This book introduces the maritime activities of India, which date back to the Harappan period, highlighting that India is one of the world's oldest seafaring nations. It summarises archaeological findings, inscriptions, epigraphy, and various written sources that have significantly contributed to reconstructing the sea-oriented history of the Indian subcontinent. This history includes understanding contacts with the Persian Gulf, the Red Sea coast, and Southeast Asian countries from the early historical period onward. Geographers and travellers, including the anonymous author of the ‘ Periplus of the Erythraean Sea ,’ Ptolemy, Megasthenes, Hiuen Tsang, Al-Masudi, Marco Polo, and many others, have documented India’s maritime connections with overseas countries across the centuries. In the last three decades, scholars from various universities and research organisations have conducted extensive exploration and excavations along India's west and east coasts, uncovering several ports and trade centres. Some of these can be matched with sites mentioned by ancient geographers and travellers, while others have been newly discovered through archaeological research. Along with the second volume, this book presents the most recent research findings from over fifty experts in the maritime archaeology of India. It serves as a valuable reference for scholars studying the Indian Ocean trade and South Asia from a long-term perspective. This book introduces the maritime activities of India, which date back to the Harappan period, highlighting that India is one of the world's oldest seafaring nations. It summarises archaeological findings, inscriptions, epigraphy, and various written sources that have significantly contributed to reconstructing the sea-oriented history of the Indian subcontinent. This history includes understanding contacts with the Persian Gulf, the Red Sea coast, and Southeast Asian countries from the early historical period onward. Geographers and travellers, including the anonymous author of the ‘ Periplus of the Erythraean Sea ,’ Ptolemy, Megasthenes, Hiuen Tsang, Al-Masudi, Marco Polo, and many others, have documented India’s maritime connections with overseas countries across the centuries. In the last three decades, scholars from various universities and research organisations have conducted extensive exploration and excavations along India's west and east coasts, uncovering several ports and trade centres. Some of these can be matched with sites mentioned by ancient geographers and travellers, while others have been newly discovered through archaeological research. Along with the second volume, this book presents the most recent research findings from over fifty experts in the maritime archaeology of India. It serves as a valuable reference for scholars studying the Indian Ocean trade and South Asia from a long-term perspective. Dr Sila Tripati was engaged in the maritime archaeological research of India at the CSIR-National Institute of Oceanography (NIO), Goa, from 1988 to 2022. He is currently the General Manager (Museum and Exhibition) of the National Maritime Heritage Complex (NMHC) Lothal, a project of the Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways (MoPSW) Government of India. Throughout his career, he has participated in the exploration and excavations of submerged settlements, ports and shipwrecks carried out by the CSIR-National Institute of Oceanography along the east and west coasts of India. He has dived to depths of 30 m in Indian waters and 45 m in the Mediterranean Sea and the North Atlantic Ocean, and in a manned submersible. He served as the Co-Guest Editor of the Special Section on “Shipwrecks” in Current Science, 2019, Vol. 117 (10). He has published more than 150 research papers as a single author and as a co-author in peer-reviewed international and national journals. He is also an Advisory Committee Member of the Centre for the Indian Ocean Studies at Tamil University, Thanjavur. Dr Sophie Hueglin is an archaeologist and holds Visiting Fellowships at the Universities of Tuebingen (Germany), Basel (Switzerland) and Newcastle (UK). She is a Member of the Chartered Institute for Archaeologists, UK, and specialises in medieval and early modern ceramics as well as medieval building technologies. Among other topics, she teaches the Archaeology of the Global Middle Ages with a focus on the maritime trade in the Indian Ocean. She is an author and co-author of more than 150 scientific publications. In 2021, she published the edited volume “Petrification Processes in Matter and Society” with Springer and authored the paper “From Basel Mission to Mangalore Tiles” in 2023 with Dr Sila Tripati and architect Dr Priya Joseph. 2014-2020, she has been Vice-President of the European Association of Archaeologists. From the 2024 Rome meeting onwards, she has organised sessions on Europe – South Asia relations together with Dr Sila Tripati and other renowned experts on maritime and South Asian arc