Page:The Periplus of the Erythræan Sea.djvu/164

 36. Sewed boats known as madarata.—Glaser (Skizze, p.190) shows this to be the Arabic muddarra'at, "fastened with palm fiber," which included, first, the fibers sheathing the base of the petioles of the date; and second, those taken from the husks of the cocoanut. This latter is what Marco Polo calls "Indian nut." It was a later cultivation in Arabia than the date, and the Periplus does not include it among Arabian exports, although noting it in §33 as a product of Sarapis or Masira Island.

The text notes that these sewed boats were exported to "Arabia," meaning the South Coast, Yemen and Hadramaut.

Periplus 154 Madarata.png

Marco Polo (I, xix) gives a description of these craft, as follows:

"Their ships are wretched affairs, and many of them get lost; for they have no iron fastenings, and are only stitched together with twine made from the husk of the Indian nut. They beat this nut until it becomes like horse-hair, and from that they spin twine, and with this stitch the planks of the ships together. It keeps well and is not corroded by the sea-water, but it will not stand well in a storm. The ships are not pitched, but are rubbed with fish-oil. They have