Treasure recovered from the wreckage of a 9th century Arabian vessel is coming to light in a BBC story about a wreck found off the coast of Sumatra. The ship was en route from China, most likely bound for the city of Samara, now called Basra.
The goods include your typical 63,000 pieces of silver, gold, along with Tang dynasty ceramics. But the stories they tell are quite remarkable, suggesting China was mass-producing goods for export several centuries earlier than previously thought and "Sinbad the Sailor was real". The character in One Thousand and One Arabian Nights lived between 750 and 1250 AD, and hailed from Basra back in the day. – PJE
There is so much Chinese pottery in Oman – I guess it was on its way to Sohar
Love this kind of stuff. :-)