets under Zheng He called at Calicut several times between 1405 and 1433.
01An old ocean, a new arrival
By 1498 the Indian Ocean was the busiest sea-trade world on earth. Gujarati, Tamil, Malayali, Arab and Chinese ships moved pepper, cloth, horses and gold between Africa, Arabia, India and China on winds every sailor knew. Da Gama’s real feat was the long Atlantic loop round the Cape of Good Hope. From Malindi onward he followed a road Indian pilots used every season. The Zamorin of Calicut received him as one more trader, and a modest one.
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Zamorins (Samoothiri) of Kozhikode
The Samoothiri, called Zamorin by Europeans, ruled the port of Kozhikode, the busiest pepper market on the Indian Ocean, for some five centuries. They received Zheng He’s fleets and Vasco da Gama, and fought the Portuguese at sea for a hundred years.
Arikamedu
A port on the Ariyankuppam river south of Puducherry that traded with the Roman world. Roman wine jars and Italian red-glazed pottery found here gave Indian archaeology one of its first firm date anchors.
