continental south asia and the islands 491147-1166: 2
1167-1186: 3After a vigorous start, Champa envoys arrived less often. 51 missions
are recorded for Northern Sung and, characteristically, only 6 for
Southern Sung.
The missions from Champa to the Northern Sung capital of K’ai-
feng travelled partially by sea and partially by land. This can be seen
from the entry for the 7th month (July/Aug.) of 966,^113 according to
which the ruler of Chiang-nan, the former Southern T’ang, delivered
to the Sung court a list of the goods which a Champa mission was
transporting through his state. Chiang-nan comprised what now is
Fu-chien, Chiang-hsi, and An-hui south of the Yangtze. It follows
that the Champa missions at that time probably sailed to Ch’üan-
chou in present Fu-chien and from there proceeded by land, and that
the officials of the then still-independent state of Chiang-nan took an
inventory of their goods.
The recorded goods from Champa are rhinoceroses, elephants,
peacocks, a red cockatoo, a “phoenix”, a lion, rhinoceros horns, a
belt of rhinoceros hide, leggings of rhinoceros hide, elephant tusks,
tortoise shells, kingfisher’s feathers, aromatics, gharu wood, putchuck,
sandalwood, frankincense, myrrh, cosmetics, rose water, glass pitchers,
opaque glass, wine vessels, coral, baroos camphor, limonite, purple ore,
naphta, a p’u-sa stone, vessels, cardamoms, cloves, peppers, cubebs,
nutmegs, fennel, betel nuts, coconuts, embroidered robes, sarongs,
cotton fabrics, yüeh-no cloth, parasols, mats, and oil lamps.
Many of these items were not native to Champa. This is true at least
for the spices (fennel, cardamons, cloves, nutmegs, pepper, cubebs),
frankincense, myrrh, putchuck, sandalwood, baroos camphor, limonite,
glass, corals, and rose water. The lion of 1011 is particularly stated to
have come from India. Of special interest is the “unstopable fierce-
burning mineral oil” of 958, which cannot have been a product of
Champa. It has been identified with greek fire or naphta. The Chinese
must have been keen to obtain it, since they used it in warfare for
incindiary attacks. Also an encyclopaedia of 1044 describes a Chinese
flamethrower using naphta.^114 In short, Champa, to a much greater
(^113) See above.
(^114) See Needham, Science and Civilisation, vol.4:2, pp.144-147.