The Forgotten Highway. Episode 2 — BEFORE MARCO POLO: MUSLIM MARINERS AND THE SEA OF CHINA

Long before Marco Polo described the eastern islands, Muslim merchants and geographers were already recording the maritime highway to China. This episode follows accounts from the ninth through fourteenth centuries describing the Sea of China, Canfu, seasonal winds, dangerous passages, monsoon timing, and the commercial system connecting Arabia, India, Southeast Asia, and Southern China. Sources include the Akhbār al-Ṣīn wa-l-Hind, al-Yaʿqūbī, Abū Zayd al-Sīrāfī, al-Masʿūdī, al-Iṣṭakhrī, Ma...