Доклады Международного конгресса ИИСАА. Т. 1

II. Middle East, Caucasus and Central Asia / Ближний Восток, Кавказ и Центральная Азия 108 Proceedings of the International Congress on Historiography and Source Studies of Asia and Africa.Vol. I. 2020 it reflects the actual situation of the Himyarite Jews in the 6 th century or whether it was a later interpolation. 1 The Martyrdom ’s valuable contribution is its explicit reference to Indo-Arab navigation and sea trade. Indian ships from the Hellenistic times were engaged in the lucrative silk trade route which, starting fromKlysma near present Suez, reached India and expanded even further to China. 2 Additionally, Indian sailors-merchants frequently traded in the port of Alexandria 3 and held a key position in the Roman maritime trade. 4 As Casson correctly pointed out, even at the peak of the Roman — Indian trade in the 2 nd and 3 rd centuries, the trade was carried out by individual Roman or Indian merchants without any governmental coordination or support. 5 There were no state-owned merchant fleets in the Indian-Arabian maritime trade routes, but only merchant ships owned by individual owners. 6 By the end of the 7 th centuryAD while the supremacy of the Byzantines’ naval power (the successors of the Romans) in the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean was declining, 7 overshadowed by the newly developed Ethiopian navy, still the Indo-Arabian sea trade continued to be left in the hands of the individual Late Roman — Byzantine and Indian merchants. 8 1 Christides V. The Dawn of the Urbanization in the Kingdom of the Himyarites in the 6 th century. P. 44–45. 2 For the early activities of the Indians in Socotra (Greek: Dioscourides), located close to theYemenite coast, seeWinkA.Al-Hind, the Making of the Indo-IslamicWorld. Leiden – New York – Köln, 1996. Vol. I. P. 45; Ubaydli A. The Population of Sūquṭrā in the Early Arabic Sources // Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies . 1989. 19. P. 137–154. 3 Casson L. (trans. and commentary). The Periplus Maris Erythraei. Princeton, 1989. P. 34. 4 For the Indo-Arabic trade see Heldaas Seland E. The Indian Ships at Moscha and the Indo-Arabian Trading Circuit // Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies . 2008. 38. P. 283–287; Heldaas S. E. Ports and Power in the Periplus: Complex Societies and Maritime Trade on the Indian Ocean in the First CenturyAD. Oxford, 2010, with an exhaustive relevant bibliography; Warmington E. H. The Commerce between the Roman Empire and India. New Delhi, 1995. 5 Casson L. The Periplus Maris Erythraei. P. 36–37, where he refutes M. Charlesworth’s opposite view: Charlesworth M. C., Norton P. (eds.). Studies in Roman Economic and Social History in Honor of Allen Chester Johnson. Princeton, 1951. P. 135–136. 6 Christides V. What Went Wrong in the Long Distance Roman Naval Power in the Red Sea and in the Indian Ocean in the Late Third CenturyAD? // Khalil Samir S., Monferrer-Sala J. P. (eds.). Graeco-Latina et Orientalia Studia in Honorem Angeli Urbani Heptagenarii. Cordoba, 2013. P. 75. 7 Elmakias A. The Naval Commanders of Early Islam / Transl. L. Yungman. Piscataway, NJ, 2018. P. 2. See also a review of this book by Christides V. in Graeco-Arabica . 2020. 13. (In print). See also Lirola Delgado J. El nacimiento del poder naval musulmán en el Mediterráneo (28–60 h./ 649–680 c.). Granada, 1990. P. 114. 8 Christides V. What Went Wrong in the Long Distance Roman Naval Power? P. 73–75. In fact, the terms “Late Roman” and “Byzantine” are conventional.