In his article, The Invisible Saraswattie, Persaud provides details of trade between Europe and India dating from as early as 2000 BCE. Persaud developed the subject first introduced by AL Balsham in his monumental work, The Wonder that was India (1979).This contact between the two places influenced economic, political, social, cultural and literary life in both societies. Europe's most dramatic contact with India was the Greek invasion, starting with the conquest of Alexander the Great in 326 BCE.The romance of India attracted Europeans to the fabled land for thousands of years. In 1492, it drove Christopher Columbus to set sail across the Atlantic to find a sea-route to the land of gold, silk, spices and stories.