And the conquests of the Mongolian superpower had other far-reaching consequences for the history of Europe. As they had surged westwards they had destroyed the great Islamic empire of the Khwarezmids in Central Asia, massacring their trading entrepôts of Samarkand, Merv and Bukhara, as well as devastating Baghdad, the capital of the Abbasid Caliphate. But crucially, the Mongols had stopped short of advancing far through Europe. The ports of Venice and Genoa remained the major mercantile centres of the West and grew in wealth and power through the later medieval period and Renaissance. By destroying the old Muslim core of Eurasia but sparing Europe, the Mongols had tipped the power balance in the region and Europe was given the opportunity to pull ahead and begin to develop faster than the Islamic world.94 Still, when Constantinople fell to the Ottomans in 1453, the Byzantine Empire had been little more than a rump state for more than a century, with Muslim rulers dominating the whole eastern Mediterranean and blocking the trade routes from the East into Europe.95 It was for this reason that European mariners began to look west for new maritime routes to the riches of China and India in the Age of Exploration, as we’ll see in the next chapter.
END OF AN ERA
For millennia, the steppes had represented a vast wilderness, home to nomadic pastoralists. These grasslands had supported large numbers of horse-riding warriors, able to strike at the agricultural civilisations around the rim of Eurasia in devastating raids. But from the mid sixteenth century, first the states of Renaissance Europe, and then Russia and China, began to decisively shift the balance of power between the worlds of the sown and the steppe. The pivotal development was that of a whole system of interrelated advances known as the Military Revolution. The agrarian states learned to effectively use gunpowder for musket and cannon, developed coordinated military drills to deliver devastating firepower on the battlefield, established far-reaching logistics to keep their troops supplied, and transformed their economies to support larger and larger standing armies.96 These innovations centralised military power, allowing rulers to consolidate their control and unify fiefdoms into large single states, marking the beginnings of our modern nations.97
Steppe societies were unable to compete with this military progress. While they could trade for firearms, just as throughout history agricultural societies had bought horses from the steppes, their purchasing power was restricted by a far less developed economy than that enjoyed by the consolidated agrarian states. This tipped the balance for the first time squarely away from the pastoral nomads in favour of the settled societies. The final gasp of nomad power was drawn in the 1750s with the defeat by Qing China of a confederation of Mongol tribes in Dzungaria. The military threat from the steppes had finally been contained and a long chapter of Eurasian history drew to a close.98 Never again would an empire of nomads emerge from the steppes and trigger an existential crisis among agrarian civilisations.
On the contrary, it was agrarian civilisations on the margins of the steppes which now began to penetrate further and further into these open grasslands, settling them and cultivating the soil, and thereby further strengthening their economies.99 Russia and China expanded into this middle ground, until their borders came to abut each other.100 Russia in particular grew into a great superpower by expanding into the steppes formerly ruled by the Mongol Empire, not in search of pasture for livestock and horses, but to exploit the rich mineral resources of this huge region and to turn it into high-yielding farmland, making use of a fertile loess soil that had been further enriched with nutrients by the grasses which had grown here for millennia.101 The expanding Russian Empire gradually transformed the Pontic–Caspian Steppe north of the Black and Caspian seas into vast fields of golden, swaying wheat.102 And by the 1930s these lands had become of immense strategic importance.fn12
The major motivation for Hitler’s invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941 was not just to seize the vital oilfields of the Caucasus region but also to lay claim to the fertile farmland of the former steppes to the north. These were both to provide their huge agricultural potential and satisfy Hitler’s vision for securing Lebensraum – ‘living space’ for the continued survival of the German people.
Operation Barbarossa ultimately failed, with the Wehrmacht defeated as much by the challenges of logistics across such vast distances as by the onset of the bitterly cold winter of the steppes and by the Red Army. But Hitler’s ambitions illustrate powerfully how the terrain of the steppes has been profoundly transformed over the past few centuries – from a wilderness inhabited by horse-riding pastoralists threatening the settled civilisations of Eurasia to rich, cultivated farmland now vital for feeding these same agricultural societies.fn13
The long era of Eurasian history with nomadic societies from the steppes repeatedly clashing with the civilisations around its rim was born of an ecological and climatic distinction, with contrasting regions supporting either horseback pastoralism or settled agriculture. The overland trade routes across the deserts of North Africa and Arabia, and the Silk Road linking the breadth of Eurasia, were also dominated by a particular climate zone – that of the band of deserts created by the dry, descending arm of one of the great circulation patterns in the Earth’s atmosphere. The global circulation patterns are also responsible for the prevailing winds around the world, and these the Europeans charted and learned to exploit during the Age of Exploration to create huge oceanic trading networks and powerful overseas empires.
Chapter 8
The Global Wind Machine and the Age of Discovery
The Age of Exploration began on the Iberian Peninsula, the very western extremity of Eurasia, peripheral to the exchange of goods and knowledge across the continent. The kingdoms that were to become Portugal and Spain could only regard with envy the riches trafficked by ports like Genoa and Venice across the Mediterranean. Through the Middle Ages, much of Iberia had been under Islamic control, after the Umayyad Caliphate had invaded across the Strait of Gibraltar in 711.fn1 The Christian kingdoms of the peninsula pushed back during the centuries of the Reconquista, with Portugal securing the full extent of its kingdom along the western coast by the mid thirteenth century. But it remained hemmed in by its larger and richer neighbour, Castile, and faced only the unknown expanse of the Atlantic.
