Source: San Francisco Chronicle
BERENIKE, EGYPT, June 12, 2002: Excavation of an ancient seaport on Egypt’s Red Sea found spices, gems and other exotic cargo showing that sea trade linking the Roman Empire and India 2,000 years ago rivaled the legendary Silk Road at times, archaeologists say. Co-directors of the dig, Willeke Wendrich, of the University of California, Los Angeles and Steven Sidebotham, of the University of Delaware, report their findings in the July issue of the journal Sahara. Archaeologists who have spent the last nine years excavating the town of Berenike say they have recovered an array of artifacts that are the best physical evidence yet of the extent of sea trade between the Roman Empire and India. They also uncovered numerous beams hewn of teak, a wood indigenous to India, and Indian sailcloth. The dry climate at Berenike preserved many organic materials from India that have never been found in the more humid subcontinent. Indian pottery found in the 30-acre site suggests Indian traders lived in the town amid a hodgepodge of other cultures. Archaeologists found evidence that a dozen different scripts, including Tamil-Brahmi, Greek, Latin and Hebrew, were used in Berenike. Elizabeth Lyding Will, an emeritus professor of classics at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, said the finds help add “a whole new dimension to Roman archaeology.” “It looks to me that India was some sort of engine driving Roman trade during the early empire. It could have been the chief focus of their trade.”