This book examines trades in animals and animal products in the history
of the Indian Ocean World (IOW). An international array of established
and emerging scholars investigate how the roles of equines, ungulates,
sub-ungulates, mollusks, and avians expand our understandings of
commerce, human societies, and world systems. Focusing primarily on the
period 1500-1900, they explore how animals and their products shaped the
relationships between populations in the IOW and Europeans arriving by
maritime routes. By elucidating this fundamental yet under-explored
aspect of encounters and exchanges in the IOW, these interdisciplinary
essays further our understanding of the region, the environment, and the
material, political and economic history of the world.