11 ms·

Smuggling of silkworm eggs into the Byzantine Empire

166 points by monkeybutton 3y ago

gostsamo 3y ago
And 1400 years later my grandfather farmed silkworms a few hundred kilometers from Constantinople.
boomboomsubban 3y ago
I like how easily television puts the event into a show set seven centuries later. That'd be like including the signing of the Magna Carta in a show about WWI.
- alehlopeh 3y ago
  This event lead to the Byzantines having a silk monopoly in Europe. It follows that the Venetians didn’t have the means to produce silk. They may have therefore tried to acquire said means. The show apparently depicts that attempt, with inspiration from the story in TFA.
  - valarauko 3y ago
    I'd also add that holy men smuggling out the means to break monopolies in their walking sticks is a popular theme, to the point of being a trope.
Floegipoky 3y ago
During the 19th century there was an attempt to establish a silk industry in New England. The industry failed, but the White Mulberry (morus alba), imported to serve as the food source for the silkworms, is thriving in North America. It's invasive in many areas and has displaced the native mulberry, morus rubra.
y-curious 3y ago
Super cool article, thank you. These 2 guys significantly changed the world and we don't know who they are.
exhilaration 3y ago
I'm curious, is there a list somewhere of these world-changing industrial espionage incidents? Here's two more I remember off the top of my head. Not sure why the top results are the Smithsonian Magazine but here are some links: Samuel Slater brings cotton mill technology to America in 1789: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/how-industrial-espionage-started-americas-cotton-revolution-180967608/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/how-industrial-esp... Robert Fortune learns Chinese tea production methods and brings them to British India in 1848: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/the-great-british-tea-heist-9866709/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/the-great-british-tea... Someone (maybe you!) should write a book about this!
- morkalork 3y ago
  >“Foreigners seemed to prefer having a mixture of Prussian blue and gypsum with their tea, to make it look uniform and pretty, and as these ingredients were cheap enough, the Chinese [have] no objection to [supplying] them as such teas always fetch . . . a higher price!” This quote and the preceding paragraph about the distrust of the Chinese tea manufacturers are quite something. I hadn't considered the "made in China" stereotype for quality had been around for centuries.
  - mjhay 3y ago
    Historically (before ~1800 let's say) China was known for its very high-quality goods. In fact, the Silk Road trade and later trade with the Spanish was almost exclusively Chinese goods flowing out and gold and silver specie flowing in - mainly because their domestic production was good enough that foreign goods couldn't compete. This was enough of a thing that the Romans became concerned at the amount of specie flowing out of the empire to pay for silk and other Chinese goods.
    - fluxinflex 3y ago
      This is was the reason for the Opium Wars with the English. The English wanted Chinas tea but the Chinese didn't want anything from the English so the English were bleeding gold and silver into China. So the English forced Opium onto the people of China against the will of the King of China. China rebelled, the English conquered and forced the Chinese to open their ports and accept Indian-grown opium as trade for Chinese tea. That continued until the English found the secret plants that made the Chinese tea. They stole those plants and planted them in India.
nologic01 3y ago
It is interesting how concepts of commercial secrecy and rule of law evolve over the centuries. In modern terms we might call this "knowledge transfer incident" a form of commercial espionage / intellectual property theft. It is unclear if the affected entity ever imposed sanctions or other form of punishment on the perpetrator (presumably they did notice that there was no longer demand for their silk in certain markets??). It also appears that the perpetrators promptly established a monopoly of their own (on the basis of somebody else's know-how which is also somewhat odd with today's eyes :-). Somehow it is all predicated on very sparse communication between different parts of the world. The flip side is that in today's hyper-connected world you might be able to tell if a secret has leaked just by triangulation.
- peteradio 3y ago
  You might have a pretty good clue of who did what but today's winning strategy is to never admit any fault and form coalitions of protection. I suspect that is the winning strategy always, just stonewall, its not particularly honorable but what has that ever won anybody, an honor trophy? You can get trophys by cheating too, and much more!
peteradio 3y ago
Silk has been produced for 3-4k years, can you imagine what a son-of-a-bitch that was back then? Was silk like gold and bitcoin? Somehow valuable because its such a bitch to produce? Feels like all of it is a goof on the people who accept it at face value.
