The Silk Roads: A New History of the World

by Frankopan, Peter

  Wild rumours circulated in Germany that the disease was not natural, but the result of Jews poisoning wells and rivers. Vicious pogroms were carried out, with one account reporting how ‘all the Jews between Cologne and Austria’ were rounded up and burnt alive. So bad were the outbreaks of anti-Semitism that the Pope intervened, issuing proclamations forbidding any violent action against the Jewish populations in any Christian country, and demanding that their goods and assets be left unmolested.62 Whether this was effective or not was another matter. It was not the first time, after all, that fear of disaster, hardship and excessive religious outpourings resulted in the widespread slaughter of the Jewish minority in Germany: there had been terrible suffering in the Rhinelands at the time of the First Crusade when circumstances were not dissimilar. It was dangerous to have different beliefs at times of crisis.

  Europe lost at least one-third of its population to the plague, and perhaps much more, with conservative estimates of the number of dead placed somewhere around the 25 million mark in an assumed total population of 75 million.63 Work on more recent epidemics of plague has also demonstrated that during large outbreaks small villages and rural areas report much higher levels of death than cities. It seems that the key determinant of spreading plague is not the density of the human population (as had usually been thought) but that of rat colonies. The disease does not spread any more quickly in a packed urban environment where there are more households per infected rodent colony than in the countryside. Escaping from cities and towns for the countryside did not in fact increase one’s chances of cheating death.64 From field to farm and city to village, the Black Death created hell on earth: putrid, rotting bodies, oozing with pus, set against a background of fear, anxiety and disbelief at the scale of suffering.

  The effects were crushing. ‘Our hopes for the future have been buried alongside our friends,’ wrote the Italian poet Petrarch. Plans and ambitions for further discovery of the east and for fortunes to be made were overshadowed by darker thoughts. The only consolation, Petrarch went on, was the knowledge ‘that we shall follow those who went before. I do not know how long we will have to wait, but I know it cannot be very long.’ All the riches of the Indian Ocean, the Caspian or the Black Sea, he wrote, could not make up for what had been swept away.65

  And yet, despite the horror it caused, the plague turned out to be the catalyst for social and economic change that was so profound that far from marking the death of Europe, it served as its making. The transformation provided an important pillar in the rise – and the triumph – of the west. It did so in several phases. First was the top-to-bottom reconfiguration of how social structures functioned. Chronic depopulation in the wake of the Black Death had the effect of sharply increasing wages because of the accentuated value of labour. So many died before the plague finally began to peter out in the early 1350s that one source noted a ‘shortage of servants, craftsmen, and workmen, and agricultural workers and labourers’. This gave considerable negotiating powers to those who had previously been at the lower end of the social and economic spectrum. Some simply ‘turned their noses up at employment, and could scarcely be persuaded to serve the eminent unless for triple wages’.66 This was hardly an exaggeration: empirical data shows that urban wages rose dramatically in the decades after the Black Death.67

  The empowerment of the peasantry, of labourers and of women was matched by a weakening of the propertied classes, as landlords were forced into accepting lower rents for their holdings – deciding it was better to receive some revenue than nothing at all. Lower rents, fewer obligations and longer leases all had the effect of tilting power and benefits towards the peasantry and urban tenants. This was further enhanced by a fall in interest rates, which declined noticeably across Europe in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.68

  The results were remarkable. With wealth now more evenly distributed through society, demand for luxury goods – imported or otherwise – soared as a result of more consumers being able to purchase items that had previously been unaffordable.69 Spending patterns were affected by other demographic changes that the plague had produced, notably the shift in favour of the working young, who were best placed to take advantage of new opportunities opening up before them. Already less disposed to saving because of their close shave with death, the new up-and-coming generation, better paid than their parents and with better prospects for the future, set about spending their wealth on things they were interested in – not least of which was fashion.70 This in turn stimulated investment in and the rapid development of a European textile industry that began to turn out fabrics in such volume that they had a major impact on the trade in Alexandria as imports fell sharply. Europe even began to export in the opposite direction too, flooding the market in the Middle East and causing a painful contraction that stood in direct contrast to the invigorated economy to the west.71

