Download The Search for Spices

The Search for Spices
Today, we take pepper for granted. To Europeans of past ages, though, this spice was as
valuable as gold. Ancient Romans paid as much as $125 for 12 ounces of pepper. During the
Middle Ages, the pepper in your local supermarket could have paid a year’s rent. The price was
measured in more than just money. As pepper traveled from Asia to Europe, each cargo cost an
estimated 1,000 lives.
By the late 1400s, the desire to share in the rich spice trade of the East spurred Europeans
to explore the oceans. In the hope of enormous reward, sailors risked death on long sea voyages
in tiny wooden ships,
Europeans take to the seas
Europeans had traded with Asia long before the Renaissance. During the Middle Ages,
the Crusades introduce Europeans to many luxury goods from Asia. Later, when the Mongol
empire united much of Asia in the 1200s and 1300s, Asian goods flowed to Europe along
complex overland trade routes. Marco Polo’s tales of Chinese wealth and splendor fascinated
Europeans.
The Black Death and the break up of the Mongol empire disrupted Asian trade routes.
By the 1400s, though, Europe was recovering from the plague. As its population increased, so,
too, did the demand for Asian goods. The most valued trade items were spices, such as cloves,
cinnamon and especially pepper. In the days before refrigeration, meat spoiled quickly. People
used spices to preserve food and to add flavor to dried and salted meant. Spices were also used
to make medicines and perfumes. The major source of spices was the Moluccas, an island chain
in present-day Indonesia, which Europeans called the Spice Islands.
In the 1400s, Muslim and Italian merchants controlled most trade between Asia and
Europe. Muslim traders brought spices and other prized goods to eastern Mediterranean ports in
Egypt, Syria, and Turkey. From there, traders from Venice and other Italian cities carried the
precious cargoes to European markets. Each time goods passed from one trader to another, the
prices increased. Europeans wanted to cut out the Muslim and Italian middlemen and gain direct
access to the riches of Asia. To do so, the Atlantic powers – first Portugal, then Spain – sought a
new route to Asia that bypassed the Mediterranean.
Many sailors hoped to get rich by trading in spices or conquering rich lands. Yet the
desire for wealth was not the only motive that lured men to sea. Some voyagers were still fired
by the centuries-old desire to crusade against the Muslims. During the Catholic Reformation,
missionaries and soldiers set out overseas to win new converts to Christianity. The Renaissance
spirit of inquiry fired people’s desire to learn more about the lands beyond Europe.
Several improvements in technology helped Europeans conquer the vast oceans of the
world. Cartographers, or mapmakers, created more accurate maps and sea charts. European
sailors also learned to use the astrolabe, an instrument developed by the ancient Greeks and
perfected by the Arabs, to determine their latitude at sea.
Along with more reliable navigational tools, Europeans designed larger and better ships.
The Portuguese developed the carvel, which combined the square sails of European ships with
Arab lateen, or triangular, sails. Caravels also adapted the sternpost rudder and numerous masts
of Chinese ships. The new rigging made it easier to sail across or even into the wind. Finally,
European ships added more armaments, including sturdier cannons.
Portuguese Pioneers
Portugal, a small nation on the western edge of Spain, led the way in exploration. As in
Spain, Christian knights in Portugal had fought off Muslim rule. By the 1400s, Portugal was
strong and stable enough to expand into Muslim North Africa. In 1415, the Portuguese seized
Ceuta on the North African coast. The victory sparked the imagination of Prince Henry, known
to history as Henry the Navigator.
Prince Henry embodied the crusading drive and the new spirit of exploration. He had
heard tales of a mysterious but very rich Christian African ruler, Prester John. Henry hoped to
form an alliance with Prester John against the Muslims. He also wanted to find the source of
African gold.
At Sagres in southern Portugal, Henry gathered scientists, cartographers, and other
experts. They redesigned ships, prepared maps, and trained captains and crews for long voyages.
Henry then sent out ships that slowly worked their way south to explore the coast of West Africa.
Henry died in 1460, but the Portuguese continued their quest. IN 1488, Bartholomeu
Dias rounded the southern tip of Africa after being blown off course by a violent storm. Despite
the turbulent seas, the tip became known as the Cape of Good Hope because it opened the way
for a sea route to Asia.
In 1497, Vasco da Gama led four ships around the Cape of Good Hope. As he sailed up
the coast of East Africa, he took on an Indian pilot who guided him across the Indian Ocean.
After a 10 month voyage, Da Gama finally reached the great spice port of Calicut on the west
coast of India.
The long voyage home took a heavy toll. The Portuguese lost half their ships. Many
sailors died of hunger, thirst, and scurvy, a disease caused by the lack of vitamin C during
months at sea. An officer wrote;
“All our people suffered from their gums, which grew over their teeth so that they could
not eat. Their legs swelled, and other parts of the body, and these swellings spread until the
sufferer died.”
Still, the venture proved highly profitable to the survivors. In India, Da Gama had
acquired a cargo of spices that he sold at a profit of 3,000 percent.
Da Gama quickly outfitted a new fleet. In 150, he forced a treaty of friendship on the
Hindu ruler of Calicut. Da Gama then left Portuguese merchants there to buy spices when prices
were low and to keep them stored near the dock until the next fleet could return to pick them up.
The Portuguese would soon seize key outposts around the Indian Ocean to create a vast trading
empire.
Spain Enters the Race
The profitable Portuguese voyages spurred other European nations to seek a sea route to
Asia. In the 1480s, an Italian navigator from the port of Genoa, Christopher Columbus, sought
Portuguese backing for his own plan. He wanted to reach the Indies by sailing west across the
Atlantic. Like most educated Europeans, Columbus knew that the Earth was a sphere. A few
weeks sailing west, he reasoned, would bring a ship to eastern Asia.
Although his plan made sense, Columbus made two errors. First, he greatly
underestimated the circumference of the Earth. Second, he had no idea that two continents,
North and South America, lay in his path.
In 1492, Columbus finally convinced Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain to finance his
“enterprise of the Indies.” Like the Portuguese, the Spanish hoped to bypass the Muslim-Italian
monopoly on the spice trade. Queen Isabella was also anxious to spread Christianity among the
people of Asia.
On August 3, 1492, Columbus sailed west with three small ships, the Pinta, the Nina and
the Santa Maria. He carried a letter to the ruler of China and took along an interpreter who spoke
Arabic. The crew grew anxious as provisions ran low and no land came into sight. Finally, on
October 12, a lookout yelled, “Land! Land!” The tiny fleet dropped anchor in the Caribbean
Sea, off what were probably the Bahamas.
Columbus spent several months cruising the islands of the Caribbean, searching for
China and Japan. Since he thought he had reached the Indies, he called the people of the region
Indians. In 1493, he returned to Spain to a hero’s welcome. In three later voyages, Columbus
remained convinced he had reached islands off the coast of East Asia. Before long, though,
other Europeans realized that he had found a route to a continent previously unknown to them.
Spain and Portugal pressed rival claims to the island Columbus explored. In 1493, Pope
Alexander VI stepped in to keep the peace. He set a Line of Demarcation that divided the nonEuropean world into two zones. Spain had the right to trade and explore lands west of the line.
Portugal had the same rights east of the line. The next year, in the Treaty of Tordesillas, the two
countries moved the line.