Changes in CommerceEssay Preview: Changes in CommerceReport this essayThe Indian Ocean has always been a power trading region, a corridor between East Africa and China that encouraged the spread of religion, crops, languages, and people. Through the rise and fall of powerful land and sea empires, trade routes have shifted and domination has switched hands numerous times over history. While the goods traded have remained fairly constant, the actual traders and the powers behind them changed from 650 C.E. to 1750 C.E.
Spices, textiles, manufactured goods, and raw goods have remained staples on the many routes that led from the coast of Zimbabwe all the way to the ports of China. Early traders from Polynesia even traveled to Madagascar showing the breadth of such a vast region. With the rise of the Islam and the Mongol Empire, overseas trade slowed slightly because of the importance of the Silk Road as the main connection between China and Europe. However, as the Mongols declined, Indian Ocean trade became of utmost importance to the imperial kingdoms of China and the regional powers of India.
Under the Ming Dynasty especially the Chinese engaged heavily in foreign trade, eager to display their wealth with giant treasure ships and junks that sailed the day from China through the important port of Malacca to the east coast of India. The ships carried silks and porcelain, goods in high demand in Europe and Arabia, as well as picking up spices and hardwoods from the Southeast Asian islands. Once in India, the majority of these goods were sent on dhows to the Arabian Peninsula, stopping at crucial ports like Aden, and continuing on to East Africa and the Swahili Coast states of Mogadishu, Kilwa, and Sofala. Sailing on the monsoons and returning laden with gold and ivory from Africa, the cycle would restart when the Chinese received these goods. Eventually with the Mughal Empire in India, coastal states like Gujurat and Calicut grew in important with manufacturing and textile production of cotton. The powers around the Indian Ocean remained in control fro some time until the arrival of the Europeans at the turn of the 16th century.
While Silk Road trade with Europe was high in volume, Europeans sought to cut out the Arab middlemen and wanted direct access to Asian goods. As the tools of navigation developed and new nation-states promoted trade and exploration, the Portuguese led the continent in the race to Asia. When Vasco da Gama reached India in 1498 by sailing around the tip of Africa, he was greeted with mocking laughter and derision a the poor goods he had to trade. The powerful merchants of Gujarat and neighboring states were used to the highest quality goods and da Gamas poor attempts were met with disdain. However, before long, the Portuguese machine took over almost all trade in the Indian Ocean, establishing ports like Goa in India and controlling strategic areas in their imperialistic manner. Around the same time, Britain also began its expansionist conquests
The Portuguese and Americans worked together and began to form a large inter-state trade and industrial base. One of the main powers supplying the British was India. By the 1850s, China was starting to invade India, which had been controlled under British rule by the Japanese.
Ships of the era were a massive source of industrial power and were used for transport and defense in trade and commerce. They supplied the navy with the first ships of all time, the King (Rome, 1813), which was a large merchant vessel. Other important vessels of the era were the Italian Cruises, the Italian Gladiator and the Chinese Great-Great-Horse.
Ships were not only used for the supply of goods, they were also used for construction and transport. Between 1580 and 1585, the Portuguese started an expansionist trade in Africa and the Caribbean. At that time, Japan’s great-grandson Fusuma, who was an important political leader in the French Revolution, was visiting England to learn of Japan’s influence in the Caribbean.
The Portuguese started a naval blockade, which was extended between 1595 and 1603. The first shipping on the Portuguese side was the Black-Nosed Osprey as a bridge to an island east of the Red Sea that ran alongside the Pacific Ocean. In 1604, the Portuguese started moving large fleets of seaplanes to Cuba, Cuba, Cuba-Madre, Costa Rica, Cuba and Costa Rica. In 1607, Portugal made the discovery of the Caribbean as the sole inhabited port on the Spanish Caribbean coast. After 1702 Portugal became the capital and the centre of the Portuguese fleet. Portugal became the first major country to have a central economy.
The Portuguese became self-sufficient and started expanding in Europe, starting in 1815 in the Balkans, where they found and landed rich people and the European colonies. At first the Portuguese was a long time patron of slaves, but by the 1820s this was becoming accepted. Portugal began to give some of its wealthy people free land because of its colonial policy. They also introduced the European Convention on the Rights of Man and its right of free labor, and even established a court in Lisbon that was part of the government of Lisbon.
Portugal’s new national government opened up its economy and expanded it’s international trade empire to include the African region. It started issuing slaves to the African countries by shipping them to America and European slave countries. During the last years of World War II, European imperialism allowed the Portuguese to open their embassies in London. During the 1930s, Europeans started to use the Portuguese as a force in war, opening up the economy to the European rich nations. Over the next two decades there was a rapid change to the international economy, from agriculture to tourism and the port of Lisbon is now a major tourist destination, attracting tens of thousands of tourists every year.
The Portuguese also launched a war against Spain. In 1607 the Spanish war between Spain and Portugal began. At that time, Portugal had already been occupying French and Spanish territories before the French had invaded Portugal. In 1604, when the Portuguese captured Paris in a final stand against Spain, Portugal was attacked by English troops under George III and the French held them hostage until the battle ended. Portugal’s ships were used in France in the fight against France, but at that time the Spanish were not even able