Silk Roads

[Heartablaze]

I was learning about this last year in school, and am still fascinated by World History in general, but at the moment, I was thinking about the impact that the roads between Europe, the Middle East, India, and China had on the general future of our planet.

In your opinion, did the silk roads help or hurt society more in the long run? I'll put up my thoughts later.

[Storico]

good topic.

I think it both helped and hurt. Any massive historical movement (including the movements along the silk road) will never be one or the other. While trade, commerce, exploration, spices, silk and religion (to name a few) were enhanced and emphasized and brought to the forefront of their respective societies, we can also see that this sort of exploratory free enterprise caused a good deal of mostly political and religious tension (to put it lightly.)

More later maybe, but it's 1 am and I'm set for bed.

Nice to meet ya, Heartablaze!

[shunyadragon]

I was learning about this last year in school, and am still fascinated by World History in general, but at the moment, I was thinking about the impact that the roads between Europe, the Middle East, India, and China had on the general future of our planet.

In your opinion, did the silk roads help or hurt society more in the long run? I'll put up my thoughts later.

I believe that trade was one of the primary motives for writen language. Some of the earliest small cuniform tablets and chinese small tablets appear to be trade tokens.

In my research on China and the Road, the earliest trade route was the Jade Road, which is the predicesor of the Jade-Silk Road (my name). Jade trade from the region called Xinjiang Province in western China is the primary source for the best nephrite in the world. Pieces of this distinctive nephrite jade has been found in Persia, at a mid-point of the trade route in China and eastern China between 2000 BC and 1500 BC, which established it as a trade route at that time. Silk trade began less than 2000 years ago.

The China Jade Road is the longest, but not the only jade trade route in the world. The earliest and longest known trade routes in the world are actually associated with different kinds of jade. A neolithic trade route has been identified from the British Isles to the Danube Valley by jade found in the Swiss and Austrian Alps. Guatamalan jadeite jade has been found in ancient American cultures from Mexico to South America. A coarse grained massive tremolite called Greenstone similar to nephrite was an important stone for Neolithic cultures throughout Eastern coastal Canada and New England.

Why was jade so important. Jade, particularly nephrite jade is probably the toughest (not hardest) stone in the world, and it was the first steel of tools and weapons, but because of its relative rarity, and beauty it became more valued for its cultural use in most Neolithic cultures that had access to it.

In my opinion these trade routes were part of the early cultural and technology development of civilization including the stimulus to develop language and writing.

[Heartablaze]

I think that, for a short period in history, the silk roads made for a very global economy: the europeans and chinese trading silk, porcelain, spices, and other goods, and the middle east making a buffer that made the price go up. In fact, it was the "middleman problem" that helped make the desire to find a route to India and China by ocean.
It also made for a natural exchange of ideas and religions: Buddhism, Christianity, and Islam. Trading posts were great places to do this.
The major events that started to make a deterioration of the use of the trading routes was this:fear of disease. The plague made its path of death all the way from China back to Italy. Many countless people died who had anything to do wiht trading posts or ports. The massive death encouraged isolationism, which is what the seperate societies mostly went back to after that.

[shunyadragon]

I think that, for a short period in history, the silk roads made for a very global economy: the europeans and chinese trading silk, porcelain, spices, and other goods, and the middle east making a buffer that made the price go up. In fact, it was the "middleman problem" that helped make the desire to find a route to India and China by ocean.
It also made for a natural exchange of ideas and religions: Buddhism, Christianity, and Islam. Trading posts were great places to do this.
The major events that started to make a deterioration of the use of the trading routes was this:fear of disease. The plague made its path of death all the way from China back to Italy. Many countless people died who had anything to do wiht trading posts or ports. The massive death encouraged isolationism, which is what the seperate societies mostly went back to after that.

The trade routes did wax and wane over time and the plagues did discourage trade at times along these routes, but trade was important to the basic foundation of all the most successful civilization, isolation contributed to the failure of some. One of the weaknesses of the Native American cicilizations was the historical isolation from early Oriental and Western civilization. When the west colonized the Americas it was a onesided relationship that ended in their demise, because of the great difference in technology and diseases that the Native Americans were isolated from, because of the lack of trade routes.

It is important to remember that the technology exchange, spiritual and philisophical knowledge, and shared disease transmission among western an Oriental civilizations was benificial in the long run despite the problems.

[NeilUnreal]

One of the weaknesses of the Native American cicilizations was the historical isolation from early Oriental and Western civilization. When the west colonized the Americas it was a onesided relationship that ended in their demise, because of the great difference in technology and diseases that the Native Americans were isolated from, because of the lack of trade routes.

Drat! You beat me to it! I second the point.

-Neil