Hey Guys,
So this past week, I read chapter 15 in our text book and as my title states, it was all about Global Commerce. In terms of European and Asian commerce, the immediate motivation for the massive effort for trading was the desire for tropical spices, and the source of most of these goods was mostly in Muslim lands.
Europeans were required to pay cash for Asian spices or textiles which is not unusual.
The Portuguese went ahead and created a "Trading Post Empire" which we discussed during class on Wednesday, which aimed to control commerce, not large territories. Spain happened to be the first to challenge Portugal's position.
I found it interesting but not unusual that the Dutch and English became heavily involved in trade within Asia and European political control was limited to the Philippines and some of the Spice islands. The silver trade that soon emerged gave birth to a global network of exchange. Africa and Asia were seen as middlemen basically and they took the American silver to Asia and competed with one another for a position in the market of Asia.
The Fur trade became a huge deal in global commerce during the early modern era. The fur trade was a highly competitive enterprise and increased demand for beaver furs. There was a huge population decline due to trading, and this essentially led to "mourning wars".
I learned that eventually many Native Americans grew dependent on European trade goods, which was no surprise to me at all. Something I did find interesting, probably only because it is such a huge part of our society today, is that alcohol was an extremely destructive import.
It was surprising to me also that Russian authorities imposed a tax or tribute on every Siberian male ages 18-50.
The Atlantic Slave trade came up in this chapter and again, as no surprise, it introduced elements of African culture.
Chapter 15 was very intriguing because I really learned about the trading routes and posts that were set up and how some of them can still affect us today.
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