The Indian Ocean Read online

  In modern times there are still a variety of factors which determine whether transport be by land or by sea. Passengers on long-distance travels go by air, on shorter distances variously by land or sea. Yet even here there can be variations: if people have a lot of luggage they may prefer to go by sea if ships are still available. Most bulk goods travel by sea when they can, though if a shorter land option is available it will be used, such as the railways across North America, and across India. Few goods go by sea from Mumbai to Kolkata, or New York to San Francisco. Some specialised goods can be moved more easily by land than by sea. The best example is oil, where pipelines can obviate the need for sea passage; yet even here, as we have seen so often in the twentieth century, politics can block a pipe line much more easily than a tanker.

  What this rather diffuse discussion is saying is that we need to be amphibious when we write of land and sea, rather like a fish found by Jacques Cousteau in the Seychelles in 1967, which was

  a species of amphibious fish, Periophthalmus koelreuteri – more commonly, and much less grandly, known as the mudskipper. It is acknowledged to be the most amphibious of all fishes, for it can stay out of water for longer periods than it spends in the water. When on land, the mudskipper carries a supply of water in the gill cavity, and it also gulps air. It is at home on mudflats and among mangrove roots, where it propels itself by 'walking' on its pectoral fins and – in order to move hurriedly – by means of rather spectacular, froglike leaps. In the water, however, the mudskipper swims quite normally. Its diet consists of insects and small crustaceans, in pursuit of which it makes optimum use of its highly functional popeyes to keep watch in every direction.13

  Throughout history only a small minority of people have travelled on or depended on the sea. And of those who did, most moved easily between land and sea, and were far from exclusively maritime. Fish demonstrate this matter. For many coastal people fish are not central in their diets, and indeed fisherfolk often will exchange their fish for the preferred land staples of wheat or meat. In any case, fish are a nutritionally inefficient resource – a kilogram of fish provides only about two-thirds the calories of a kilogram of wheat. And fish also are an aleatory resource, that is depending on chance, as compared with rather more routine land-based food production. Yet fish also can be sent far inland, thanks to another part of the maritime scene. Coastal areas produce salt too, at low tides or when marshes dry up seasonally, and salt is vital in transforming perishables, especially fish, into items which can be exported for long distances and so can enter distant markets.

  Port cities have been much discussed. They are the quintessential merging of town and sea, the conduit through which maritime and terrestrial influences mingle and merge. Broeze made some useful comments: to use the term port city

  means that the economic, social, political and cultural life of that city is also predominantly determined by and has to be analysed in the light of that port function.... It is above all the active intertwining of all forces from foreland and hinterland through the physical and mediating function of the port which explains the extent, pace and manner of each port city's specific development.14

  Matvejevic put this in more abstract terms: 'Cities with ports differ from city-ports, the former building their piers out of necessity, the latter growing up around them by the nature of things. In the former they are a means and an afterthought; in the latter, starting-point and goal.'15

  In discussing the connections and character of port cities, we can use concepts which have long been in use in European studies. A useful one is the geographers' term, 'umland'. This is defined as 'formerly applied in a general way to surroundings, and included in hinterland; now more precisely applied to an area which is culturally, economically and politically related to a particular town or city.'16 It is then the immediate surrounding area, directly connected to the city, frequently because it provides foodstuffs for the city. The umland may be best seen as transitional between the dominant town and the pure countryside.

  Port cities have relationships both with the sea and the land. For the former, the term 'foreland' is much used. The foreland is the area of the overseas world with which the port is linked through shipping, trade and passenger traffic. It is separated from the port city by maritime space. The 'hinterland' radiates out from the port city inland and so begins at the end of the umland. It is the landed area to which the port's imports go, and from which come its exports. To try and be more specific than this is difficult. One obvious point is that while all cities have umland and hinterlands, only port cities also have forelands.17 All port cities act as hinges, connecting different maritime areas. In the early modern period Hurmuz connected the Gulf with the Arabian Sea; Melaka, and now Singapore, connect two oceans. Many are located on choke points, as with the examples just given.

  The relationship of the port city or emporia to the surrounding areas varies greatly. They can be seen as Janus-faced, looking at both hinterland and foreland, and most of them are affected by changes in either. Yet even this is not invariant; all are bound to and affected by the sea, but those which are mere redistribution centres, like again Singapore, and earlier Aden, Melaka, Hurmuz and Mocha, are little affected by events in the hinterland. These are 'entrepot' ports, which live by redistribution. Such ports draw little or nothing from the interior, but rather repackage, break up, and send on foreign goods to a foreign destination. On the other hand those which draw goods from the hinterland will clearly be affected by changes there: Colombo, Surat, Mumbai, Jakarta, Bangkok.

