While temporarily dampened by the onslaught of Covid-19, China dominates global trade. However, this is no new feature of Chinese History, as this study into Tang-Abbasid trade between the 7th to 10th centuries shows. The paper below reveals the social and economic impacts of this incredible phenomenon, creating a context from which we can potentially explore the problems and features of our globalised world. This is done through answering the question:
How important was trade and exchange between the ‘Abbasid and Tang states from the C7th to the C10th CE?
Background – what happened?
It is common to suppose that the initial point of contact and interaction between distant cultures did not occur until 1492, and Europe’s encounter with the New World. However, The Tang and ‘Abbasid states were in intimate contact long before Columbus sailed. More than 600 years earlier, they faced each other initially at the Battle of Talas in Central Asia in 651, when both states were fighting for control over the Silk roads, the Muslims were victorious, and China lost dominance over the land trade routes. Amongst other factors, this stimulated their great extension of sea-based trade, with the Tang’s major partner ironically being the victors, the Abbasids. With the Abbasid capital moving to Baghdad in 762 AD, Al-Mansur (the city’s founder) remarked “there is no obstacle between us and China. Everything on the sea can come to us from it (Sen 1996).” Indeed, it did.
From Basra to Guangzhou, the sea-route was 6000 miles long, there being four legs to the trip each taking around 29-30 days[1], with the whole journey lasting approximately 6 months in total (Chaffee 2018) .The Biography of Li Mian, a military governor in Lingnan from 769, accounts that the number of dhows (Arab ships) that had landed there each year had increased from four to forty (Wei 2010). Accounts like these, combined with the numerous archaeological discoveries dating back to this time, from ceramics produced in China found in a dhow, off the coast of Indonesian island Belitung to others found in Kenya, tell us that this trade became increasingly frequent and widespread. It is worth highlighting that the exchange connected a large proportion of the world’s land: the furthest China conquered was Sudan, while Islamic merchants got to the Philippines and Korea. It was conducted mostly by Arab merchants travelling back and forth, who settled for long periods of time (and sometimes for the rest of their lives) in Chinese port cities.
As such, the exchanges were extensive and significant, covering the travel of not only material goods but also ideas, faith, and people. The presence of such a phenomenon is alone a reason to study it and this essay will assess the short-term and long-term economic and social impacts of the objects and ideas that were traded via this under-studied cross-state relationship in order to determine its importance. First, we will paint a picture of what this trade entailed by discussing which goods were traded, and the importance of such goods by considering the relative quantities at which they were exported.
The exchange of material goods
Ibn Khurradadbih’s (dated to 885) catalogue of goods to be had from across maritime Asia in The Book of Routes and Realms tells us:
as for goods what can be exported from the Eastern Sea, from China we obtain white silk, coloured silk, and damasked silk, musk, aloes-wood, saddles, marten fur, porcelain, cinnamon and galangal (Chaffee 2018)
He continues to list goods acquired from other regions around the Indian ocean. This list tells us that a profusion of luxury goods was made available to Arabic society via this trade, from cloths and foods to medicines. It is possible to go further: by listing three types of silk, we infer that demand for silk was particularly great in Abbasid society and thus was an important Chinese export. This is further supported by two Arabic accounts, by Abu Zayd al-Sirafi and al-Mas’udi (896-956), which in independently documenting the destruction caused by the Huang Chao rebellion of 879 in China, both note the destruction of the mulberry trees which (according to Abu Zayd) ‘caused silk… to disappear from the Arab lands’. This suggests that silk was an important commodity to the Chinese and thus was exported in large quantities to the Islamic route. Moreover, Ibn Khurradadbih’s catalogue points us to the export of porcelain, and wider to ceramics, which prove to have been shipped in vast quantities. This is primarily illustrated by the discovery of the Belitung shipwreck, an Arab ship (dhow) which was found in 1998 off the coast of Belitung, and contained 60,000 artefacts, with 98% of them being ceramics (Effeny 2010). This is certified by 1968 excavations in Siraf (on the coast of the Persian Gulf), which unearthed Chinese ceramics (Park 2012). As such, it appears that the most important Chinese exports were ceramic and silk. Yet, Zayd’s catalogue is testament to the fact that a vast array of other goods were exported, such as Tibetan musk, but whose significance cannot be determined archeologically due to their relative nondurability.
In return, what historian Patricia Risso calls the ‘Chinese taste for the exotic’ (Risso 1995), was satisfied by Abbasid exports of raw materials and finished goods, such as textiles and glass made in Basra, as well as frankincense and myrrh (Chaffee 2018). Moreover, a meaningful product of the trade was the creation of networks along the route between the two states, that went through places such as Malaya, Indonesia, India. These networks were responsible for local as well as international stimulus, seeding wealth, ideas and objects in those regions, too. The nature of the networks meant that Islamic merchants also picked up other exotic goods on the way to Guangzhou that the Chinese could enjoy. For example, ‘ivory, pepper and cotton goods from India; pearls, gemstones and spices from Sri Lanka; and… scented woods, and resin from Southeast Asia’ (Guy 2010).
Who consumed the goods?
The Chinese imperial family were immediate consumers of these exports. Arabian glass was found among the imperial treasures donated to the Famensi, a temple west on Chang’an, the capital city. This suggests these exports were regarded as luxury goods reserved for only the wealthiest in Chinese society, conferring status to those who possessed them. Moreover, one particular good stands out, even if its influence expanded later: during the Song dynasties, imported fragrances from Western Asia (a consumption pattern which emerged in the Tang era) would become important for religious worship, as well as the popularity of fragrances perhaps signalling ‘the birth of a modern and polite society, where personal and public hygiene reflected one’s social status’ (Yangwen 2014).
Thus, the type of goods that were traded between Siraf and Guangzhou often fell into the luxury category, purchased by elite members of society who could afford them and giving them status accordingly. However, the great quantities of ceramics being exported leads me to believe they were not only available to the wealthy elites, but perhaps were even accessible to our equivalent of a middle class. This is speculative, but in assessing whose hands these goods fell into, we might conclude that they were enjoyed by more than just the imperial class, and thus the trade can be attributed greater importance as it impacted the daily consumption patterns of a more diverse population. On the other hand, if it is true that these goods were majorly reserved for the elite, then it shows that while this is a case of limited influence, it involved influential people and can still be regarded as significant that their behaviours were changed as a result.
Economic Impact – short and long term
It has not been possible to reconstruct the economic impact of the trade exactly as there are no existing tables about the quantities and profits, but archaeology and written sources provide a key. In Chinese ports, a tax levied according the weight of the cargo by the imperial court upon arrival, known as the Xiading shui (duty of anchorage) (Sen 1996) ,was a source of revenue. The imperial court, presumably recognising the rewards this tax might reap, created the role of Maritime Trade commissioner, shibo shi, in 763 to ensure it would be efficiently and fully tapped into. Numbers, even if they are not exact government accounts, can still help us visualise how big this profit might have been. If we assume the Belitung wreck to be a model of the regular ship that went between China and the Islamic world, and that Li Mian’s figures of 40 ships in his final year were going back and forth, we might conclude that roughly 2,400,000[2] goods were being exported from China over the course of a year. Of course, this is an approximation, and we cannot know if the Belitung ship exported uniquely large (or in fact small) quantities, but the calculation sheds light on the potential of the number of goods that could have been shipped regularly across the sea at this time. When these figures are revealed, it seems implausible to not consider that this gave the Tang and Abbasid states a significant economic boost. Even so, the single biggest indicator that profit was made on either end is that it continued for three centuries– it seems hard to believe that such an arduous journey, through shallow waters and dangerous reefs, would have continued to be taken without the appropriate economic incentive.
Hyunhee Park has argued that the ‘structure of sea-borne commerce outlives political regimes’. If she is correct, then we might expect the economic benefits outlived the Tang and Abbasid existences. This seem true for the Song dynasty (960 – 1276) that succeeded the Tang as the production and sale of this porcelain would contribute to its economic growth. This view of an economic boost is supported by Emperor Gaozong’s (1127 – 1162) statement that “Maritime trade is the most profitable; its profits can reach hundreds of millions if it is managed properly.” (Yangwen 2014) Of course, this is not the sole contributing factor, but it is still possible to suggest that the foundations were laid for this economic boost by the Tang and Abbasids setting the precedent of international maritime trade. An even wider implication is that the initiation of an interlocking trading ‘world’ between China and the Islamic world, by virtue of taking the first steps towards establishing a genuine world economy, could provide a platform off which the medieval ‘world system’ could build, as Janet Abu-Lughod terms the structures she describes in her Before European Hegemony.
Thus, we see the trade was important not only for short term economic gain for the states, but also for moulding and contributing to the future Chinese economy and, by extension, the era of the birth of the world economy with China at the centre. However, this trade also saw the transmission of the intangible: ideas and cultures, with merchants serving as cargos of culture and knowledge.
Muslim merchants: cargos of culture
First, both states exchanged geographic and cartographic knowledge, which can be illustrated by the development of maps. It cannot be shown that any maps of the Islamic world existed in China prior to 750, but by 1402 – that is, before the western voyages of the well-known Chinese Zheng He – Chinese maps included ‘accurate knowledge of the contours of the Arabian Peninsula’ (Park 2012). This happened through a process of scholars of each state recording the accounts of merchants and drawing maps based on their accounts. The development had commercial, political and religious importance to the Abbasids. It would stimulate trade between the states further, and it would allow the Abbasids to ‘better govern their new territorial acquisitions’ (Park 2012) by having increased knowledge of their composition. Additionally, this early accumulation of cartographic knowledge by the Islamic and Chinese was later collected and communicated by Marco Polo in his travelogue, read by his predecessors (Henry the Navigator and Christopher Columbus) who would then pave the way of European exploration and discovery in the 16th century. As such, the transfer of cartographic knowledge would become significant feature of the trade.
The Abbasids also received Chinese knowledge about navigation by compass, which would contribute to its future trading ability, alongside technologies such as crystallisation and basin solar evaporation and instalments of alchemy (Adshead 2004). Introduction of the compass also ensured that Muslims could always pray facing Mecca and thus enriched religious life. While these were no doubt valuable to the Abbasids, the most significant contribution to Abbasid knowledge was received soon after the very first point of contact at the Battle of Talas in 651. After this, Chinese prisoners of war (according to an Arabic source) introduced the Chinese art of papermaking to the Islamic world (Risso 1995). Replacing the expensive parchment and fragile papyrus, this would prove important to the subsequent growth of books and libraries, with the first papermill built in Baghdad in 794-95. This development contributed to the growth of an elite literate class, the ulama (learned men). These men travelled widely and spread a new high Islamic culture across the empire during an era of scholarship, resulting in French Historian Maurice Lombard coining the term The Golden Age of Islam (Lombard 2003), which involved surges in translations of classical Greek and Roman texts and the cultivation of the humanities. Thus, the exchange between the Tang and Abbasids was important as it provided the Abbasids with the technological key to accelerate the development of their high culture. It is worth noting that no other trade in this period or for long after this period had anything like even that impact, and thus the relative importance of this feature is apparent.
The Tang were certainly enriched by the Abbasid’s knowledge in astronomy, mathematics, engineering and medicine (Park 2012) which filtered into their society through the exchange. It is difficult to map the relative of importance of these various transfers of knowledge, but we can certainly say that it contributed to a more informed society. These discoveries make it possible to take issue with the conclusion of S.A.M Adshead who argued that the Islamic world ‘itself invented very little’ and was ‘dangerously self-sufficient and inward looking’ (Adshead 2004).
The Advent of Islam in China
Moreover, the trade led to a lasting import – Muslim merchant communities in several port cities, including Yangzhou, Ningbo, Guangzhou and Quanzhou (Effeny 2010). Evidently, not all Muslims were ‘inward looking’ enough to stay in the geographical bounds of the Islamic world. In fact, discoveries of mosques in these port cities (such as the Huaishing Si in Guangzhou, commemorating the prophet) and Muslim cemeteries built at this time (with one that still stands in Quanzhou to this day) testify to the fact that a considerably large population of Muslims lived and died in the country. These cities were also inhabited by smaller populations of Malays, Chams from central Vietnam and Indians (Effeny 2010). This discovery suggests that the port cities of China served the role of melting pots in which cultures from many different parts of the world met and mingled.
We can infer that these foreign populations became large from accounts of the casualties of the An Lushan rebellion. While probably exaggerated and really nothing more than a way of saying ‘very large amounts’, Abu Zayd alleges 120,000 Muslims, Jews and Christians (as well as others) being killed in Guangzhou (Chaffee 2018). One might argue that the presence of these communities brought about tension by looking to 758 (when Arab merchants supposedly plundered Guangzhou) and 760 (the date of the An Lushan rebellion in which a rebel army massacred tens of thousands of Yangzhou’s foreign merchants). However, these episodes are anomalous, and it seems the Tang and the Muslim merchants otherwise had a civil and harmonious relationship.
All of this might seem to suggest that the maritime trade with the Abbasids was a significant factor in introducing Islam to China. Indeed, it can be argued that the new religion arrived in much the same way as Buddhism had done some centuries earlier (Yangwen 2014). However, Islam did not have the same quick widespread influence due to a number of factors. Part of the explanation lies in the sectioning off of the Muslim merchant communities by imperial authorities into foreign quarters called fanfang. In Guangzhou, the fanfang had their own leader, and could also operate under their own law when matters were between those from the same country. These moves accommodated the settlement of merchants, but with the primary aim of separating them from the rest of the community to avoid unwanted integration. Moreover, due to the fact that the relationship between the Chinese and Muslims was primarily commercial, the merchants were not there to be missionaries. The idea that these merchant communities were not active in promoting religion is further supported by the fact that during the anti-religious campaign in 848, while Buddhism was vehemently persecuted, Islam was not (Wei 2010). One possible explanation for this difference is that Islam appeared more as a philosophy and practical guide that facilitated a profitable commerce, rather than a religion that was spreading. Extracts from the Qur’an praise and encourage maritime trade, such as “it is He who has made the sea subject to you… and you see ships ploughing in it that you may seek [profit]”. Other extracts provide practical guidance about marketplace conduct, such as “fill the measure when you measure and weigh with balanced scales; that is fair, and better in the end” (Risso 1995). Extracts such as these support the idea that the state perceived the Qur’an as an advisory text for trade, rather than a religion to change the daily practice of their citizens. Thus, the nature of the fanfangmeant that while Islam was practised within it, it had very limited immediate impact outside it.
Concluding Thoughts
Nonetheless, it also does not appear to be the case that their settlement had no social or religious impact. The policy of separation pursued by the state by segregating them into fanfang was not entirely successful. Lu Jun, (a prefect and military governor of Guangzhou in 856), created laws which prohibited the process of intermarriage (likely to avoid conflict arising) between the two cultures. The fact that such laws would have not been necessary if such intermarriage had not been occurring, alongside reports by Maritime Trade Ambassadors that ‘locals and foreigners… seem to attract to each other’, seem to imply that significant integration was underway. Moreover, The Account of China and India, a transcription of oral histories provided by Arabic merchant contemporaries, includes a detailed description on how the Chinese lived – from what they ate to information about Chinese toilet practices and the males’ lack of circumcision. This illustrates the level of personal and social intimacy that developed, implying there was a level of integration in Guangzhou that inevitably occurred due to the close proximity. Despite the fact the state fought against, it seems as though through integration and the subsequent (Chaffee 2018) intermarriage of Chinese and Muslims in the port cities, the umma was embedded, and Islam’s future in China was assured. As such, the advent of Islam in China can be attributed to the symptoms of this maritime trade, by setting up permanent communities, even if the process was one whose impact was felt across a longer term.
The Cambridge Dictionary defines ‘important’ as an adjective describing something ‘having great effect or influence’. This assessment shows that the maritime trade and exchange between the Tang and Abbasid states had these qualities not only to its contemporaries who enjoyed the consumption of a range of luxury goods, as well as the states who would have experienced a boost in revenue; it also had economic and social implications that outlived its existence. It is difficult to determine the relative importance of these impacts as doing so would leave one impact more ‘relevant’ than the other. This seems impossible as the answer will depend on the perspective you look at the question from. If one were to ask a Chinese Muslim which impact was the most important, the settlement of Islamic communities might be their answer. If you were to ask an American, then the collection of cartographic knowledge that later contributed to Columbus’ discovery of the Americas would perhaps be their answer. The point is that there is no answer for the ‘most important’ impact, rather the various impacts accumulate to give the trade importance.
To me, the greatest importance that emerges in understanding these impacts is that it provides a point of reference from which to look at historical development and turns us to new avenues of exploration. The harmony and respect that existed most of the time between Muslim communities and the state implies that the current persecution in China being suffered by the Uyghurs is not inherent in all of China’s history. Or, perhaps the nature of the fanfang prove the opposite as the presence of the 760 massacre in Yangzhou paired with the Tang state’s aversion to integration shows the long-existing tensions of Muslim settlement in China. This might inspire us to explore the changing relationship between the Muslim community and the state in order to better understand Sino-Islamic relations of the 21st century. Alternatively, the development from the trade of majorly luxury goods, to the trade now which sees a wide type of imports, might urge historians of science and technological development to assess the way this became possible. These are only a couple of multiple leads that could emerge from studying the impact of this trade, highlighting the interface between economic development and social impact and more specifically the benefit of looking at history through the lens of episodes of trade. Thus, the importance of assessing this trade extends beyond its contemporaries and subsequent eras, right into providing context that might help us answer how our globalised world’s features and problems came about.
Word count (excluding bibliography and footnotes): 3430
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Footnotes
[1] See Figure 1
[2] Assuming 40 ships per year arriving and leaving port Lingnan, each containing 60,000 trade items. This is potentially an under-estimate, as while porcelain survives underwater, smaller and more delicate items (such as perfumes, mirrors) would not be around to be recovered.
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