Roman trade with the East refers to the overland and maritime exchange networks that connected the Roman Empire with Parthian Iran, the Kushan Empire, India, Southeast Asia, Han China, and, from the 3rd century CE, the Sasanian Empire. During the 1st–3rd centuries CE, these routes linked the Mediterranean world with wider Afro-Eurasian systems of commerce through the Silk Roads, the Red Sea, the Persian Gulf, the Indian Ocean, and the South China Sea. This was a shifting network of corridors shaped by geography, monsoon winds, desert oases, imperial frontiers, and the actions of merchants, sailors, envoys, and local intermediaries. Goods such as silk, pepper, cotton textiles, gems, ivory, aromatics, glassware, coral, wine, metalware, and Roman coinage moved across these routes, often changing hands many times before reaching their final markets.
These exchanges linked Han China (206 BCE–220 CE), Indian kingdoms and port polities, Southeast Asian maritime hubs, the Parthian Empire (247 BCE–224 CE), the Sasanian Empire (224–651 CE), and the Roman Mediterranean. Chinese silk reached Roman consumers through Central Asian, Kushan, Indian, and Iranian intermediaries; Indian pepper, cotton textiles, gems, and aromatics moved toward the Red Sea and Mediterranean; and Buddhist monks, scholars, and merchants traveled from Gandhara and Taxila into Central Asia and China. Cities and ports such as Chang’an, Samarkand, Palmyra, Barygaza, Muziris, and Alexandria functioned as cosmopolitan entrepôts where caravans, river traffic, and monsoon shipping converged. As empires rose, declined, and contested frontier zones, trade routes adapted to changing political control, demand, technology, and environmental knowledge, making Roman trade with the East part of one of the ancient world’s most important systems of interregional exchange.
About the Author
Related Images
Map of the Trade in the Indian Ocean 15th-16th century - From Afro-Asian Exchange to European Intervention
Map of the Silk Road During the Late 8th Century
Map of the East India Company Trade, c.1800
Map of the Silk Road Routes
Map of Roman & Parthian Trade Routes
Robert Clive & The East India Company Rule in India, c. 1765
Cite This Work
APA Style
Netchev, S. (2026, July 05). Map of the Roman Trade with the East, c. 1st–3rd Centuries: Silk Roads and Indian Ocean Routes across Afro-Eurasia. World History Encyclopedia. https://www.worldhistory.org/image/15772/map-of-the-roman-trade-with-the-east-c-1st-3rd-cen/
Chicago Style
Netchev, Simeon. "Map of the Roman Trade with the East, c. 1st–3rd Centuries: Silk Roads and Indian Ocean Routes across Afro-Eurasia." World History Encyclopedia, July 05, 2026. https://www.worldhistory.org/image/15772/map-of-the-roman-trade-with-the-east-c-1st-3rd-cen/.
MLA Style
Netchev, Simeon. "Map of the Roman Trade with the East, c. 1st–3rd Centuries: Silk Roads and Indian Ocean Routes across Afro-Eurasia." World History Encyclopedia, 05 Jul 2026, https://www.worldhistory.org/image/15772/map-of-the-roman-trade-with-the-east-c-1st-3rd-cen/.
