Unit 2 · Networks of Exchange, c. 1200–1450

Silk Roads ● (core concept) — The overland trade routes linking China with Central Asia, the Middle East, and Europe. After 1200, improved commercial practices increased the volume of trade and expanded the geographical range of these routes.

Trading cities ● (core concept) — Cities that grew wealthy and powerful as hubs of long-distance commerce, promoted by the increased volume of trade and the expanded geographical range of trade routes after 1200.

Improved commercial practices ● (core concept) — New ways of doing business — including forms of credit, banking, and money economies — that increased the volume of trade and expanded the geographical range of existing trade routes.

Luxury goods ● (core concept) — High-value, low-bulk products (such as silk, spices, textiles, and porcelain) traded across long distances. Rising demand for them in Afro-Eurasia drove the growth of interregional trade.

Caravanserai ● (core concept) — Roadside inns along trade routes where merchants, their animals, and their goods could rest safely. A key transportation innovation that supported the growth of Silk Road trade.

Forms of credit ● (core concept) — Financial instruments, such as bills of exchange, that let merchants transfer funds without carrying coins, encouraging long-distance interregional trade.

Money economies ● (core concept) — Economies in which standardized currency (including paper money) replaced barter and informal exchange. The development of money economies encouraged trade in luxury goods.

Textiles and porcelains ● (core concept) — The manufactured goods that Chinese, Persian, and Indian artisans and merchants expanded production of for export, driven by rising Afro-Eurasian demand for luxury goods.

Iron and steel ● (core concept) — Metals whose manufacture expanded in China during this period as productive capacity, trade networks, and innovations in manufacturing grew.

Paper money ○ — Currency printed on paper, issued by Song China, that made large commercial transactions easier. A famous example of the new forms of credit and money economies.

Bills of exchange ○ — Written orders allowing merchants to pay or receive money in distant cities without carrying specie. A new form of credit that made long-distance trade safer and easier.

Samarkand ○ — A great Silk Road trading city in Central Asia (in present-day Uzbekistan) where goods, merchants, and cultures from east and west met.

Mongol Empire ● (core concept) — The vast 13th- and 14th-century empire built by Chinggis (Genghis) Khan and his successors, stretching from China to Eastern Europe — the largest contiguous land empire in history. Its expansion drew new peoples into Afro-Eurasian trade and communication networks.

Mongol khanates ● (core concept) — The successor states into which the Mongol Empire divided — including the Yuan dynasty in China, the Ilkhanate in Persia, the Chagatai Khanate in Central Asia, and the Golden Horde in Russia. They are examples of new imperial states replacing collapsed empires.

Afro-Eurasian trade and communication ● (core concept) — The commercial and information networks spanning Africa, Europe, and Asia. The Mongols facilitated these as conquered peoples were drawn into Mongol economies and trade networks.

Technological and cultural transfers ● (core concept) — The movement of technologies, knowledge, and cultural practices between societies, encouraged by interregional contact and conflict — including contacts involving the Mongols.

Transfer of Greco-Islamic medical knowledge to western Europe ○ — The movement of Greek and Islamic medical learning into western Europe — an example of the technological and cultural transfers encouraged by Mongol-era interregional contacts.

Indian Ocean trading network ● (core concept) — The maritime trade system linking East Africa, the Middle East, South Asia, Southeast Asia, and China. After 1200, improved transportation technologies and commercial practices increased its volume and range, fostering the growth of states.

Compass ● (core concept) — The magnetic navigation instrument, adopted from China, that let sailors determine direction at sea. A key transportation innovation that expanded the volume and range of Indian Ocean trade.

Astrolabe ● (core concept) — A navigational instrument used to determine latitude from the stars. Along with the compass and larger ship designs, it was a significant innovation encouraging interregional trade.

Larger ship designs ● (core concept) — New, bigger vessels (such as Chinese junks and Arab dhows) that carried more cargo across the Indian Ocean, expanding the volume and geographical range of trade.

Diasporic communities ● (core concept) — Communities of merchants who settled in key places along important trade routes, introducing their own cultural traditions into indigenous cultures while indigenous cultures influenced merchant cultures in return.

Monsoon winds ● (core concept) — The seasonal reversing winds of the Indian Ocean. Advanced knowledge of them was an environmental factor on which the expansion of long-distance trade routes depended.

Swahili Coast city-states ○ — Trading city-states along the East African coast (such as Kilwa) that grew wealthy as intermediaries between the African interior and the Indian Ocean trade network.

Sultanate of Malacca ○ — A powerful 15th-century trading sultanate on the Malay Peninsula that controlled the strategic strait between the Indian Ocean and the South China Sea.

Zheng He ● (core concept) — The Ming admiral who led massive Chinese treasure fleets across the Indian Ocean in the early 1400s, an example of state-sponsored maritime activity that encouraged technological and cultural transfers.

Trans-Saharan trade network ● (core concept) — The overland trade routes crossing the Sahara Desert, linking West Africa with North Africa and the Mediterranean. Improved transportation technologies and commercial practices expanded its volume and range after 1200.

Mali Empire ● (core concept) — The powerful West African empire (13th–16th centuries, famed for Mansa Musa) whose expansion facilitated Afro-Eurasian trade and communication by drawing new peoples into its economies and trade networks.

Innovations in transportation technologies ● (core concept) — Improvements to existing transport methods — such as the camel saddle — that encouraged the growth of interregional trade, including across the Sahara.

Camel saddle ○ — The redesigned saddle that let camels carry heavier loads comfortably, making large-scale trans-Saharan caravan trade possible.

Diffusion of cultural traditions ● (core concept) — The spread of literary, artistic, and cultural traditions across societies through increased cross-cultural interaction — including the diffusion of Buddhism, Hinduism, and Islam into new regions.

Diffusion of scientific and technological innovations ● (core concept) — The movement of scientific knowledge and technologies (such as gunpowder and paper from China) between societies through intensifying exchange networks.

Urbanization ● (core concept) — The growth of cities. The fate of cities varied greatly in this period, with both significant decline and periods of increased urbanization buoyed by rising productivity and expanding trade networks.

Travel literature ● (core concept) — Accounts written by the increasing number of travelers within Afro-Eurasia (such as Ibn Battuta and Marco Polo) describing the societies they visited.

Gunpowder ○ — The explosive mixture invented in China whose technology diffused westward along exchange networks — a classic example of the spread of a scientific and technological innovation.

Paper ○ — The writing material invented in China whose production technology diffused across Afro-Eurasia along trade routes.

Ibn Battuta ○ — The 14th-century Moroccan Muslim scholar and traveler whose journeys across Africa, the Middle East, India, and beyond produced one of the great travel accounts of the era.

Marco Polo ○ — The 13th-century Venetian merchant whose travels to Mongol-ruled China, recorded in his travel account, spread knowledge of Asia in Europe.

Diffusion of crops ● (core concept) — The continued movement of cultivated plants (such as bananas into Africa and new rice varieties into East Asia) along trade routes — an environmental consequence of connectivity.

Epidemic diseases ● (core concept) — Contagious illnesses that spread along trade routes in this period. Their diffusion was a major environmental consequence of connectivity.

Bubonic plague ● (core concept) — The deadly bacterial disease (the Black Death) that spread along Afro-Eurasian trade routes in the 14th century, killing a huge share of the population.

Bananas in Africa ○ — An example of crop diffusion: bananas, originally from Southeast Asia, spread to Africa along Indian Ocean exchange networks.