[Sca-cooks] spice trade transit time

[Decker, Terry D.]

Thorvald, you wanted information about sea transit times in the spice trade.
I was a little puzzled that there wasn't much out there so I hit  my library
and found some items.  The quotes were a little more than I wanted to type,
so I've paraphrased and tried to provide sources.  I've also tossed in some
information about the 15th Century Chinese trade and cargo packing.

Arab Seafaring by George F. Hourani gives the following information.

Quoting the Periplus of the Erythrean Sea and Pliny's Natural Histories,
Hourani provides that Hippalus, a Greek, was the first to use the southwest
monsoon (winter) to sail from Arabia to the Malabar coast, probably in the
2nd Century BCE.  It was a fast but dangerous passage requiring extensive
blue water sailing.  I found this interesting because it is in direct
opposition to a common idea that the Mediterranean sailors were primarily
coastal sailors spending nights on the shore.

 Goods from the Mediterranean were shipped south on the Nile then
transported either overland or by canal to Berenice on the Red Sea.
Starting in July, it was 30 days sail to Cane (Cana or Kane in Yemen).  With
the monsoon it was 40 days sail from Ocealis (somewhere near Mocha, Arabia)
to Muziris ofn the Malabar coast of India.  Hourani identifies Muziris as
Mysore, but most other historians disagree.  For our purpose, it's close
enough.  So a maximum 70 days fast passage from Egypt to India in the 1st
Century with another month (my estimate) between Alexandria and Berenice.

Return voyages were made in summer when the prevailing winds are from the
northeast.

The Akhbar al-Sin w-al-Hind (mid 9th Century) gives a sailing time from
Muscat to Canton of 120 days or:

Musqat to Kulam Mali - 1 lunar month
Kulam to Kalah Bar - 1 month
Kalah to Sanf Fulaw - 1 month
Sanf  Fulaw to Canton - 1 month

Kulam Mali is a port on the Malabar coast.  Kalah Bar equates roughly to
Kedah, Malaya.  Sanf Fulaw was part of the Champa kingdom in eastern
Indo-China (South Vietnam?)

Average speed was just over 2 knots per hour.  Beginning the voyage in
November or December and adding 2 months of trading time gives the best
conditions of wind and weather to arrive in Canton in April or May with time
to trade and catch the favorable northeast winds back.

A passage from Aden to the Malabar coast by Buzurg ibn-Shahriyar had an
estimated average speed of between 3 and 4 knots.

Al-Mariwazi (12th Century) place a days voyage with a fair wind at about 150
nautical miles or 6.2 knots.

About the beginning of the 10th Century direct Arab trade with China ceased.
Trade between China and al-Islam continued at Kalah Bar.  Between 1405 and
1433, the Chinese would send a trading fleet into the Indian Ocean to trade
with India, Arabia and Africa.  The voyages would last over a year each and
have supply ships, water tankers, a field army with cavalry, and trade
ships, the largest vessel being over 400 feet in length (the Santa Maria was
only 98 feet).  The first fleet consisted of 317 ships.  Among the shipping
containers used by this fleet were thousands of large terracotta jars and
smaller glazed jars (similar to ginger jars) for storing spices and to be
traded.  Louise Levathes When China Ruled the Seas makes some questionable
comments, but it covers the fleet fairly accurately.  One of the Chinese
ships has been salvaged within the last few years and a documentary made of
the operation.

Vasco da Gama's first voyage to India lasted less than 2 years.  On November
22, 1497, he rounded the Cape of Good Hope and was off the Natal coast on
December 25th.  He spent some time along the coast of Africa and in
Mozambique, then sailed to India.  IIRC, he returned to Portugal in the Fall
of 1498.  Some of his later voyages were slightly more than a year in
length, but in most cases, da Gama was engaged in diplomacy or combat.  With
factors on the ground in Malabar to handle the purchasing, a round trip
could be made in under a year.

So my best guess is that spices were no more than 1 year to 1 1/2 years old
when they were sold in Europe with the possible exception of the Early
Medieval period.  Of course, this doesn't address the issue of shelf time
after they were sold.

Bear