The Portuguese continued their holy war across the Strait of Gibraltar, and in 1415 captured the Muslim port of Ceuta on the northern tip of Morocco, one of the end-points of the trans-Saharan caravan routes. It was here that the Portugese first tasted the wealth that might be acquired if they could outflank the Muslim world and carry this gold and slave trade on their own ships.1 They began to explore the West African coastline to find the sources of the gold, and before long some mariners contemplated the possibility of sailing all the way round the southern tip of Africa to reach India and the riches of the spice trade.2
Then, by the late fifteenth century, the kingdoms of Castile and Aragon united into what would become modern Spain. In 1492 they completed the Reconquista of the peninsula when they captured the last Moorish stronghold of Granada, and joined Portugal in seeking new overseas trade routes and territories through the Atlantic.fn2
VOLTA DO MAR
In the Atlantic, at some distance from the European and African coasts, lie four small archipelagoes: the Canary Islands, the Azores, Madeira, and the Cape Verde Islands. For the Romans the Canary Islands marked the end of the known world,fn3 but knowledge of them seems to have been lost during the Dark Ages: they literally vanished off the maps. They were rediscovered and encountered alongside the other, previously unknown archipelagoes, in the late fourteenth and early fifteenth centuries when Portuguese and Spanish sailors began venturing beyond the Iberian Peninsula.4 They found the Canaries, only about 100 kilometres off the coast of Morocco, to be already settled by indigenous tribes, probably descendants of Berbers from North Africa, but the more remote Azores and Cape Verde Islands were uninhabited when the Portuguese reached them.
Iberian sailors heading out to sea soon encountered
the Canary current that carried them southwest down the African coast. At about 30° latitude, prevailing northeasterly winds picked up to carry them to the Canary Islands. This course along the Moroccan coastline, borne by favourable currents and winds, was an ancient sea route, used by the Phoenicians to trade along the north-western coast of Africa with their galleys, which were also fitted with banks of oars. The problem for European sailors venturing out 2,000 years later was how to get home again. Sailing ships don’t need teams of straining oarsmen and can therefore carry more provisions and trade goods, but they struggle to make headway against adverse currents or winds.
The critical innovation developed by Portuguese navigators is known as the volta do mar – the turn, or return, of the sea. In order to get back northeast to Portugal from the Moroccan coastline or the Canaries, they turned out west into the expanse of the Atlantic Ocean. This seems pretty paradoxical at first but the Canary current weakens further offshore, and as soon as the ships were north of about 30° latitude they could pick up prevailing southwesterly winds and ride them all the way back home. Thus, on their return voyage to the Canaries these sailors took advantage of different regions of oceanic currents and atmospheric wind circulation. It just so happens that the Canary Islands lie close to the region on Earth where the northeasterly trade winds give way to the southwesterlies.
We’ll come back to this later, but at this point it’s worth explaining a perplexing quirk in the way winds and ocean currents are named. A wind is specified by the direction from which it is blowing, so a northerly wind blows from the north towards the south. Ocean currents, on the other hand, are named the opposite way: by the direction in which they are going. Thus a northerly current arrives from the south and carries you north. This is potentially very confusing, but it does carry a degree of sense. When you’re on land, the direction a wind is coming from is the important aspect: what matters is from where a storm arrives, or the direction in which you need to turn a windmill. But for a ship being carried along by an ocean current, it’s where it’s taking you that is important – especially if it’s towards a reef or shoal that could wreck you.5
If you steer a wide, looping volta do mar course through the open ocean to return to the Iberian Coast from the Canaries you will get to Madeira. Although Madeira actually lies closer to Portugal, the Canaries were discovered first as the prevailing northeasterly winds carried the European ships straight there from the Strait of Gibraltar. As successive Portuguese expeditions pushed further and further down the African coast, they steered wider volta do mar courses out into the mid Atlantic, and in the process encountered the Azores. This archipelago lies about 800 kilometres from the edge of the Iberian peninsula, and from here another ocean stream, the Portugal current, carried the ships back to port. Finally, the Cape Verde islands, lying off the western bulge of the African continent at the point where the Sahara desert yields to the thick tropical rainforest of Central Africa – the islands’ name means the ‘Green Cape’ – were discovered by the Portuguese in 1456.
The Atlantic archipelagoes and example volta do mar routes exploiting different regions of winds and currents.
