The spice trade refers to the trade between historical civilizations in Asia, Northeast
Africa and Europe.
Spices such as cinnamon, cassia, cardamom, ginger, pepper, and turmeric were known, and
used for commerce, in the Eastern World well into antiquity.
Opium was also imported.
These spices found their way into the Middle East before the beginning of the Christian
Era, where the true sources of these spices was withheld by the traders, and associated
with fantastic tales.
Prehistoric writings and stone age carvings of neolithic age obtained indicates that India's
South West Coast path, especially Kerala had established itself as a major spice trade
centre from as early as 3000 B.C, which marks the beginning of Spice Trade.
The Greco-Roman world followed by trading along the Incense route and the Roman-India
routes.
In the middle of the first millennium, the sea routes to India and Sri Lanka were controlled
by the Indians and Ethiopians that became the maritime trading power of the Red Sea.
The Kingdom of Axum had pioneered the Red Sea route before the 1st century AD.
By mid-7th century AD the rise of Islam closed off the overland caravan routes through Egypt
and the Suez, and sundered the European trade community from Axum and India.
Arab traders eventually took over conveying goods via the Levant and Venetian merchants
to Europe until the rise of the Ottoman Turks cut the route again by 1453.
Overland routes helped the spice trade initially, but maritime trade routes led to tremendous
growth in commercial activities.
During the high and late medieval periods Muslim traders dominated maritime spice trading
routes throughout the Indian Ocean, tapping source regions in the Far East and shipping
spices from trading emporiums in India westward to the Persian Gulf and the Red Sea, from
which overland routes led to Europe.
The trade was transformed by the European Age of Discovery, during which the spice trade,
particularly in black pepper, became an influential activity for European traders.
The route from Europe to the Indian Ocean via the Cape of Good Hope was pioneered by
the Portuguese explorer navigator Vasco da Gama in 1498, resulting in new maritime routes
for trade.
This trade — driving the world economy from the end of the Middle Ages well into
the modern times — ushered in an age of European domination in the East.
Channels, such as the Bay of Bengal, served as bridges for cultural and commercial exchanges
between diverse cultures as nations struggled to gain control of the trade along the many
spice routes.
European dominance was slow to develop.
The Portuguese trade routes were mainly restricted and limited by the use of ancient routes,
ports, and nations that were difficult to dominate.
The Dutch were later able to bypass many of these problems by pioneering a direct ocean
route from the Cape of Good Hope to the Sunda Strait in Indonesia.
Origins
The Egyptians had traded in the Red Sea, spices from the "Land of Punt" and from Arabia.
Luxury goods traded along the Incense Route included Indian spices, ebony, silk and fine
textiles.
The spice trade was associated with overland routes early on but maritime routes proved
to be the factor which helped the trade grow.
The Ptolemaic dynasty had developed trade with India using the Red Sea ports.
People from the Neolithic period traded in spices, obsidian, sea shells, precious stones
and other high value materials as early as the 10th millennium BC.
The first to mention the trade in historical periods are the Egyptians.
In the 3rd millennium BC, they traded with the Land of Punt, which is believed to have
been situated in an area encompassing northern Somalia, Djibouti, Eritrea and the Red Sea
coast of Sudan.
In the first millennium BC the Arabs, Phoenicians, Israelites and Indians were engaged in sea
and land trade in luxury goods such as spices, gold, precious stones, leather of rare animals,
ebony and pearls.
The sea trade was in the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean.
The sea route in the Red Sea was from Bab-el-Mandeb to Berenike and from there by land to the
Nile and then by boats to Alexandria.
The land trade was in deserts of Western Arabia using camels.
The Indonesians were trading in spices (mainly Cinnamon and Cassia} with East Africa using
Catamaran boats and sailing with the help of the Westerlies in the Indian Ocean.
In the second half of the first millennium BC the Arab tribes of South and West Arabia
took control over the land trade of spices from South Arabia to the Mediterranean Sea.
The tribes were the M'ain, Qataban, Hadhramaut, Saba and Himyarite.
In the north the Nabateans took control of the trade route that crossed the Negev from
Petra to Gaza.
The trade made the Arab tribes very rich.
The South Arabia region was called Eudaemon Arabia by the Greeks and was on the agenda
of conquests of Alexander of Macedonia before he died.
The Indians and the Arabs had control over the sea trade with India.