  As recent research based on skeletal remains in graveyards in London demonstrates, the rise in wealth led to better diets and to better general health. Indeed, statistical modelling based on these results even suggests that one of the effects of the plague was a substantial improvement in life expectancy. London’s post-plague population was considerably healthier than it had been before the Black Death struck – raising life expectancy sharply.72

  Economic and social development did not occur evenly across Europe. Change took place most rapidly in the north and the north-west of the continent, partly because this region was starting from a lower economic point than the more developed south. This meant that the interests of landlord and tenant were more closely aligned and therefore more likely to end in collaboration and in solutions that suited both parties.73 It was also significant, however, that the cities in the north did not carry the same ideological and political baggage as many of those in the Mediterranean. Centuries of regional and long-term commerce had created institutions such as guilds that controlled competition and were designed to hand monopolistic positions to defined groups of individuals. Northern Europe, by contrast, began to boom precisely because competition was not restricted – causing urbanisation and economic growth to happen at a markedly faster rate than in the south.74

  Different behavioural profiles also emerged across different parts of Europe. In Italy, for example, women were either less tempted or were less able to enter the labour markets, and continued to marry at the same age and to have as many children as before the outbreak of plague. This contrasted sharply with the situation in the northern countries, where the demographic contraction gave women the chance to become wage-earners. One effect of this was to raise the age at which women tended to get married – which in turn had longer-term implications for family sizes. ‘Don’t hurtle into marriage too soon,’ advised Anna Bijns in a poem written in the Low Countries, for ‘one who earns her board and clothes shouldn’t scurry to suffer a man’s rod . . . Though wedlock I do not decry; unyoked is best! Happy the woman without a man!’75

  The transformations triggered by the Black Death laid foundations that were to prove crucial for the long-term rise of north-western Europe. Although the effects of the divergence between parts of Europe would take time to evolve, the systemic flexibility, the openness to competition and, perhaps most importantly of all, the sense of awareness in the north that geography counted against them and that a strong work ethic was required in order to turn a profit, all laid the basis for the later transformation of the European economies in the early modern period. As modern research is increasingly making clear, the roots of the industrial revolution of the eighteenth century lay in the industrious revolution of the post-plague world: as productivity rose, aspirations were cast upwards and levels of disposable wealth increased along with opportunities to spend it.76

  As the bodies were finally buried and the Black Death faded to become a horrific memory (periodically brought to life by cyclical secondary outbreaks), southern Europe underwent change too. In the 1370s, the Genoese tried to take advantage of the terrible effect that p
lague had had on Venice, where suffering had been particularly acute, and attempted to wrest control of the Adriatic. The gamble backfired spectacularly: unable to deliver a decisive blow, Genoa found itself suddenly overstretched and vulnerable. One by one, the appendages that the city-state had added over generations linking the city to the Middle East, the Black Sea and North Africa were picked off by rivals. Genoa’s loss was Venice’s gain.

  Freed from the attentions of its long-term competitor, Venice now soared as life returned to normal, exerting a vice-like grip over the spice trade. Pepper, ginger, nutmeg and cloves were imported in increasing quantities, above all via Alexandria. On average, Venetian ships were bringing back over 400 tons of pepper per year from Egypt, as well as shipping considerable volumes from the Levant. By the late fifteenth century, nearly 5 million pounds of spices were passing through Venice each year to be sold on at handsome profits elsewhere, where they were used in food, medicine and cosmetics.77

