Kollam Migration 825 CE

There were serious political upheavals in the 8^th-9^th centuries in the Arabian Sea rim, when the Muslim Arab merchants became powerful and sought to bring under their monopoly, the trade in Malabar spices.  The JSOC record two instances of wars between the Muslim Arabs (referred to in Malayalam as the Jonakars, a corruption of the term Yavanas or Greeks), one in Kodungalloor and the other in Kollam.  The wars were primarily between the Jonakars and the Jewish merchants, but because the Nasṟāni-Mappilas supported the Jews, their city of Kodungalloor, as well as the rich and powerful city of Kollam, one of the leading cities in the spice-trade, were set on fire, and the people fled.   Whether it was in order to succour the Christians at this time of trouble or coincidental, it is not clearly stated, that at this time, in the year 825, a rich and illustrious merchant named Maruvan Sabrisho, along with two Metropolitans  called Mar Sabor and Mar Aphroth arrived in Kollam, bringing with them a second large cohort of Christian settlers from Mesopotamia.  (This merchant in some texts is referred to as Iyyob, which is Syriac for Job).  According to the JSOC’s narratives, this merchant also, like Knai Thoma, proffered rich gifts to the reigning king of Kollam, and in return secured from him lands to build a church and for his people to settle in, as well as innumerable social and mercantile rights and privileges.  As in the case of the Charter given to Knai Thoma, these rights and privileges were also granted to them, inscribed on copper-plates.  The Kollam copper-plates are till extant, and are the objects of historical curiosity, and scholarly investigations of palaeographers and social and mercantile historians.  

The JSOC history is rather deficient in recording any significant events for the next 700 years, except for recording the names of 11 metropolitans who arrived from Antioch.  The tradition of the metropolitans or the Archdeacons keeping historical accounts also appear to have terminated when persecution of the St. Thomas Christians or the Nasrani Mappilas began in earnest by the middle of the 16^th century.