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Prior to Europe's Age of Discovery, much of the world was actually quite well-connected. Just look at Ibn Battuta's travels (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ibn_B
by z2 10y ago
Prior to Europe's Age of Discovery, much of the world was actually quite well-connected. Just look at Ibn Battuta's travels (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ibn_Battuta https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ibn_Battuta) -- when in Yuan Dynasty China, he stayed in a city's Muslim quarter with Egyptian immigrants!
- Florin_Andrei 10y agoIt was, for sure, but in a low-bandwidth, high-risk kind of way.
- Retric 10y agoNot if you adjust for relative population sizes. Many societies had huge dependency's on foreign trade.
- perfmode 10y agoWorld traveler in the 1300's. Incredible.
- douche 10y agoThe Pax Mongolica[1] was actually a great heydey of trade and travel across Eurasia. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pax_Mongolica https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pax_Mongolica
- HarryHirsch 10y agoThe Ancients were not that primitive. There is the Periplus Maris Erythraei, a manual for traders that describes the ports of the Indian Ocean, from Zanzibar to Sri Lanka. These are the ports that were regularly visited by merchantmen on trading voyages. More adventurous characters might want to cut out the middleman and sail further to China, whose existence is mentioned in the same text. 700 years prior Pharao Necho II outfitted an expedition to sail around the African continent, for no other reason than research. http://www.livius.org/sources/content/herodotus/herodotus-on-the-first-circumnavigation-of-africa/ http://www.livius.org/sources/content/herodotus/herodotus-on...
- ekianjo 10y agoAncient Greeks were already world travelers. Look at Herodotus and his list of 7 wonders (the real, original one).
- trgn 10y agoThe most famous one being Marco Polo of course. From his descriptions of the Khan's empire, he's practically tripping over the foreigners. Turks, Arabs ("Saracens"), Indians, Tartars, "Latins" (ie. europeans), all traveling Eurasia.
- buzzybee 10y agoThe evidence continues building for the case that colonial Europe rewrote world history to maximally justify conquest.
- frozenport 10y agoOr that this guy is misinformed, for example, were there tomatoes in India before the Age of Discovery?