The Silk Road was the most crucial economic route in the world prior to the Age of Discovery.
Many goods were transferred via the Silk Road, but the silk itself was the primary commodity
and was in high regard throughout the Old World.
This is the story of one of the earliest examples of industrial espionage, the story of how
the Roman emperor Justinian stole the technology of silk production from China.
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Wild silk is produced by many types of caterpillar throughout temperate regions of Asia and Europe.
The Chinese industrialised this process by domesticating the mulberry silkworm sometime
around 4000 BC.
This new product was of a much higher quality and was easy to dye, so it soon became a luxury
fabric in China.
The emperors guarded the secret of its production in order to keep it a monopoly.
In the 2nd millennium BC silk started appearing in Central Asia and found its way to Iran,
India, Egypt, and Europe by the end of the 1st millennium BC, becoming a staple luxury
of ancient trade.
The Scythians and the Achaemenid dynasty were making a fortune as the middlemen, and the
latter used their famous Royal Road as a continuation of the Silk Road.
Alexander of Macedon was the first to connect the Greek world to the Silk Road directly
when he founded Alexandria Eschate, and his successors used it to their advantage.
The Romans established trade with India through Egypt in order to acquire silk, and their
economy flourished from the high customs duty, as Roman nobility were ready to pay exorbitant
prices.
However, that meant that gold was flowing out of the Roman empire and to China and Iran.
Eventually, the lack of gold became fatal for the Romans and led to the Crisis of the
Third Century and then the fall of the Western Empire.
The Germanic conquerors also liked silk, so the Eastern Roman empire turned into a middleman
re-selling silk bought from China via the Sassanid Empire.
The Silk Road was hardly protected at this point; China was going through a period of
disunity from 420 to 589 and the risky journey from China to Constantinople was taking more
than seven months, while the sea route was full of pirates and other dangers of seafaring.
At the same time, the Sassanids and the Romans were at war almost all the time, and that
was slowing down or stopping the silk trade completely.
Emperor Justinian I attempted to change this situation in order to procure silk.
Alternative routes via Lazica and Axum were tried.
The first was relatively successful, but its length was decreasing the profits, and as
this route was passing through the less civilized lands, many caravans may have been lost.
The sea route from Ethiopia to India was blocked by the Sassanid fleet.
Entire Roman merchant fleets were confiscated by the Sassanids.
That wasn’t good enough for the Roman emperor.
During that period Justinian restored control over North Africa, Italy, and Spain, which
was a political victory but strained the economy of the empire even more.
According to the famous contemporary historian Procopius, two Nestorian monks approached
Justinian sometime in the 550s.
They had traveled to China, Central Asia, and the Sassanid Empire and were returning
from India and to Constantinople.
They claimed that they could solve the emperor’s silk problem for a price.
Justinian promised to bestow them with gifts, and the monks started their adventure.
The sources are conflicted here, as some claim that they traveled on a ship to India and
then to China and some say that they moved via the northern route.
Even the dates are not clear, but we know that these monks spent two years on the road
between 552 and 563.
The secret of silk industry was protected by the Chinese imperial dynasties, yet the
disunity that we noted previously was probably detrimental to this practice.
We don’t know if these monks received any help from the locals, but they were allowed
to see and learn the process.
Mulberry silkworms are delicate creatures, so the Chinese probably weren’t expecting
them to be stolen, as the perpetrators wouldn’t be able to keep them alive.
But the monks had a plan: they secretly hid either the eggs or the larvae of the silkworms
in their canes and also asked the locals to gift them the mulberry bushes, that the worms
ate.
The monks also probably had help in Sogdiana, the Northern Caucasus and Crimea, as many
natives converted to Nestorianism in the 5th century.
One thing is clear: by the time they returned to Constantinople, there were enough mulberry
bushes there for the silkworms to eat and procreate, so the whole affair was well planned.
Justinian and his successor Justin II created silk industry centers in Berytus, Prusa and
Morea.
Although Chinese silk was still considered superior due to its quality, the Chinese and
Sassanid silk monopoly was broken and the Roman emperors had a new source of revenue.
The silk trade became central to the economic dominance of Constantinople and the rise of
the Italian merchant republics.
One of the earliest cases of industrial espionage was a success.
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