The “bowl-shaped” bloomeries of Pingnan County, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region and the origins of “bowl-shaped” bloomery in China

2020 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 167-170
Author(s):  
Yingfu Li

AbstractBased on the discussion on the shape, nature, iron-smelting products and technical characteristics of the “bowl-shaped” bloomeries of the iron-smelting remains of the Han dynasty at Liuchen Town in Pingnan County, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, this paper puts forward the issue of the origin of the “bowl-shaped” bloomeries in China, and referring to the “bowl-shaped” bloomeries found in West Asia, South Asia, Europe, and Africa and their smelting technical traditions. This paper pointed out that the “bowl-shaped” bloomeries in China had the same origin with that of the other regions of the world, which was the result of the far and wide diffusion of the “bowl-shaped” bloomeries of West Asia, and its introduction route might be from West Asia via South Asia and Southeast Asia along the Indian Ocean.

Author(s):  
Carool Kersten

The Islamization of Southeast Asia resulted in a distinct Malay-Muslim culture combining the universalist dimensions of a religious doctrine with a global reach and the cultural particularities of the region (language, local practices). Recent discoveries of new text material and archaeological evidence have pushed the emergence of this civilization back in time. Key elements of the chapter’s narrative are the emergence of Muslim states in the archipelago, and the active participation of diasporic groups from the Middle East, cosmopolitan figures from insular Southeast Asia, and mediators from South Asia in the further Islamization of maritime Southeast Asia. It also provides the argument for challenging the frequent dismissal of Islam in Indonesia as a ‘thin veneer’ over older religious deposits of indigenous or Indian origin, a misconception that was later corroborated by anthropological research in the 1980s. Throughout this time frame, the Indian Ocean continues to act as a conduit for the ‘global circulation of ideas’ and the emerge of sophisticated intellectual milieus in Sumatra and Java


Author(s):  
Geoff Wade

Over the first three decades of the 15th century, Ming China dispatched a succession of naval fleets through the Southeast Asian seas and across the Indian Ocean, reaching South Asia, the Middle East, and even the east coast of Africa. These were the largest and best-armed naval fleets in the world at that time, comprising more than 100 ships and tens of thousands of troops. Like similar overland military missions sent to Đại Việt and Yunnan in the same period; these missions were initially intended to awe foreign powers and create legitimacy for the usurping emperor, Yongle. The maritime missions were generally led by eunuch officials, the most famous of whom was Zheng He. In the 21st century the Chinese state depicts these missions as “voyages of peace and friendship” and utilizes this trope in its contemporary diplomacy. However, the Ming sources reveal that military violence was an integral aspect of the successive voyages, whilst the fact that many rulers from Southeast Asian polities were taken to China by the eunuch-led missions also suggests that some degree of coercion was employed. The missions were ended by the court in the mid-1430s over concerns about the costs and the need for such missions.


2019 ◽  
pp. 21-39
Author(s):  
Khairudin Aljunied

This chapter uncovers the connectedness of Malay societies that made it conducive for Muslim traders and travelers who crossed the Indian Ocean to live alongside non-Muslim Malays, thereby introducing Islam in an incidental fashion. These traders and travelers were, later on, joined by rulers, Sufi missionaries, and Islamic scholars hailing from the Arab world, South Asia, China, and Southeast Asia who gained new converts through direct preaching. Even though many Malays embraced Islam during this phase, their conversion did not radically change the outlook and governance of Malay states. Hindu-Buddhist-animist frames of reference were generally maintained by the masses as the common people slowly internalized the tenets of Islam. Islamic and pre-Islamic codes of law and ethics were fused together by Malay elites in the management of their societies so as to not disrupt the age-old cultures that the common people held on to.


Ecology ◽  
2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Priya Davidar

South Asia includes regions south of the Himalayan Mountains bounded by the Indian Ocean, West Asia, Central Asia, Southeast Asia, and East Asia. The countries within South Asia are Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka. South Asia is the most densely populated region in the world with more than 1.7 billion people in 5.1 million square kilometers of territory. This article considers the biomes south of the Himalayan Mountains, including the Himalayas and the archipelagoes such as the Maldives-Lakshwadeep-Chagos in the Indian Ocean and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands off Southeast Asia since these are included within the territory of India. Treatment is challenging due to the inherent complexity of the natural ecosystems, the variation in quality of the source materials, and the lack of information on certain ecosystems. Limits between biomes are difficult to delineate due to strong climatic gradients that juxtapose different ecosystems within short distances. These issues are discussed in the respective sections.


2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 61-82
Author(s):  
Rosa Maria Perez

Abstract In Gujarat, as in other states of India, the Sidis illustrate the long-term African existence in India, which was dominantly analyzed through Eurocentric categories substantiated either by the semantics of slavery or, more recently, by the paradigm of the African diaspora in the world. Both were mainly produced in and for the North Atlantic realm. This article aims at identifying the intersection between the two margins of the Indian Ocean grounded on an ethnohistory of the Sidis of Gir, in Saurashtra. As an anthropologist, it is at the level of contemporary Indian society within the dialectic and dialogic framework of relationships between the Sidis and the other groups that I observed them, being aware of the discontinuities existing within this category on the one hand and, on the other, of a common idiom through which the Sidis communicate their “Africanness.”


2007 ◽  
Vol 50 (2-3) ◽  
pp. 91-105 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gita Dharampal-Frick ◽  
Bhaswati Bhattacharya ◽  
Jos Gommans

AbstractWe believe ourselves to be the most astute men that one can encounter, and the people here surpass us in everything. And there are Moorish merchants worth 400,000 to 500,000 ducats. And they can do better calculations by memory than we can do with the pen. And they mock us, and it seems to me that they are superior to us in countless things, save with sword in hand, which they cannot resist.


1998 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
pp. 269-294 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roderich Ptak

Ships sailing from Fujian to Southeast Asia could choose between two different sea routes. The first route followed the China coast to central Guangdong; it then led to Hainan, the Champa coast and Pulau Condore, an island near the southern tip of Vietnam. From there it continued in three directions: to Siam, to northwestern Borneo and to the Malayan east coast. Going south to the Malayan east coast was the most direct way to Trengganu, Pahang, Pulau Tioman, Johore and modern Singapore whence it was possible to sail into the Indian Ocean or to cross over to Sumatra, Bangka Island and Java.


Tempo ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 23 (3) ◽  
pp. 465-481
Author(s):  
Malyn Newitt

Abstract: Portuguese creoles were instrumental in bringing sub-Saharan Africa into the intercontinental systems of the Atlantic and Indian Ocean. In the Atlantic Islands a distinctive creole culture emerged, made up of Christian emigrants from Portugal, Jewish exiles and African slaves. These creole polities offered a base for coastal traders and became politically influential in Africa - in Angola creating their own mainland state. Connecting the African interior with the world economy was largely on African terms and the lack of technology transfer meant that the economic gap between Africa and the rest of the world inexorably widened. African slaves in Latin America adapted to a society already creolised, often through adroit forms of cultural appropriation and synthesis. In eastern Africa Portuguese worked within existing creolised Islamic networks but the passage of their Indiamen through the Atlantic created close links between the Indian Ocean and Atlantic commercial systems.


Itinerario ◽  
1987 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 72-86 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kenneth McPherson

Until fairly recently, histories of European imperial expansion in the Indian Ocean region have been written largely in terms of the endeavours of Europeans in creating and controlling empire. Only in the last couple of decades has recognition been given slowly to the role of the indigenous economic and political compradors, both large and small, who were vital to the evolution and sustenance of European colonial empires.


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