Arabian Sea

This article is about the Arabian Sea (Bahr al-'Arab). For the river in Sudan, see Bahr al-Arab.

Arabian Sea
Coordinates	18°N 66°E
Max. width	2,400 km (1,500 mi)
Surface area	3,862,000 km2 (1,491,000 sq mi)
Max. depth	4,652 m (15,262 ft)

The Arabian Sea is a region of the Indian Ocean bounded on the east by India, on the north by Pakistan and Iran, on the west by the Arabian Peninsula, on the south, approximately, by a line between Cape Guardafui in northeastern Somalia and Kanyakumari in India. Some of the ancient names of this body of water include Sindhu Sagar (meaning "Sea of Sindh" in Sanskrit) and Erythraean Sea.

Description

Gwadar Bay, located in the Gulf of Oman in the Makran region of Pakistan. It is an inlet of the Arabian Sea indenting the sandy Makran coast at the Iran–Pakistan border.

Colva Beach, Goa

The Arabian Sea's surface area is about 3,862,000 km² (1,491,130 sq mi). The maximum width of the Sea is approximately 2,400 km (1,490 mi), and its maximum depth is 4,652 metres (15,262 ft), in the Arabian Basin approximately at the same latitude as the southernmost tip of India. The largest river flowing into the Sea is the Indus River.

The Arabian Sea has two important branches — the Gulf of Aden in the southwest, connecting with the Red Sea through the strait of Bab-el-Mandeb; and the Gulf of Oman to the northwest, connecting with the Persian Gulf. There are also the gulfs of Cambay and Kutch on the Indian coast. The largest islands in the Sea are Astola Island (off the Pakistani coast), Socotra (off the Horn of Africa) and Masirah (off the Omani coast).

The countries with coastlines on the Arabian Sea are Somalia, Djibouti, Yemen, Oman, Iran, Pakistan, India and the Maldives. There are several large cities on the Arabian Sea coast including Karachi, Gwadar, Pasni, Ormara, Aden, Muscat, Mumbai, Mangalore, Kochi and Thiruvananthapuram.

Surathkal beach, Mangalore on the shores of the Arabian Sea

Limits

The International Hydrographic Organization defines the limits of the Arabian Sea as follows:

On the West. The Eastern limit of the Gulf of Aden [The meridian of Cape Guardafui (Ras Asir, 51°16'E)].

On the North. A line joining Ràs al Hadd, East point of Arabia (22°32'N) and Ràs Jiyùni (61°43'E) on the coast of Pakistan.

On the South. A line running from the South extremity of Addu Atoll (Maldives), to the Eastern extreme of Ràs Hafun (Africa, 10°26'N).

On the East. The Western limit of the Laccadive Sea [A line running from Sadashivgad Lt. on West Coast of India (14°48′N 74°07′E) to Corah Divh (13°42′N 72°10′E) and thence down the West side of the Laccadive and Maldive Archipelagos to the most Southerly point of Addu Atoll in the Maldives].

Alternative names

The Arabian Sea has historically and geographically had many other different names, such as: Akhzar Sea,^{[citation needed]} Persian Sea,^{[citation needed]} Makran, Mokran or Mecran Sea,^{[citation needed]}, Daria, Sindhu Sagar, Erythraean Sea, Sindh Sea,^{[citation needed]} Chah Bahar,^{[citation needed]} Mare indicum,^{[citation needed]} Mare Rubrum,^{[citation needed]} Vagh vagh,^{[citation needed]}, and Sea of Moheet-E.^{[citation needed]}.

The name of the sea has been disputed by some historians in Iran, India and Pakistan.^{[citation needed]} They believe that the name Arabian Sea was first used on maps due to colonialism in the past 400 years.^{[citation needed]}

Trade routes

Astola is an uninhabited Pakistani island just off the coast of Balochistan, Pakistan.