  It also seems to have been the main point of entry for pigments used in paintings. Often referred to collectively as ‘oltremare de venecia’ (Venetian goods from overseas), these included verdigris (literally, green from Greece), vermilion, fenugreek, lead-tin yellow, bone black and a gold substitute known as purpurinus or mosaic gold. The most famous and distinctive, however, was the rich blue that came from lapis lazuli, mined in Central Asia. The golden age of European art – of Fra Angelico and Piero della Francesca in the fifteenth century, and then of artists like Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael and Titian – owed much to their ability to use colours drawn from pigments that were part of the extension of contacts with Asia on the one hand and rising levels of disposable wealth to pay for them on the other.78

  Trade missions to the east were so lucrative that the republic auctioned them off in advance, guaranteeing payments while devolving market, transport and political risks to the successful bidder. As one Venetian put it proudly, galleys set off from the city in all directions – to the coast of Africa, to Beirut and Alexandria, to the Greek lands, to the south of France and to Flanders. Such wealth flowed into the city that palazzi shot up in value, especially in the best locations near the Rialto and St Mark’s cathedral. With land rare and expensive, new techniques were used in the construction of buildings, such as replacing spectacular but indulgent double courtyard staircases with smaller stairwells that required less space. Nevertheless, said one proud Venetian, even normal merchants’ houses were lavishly appointed with gilded ceilings, marble staircases, balconies and windows fitted with the finest glass from nearby Murano. Venice was the distribution point for European, African and Asian trade par excellence – and had the trappings to show it.79

  It was not just Venice that flourished. So too did the towns dotted along the Dalmatian coast which served as stopping points on the outbound and inbound journeys. Ragusa, modern Dubrovnik, saw extraordinary levels of prosperity in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Disposable wealth quadrupled between 1300 and 1450, spiralling up so quickly that a cap on dowries was enforced to stop payments that were rising rapidly; the city was so awash with cash that steps were taken partially to abolish slavery: in times of such plenty, it seemed wrong to hold fellow humans in bondage and not to pay them for their work.80 Like Venice, Ragusa was busy building its own trading network, developing extensive contacts with Spain, Italy, Bulgaria and even India, where a colony was established in Goa, centred on the church of St Blaise, Ragusa’s patron saint.81

  Many parts of Asia saw a similar surge in growth and ambition. Business boomed in southern India as trade with China built up alongside that from the Persian Gulf and further afield. Guilds sprang up to ensure security and quality controls, but also to create a monopoly that obstructed the rise of local competition. These guilds concentrated money and influence in the hands of a self-selecting group who maintained a dominant position on the Malabar coast and in Sri Lanka.82 Under this system, commercial relations were formalised to ensure transactions were done efficiently and fairly. According to an account written by the Chinese traveller Ma Huan in the early fifteenth century, prices between buyer and seller were set by a broker; all taxes and duties were calculated and had to be paid in advance before goods were released and shipped. This made for good long-term trading prospects: ‘the people there are very honest and trustworthy’, Ma Huan added.83

  That was the theory, at any rate. In fact, the towns on the southern coast of India did not operate in a vacuum, and competed with each other fiercely. Cochin emerged as a rival to Calicut in the fifteenth century after an aggressively competitive tax regime succeeded in attracting considerable trade. This became something of a virtuous circle, as it caught the eye of the Chinese. A series of major expeditions led by the great admiral Zheng He, a Muslim eunuch, to demonstrate China’s naval power, assert its influence and gain access to long-distance trade routes deep into the Indian Ocean, the Persian Gulf and the Red Sea, paid special attention to building up ties with the ruler of Cochin.84

  These missions were part of an increasingly ambitious set of measures taken by the Ming dynasty that replaced the Mongol Yuan rulers in the middle of the fourteenth century. Lavish funds were spent on Beijing, building an infrastructure to supply and defend the city. Considerable resources were devoted to trying to secure the steppe frontier to the north and on competing with a resurgent Korea in Manchuria, while the military presence to the south was built up with the result that regular tribute missions began to arrive from Cambodia and Siam bringing local specialities and luxury items in considerable quantities in return for the promise of peace. In 1387, for example, the kingdom of Siam sent 15,000 pounds of both pepper and sandalwood, and then two years later ten times that amount of pepper, sandalwood and incense.85

