India is the birthplace of navigation. Indus valley Civilization had actuall developed advanced means of studying stars to navigate around areas near to the coast and developed many different kinds of boats for rivers & trade.
Navigation evolved after the introduction of compass, known as Matsya Yantra, and there was a lot of trading with SE Asia, China, Japan, and Persia. Some also say that Indians (not the latter Tamils, early times like 7th century CE) sailed as far as the Medeterranian, to Edypt, Greece, and Rome.
I've heard that there are poems and works of literature in Tamil over 1500 years old describing South American Civilizations and recorded trading with peoples who appear to be South American Incas...
Ships were really big after 17th century (more than 1000 tons), and even some Iron Clads were made. Ships were bigger that 600 tons by the 7th century, larger than most other nations. In 5th-4th century BCE, ships were as big as 250 tons. Naval influence shortened after the 1600s because money was spent on land warfare with Shah Jahan and Aurangzeb, and funds had to be cut from navy. One good thing done by many Islamic rulers was to keep the Indian navies alive and adopt them into their own military instead of destroying them, even the dhow (most commonly used boat of Arabia) is Indian tech.
Pics:
3rd Century BCE:
Ancieant sea going ship:
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17th century India, The Masters of the Oceans...