The Arabian Sea has been an important marine trade route since the era of the coastal sailing vessels from possibly as early as the 3rd millennium BCE, certainly the late 2nd millennium BCE through the later days known as the Age of Sail. By the time of Julius Caesar, several well-established combined land-sea trade routes depended upon water transport through the Sea around the rough inland terrain features to its north.

These routes usually began in the Far East or down river from Madhya Pradesh with transshipment via historic Bharuch (Bharakuccha), traversed past the inhospitable coast of today's Iran then split around Hadhramaut into two streams north into the Gulf of Aden and thence into the Levant, or south into Alexandria via Red Sea ports such as Axum. Each major route involved transhipping to pack animal caravan, travel through desert country and risk of bandits and extortionate tolls by local potentiates.

This southern coastal route past the rough country in the southern Arabian peninsula (Yemen and Oman today) was significant, and the Egyptian Pharaohs built several shallow canals to service the trade, one more or less along the route of today's Suez canal, and another from the Red Sea to the Nile River, both shallow works that were swallowed up by huge sand storms in antiquity. Later the kingdom of Axum arose in Ethiopia to rule a mercantile empire rooted in the trade with Europe via Alexandria.

Major Ports

The Port of Karachi in Pakistan's largest city, Karachi, with some of the city's residential areas visible. The port is one of the busiest in the Arabian Sea.

The Port of Karachi (Urdu: بندر گاہ كراچى Bandar gāh Karācī) is Pakistan's largest and busiest seaport, handling about 60% of the nation's cargo (25 million tons per annum). It is located between the Karachi towns of Kiamari and Saddar, close to the main business district and several industrial areas. The geographic position of the port places it in close proximity to major shipping routes such as the Strait of Hormuz. The history of the port is intertwined with that of the city of Karachi. Several ancient ports have been attributed in the area including "Krokola", "Morontobara" (Woman's Harbour) (mentioned by Nearchus), Barbarikon (the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea, and Debal (a city captured by the Muslim general Muhammad bin Qasim in 712 CE). There is a reference to the early existence of the port of Karachi in the "Umdah", by the Arab navigator Sulaiman al Mahri (AD 1511), who mentions "Ras al Karazi" and "Ras Karashi" while describing a route along the coast from Pasni to Ras Karashi.

Karachi is also mentioned in the sixteenth century Turkish treatise Mir'ât ül Memâlik (Mirror of Countries, 1557) by the Ottoman captain Seydi Ali Reis, which is a compilation of sailing directions from the Portuguese island of Diu to Hormuz in the Persian Gulf. It warns sailors about whirlpools and advises them to seek safety in "Kaurashi" harbour if they found themselves drifting dangerously.

The gate facing the sea was called "Kharadar" (salt gate), and the gate facing the Lyari River was called "Mithadar" (sweet gate). The modern neighbourhoods around the location of the gates are called Mithadar and Kharadar. Surrounded by mangrove swamps to the east, the sea to the southwest, and the Lyari River to the north, the town was well defended and engaged in a profitable trade with Muscat and Bahrain.

There is a legend of a prosperous coastal town called Kharak in the estuary of the Hub River (west of modern Karachi) in the late 17th and early eighteenth century.

Gwadar Port, situated at Gwadar in Balochistan, Pakistan The largest port in the Arabian Sea after the port of Karachi.

The Gwadar Port is a warm-water, deep-sea port situated at Gwadar in Balochistan, Pakistan at the apex of the Arabian Sea and at the entrance of the Persian Gulf, about 460 km west of Karachi and approximately 75 km (47 mi) east of Pakistan's border with Iran. The port is located on the eastern bay of a natural hammerhead-shaped peninsula jutting out into the Arabian Sea from the coastline. It is the largest port in the Arabian Sea after the port of Karachi.

See also

• Tropical cyclones in the Arabian sea
• Periplus of the Erythraean Sea
• Erythraean Sea
• Piracy in Somalia

References

 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. 

External links

• Arabian Sea (World Wildlife Fund)