From Torres Strait to Dampier Land the shelf spreads out, and connects Australia with New Guinea and the Malay Archipelago.
Ibn Batuta made the voyage through the Malay Archipelago to China, and on his return he proceeded from Malabar to Bagdad and Damascus, ultimately reaching Fez, the capital of his native country, in November 1349.
In Further India and the Malay Archipelago the Portuguese acquired predominating influence at sea, establishing factories on the Malabar coast, in the Persian Gulf, at Malacca, and in the Spice Islands, and extending their commercial enterprises from the Red sea to China.
The Arctic voyages of Barents were quickly followed by the establishment of p u a Dutch East India Company; and the Dutch, ousting the Portuguese, not only established factories on the mainland of India and in Japan, but acquired a preponderating influence throughout the Malay Archipelago.
In 1583 Jan Hugen van Linschoten made a voyage to India with a Portuguese fleet, and his full and graphic descriptions of India, Africa, China and the Malay Archipelago must have been of no small use to his countrymen in their distant voyages.