- Avicebron 3y ago
  Silk definitely had(has) the immediate day to day use case of a comfortable fabric to wear, I can imagine that alone drove up demand. I'm sure it being difficult to produce increased it's value. Sure gold and bitcoin are stores of value and currency, but we don't usually make our boxers out of them.
- giraffe_lady 3y ago
  Silk has unique characteristics as a material, and in a pre-plastic pre-industrial world with relatively few viable fabric materials (and all of them profoundly labor-intensive by modern standards) it would have been valuable regardless. Obviously its rarity, social connotations, and mysterious origins had a huge effect on its value. But like gold, its characteristics alone are enough to cause people to go through the trouble to acquire it initially, enough for those other factors to take over.
  - peteradio 3y ago
    IMO we shouldn't have started wearing clothes to begin with, it was a bad call. If my ancestors could have just held off on that I'd have nice thick fur right now.
    - whythre 3y ago
      I mean… if you stick to the areas that mimic the early hominid climate you don’t really need them. Lots of modern tropical tribes wear functionally zero clothing.
- mistrial9 3y ago
  silk materials relate to a sensual world, where the touch, feel and quality of the physical embodiment is valued highly.. It is possible that English-style commerce downplays this sensual value, preferring all forms of money, e.g. rare coins, stamps, securities and financial agreements, as higher value. It is an example of a polarity. There is a rumor that Bill Gates will not pay for art because "that is not worth money" .. he famously had giant digital screens hung in his thirty thousand square foot home, displaying reproductions of famous art without paying for them. Yet, he has spent millions of dollars building and acquiring software patents, which are applied with attorneys to generate many times that income. I suggest that is directly reflective of that cultural difference.
ptsneves 3y ago
Byzantine history is so important to understand the modern world. It gives us the context for the orthodox/west divide; it gives us an example of a economic and intellectual superpower needing to live with the realities of barbarian neighbors, and being destroyed! It shows us great statecraft lasting a thousand years. It even shows us why generals and senior civil servants were eunuchs and how the next best thing was celibate people. This is the reason why catholic priests should be celibate and therefore the answer against nepotist corruption. We all know how nepotism is a serious issue in states everywhere in the world. I became a fan of the Byzantines and seriously found team Roman Catholic to be a bunch of barbarians. I say team Roman Catholic because this small book[1] makes Byzantine history and trivia so humorous. [1] https://global.oup.com/academic/product/a-cabinet-of-byzantine-curiosities-9780190625948?cc=ru&lang=en& https://global.oup.com/academic/product/a-cabinet-of-byzanti...
- nerdponx 3y ago
  One thing I learned recently is that 12th Century Fourth Crusade actually culminated in sacking Constantinople and establishment of the "Latin Empire", as the intended successor of the Byzantine Empire, which only existed for a brief time before it was recaptured by a rump state founded by exiled Byzantine aristocrats. Apparently (and understandably) this led to major deterioration in East-West Christian relations, and furthermore the resulting weakening of the Byzantine Empire is what might have enabled the Ottoman Empire to eventually conquer the Byzantine Empire in the 15th Century. The level of geopolitical chaos involved in such an event is unimaginable today. Even the messiest of 20th century wars seem downright orderly by comparison.
  - qwytw 3y ago
    The Fourth Crusade was preceded by: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massacre_of_the_Latins https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massacre_of_the_Latins which was a reaction to the empire becoming near completely dominated by westerns both economically and (to a lesser degree) politically. The last coup attempt/civil war (which was also a near permanent issue in the empire) before the massacre was between a French Princess ruling the empire as a regent for her underage son and her stepdaughter who was married to a Frankish nobleman from the Outremer (he was -the second highest ranking official in the empire and seemingly the heir apparent together with his wife). Had they succeeded the Empire would probably have had its first Latin Emperor (or at least co-Emperor) without even being directly conquered. Of course instead it ended with late emperor's cousin* murdering (he forced the 12 year old emperor to sign her mothers death warrant and before having him assassinated soon after). mothers everyone and taking the throne for himself after he masterfully utilized the widespread public hatred towards the Latins amongst the general population.. *Andronikos Komnenos, who was in his middle 60s at the time and while being quite a terrible person had a very interesting life. Amongst other things (while in exile due all kinds of scheming) he seduced the former queen of Jerusalem (who happened to be his niece..) and up having two children with her after they ran away to the Turkish Sultanate of Damascus. Eventually she was captured by the emperor who used her to lure Andronikos into Constantinople and then (unfortunately for the emperor's son) decided pardon him and exile him to a remote province instead of executing him.
