Notes
The Silk Roads
- Overland routes across Eurasia carried mostly luxury goods (silk, porcelain, spices). Innovations made trade easier: caravanserai (roadside inns), paper money and bills of exchange (flying cash in China), and banking houses.
- Cities like Kashgar and Samarkand grew as trading centers.
The Mongol Empire
- Chinggis (Genghis) Khan united the Mongols (1206) and built the largest land empire in history.
- The Pax Mongolica made Silk Road travel safer, increasing trade and the exchange of ideas and technology (gunpowder and printing moved west).
- The Mongols also spread the bubonic plague along trade routes.
- They split into khanates (like the Yuan dynasty in China under Kublai Khan) and often adapted to local cultures.
The Indian Ocean
- Monsoon winds made sea trade predictable. Lateen sails, dhows, the astrolabe and the magnetic compass helped sailors.
- Trade connected East Africa (Swahili city-states like Kilwa), Arabia, India, Southeast Asia (Malacca) and China.
- Diasporic communities of merchants (Arab and Persian traders in East Africa, Chinese in Southeast Asia) spread culture and religion. The Swahili language blended Bantu and Arabic.
- Zheng He's Ming dynasty voyages (1405–1433) showed Chinese naval power and collected tribute.
Trans-Saharan trade
- Camels and camel saddles made desert crossing possible. Gold from West Africa was traded for salt from the Sahara.
- The Mali Empire grew rich from this trade; Timbuktu became a center of Islamic learning.
Cultural and environmental effects
- Travelers like Ibn Battuta and Marco Polo wrote about these networks.
- Crops spread: Champa rice, citrus, bananas. Diseases spread too.
Practice
A single empire controlled and protected the routes.
Sailors timed voyages with seasonal wind patterns.
Swahili blends Bantu with Arabic words.
West African gold was traded for desert salt.
They gave travelers places to rest and trade.
Fleas on rats traveled with merchants.
His huge treasure fleets sailed as far as East Africa.
It had famous mosques and libraries.
Free response
Write your answer first, then open the scoring guide.
Free-response question
Answer (a), (b) and (c).
(a) Identify ONE technology that helped expand Indian Ocean trade between 1200 and 1450.
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The lateen sail (or the astrolabe or magnetic compass) helped sailors navigate and sail against the wind.
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(b) Explain ONE way the Mongol Empire affected trade across Eurasia.
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By uniting much of Eurasia and protecting merchants (the Pax Mongolica), the Mongols made Silk Road trade safer and busier.
Check off the points you earned:
(c) Explain ONE cultural effect of trade networks in this period.
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The spread of Islam to West Africa and Southeast Asia through merchants, or the blending of cultures in Swahili city-states.
Check off the points you earned: