We may begin with a list of India’s principal objects of trade with the outside world during this period. Among agricultural products the first place belongs to spices. We know from Cosmas that spikenard, among other articles, was gathered at Sindhu (no doubt, from the Upper Himalayas) for export, while pepper was exported from no less than five ports of Malabar.
In the list of articles forming the subject of Justinian’s regulations on customs duties are included typically Indian spices as cinnamon, long white pepper, cost us, cardamom, and aromatics. Among the products of useful fragrant trees sesame logs, we are told by were exported from Kalyana, while the Arum the Tang Dynasty state that Indian sandal and saffron were exported to the Roman (the predecessor kingdom Cambodia)
An interesting testimony to the high value of In products in Eastern lands, for we are told Rudravarman, king of Fu-Nan, sent a mission the Chinese emperor in A.D. 519 with the of a Buddha image made of Indian sandalw From the Amarakosa we learn that mashaparni,i medicinal plant, was acquired from Kamtw beyond Gandhara, in extreme north-west, while ( silhaka (a kind of incense) as well as asafetida was supplied by Turuska, Bahlika, and Ramatha’ (lands of Western Asia). It remains to mention that aloes, cloves, and sandalwood are Cosmas in the list of products reaching Sri Lanka from South-east Asia by way of the Coroman ports.
As regards the trade in animals, the best breeds of horses, as before, were imported from Arabia, Persia, and modern Afghanistan. But a local breed, reputed to be of dragon stock was foundby Hiuen-tsang in Kashmir.
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Among animal products the most important were pearls, corals, silk, and ivory. Pearls, from the junction of the Tamraparni river with the sea, formed the most precious product of the Pandya country in the time of Kalidasa, while Hiuen-tsang knew the same land (under the name of Malakuta) as a depot for sea-pearls.
To judge from the extensive references to the use of pearls in the Gupta Age, the pearl trade of the Pandya country must have been very important at that period. Pearls as well as raw silk, silk yarn, and silk robes, partly at any rate of Indian origin, are included in Justinian’s list of imported articles above mentioned.
Corals were obtained from the sea, separating India from Sri Lanka, in Kalidasa time according to an allusion in the Raghuvamsam. The literature of the Gupta period contains occasional references to Chinese silk, Cosmas not only mentions silk as a product (China but also includes it in the list of articles through Indonesia and the East Indian coast Sri Lanka for export to the West.
Silk from a must have likewise been brought down by e great land routes to Central Asia. Ivory was from Ethiopia to India in the time of smas, who adds that Ethiopian elephants were umerous and had larger tusks than the Indian an additional article of trade was musk which, according to Cosmas, was procured at Sindh (no doubt, from the Upper Himalayas) for export.
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As for the trade in mineral products, copper was obtained from mlechchha countries (of the Western Mediterranean), according to the Amarakosa. The copper which, as Cosmas informs us, was exported from Kalyana was probably likewise imported from abroad; for Kalyana was one of the principal marts of Western India at that time.
We know from the last-named authority that sapphire was imported into India from Sri Lanka, while emerald was imported by the Ethiopians who secured it from the Blemmyes (natives of Nubia).
On the other hand, “Indian iron not liable to corrosion” (Indian steel?) is among Justinian’s list of imported articles above quoted. Diamonds are included in the list of exports from India to the Roman Orient, Fu-Nan and Kiaochi in the passage of the Annals of the T’ang Dynasty cited above.
As regards textiles, Cosmas tells us that cloth for making dresses was exported from Kalyana. A variety of fabrics called po-tie (‘cotton brocade’ or ‘cotton stuffs’) is mentioned in the authoritative Chinese works as an Indian product which was exported to China from Ho-Lo-Tan or Java.