  As Broeze implied, location on the shore does not necessarily produce a port city. It is a matter of which function is dominant. Two examples of cities on the shore which are even so not port cities are primate cities, and cities with ports. Kuwait is, and Hong Kong used to be, a primate city, because they are really city states which include a port role among their many functions. So also with Colombo and Bangkok. They dominate in terms of population, industry, politics, culture, or at least high culture, and so while they have docks, they are not really port cities, but rather cities with ports, for they have so many other functions. Contrariwise, today some ports have no cities: they are simply jetties which provide facilities to load cargoes of oil, or iron ore, onto huge carriers or tankers. These purpose built, single function ports are located close to the source of the raw materials, and have no need for cities or people. Examples are Ra's Tannurah for Saudi oil, or Port Hedland and Dampier for iron ore from Australia.

  The true port city by definition links very distant maritime spaces, and this is the reason for what is perhaps its most noticeable characteristic. Ports are inclusive, cosmopolitan, while the inland is much less varied, much more exclusive, single faceted rather than diverse. As Murphey noted:

  Port functions, more than anything else, make a city cosmopolitan.... A port city is open to the world, or at least to a varied section of it. In it races, cultures, and ideas as well as goods from a variety of places jostle, mix, and enrich each other and the life of the city. The smell of the sea and the harbour, still to be found... in all of them, like the sound of boat whistles or the moving tides, is a symbol of their multiple links with a wider world, samples of which are present in microcosm within their own urban areas.18

  An English writer on the Gulf in the late nineteenth century put it well:

  A sea-coast people, looking mainly to foreign lands and the ocean for livelihood and commerce, accustomed to see among them not infrequently men of dress, manners, and religion differing from their own, many of them themselves travellers or voyagers to Basrah, Bagdad, Bahreyn, 'Oman, and some even farther, they are commonly free from that half-wondering, half-suspicious feeling which the sight of a stranger occasions in the isolated desert-girded centre; in short, experience, that best of masters, has gone far to unteach the lessons of ignorance, intolerance, and national aversion.19

  The location of port cities depended on many variables. In the Red Sea Jiddah was both a trade centre and t
he gateway to the Holy City of Mecca. Aydhab, on the other shore, prospered entirely because of its location. It funnelled African Muslim pilgrims across to Jiddah. As described in 1183, it

  has no walls, and most of its houses are booths of reeds. It has, however, some houses, newly-built, of plaster . . . its people, by reason of the pilgrims, enjoy many benefits, especially at the time of their passing through, since for each load of victuals that the pilgrims bring, they receive a fixed food tax.... A further advantage they gain from the pilgrims is in the hiring of their jilab: ships which bring them much profit in conveying the pilgrims to Jiddah and returning them when dispersing after the discharge of their pious duty. There are no people of easy circumstances in 'Aydhab but have a jilabah or two which bring them an ample livelihood. Glory to God who apportions sustenance to all in divers forms. There is no God but He.20

  One would assume that ports are on the coast, and indeed this is the case today. Modern port cities have to deal with huge tankers and carriers and container ships, and so must be located on the sea shore, for the ships are too large to easily travel far up rivers or estuaries, the Rhine and the St Lawrence system notwithstanding. In earlier times when ships were smaller and artificial harbours unknown this was far from the case. Smaller ships could penetrate up rivers and estuaries, thereby getting closer to production centres, and further away from pirates.

  Among rivers where important ports were located are the Mekeong system, the Irrawaddy, the Tigris-Euphrates, the Ganga, and the Zambezi system. Malyn Newitt has described this last system. 'The valley of the Zambezi... is in many ways like an extension of the coastal zone, a finger of low veldt extending 300 miles [480 km] into the interior.' In the East African case what we are used to conceptualising as port cities, Kilwa, Sofala, Angoche, and Mombasa, shared very similar roles with Sena and Tete, respectively 260 and 515 km from the sea.21 The best term for Sena and Tete is 'inland port cities', or maybe 'fluvial ports'.

  Important river ports are also to be found in southeast Asia. Thomas Bowrey described several of them. Kedah was on a large river in Malaya, and ships of even 250 tons could get over the bar at the river mouth and right up to the town, 60 miles above the bar. Aceh was two or three miles beyond the bar, and vessels of 60–80 tons could come this far. Bangkok was on the Chao Phraya river, about twenty miles from where this river enters the Gulf of Thailand. In the Middle East, Basra is about 75 miles up the Shatt al Arab from the Gulf.

  In India also many ports are far inland on rivers, or at least a considerable distance from the coast. The Jatakas refer to a port near modern Varanasi,22 and at other times Patna and Allahabad have been major ports. Even Surat is three leagues from the sandbar at the mouth of the Tapti River. Deep sea vessels berthed some 10 or 20 miles away at places like Swally Hole, and discharged into lighters. A similar regime occurred at Cambay. On the west coast of India, the city of Cranganore was some fifteen miles inland from the seashore, located on several small rivers. Traders included Syrians, Egyptians, Persians, Arabs, Medes and many other races.23 On the Konkan coast indigenous ports are on navigable estuaries and creeks as these provide shelter against storms, protection from pirates, and possible inland water connections. Dabhol is two miles from the sea, Rajapur is at the head of a tidal creek and 20 km from the sea. Turning to the Indus river, the first major port there was Daybul, or Dewal, until Lahari Bandar took over in the late twelfth century, but there also was Thatta, which was nearly 200 km up river from the coast and was a major trade centre in the fifteenth to seventeenth centuries at least.

