3 - The Military Campaigns of Rajendra Chola and the Chola-Srivijaya-China Triangle

Summary

The Chola king Rajendra (1012–44) is known to have launched several military expeditions against kingdoms in the Indian Ocean. This paper focuses on his raids on the Srivijayan ports in the context of growing commercial activity between southern Asia and Song China (960–1279). It argues that Rajendra Chola launched two attacks on the Srivijayan ports, one in 1017, and then a more extensive raid in 1025, in retaliation for Srivijayan interference in the direct trade between southern India and Song China. Scholars such as K.A. Nilakanta Sastri and O.W. Wolters have already proposed this motive for the Chola military campaigns against Srivijaya. However, the details about the Srivijayan interference that resulted in these raids by Rajendra Chola's navy have not been fully explained. By analysing relevant Chinese sources, this paper will provide some specific examples of ways in which the Srivijayans might have attempted to prevent direct commercial (and perhaps diplomatic) links between the Cholas and the Song court.

THE ALLURE OF CHINESE MARKETS

In the early eleventh century, the markets and ports in China emerged as some of the most lucrative places for international commerce. Traders from almost every region of Asia gathered at these places to procure Chinese commodities such as porcelain and silk, and sell foreign goods ranging from spices to horses. In fact, trading activity in China during the tenth and eleventh centuries had begun to affect the local economies of several Indian Ocean kingdoms and shaped the lives of merchant communities as far away as the Mediterranean Sea. Rajendra Chola's military raids on the Srivijayan ports must be understood in this context of an international trading system that linked markets in China to the economies and societies elsewhere in the world.

Although foreign traders had been frequenting Chinese markets as early as the Han dynasty (see, for example, Yu 1967), significant expansion in their numbers took place after the middle of the eighth century. This increased interest in Chinese markets and the upsurge in foreign trade during the eighth century were intimately liked to the abolition of an extremely rigid economic system that had previously existed in China. The An Lushan rebellion of 755 against the reigning Tang dynasty, although unsuccessful, had significant impact on the existing political and social structure.