Trade and Exchange Networks

Trade Networks

Silver Trade Route

  • Luxury goods traded, especially silk.
  • Cities like Kashgar and Samarkand grew due to trade facilitation.
  • Innovations:
    • Caravan Sarai: Inns for merchants.
    • Improved saddles and stirrups.
    • Money economies (paper money).
    • Originated in China to facilitate trade
    • New forms of credit and banking houses.

Indian Ocean Network

  • Most significant sea-based trade network until 1500.
  • Causes for Growth:
    • Demand for goods like Chinese porcelain, Indian cotton, and spices.
    • Technological innovations: lateen sails, magnetic compass, astrolabe, new ship designs.
    • Spread of Islam: facilitated connections among Muslim traders.
  • Growth of cities like Swahili city-states and the Sultanate of Malacca due to strategic trade positions.
  • Effects:
    • Establishment of diasporic communities (e.g., Arab and Persian communities in East Africa, Chinese communities in Southeast Asia).
    • Cultural and technological transfers.
    • Voyages of Zheng He: increased Chinese power in the Indian Ocean.

Trans-Saharan Trade

  • Connected North Africa and the Mediterranean with West Africa.
  • Growth Factors:
    • Introduction of the Arabian camel and saddles.
  • Empires:
    • Mali: Islam connected Mali to Muslim merchants across Afro-Eurasia.
    • Mansa Musa: monopolized trade, increasing Mali's wealth and trade network growth.

Cultural Diffusion

  • Religion:
    • Buddhism spread to China and Japan (Chan and Zen Buddhism).
    • Hinduism and Buddhism entered Southeast Asia.
    • Islam spread throughout Sub-Saharan Africa and Asia.
  • Scientific and technological innovations: Champa rice.
  • Rise and Fall of Cities:
    • Samarkand and Kashgar rose as centers of Islamic scholarship.
    • Baghdad declined after being sacked by the Mongols.
  • Travelers: Ibn Battuta's travels facilitated by trade routes.

Environmental Consequences

  • Spread of crops:
    • Bananas in Africa led to the rise of chiefdoms and kingdoms.
    • Champa rice in East Asia.
  • Spread of diseases like the bubonic plague.

The Mongols

  • Facilitated interconnection across Afro-Eurasia.
  • Facilitated trade by controlling the Silk Road network.
  • Increased communication and cooperation across Eurasia.
  • Technological and cultural transfers: Advances in astronomy and astronomical tools.