  Kolkata provides an excellent case study of the advantages and hazards of an estuarine or deltaic location. On the one hand, land transport in deltaic areas is very difficult. On the other, these lands are very fertile, being constantly replenished by floods. These lands were able to feed the city, and also grow the jute which was for long Kolkata's main export. Yet river navigation can be very difficult indeed, and their courses can move very often. Kolkata is about 80 miles from the sea, and has a tidal range of 22 feet. However, all these problems are outweighed by the advantage of a dense network of waterways giving access to the vast riparian hinterland. Hence through history, and long before Kolkata, there were major ports in this general area.24

  In the locations of many of these port cities we have been seeing an interaction of geographical and human matters. Much of the time it is land influences which determine where a port is located. This explains the initially puzzling fact that many fine harbours have no ports, while many ports have miserable or no harbours. Again we have a caution against giving the sea and maritime matters too much agency. Gujarat in the sixteenth century provides an excellent case study. The area was incorporated into the major inland state, the Mughal empire, in 1572, and thus its hinterland was extended, and its ports were made responsive to the needs of the inner core of the empire, that is the Agra–Delhi doab region. The fate of the various ports in the Gulf of Cambay was also changed. Pre conquest, Cambay and its outer ports had been dominant, and the main route to the north went via Rajasthan, where hostile raiders were common and deserts were difficult to cross. After the conquest the main route to the north went east from Gujarat and then north to Agra. Traffic on this route passed through fertile lands, and the area was also much more closely controlled by the Mughal state and hence was safer. As a result Surat rose in importance, and Cambay fell.25

  The locations the Portuguese chose for their main ports in the sixteenth century demonstrate the role of political and strategic factors. Many of them seemed on the face of it to be extremely unpromising. Hurmuz had to import all its water, and its climate was extreme. Mozambique Island similarly was extremely hot and unhealthy, and again had no local water. Aden yet again had a shocking climate, and was cut off from the surrounding country by mountains so that it also was nearly an island. Yet these ports fitted in with Portuguese strategic designs, and so they were taken, except Aden, and even prospered for a time.

  Some centuries later Aden rose again when inefficient early steam ships needed to take on coal at short intervals. Aden was well located to be one such stop. The needs of the early steam ships influenced other ports also. In the early days when they gobbled up coal, it was of the essence that they load coal quickly, preferably from both sides at once. This meant that good natural harbours for a time did well, such as Galle and Albany. But as steam ships became more efficient and needed less coal, and then ships converted to oil, other political factors came into play and these ports declined.

  They were replaced by ports which met different needs, even if they had few natural advantages. Fremantle, located adjacent to the capital of Western Australia, and closer to the areas producing exports and needing imports, was built up at considerable expense in the late nineteenth century, although Albany had by far the better harbour. Yet even after this decision political matters continued to influence what happened. Fremantle was still subject to the vagaries of local politics. Labour relations were usually appalling, leading to frequent strikes. For decades wooden piles were used to build new wharves, even though they rotted very quickly: the state government wanted to protect the local timber industry.

  Most of the great ports of British India were located according to economic and political factors, not whether or not they had good harbours. Kolkata is an obvious example, keeping in mind the appalling difficulties of getting from the sea to the docks. Similarly Mumbai had a much better harbour than Surat, yet took over a century to displace it, and really only rose once the British built rails to the interior to provide it with an hinterland. There is an excellent harbour there to be sure, but building the city was a difficult task. The city was built on what was seven islands, separated at high tides, but joined by mud flats at low tide. Essentially the history of the city was a history of reclamation; the city was invented from marshes, salt flats, isolated islands, even open sea. Indeed one version is that Mumbai was created long ago by coconut palms, which grew on small islands. As they shed
leaves into the shallow sea they extended the area of the land. Once the palms were exploited for their coconuts, people began to fertilise them with fish meal. In short, Mumbai is built on coconut leaves and rotten fish.26

  Chennai also shows the primacy of politics over geography. For all of the nineteenth century it had no decent harbour and was a very difficult place to load and unload. Nevertheless, it suited the economic and political needs of the British rulers. Mrs Graham in 1810 well described the hazardous nature of getting ashore:

  A friend who, from the beach, had seen our ship coming in, obligingly sent the accommodation boat for us, and I soon discovered its use. While I was observing its structure and its rowers, they suddenly set up a song, as they called it, but I do not know that I ever heard so wild and plaintive a cry. We were getting into the surf; the cockswain now stood up, and with his voice and his foot kept time vehemently, while the men worked their oars backwards, till a violent surf came, struck the boat, and carried it along with a frightful violence; then every oar was plied to prevent the wave from taking us back as it receded, and this was repeated five or six times, the song of the boatmen rising and falling with the waves, till we were dashed high and dry upon the beach.27