  Widening horizons in this way, however, had its costs. Zheng He’s first expedition involved some sixty large ships, several hundred smaller vessels and nearly 30,000 sailors, representing a very substantial outlay in terms of pay, equipment and the extensive gifts sent along with the admiral for use as tools of diplomacy. This and other initiatives were paid for by a sharp rise in the production of paper money, but also by increasing mining quotas – which led to a trebling of revenues from this sector in just over a decade after 1390.86 Improvements in the agricultural economy and tax collection also produced a sharp uplift in proceeds for the central government and stimulated what one modern commentator has described as the creation of a command economy.87

  China’s fortunes were helped by developments in Central Asia, where a warlord of obscure origins rose to become the single most famous figure of the late Middle Ages: Timur’s – or Tamurlaine’s – achievements became celebrated in plays written in England, his savage aggression a part of modern Indian consciousness. Forging a great empire across the Mongol lands stretching from Asia Minor to the Himalayas from the 1360s onwards, Timur embarked on an ambitious programme to construct mosques and royal buildings across his realm, in cities such as Samarkand, Herat and Mashad. Carpenters, painters, weavers, tailors, gem cutters, ‘in short craftsmen of any kind’ according to one contemporary, were deported from Damascus, when it was ransacked, to embellish cities to the east. An account by an envoy from the King of Spain to the Timurid court provides a vivid portrait of the scale of the construction, and of the level of ornamentation lavished on these new buildings. At the Aq Saray palace, near Samarkand, the gateway was ‘beautifully adorned with very fine work in gold and blue tiles’, while the principal reception room was ‘panelled with gold and blue tiles, and the ceiling is entirely of gold work’. Even the famed craftsmen of Paris would not have been able to produce such fine workmanship.88 This was nothing in comparison to Samarkand itself and Timur’s court, which was decorated with golden trees ‘with trunks as thick as might be a man’s leg’. Among the golden leaves were ‘fruits’ which on closer inspection turned out to be rubies, emeralds, turquoise stones and sapphires, along with large, perfectly round pearls.89

  Timur was not afraid to
spend the money he extracted from the peoples he subjugated. He bought silks from China that were ‘the finest in the whole world’, as well as musk, rubies, diamonds, rhubarb and other spices. Caravans of 800 camels at a time brought merchandise to Samarkand. Unlike some people – such as the inhabitants of Delhi, 100,000 of whom were executed when the city was taken – the Chinese did well from Timur.90

  It seemed, though, that they would be the next to suffer. According to one account, Timur spent time reflecting on his early life, and concluded that he needed to atone for ‘acts like pillage, the taking of captives, and massacre’. He decided that the best way to do so was by ‘mounting a holy war against the infidels, so that, in accordance with the dictum “Good deeds wipe out bad deeds”, those sins and crimes might be forgiven’. Timur suspended relations with the Ming court, and was on his way to attack China when he died in 1405.91

  The problems did not take long to materialise. Fragmentation and rebellion broke out in the Persian provinces as Timur’s heirs jostled to take control of his empire. But more structural difficulties were unleashed by a global financial crisis in the fifteenth century that affected Europe and Asia. The crisis was caused by a series of factors that resonate 600 years later: over-saturated markets, currency devaluations and a lopsided balance of payments that went awry. Even with the growing demand for silks and other luxury products, there was only so much that could be absorbed. It was not that appetites were sated or that tastes had changed, it was that the exchange mechanism went wrong: Europe in particular had little to give in return for the fabrics, ceramics and spices that were so highly prized. With China effectively producing more than it could sell abroad, there were predictable consequences when the ability to keep buying goods dried up. The result has often been described as a ‘bullion famine’.92 Today, we would call it a credit crunch.