Place Map 5.1 alongside this map of the Indian Ocean world, add Map 2.1 on British shipping, and you will get a sense of the bewildering complexity and diversity of this part of the planet. What is not represented here is the traffic of dhows moving along monsoonal systems in the western Indian Ocean, ships moving across the Bay of Bengal, and the movement of prahus from the Moluccas to China and beyond. Today, as in the past, these are among the most densely traveled waterscapes anywhere.