In the late second century BC, the Greeks from Egypt learned from the Indians how to
sail directly from Aden to the West coast of India using the Monsoon winds and took
control over the sea trade.
Arab trade and medieval Europe
Rome played a part in the spice trade during the 5th century, but this role, unlike the
Arabian one, did not last through the Middle Ages.
The rise of Islam closed off the overland caravan routes through Egypt and the Suez,
and Radhanite Jewish and Arab merchants particularly from Egypt eventually took over conveying
goods via the Levant to Europe.
The Spice trade had brought great riches to the Abbasid Caliphate, and even inspired famous
legends such as that of Sinbad the Sailor.
These early sailors and merchants would often set sail from the port city of Basra and eventually
after many voyages they would return to sell their goods including spices in Baghdad.
The fame of many spices such as nutmeg and cinnamon are attributed to these early Spice
merchants.
The Indian commercial connection with South East Asia proved vital to the merchants of
Arabia and Persia during the 7th and 8th centuries.
Arab traders—mainly descendants of sailors from Yemen and Oman—dominated maritime routes
throughout the Indian Ocean, tapping source regions in the Far East - linking to the secret
"spice islands".
The islands of Molucca also find mention in several records: a Javanese chronicle mentions
the Moluccas and Maloko; and navigational works of the 14th and 15th centuries contain
the first unequivocal Arab reference to Moluccas.
Sulaima al-Mahr writes: "East of Timor [where sandalwood is found] are the islands of Bandam
and they are the islands where nutmeg and mace are found.
The islands of cloves are called Maluku ....." Moluccan products were then shipped to trading
emporiums in India, passing through ports like Kozhikode, and through Sri Lanka. from
there they were shipped westward across the ports of Arabia to the Near East, to Ormus
in Persian Gulf and Jeddah in the Red Sea and sometimes shipped to East Africa, where
they would be used for many purposes, including burial rites.
The Abbasids used Alexandria, Damietta, Aden and Siraf as entry ports to India and China.
Merchants arriving from India in the port city of Aden paid tribute in form of musk,
camphor, ambergris and sandalwood to Ibn Ziyad, the sultan of Yemen.
Indian spice exports find mention in the works of Ibn Khurdadhbeh, al-Ghafiqi, Ishak bin
Imaran and Al Kalkashandi.
Chinese traveler Hsuan Tsang mentions the town of Puri where "merchants depart for distant
countries."
From there, overland routes led to the Mediterranean coasts.
From the 8th until the 15th century, the Republic of Venice and neighboring maritime republics
held the monopoly of European trade with the Middle East.
The silk and spice trade, involving spices, incense, herbs, drugs and opium, made these
Mediterranean city-states phenomenally rich.
Spices were among the most expensive and in-demand products of the Middle Ages, used in medicine.
They were all imported from Asia and Africa.
Venetian merchants distributed then the goods through Europe until the rise of the Ottoman
Empire, that eventually led to the fall of Constantinople in 1453, barring Europeans
from important combined land-sea routes.
Age of European Discovery: finding a new route and a New World
The Republic of Venice had become a formidable power, and a key player in the Eastern spice
trade.
Other powers, in an attempt to break the Venetian hold on spice trade, began to build up maritime
capability.
One of the major consequences of the spice trade was the discovery of the American continent
by European explorers.
Until the mid 15th century, trade with the east was achieved through the Silk Road, with
the Byzantine Empire and the Italian city-states of Venice and Genoa acting as a middle man.
In 1453, however, the Ottomans took Constantinople and so the Byzantine Empire was no more.
Now in control of the sole spice trade route that existed at the time, the Ottoman Empire
was in a favorable position to charge hefty taxes on merchandise bound for the west.
The Western Europeans, not wanting to be dependent on an expansionist, non-Christian power for
the lucrative commerce with the east, set about to find an alternate sea route around
Africa.
The first country to attempt to circumnavigate Africa was Portugal, which had, since the
early 15th century, begun to explore northern Africa under Henry the Navigator.
Emboldened by these early successes and eyeing a lucrative monopoly on a possible sea route
to the Indies the Portuguese first crossed the Cape of Good Hope in 1488 on an expedition
led by Bartolomeu Dias.
