Secrets of history

The great thing about archaeology is that there’s always the chance that an unexpected find will revolutionise our settled view of history. Heinrich Schliemann’s discovery of Troy in the 1870s, for example, which converted into hard reality what was earlier considered myth and literature. Or, closer home, the discovery of the Harappan civilisation in 1921-22 by John Marshall, which created a past for India totally de novo.

David Gibbins, an underwater archaeologist and expert on ancient shipwrecks and sunken cities, in this book, invents a handful of such epoch-shaking discoveries. It all starts in Rome, of course. The rich but incompetent general Crassus loses his legions (and his life) to the Parthians. Roman soldiers are taken as slaves to Central Asia. Decades later a few hardy survivors head off eastwards to China, in search of a treasure that promises immortality. One legionary breaks off south towards India, hoping to find a way back to Rome. He’s carrying an important secret.

In the present day, Jack Howard — the amply funded and improbably lucky archaeologist-hero — traces a chain of finds back to this long-lost legionary. Among the most audacious is of the author of the Periplus of the Erythrean Sea, an ancient handbook describing the sea route between Egypt and India. We see Egypt, Kyrgyzstan, Afghanistan, China, even India — the Roman port of Arikamedu in Tamil Nadu and a Maoist-infested jungle along the Godavari.

The characters are flat, the exposition tiresome, and the bestselling Gibbins has a tin ear for dialogue. But his story is thrillingly plotted, and the action passages make up for the worst of the rest.

THE TIGER WARRIOR
Author: David Gibbins
Publisher: Headline
Pages: xii + 432
Price: Rs 295