3 - ‘THE Harbour and THE Path of All Countries’

Summary

Chapter 3 shows that Linyi kingdom occupied the key relay position in the longest chain of transshipment relays in the world at the turn of the first millennium. It became the most fully Indianised kingdom among all other Southeast Asian countries by the sixth century CE despite its close ties with Chinese courts and markets. Its wide networks built itself a wealthy society along the central coast and its existence proved vital to the prosperity of Jiaozhou under the Chinese rule. The flow of commercial wealth that Linyi generated changed political equations in the Tongking Gulf. Linyi rested on control of two key resources: strategic harbours for ports of call and the aromatic forests of the interior liked by well-established overland trails. These two factors would constitute the economic base of this important polity on the central coast between China and other Southeast Asian neighbours. Linyi did not collapse so much as fade away to re-emerge in part as Champa.