The first kingdom of the "Cheras"
rose from the union of northern Hindus and native
Dravidians. It was to this ancient state with its
capital at Muziris, now modern Cranganore near Calicut,
that traders sailed across the Arabian Sea in their
small cargo vessels. What they sought was a commodity
so valuable that it was called "Black Gold"
("Karutha Ponnu" in Malayalam). It was pepper,
the fruit of a vine native to Kerala. King Solomon
of Judea in the 10th century BCE is said to have sent
ships to get it. So did Ancient Greeks, Roman, Arabs,
Chinese, Turks, Venetians, and others. Even today,
Roman coins are found in sites all along the coast.
Merchants sought not only pepper but also cardamon,
ginger, and turmeric, rice, monkeys, ivory, and woven
cloth. In fact, the name for one kind of popular cotton
cloth, Calico, comes from the city of Calicut.
So great was the demand in Europe
for spice, so much money was to be made in the trade,
that in the 15th Century states such as Portugal and
Spain began to search for all-water routes to the
Indies. It was to the Indies that Christopher Columbus
set sail in 1492 and he actually thought that he'd
found them when he landed on an island in the Bahamas
in October of that year. He had not, but his commercial
rival, the Portuguese Vasco da Gamma did by sailing
around the horn of Africa and landing at Calicut in
1498. Thus began the modern age of exploration and
conquest: the opening of the New World to the Old
World peoples of Europe and Asia. And it was all due
to the spices of Kerala.
cutter in the Cardamon Hills.
Throughout most of its history,
Kerala was divided into several states headed by hereditary
royal families. The Portuguese, Dutch, and French
captured areas of Kerala and set up trading posts,
but never really ruled the area completely. It was
the British who took over all of India early in the
19th century and made it the "Jewel in the Crown"
of their empire. They brought their language, laws,
educational systems, transportation networks (railroads),
to India and even began the tea plantations in the
Cardamon Hills. Though they did not completely control
the old princely states of Kerala, the British influenced
them greatly. Today, English is virtually the second
language of south India. Kerala became one of India's
states in 1956 when the several old kingdoms, the
main one being Travancore, gave up their sovereignty
and joined the great union of peoples and cultures
that comprise modern India.