The Portuguese had many involvements in South India, including their support of the Paravars in a trade battle over control of the pearl fisheries of Malabar, but in the Nair kingdoms their principal interest was to obtain control of the trade in pepper. In this they followed the Muslim Arabs, whom they eventually marginalised; and they were in turn followed by the Dutch in 1683. The British and French were also active in the region now known as Kerala, the former from 1615 and the latter from 1725. These various European powers combined with one or another of the Nair rulers, fighting for control. One notable alliance was that of the Portuguese with the Kingdom of Cochin, with whom they sided in order to work against the power of the Zamorins of Calicut. Although Calicut remained the most significant of the kingdoms until the 1730s, its power was eroded and the rulers of Cochin were freed from being vassals of the Zamorins.