One of the most important technological exchanges of the spice trade network was the early introduction of maritime technologies to India, the Middle East, East Africa, and China by the Austronesian peoples. In Alexandria spices were bought by the Venetians and the Genoese and then shipped to Europe. Terms of Use At times, Jews enjoyed a virtual monopoly on the spice trade in large parts of Western Europe. California Do Not Sell My Info Venice’s lucrative pilgrim and spice trade supported a host of other ancillary industries. Spices such as cinnamon, cassia, cardamom, ginger, pepper, and turmeric were known and used in antiquity and traded in the Eastern World. Rather, they were whisked across the sea in armed fleets carrying up to 300 metric tons of spice, defended by a contingent of marines, and sped on their way by banks of rowers, swift enough to outrun any pursuer. Venetian merchants sold their goods throughout Europe. What one can see there are small fancied delicatessen shops selling olive oils etc. The reason being that it gained large scale profit of the adjacent middle European markets. This trade, which drove the world economy from the end of the Middle Ages well into the Renaissance,[4] ushered in an age of European domination in the East. New paths and trade routes to India were heavily sought to avoid paying these high prices. As Constantinople was important in trade, being in a central location between Europe, Asia and Africa, its fall under the Ottoman rule greatly disrupted Venetian commerce as both northern and southern silk roads were cut off. They were small, readily transferable, durable—and immensely desirable. Commerce: Spices and Silk. Each course comes from a different city along the Silk Road, the 7,000 mile long trade route which spanned the globe from Indonesia to Italy. No spices were allowed in the cogs, round ships, or carracks that were the workhorses of maritime trade. In the 3rd millennium BC, they traded with the Land of Punt, which is believed to have been situated in an area encompassing northern Somalia, Djibouti, Eritrea and the Red Sea coast of Sudan. He decided to orchestrate a risky trade that could help him pay off his loans and restore his wealth, a trade for one of the most valuable commodities of the day: pepper. We’ll make stops in Quanzhu, Calcutta, Baghdad and finally Venice, diving into the history of each city and its role in the spice trade. The silk and spice trade, involving spices, incense, herbs, drugs and opium, made these Mediterranean city-states phenomenally rich. Some were resold directly to merchants arriving from the north. VENICE was a city built on trade, goods flooded in and out of the city, bringing tremendous wealth to the merchants of Venice. In Mairano’s era, Venetian traders in London sold a pound of pepper … The story of an import so prized, royals were literally rolling in it. [19] Sulaima al-Mahr writes: "East of Timor [where sandalwood is found] are the islands of Bandam and they are the islands where nutmeg and mace are found. - Although Venice’s traditional route to the East by the Mediterranean was shorter, it was time-consuming. The demand for spices was insatiable. The first to mention the trade in historical periods are the Egyptians. Indeed, a trade treaty between Venice and the Mongol Empire was established in 1221, illustrating their ambitions to extend their trading capacities across Central Asia. Pepper grows on a vine that produces strings of berries that are initially green and [1] Until the mid-15th century, trade with the East was achieved through the Silk Road, with the Byzantine Empire and the Italian city-states of Venice and Genoa acting as middlemen. 7. Within specific regions, the Kingdom of Axum (5th century BC–AD 11th century) had pioneered the Red Sea route before the 1st century AD. Venice lost monopoly in spice trade and suffered losses in their economy. Venice was the European end of the Silk Road trade route which moved goods all the way from China, and consequently was a cosmopolitan city, a true melting pot. 18th Annual Photo Contest Winners and Finalists Announced! Portugal - Portugal - Control of the sea trade: In 1505 Francisco de Almeida arrived as viceroy of India and supported the ruler of Cochin against the zamorin (Hindu ruler) of Calicut. Venice became extremely prosperous by charging huge tariffs, and without direct access to Middle Eastern sources, the European people could do little else but pay the exorbitant prices they were charged. Spices were among the most expensive and in-demand products of the Middle Ages, used in medicine as well as in the kitchen. Venice dominated the trade in luxury goods in the Mediterranean and Henry viewed the Venetians as a rival – hence his move to develop stranger ties with Florence. Its colonies across the Mediterranean secured a second flow of income for the Doge and his naval fleet. Around the year 1100, one Duke William of Aquitaine boasted of a week-long ménage à trois, claiming his exertions (188, no less) were fueled by a hearty dose of the spice. The most eminent medical authorities of the time insisted that pepper could revive flagging libidos. They controlled the monopoly for the next century. This was a major theme of Frederic C. Lane (e.g. Although the origins of spices were known throughout Europe by the Middle Ages, no ruler proved capable of breaking the Venetian hold on the trade routes. The Importance of the Dutch opium trade in the Seventeenth Century, "Austronesian Shipping in the Indian Ocean: From Outrigger Boats to Trading Ships", "Austronesians were first to sail the seas", "Fruits and arboriculture in the Indo-Pacific region", The Medieval Spice Trade and the Diffusion of the Chile, "The Third Voyage of Sindbad the Seaman – The Arabian Nights – The Thousand and One Nights – Sir Richard Burton translator", "International School History - MYP History", "The spice trade and its importance for European expansion", "If Only Plants Could talk...: Reconstructing Pre-Modern Biological Translocations in the Indian Ocean", "Independent Origins of Cultivated Coconut (Cocos nucifera L.) in the Old World Tropics", "Ancient crops provide first archaeological signature of the westward Austronesian expansion", "The origin