Consequences of Exchange: Diffusion of Foods and Technologies

A savory Greek pastry called Spanakopita made with spinach, a crop that spread thanks to the exchange You have already learned many positive consequences of commercial connections during this period. In this lesson, we will focus on food and technology.

Along with the information from this page, download The Consequences of Trade (1200-1450) presentation handout. It covers the contents of this lesson in great detail.

The Diffusion of Foods and Technologies

Islam followed merchants across the Sahara, enabling populations with deep tribal loyalties to form empires around a single faith. Chinese forms of Buddhism spread into almost every area of East and Southeast Asia, where converts adapted it to their specific needs and circumstances. Mahayana Buddhism would make commercial connections across Asia smoother, as monasteries became centers of trade, learning, and religious practice. Diasporic communities created “stepping stones” for merchants from a particular region to link with others sharing their culture and ethnicity.

Important merchant cities grew because of connectivity. Timbuktu in West Africa became a hub for Trans-Saharan trade as well as a center for Islamic scholarship. Cities along the Silk Road, like Kashgar and Samarkand, depended on trade for their livelihood, and would decline when that trade no longer flourished. In the Indian Ocean, Malacca got rich from the trade in spices, and Kilwa leveraged its geographic location to its economic advantage.

New Crops

Spinach and citrus spread across trade routes in this period. The cultivation of citrus fruits required the establishment of new orchards and the development of specific agricultural techniques, including advanced irrigation. This reshaped the environment in places like Spain and Sicily.

Both crops had effects on maritime trade as well. They added important nutrients, such as vitamin C, to the diets of sailors, which prevented scurvy, a disease that brought weakness and fatigue, slowing down trade. As the benefits of citrus became realized, these trees were planted at important ports and stopping points to keep sailors from developing this disease.

Technologies

Connectivity transformed civilizations as advancements such as paper and gunpowder made their way from China across networks of exchange. As you learned previously, the Song Dynasty of China was conquered by the Mongols in 1279. In 1368, a peasant-led rebellion in China overthrew Mongol rule with the help of gunpowder, a technology the Mongols ironically helped spread out of China across the Central Asia trade routes. The full effects of this new technology were realized in the next time period we will study, 1450-1750, as new empires expanded vastly across Eurasia and into the Americas.

The transfer of papermaking technology had a tremendous effect on civilizations in this period. The House of Wisdom in Baghdad flourished under the Abbasids because of paper. Paper allowed knowledge to be preserved, compared, analyzed, and discussed more than any other invention before modern times. Mathematical, medical, and scientific knowledge was written on paper and moved from city to city, filling libraries and allowing for more standardized education. When papermaking technology finally made it to Europe, it had tremendous cultural effects, as we will see later.

Connectivity and Travelers

Technology and connections allowed people to travel across regions more frequently than ever before. Several travelers wrote memoirs of their experiences and encounters and provided us with valuable insights into the civilizations and the connections between them in the period 1200 to 1450. Select each tab to learn more about the most prominent of these travelers.

Margery Kempe
Ibn Battuta
Marco Polo

Margery Kempe was a deeply devout Christian mystic living in England during the 15th century. She traveled to Spain, Rome, Norway, and Jerusalem, recording her experiences in an autobiography. Her ability to undertake these voyages and pilgrimages testifies to the connectedness of Europe and the Middle East in the period 1200 to 1450.

A painting of Margery Kempe writing a letter

Battuta was the most traveled person we know in this period, racking up about 73,000 miles across Spain, North Africa, the Indian Ocean, the Arabian Peninsula, and Asia. His travel logs and observations provided us with deep insights into daily life, cultural practices, and the connectedness of Afro-Eurasia between 1200 and 1450.

An illustration of Ibn Battuta

Born in Venice in 1254, Polo was a merchant who traveled across Eurasia, meeting the Mongol leader of China, Kublai Khan, and reporting back to Europeans about the culture of Central Asia and China, something they thought mysterious and exotic. He went on to travel to South and Southeast Asia, creating written memoirs that would fascinate Europeans for centuries.

A portrait of Marco Polo holding books and scrolls

Final Reflection: Networks of Exchange

This lesson draws on things you have learned in previous lessons and elaborates on the consequences of exchange in more detail. You should be able to compare the consequences of trade in several categories of historical content, such as political, environmental, social, economic, and cultural effects.

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