Number of words: 360<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As we have seen, the boom in overseas trade made India an economic and cultural superpower. According to Angus Maddison, a British economist, the country accounted for 33 per cent of the world GDP in the first century CE!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
India\u2019s share was three times that of western Europe and much larger than that of the Roman Empire as a whole! China\u2019s share of 26 per cent of world GDP was much smaller than India\u2019s. India\u2019s population was estimated to be 75 million at that time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What did the merchant ships in the Indian Ocean look like in those times? There were many kinds of vessels, ranging from small boats for river and coastal use to large ships with double masts for long voyages. There were also regional variations. However, they all seem to have shared a peculiar design trait: they were not held together by nails; they were stitched with rope!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Throughout the ages, travellers from outside the Indian Ocean have repeatedly commented on this odd design. This technique persisted into modern times\u2014 locally built vessels were stitched together well into the twentieth century! Apparently, there are boat builders who continue to do this even now. Like the Harappan ox-cart, this example shows how ancient technologies live on in India even as new ones come up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We\u2019re not sure why the shipbuilders in the Indian Ocean region used this technique when they had access to iron nails from an early stage. Some say it may have been because of a superstition that magnetic lodestones in the sea would suck in ships which bore iron nails but this not very convincing. It\u2019s more likely that this was because these ships sailed in waters full of atolls and reefs and had to be beached in many places due to lack of sheltered harbours or due to the rough monsoon sea. This would require a hull that was flexible and did not break easily. The stitched technique provided this flexibility but it later limited the ability of Indian shipbuilding to match Chinese and then European design innovations. <\/p>\n\n\n\n