Muziris

1 · POSITION

Muziris was the port at the mouth of the Periyar in what is now Kerala, which Pliny called the first emporium of India. A Tamil Sangam poem describes the ships of the Yavanas — Greeks and Romans — arriving with gold and leaving with pepper. The register holds it as a port that received foreign merchants for centuries on the Malabar coast. [1]

2 · GOLD FOR PEPPER

The trade it served ran from the Roman Red Sea ports across the Arabian Sea to Malabar, and its cargo was the spice the Roman world paid gold for. Pattanam, north of Kodungallur, has been identified as its site and holds the largest collection of Roman artefacts found in India; an agate ring carved with a sphinx was excavated there in 2020. [1]

3 · LOST TO A FLOOD

The port remained open until 1341, when a storm flooded the Periyar and drowned the town. Its place on the river was lost, and only the excavations have given it back. [1]

4 · IN THE REGISTER

The register reads Muziris with the other ports of the sea route east — Al-Baleed, Quanzhou and Guangzhou — as places where the foreign merchant lived for a season while the trade turned. [1]

5 · ⚑ CANDOUR

⚑ Checked on 22 October 2026. Half a year was not found. Ships came on the summer monsoon and left on the winter winds and might wait a season in port; the note now says that. Only one source was read for the rest of this article. [1–2]