Malacca and Batik

Sultan Mahmud (r. 1488–1528), the last and wealthiest ruler of the Melaka emporium, is credited in the 17th century Sejarah Melayu chronicle with sending Laksamana Hang Nadim on a mission to south India to acquire hundred and forty serasah cloth (batik) with forty varieties of floral motifs. Unable to find any that fulfilled the requirements explained to him, Hang Nadim made the batiks himself. On his return, unfortunately, his ship sank and he only managed to bring four pieces, earning the displeasure from the Sultan. 

The Portuguese scribe Tomé Pires, writing shortly after the Portuguese conquest of Melaka in 1511, estimated that cloth imports from Bengal, Coromandel (south India) and Gujarat (northwest coast India) conservatively totalled 460,000 cruzados per year, equivalent to about nineteen tons of silver.

I wonder what's the inflation-adjusted value today?

Reference: Armando Cortesão, The Suma Oriental of Tome Pires (London: Hakluyt Society, 1944), pp. 269–272

cottonandsago.com