ABSTRACT
This chapter looks at the nature of people on the move in the Asian seas and to see the pattern of migration along the coastal rim of the Indian Ocean in pre-modern period. It also examines the dynamics with which the different migrant groups got spread to diverse value-intense geographies of this maritime space, but united together by a complex network of commodity movements, faith-related travels and sharing processes of market information. The period from fourth century onwards, which witnessed slackening of long-distance trade in different parts of the world, experienced restricted movement of luxury goods from the Indian Ocean to the markets of Sassanian and Eastern Roman empires. The migrant settlements of Persian Christians were networked and united by the itinerant religious personnel, particularly missionaries and bishops coming from Persia. The Jewish trading networks running through diasporas dispatched a considerable volume of cargo, particularly spices, to the Mediterarnean, from which they bagged significant amount of profit.