Just nine years later in 1497 on the orders of Manuel I of Portugal, four vessels under
the command of navigator Vasco da Gama rounded the Cape of Good Hope, continuing to the eastern
coast of Africa to Malindi to sail across the Indian Ocean to Calicut in south India
-the capital of the local Zamorin rulers .The wealth of the Indies was now open for the
Europeans to explore; the Portuguese Empire was the earliest European seaborne empire
to grow from the spice trade.
It was during this time that Spanish and Portuguese explorers first set foot on the New World.
Christopher Columbus was the first to do so in 1492 while sailing westward across the
Atlantic Ocean on an expedition to the indies.
Instead of reaching Asia, Colombus discovered America, landing on an island in what is now
The Bahamas.
Believing to have in fact reached India, the crew named the natives "Indians", a name which
has continued in use to this day, to describe native Americans.
Just eight years later in 1500, the Portuguese navigator, Pedro Álvares Cabral while attempting
to reproduce Vasco da Gama’s route to India was blown westwards to what is today Brazil.
After taking possession of the new land, Cabral resumed his voyage to India, finally arriving
there in September 1500 and returning to Portugal by 1501.
By the early 16th century the Portuguese had complete control of the African sea route.
Spain organized the expedition of Christopher Columbus to compete with Portugal for the
spice trade with Asia, but instead, landed in a New World.
The search for a route to Asia was resumed a few years later, after explorer Núñez
de Balboa crossed the Isthmus of Panama in 1513 and became the first European to sight
the Pacific Ocean, confirming that America was a separate continent.
The Spanish crown then prepared a great westward voyage with Ferdinand Magellan, in order to
reach Asia from Spain across the Atlantic, and then Pacific Oceans.
On October 21, 1520 his expedition crossed the strait that bears his name in the southern
tip of South America, opening the Pacific to European exploration.
On March 16, 1521 the ships reached the Philippines and soon after the Spice Islands, ultimately
resulting in the Manila Galleon trade, the first westward spice trade route to Asia.
After Magellan's death in the Philippines, navigator Juan Sebastian Elcano took command
of the expedition and drove it across the Indian Ocean and back to Spain, where they
arrived in 1522 aboard the last remaining ship: the Victoria.
These explorers became the first men to circumnavigate the globe.
For the next two and half centuries, Spain controlled a vast trade network that linked
three continents: Asia, the Americas and Europe.
A global spice route had been created: from Manila in the Philippines, to Seville in Spain,
via Acapulco in Mexico.
Cultural exchanges Hindu and Buddhist religious establishments
of Southeast Asia came to be associated with economic activity and commerce as patrons
entrusted large funds which would later be used to benefit local economy by estate management,
craftsmanship and promotion of trading activities.
Buddhism, in particular, traveled alongside the maritime trade, promoting coinage, art
and literacy.
Islam spread throughout the East, reaching Maritime Southeast Asia in the 10th century;
Muslim merchants played a crucial part in the trade.
Christian missionaries, such as Saint Francis Xavier, were instrumental in the spread of
Christianity in the East.
Christianity competed with Islam to become the dominant religion of the Moluccas.
However, the natives of the Spice Islands accommodated aspects of both religions easily.
The Portuguese colonial settlements saw traders such as the Gujarati banias, South Indian
Chettis, Syrian Christians, Chinese from Fujian province, and Arabs from Aden involved in
the spice trade.
Epics, languages, and cultural customs were borrowed by Southeast Asia from India, and
later China.
Knowledge of Portuguese language became essential for merchants involved in the trade.
Indian merchants involved in spice trade took Indian cuisine to Southeast Asia, notable
present day Malaysia and Indonesia, where spice mixtures and curries became popular.
European people intermarried with the Indians, and popularized valuable culinary skills,
such as baking, in India.
The Portuguese also introduced vinegar to India, and Franciscan priests manufactured
it from coconut toddy.
Indian food, adapted to European palate, became visible in England by 1811 as exclusive establishments
began catering to the tastes of both the curious and those returning from India.
References Notes
Further Reading Nabhan, Gary Paul: Cumin, Camels, and Caravans:
A Spice Odyssey.
[History of Spice Trade] University of California Press, 2014.
ISBN 978-0-520-26720-6 [Print]; ISBN 978-0-520-95695-7 [eBook]
External links Trade between the Romans and the Empires of
Asia.
Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art
* La Mémoire maritime des arabes, documentaire, Khal Torabully et Oman TV.