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{{Short description|Former name of a sea port near the modern-day city of Karachi, Sindh, Pakistan}}
{{History of Karachi}}
'''Barbarikon''' ({{lang-grc|Βαρβαρικόν}}) was the name of a [[sea port]] near the modern-day city of [[Karachi]], [[Sindh]], [[Pakistan]], important in the ancient era of the Indian subcontinent in [[Indian Ocean]] trade. The port is considered one of the premiere ports regarding the interaction between [[ancient India]] with the [[Middle East]] and [[Mediterranean world]].<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=UmMnh1XKJjQC&pg=PA125&dq=barbarikon+hindu|title = Intercourse Between India and the Western World: From the Earliest Times of the Fall of Rome|isbn = 9788120615496|last1 = Rawlinson|first1 = H. G.|year = 2001}}</ref> It comes from the [[Greek language|Greek]] word of the term (also in [[Latin]], ''[[barbaricum]]''), designating areas outside the civilization and/or the [[Roman Empire]] and the [[Greek world]].

It may have been a translation from Sumerian word [[Meluhha]] for the [[sindh]] from which the Sanskrit word for barbarian, [[Mleccha]] derives.
[[File:Periplous of the Erythraean Sea.svg|thumb|450x450px|Barbarikon as mentioned in ''Periplus of the Erythraean Sea'']]

Barbarikon is mentioned briefly in the [[Periplus of the Erythraean Sea]]:

:"This river [the [[Indus]]] has seven mouths, very shallow and marshy, so that they are not navigable, except the one in the middle; at which by the shore, is the market-town, Barbaricum. Before it there lies a small island, and inland behind it is the metropolis of [[Scythia]], [[Minnagara]]; it is subject to [[Parthia]]n princes who are constantly driving each other out."

:"The ships lie at anchor at Barbaricum, but all their cargoes are carried up to the metropolis by the river, to the King. There are imported into this market a great deal of thin clothing, and a little spurious; figured [[linen]]s, [[topaz]], [[coral]], [[storax]], [[frankincense]], vessels of glass, [[silver]] and [[gold]] plate, and a little wine. On the other hand there are exported [[costus]], [[bdellium]], [[lycium]], [[Spikenard|nard]], [[turquoise]], [[lapis lazuli]], [[Seres|Seric]] skins, [[cotton]] cloth, silk yarn, and [[indigo]]. And sailors set out thither with the Indian Etesian winds, about the, month of July, that is Epiphi: it is more dangerous then, but through these winds the voyage is more direct, and sooner completed."

Its principal function beyond supplying its immediate hinterland was as a [[transshipment]] port for supplies of Persian turquoise and [[Afghanistan|Afghan]] lapis lazuli, to be carried overland to [[Egypt]].<ref>{{cite journal | last =Wendrich | first =W. Z. |author2=R. S. Tomber |author3=S. E. Sidebotham |author4=J. A. Harrell |author5=R. T. J. Cappers |author6=R.S. Bagnall | title =Berenike Crossroads: The Integration of Information | journal =Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient | volume =46 | issue =1 | pages =59–60 | year =2003 | doi = 10.1163/156852003763504339}}</ref>

==See also==
* [[Periplus of the Erythraean Sea]]
* [[Regio Patalis]]
* [[Banbhore]]

==References==
{{reflist}}

== External links==
* [http://depts.washington.edu/silkroad/texts/periplus/periplus.html Periplus of the Erythraean Sea]

{{coord missing|Karachi}}

[[Category:History of Sindh]]
[[Category:History of Karachi]]
[[Category:Former populated places in Pakistan]]
[[Category:Populated places along the Silk Road]]
[[Category:Maritime history of Pakistan]]
[[Category:Economic history of Karachi]]

Barbarikon - Revision history

imported>Ffffrr at 14:02, 25 August 2021