Indian Shipping/Book 1/Part 2/Chapter 8
CHAPTER VIII.
The Period of Hindu Imperialism in Northern India (continued): Maritime Activity on the West Coast.
During the latter days of the Gupta Empire, i.e. during the 5th and 6th centuries a.d., Indian maritime activity was equally manifest towards the West. In the 5th century, according to Hamza of Ispahan, the ships of India and China could be seen constantly moored at Hira, near Kufa, on the Euphrates.[1] The ports of Sindh and Gujarat appear among the chief centres of this naval enterprise of the time. It was from these ports that the Indian adventurers sailed to colonize Java. In a.d. 526 Cosmas found Sindhu or Debal and Orhet, i.e. Soratha or Veraval, as leading places of trade with Ceylon.[2] In the 6th century, apparently driven out by the White Hunas, the Jats from the Indus and Cutch occupied the islands in the Bahrein Gulf. About the same time, as Fergusson has pointed out, Amravati, at the mouth of the Kṛishñā, was superseded as the port for the Golden Chersonese by the accomplishment of the direct voyage from Gujarat and the west coast of India.
In the time of the empire of Śrī Harsha, succeeding that of the Guptas, the people of Surastra were described by Hiuen Tsang (about a.d. 630) as deriving their livehood from the sea by engaging in commerce and exchanging commodities.[3] He further notices that in the chief cities of Persia, Hindus were settled enjoying the full practice of their religion.[4] Again, the Jats were probably the moving spirit in the early Mahomedan sea raids (a.d. 630-770) against the Gujarat and Konkan coasts. During the 7th and 8th centuries, when the chief migrations by sea from Gujarat to Java and Cambodia seem to have taken place, Chinese fleets visited Diu under the pilotage probably of the Jats. On the Sindh, Cutch, and Gujarat coasts, besides the Jats there were other tribes that showed notable energy at sea. Thus in the 7th and 8th centuries the Gurjjaras, chiefly of the Chapa or Chavada clan, both in Dwarka and Somnath, and inland, rose to power, and about a.d. 740 established themselves at Anahilavada Patan. They tried to put down the piracy of the Jats, but afterwards themselves became more dangerous pirates.