Unlike islands such as the Isle of Wight, Mallorca or Sri Lanka, which sit on the continental shelf but have been cut off from the mainland by rising sea levels, these Atlantic archipelagoes stand isolated in the ocean: they are the very tips of volcanoes rising from the sea floor.6 In fact, the Azores are the peaks of the highest volcanoes of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, the great spreading rent in the oceanic crust that stretches all the way to Iceland.7 fn4
The Atlantic islands provided important oceanic staging posts for the Iberian explorers – they were stepping stones in the ocean. The Canaries in particular presented a vital stop for taking on board provisions and fresh water, enabling ships to embark on longer voyages.8 The Azores offered a similar function on the route home. The early navigation between the African coast and these different archipelagoes also served as crucial training grounds, allowing European sailors to gain proficiency and confidence for attempting greater voyages into the unknown. It was here that they began to understand the grand-scale circulation within the planet’s oceans and atmosphere, and how to exploit these patterns of currents and winds.
But the Atlantic islands also became economically valuable in their own right. Their climates and rich, volcanic soils made them perfectly suited for growing crops like sugar.9 Madeira had originally been densely forested – it took its name from the Portuguese for ‘wood’10 – but the forests were rapidly cleared by Portuguese sailors and the land turned to the cultivation of wine and sugar. By the end of the fifteenth century, Madeira was producing almost 1,400 tonnes of sugar every year,11 the plantations worked by slaves brought from the African mainland. So the Atlantic islands played a pivotal role in the Age of Exploration, but their ‘discovery’ also presaged the ugliest aspects of European expansion: territorial conquest, colonialism and plantations worked by slave labour.
TO THE CAPE OF STORMS
If you look at a map, Cape Bojador appears as no more than a bump in the convex coastline of West Africa. Yet for a time this innocuous-looking, duney headland was considered the southernmost point to which it was possible to sail along the African coast – treacherous to navigate, it was known in Arabic as Abu Khatar, ‘the Father of Danger’.12
The maritime tradition of the time was for ships to hug the coast. Staying close to the shoreline gave regular access to food and fresh water and, more importantly, provided landmarks for navigation. But around Cape Bojador the gentle winds blowing along Morocco give way to strong winds from the east that threaten to blow any ship out into the open ocean.fn5 In addition, a broad, submerged sandbar at the cape extends from the shore over 20 miles out to sea, reducing the water depth to just a few metres. Thus a ship leaving sight of the coastline to steer around that danger risks being caught by the stronger currents and dragged further and further out into the ocean.13
But then, in 1434 the Portuguese navigator Gil Eanes came up with a revolutionary new technique that allowed him to round Cape Bojador – known today as current sailing. To sail in a desired direction through complex winds and oceanic currents you need to take into account the deflection to your ship’s course by the unseen current. The only way Eanes could have done so is to have meticulously measured both the direction and speed of the current at the Canary Islands before setting off, and then at several points along the way by hauling in his sails or dropping anchor to get a reading on the local current and make the necessary corrections to his course. Eanes may have initially guessed the compensatory course he needed to sail, or perhaps he even calculated it, as modern mariners would, by plotting a triangle on his nautical map: marking the line between his current position and his destination, the line of deflection from the current, and joining these with a third line that showed the actual course that must be steered to compensate for the current. Cape Bojador was thus conquered by Portuguese navigators seeking to understand the patterns of the sea. And as they began to master them, they gained confidence to sail further from the shore.
Once the way past Cape Bojador had been shown, successive Portuguese expeditions pushed steadily further down the coast of West Africa, discovering the Senegal river as well as the Cape Verde archipelago lying 570 kilometres offshore. By 1460 the Portuguese had sailed 3,000 kilometres down the African coast, and were now edging round the lip of the great bulging protrusion of West Africa to enter the Gulf of Guinea.14 Here the Guinea Current carried them east, but the explorers found that the prevailing northeasterly winds that had been a reliable companion all the way south since the leaving the Canaries gave out. They now had to contend with the light and variable winds of the doldrums.
In 1474 Portuguese captains reached the point where the African coast turned south again, and when soon after they crossed the equator they lost sight of Polaris, the ‘pole star’. This is a bright star in the constellation of Ursa Minor (the Little Bear, or Little Dipp
er) that just happens to lie directly above the North Pole. If you want to work out your latitude – how far north of the equator you are – you simply measure the angle between Polaris in the night sky and the horizon. But as the star now disappeared from view, the sailors were entering not just uncharted waters but strange new parts of the world where even their navigational techniques no longer worked. The Portuguese word coined for losing sight of Polaris was desnorteado – to be ‘dis-northed’ – and it soon took on the more general meaning of being lost or confused.15 fn6 But as Portuguese sailors continued down the African coast, on the opposite horizon they caught sight of the Southern Cross, a bright constellation that could serve the same guiding function in the Southern Hemisphere.16
As the Portuguese continued with their quest to find the southern tip of this mysterious continent, each mission stopped regularly to collect information about the local geography, languages and, crucially, the goods that could be traded. Their ships also took with them stone pillars to be erected at the furthest point along the coast they reached on each expedition. Not only were these intended to stake territorial claims for the glory of the Portuguese crown, but they also served as a visible marker to be exceeded by subsequent voyagers.17 These small monuments carried in the hold of the pitching and rolling caravels as they sailed towards new frontiers were the fifteenth-century equivalent of the flags carried by US astronauts on the Apollo missions to the Moon.
Origins Page 20