and diffusion of betel chewing: a synthesis of evidence from South Asia, Southeast Asia and beyond", "Opium Throughout History | The Opium Kings | FRONTLINE | PBS", Spices in maps. Banking, accounting, and mathematics flourished in this trading environment. Encouraged Europe to Invest in its maritime capability. Lane 1933, 1940), and it was taken up later by Fernand Braudel (1972), Niels Steensgaard (1973) and others. The Spice Trade. In the mid 15th century Europe was flush with trade networks especially for the lucrative spice and silk trades. The spice trade involved historical civilizations in Asia, Northeast Africa and Europe. No trace of these legendary grand warehouses of spices. However, it was also known for the trading of gold, silver and spices… [45] Epics, languages, and cultural customs were borrowed by Southeast Asia from India, and later China. [1], In the second half of the first millennium BC the Arab tribes of South and West Arabia took control over the land trade of spices from South Arabia to the Mediterranean Sea. On the 29th of May 1453, the capital city of the Byzantine Empire was taken over by the Ottoman Empire, known as the Fall of Constantinople. Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Spice Trade and its importance for European Expansion, Doz. By virtue of its access to the Red Sea trade routes leading to Arabia and beyond, Alexandria was the chief entrepôt between East and West, the point where fine luxuries such as silks, perfumes, gems, and, above all, spices arrived from the most remote parts of Asia. Venice was built for ocean trade, the city is made up of hundreds of islands surrounded by water, with canals dividing the islands. Today, the city is known as Istanbul. [18] Arab traders — mainly descendants of sailors from Yemen and Oman — dominated maritime routes throughout the Indian Ocean, tapping source regions in the Far East and linking to the secret "spice islands" (Maluku Islands and Banda Islands). For the Venetian merchant courageous or lucky enough, Alexandria was the gateway to riches. One of the major consequences of the spice trade was the discovery of the American continent by European explorers. In Mairano’s era, Venetian traders in London sold a pound of pepper for a sum equivalent to a week’s work for an unskilled laborer. From there, overland routes led to the Mediterranean coasts. Any moral peril was neatly transferred to the Armenians. [47], Indian merchants involved in spice trade took Indian cuisine to Southeast Asia, notably present day Malaysia and Indonesia, where spice mixtures and black pepper became popular. As they moved between the jungles of South and Southeast Asia, where they were harvested, to their final points of sale in Europe, the value of spices mounted exponentially. Henry had to encourage merchants to trade in the region, as the Venetians were so dominant. The Western Europeans,[which?] And its status as a trading market also caused Venice to become a major financial centre in Europe, including the development of futures, credit letters and early bank notes. But I found only this old stone sign, naming the place-- Said to be "Ruga dei Spezieri" (Spice street). The islands of Molucca also find mention in several records: a Javanese chronicle (1365) mentions the Moluccas and Maloko,[19] and navigational works of the 14th and 15th centuries contain the first unequivocal Arab reference to Moluccas. In Alexandria spices were bought by the Venetians and the Genoese and then shipped to Europe. The rise of Islam brought a significant change to the trade as Radhanite Jewish and Arab merchants, particularly from Egypt, eventually took over conveying goods via the Levant to Europe. Eventually, in the mid-13th century, Venice emerged as the primary trade port for spices bound for western and northern Europe. They were now able to buy spices directly from India and greatly reduced the large profits of the Venetian traders. Buy the Venice Issue of the Smithsonian Journeys Travel Quarerly, Venice Issue of the Smithsonian Journeys Travel Quarterly, Smithsonian Journeys Travel Quarterly: Venice, Star Wars X-Wing Starfighter Lands at the National Air and Space Museum. Middle Ages 476–1492 Commerce between Europe and the East was limited (robbers, poor roads, slow transport, undeveloped shipping). Rome briefly played a part during the 5th century. The loss of the spice trade would be like the loss of milk and nourishment to an infant, wrote Girolamo Priuli, a prominent spice trader in his journal in July 1501. Nearly 2,500 years ago, Arab traders told stories of the ferocious cinnamon bird, or cinnamologus. People used spices to flavour their food and make them taste better. They built the ‘Fondaco dei Tedeschi’ literally the German Warehouse. [20] The Abbasids used Alexandria, Damietta, Aden and Siraf as entry ports to trade with India and China. Food in 16th Century Venice Sabine d'Ricoldi da Forli Venice was an Italian city unlike any other when it came to cuisine. After Vasco Núñez de Balboa crossed the Isthmus of Panama in 1513, the Spanish Crown prepared a westward voyage by Ferdinand Magellan in order to reach Asia from Spain across the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. The spice trade refers to the trade in spices between historical civilizations in Asia, Northeast Africa and Europe. Pepper, along with other spices such as cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg, were hot commodities that drove European nations to sail across oceans searching for new routes to the spice-rich Orient. The commercial decline of Venice, with specific regard to spices, is traditionally associated with the agreement made between Vasco da Gama and the sultans of Cochin Cananor in Calicut (Kerala, India), which guaranteed the supply of the most precious varieties of spices to the Portuguese merchants, making Lisbon the new capital of this trade. The win contributed greatly to the prosperity of Venice as it made huge profits from the trade of spices they had with buyer-distributors from western and northern Europe. After capturing Egypt, Ottomans had control of the flow of trade though the Mediterranean and the Venetians were skilled at making boats, this made for a good trading relationship.