Gasparo Balbi

A Venetian merchant and traveller, Gasparo Balbi was best known for his account of travels to India and the East from 1579-1588 which contains the first European description of India beyond the Ganges.

In pursuit of trade, Balbi went for the East Indies. He first set out for Syria, and then he proceeded to India and Burma where he stayed for nine years (1579-1588) returning back to Venice in 1589. In his report Balbi described different places and traditions that encountered during his travel. His work contains the first written reference to Dubai, described as a fishing village called “Dibei”, as one of the places where Venetians worked, diving for pearls. However, by its nature, his account is a commercial report of places and their contents including observations of the mechanics of trade, the various exchange rates and the way in which traders used the abacus for calculations, and their units of measurement.

His story, published in 1590 in Venice, was titled “Journey to the East Indies”.