vrglvrglvrgl 3y ago
[dead]
infamia 3y ago
Byzantine history is interesting and vastly underappreciated (IMO). If you'd like to learn a bit more, the "12 Byzantine Rulers" podcast is a good place to start. It starts off a touch stiff, but loosens up and is great overall. https://12byzantinerulers.com/ https://12byzantinerulers.com/
- bjackman 3y ago
  I can also recommend the History of Byzantium podcast for anyone that wants to to extremely deep into the timeline. I've listened to all 265 episodes so far, and I'm still thrilled every time a new one comes out!
m00dy 3y ago
It is so fascinating that I can find "ottoman" keyword at least 6 times on this thread even-though this smuggling had happened way before the ottomans concurred the Byzantine.
- cgio 3y ago
  Your comment would have upped the incidence of said keyword by 33% at the time it was published.
cubefox 3y ago
Perhaps a naive question: What was so special about silk? It seems it was just a luxury article for the rich. I assume unlike today, not many people had a lot of disposable income to spend on luxury products. So I don't understand how silk could have been economically relevant compared to other non-luxury goods.
Jun8 3y ago
It seems there's a lot of interest for Byzantine History on HN, that's fantastic! My friends and I have run a book club for the past four years on Ancient History with focus on the Eastern Roman Empire. Most books we read were kind of dry. Here's a list of books I found readable and engaging if you want to delve deeper: * Byzantium trilogy by Norwich. If you don't want to get all three, I suggest getting The Apogee (2nd volume). Fantastically readable and solid historical work with a generous side of gossip. * Alexiad by Anna Komnene. Written around 1140 after Anna was deposed to a convent, this biography of her father, Alexios, has an immediacy that history books cannot match. The end will probably bring you to tears. * Anecdota (Secret History) by Procopius. For pure titillation factor cannot be beat! Severe attack against Justinian, Theodora, Belisaurus, and his wife Antonina. "Severe" is an understamenet really, here's Procopius on Theodora's depraved youth: On the field of pleasure she was never defeated. Often she would go picnicking with ten young men or more, in the flower of their strength and virility, and dallied with them all, the whole night through. When they wearied of the sport, she would approach their servants, perhaps thirty in number, and fight a duel with each of these; and even thus found no allayment of her craving. Once, visiting the house of an illustrious gentleman, they say she mounted the projecting corner of her dining couch, pulled up the front of her dress, without a blush, and thus carelessly showed her wantonness. And though she flung wide three gates to the ambassadors of Cupid, she lamented that nature had not similarly unlocked the straits of her bosom, that she might there have contrived a further welcome to his emissaries. So, she fit the full Messalina archetype. Full text available at Fordham (https://sourcebooks.fordham.edu/basis/procop-anec.asp https://sourcebooks.fordham.edu/basis/procop-anec.asp). Here's an interesting paper on the depiction of Theodora in the Secret History (https://www.mcgill.ca/classics/files/classics/2004-09.pdf https://www.mcgill.ca/classics/files/classics/2004-09.pdf) * Chronographia by Michael Psellos covers the reigns of 14 emperors and empresses in a 100 time period
- mr_toad 3y ago
  I’m not convinced that Procopius wasn’t just writing erotic fiction.
  - rippercushions 3y ago
emmelaich 3y ago
Related, the Melvyn Bragg podcast on Marco Polo is excellent https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01hxpxh https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01hxpxh
Khaine 3y ago
There is a great podcast (https://thehistoryofbyzantium.com https://thehistoryofbyzantium.com) that is carrying on from Mike Duncan's excellent history of Rome podcast. They just got up to the 4th Crusade sack of Constantinople.

166 points by monkeybutton 3y ago

And 1400 years later my grandfather farmed silkworms a few hundred kilometers from Constantinople.

I like how easily television puts the event into a show set seven centuries later. That'd be like including the signing of the Magna Carta in a show about WWI.

alehlopeh 3y ago
This event lead to the Byzantines having a silk monopoly in Europe. It follows that the Venetians didn’t have the means to produce silk. They may have therefore tried to acquire said means. The show apparently depicts that attempt, with inspiration from the story in TFA.
- valarauko 3y ago
  I'd also add that holy men smuggling out the means to break monopolies in their walking sticks is a popular theme, to the point of being a trope.

Floegipoky 3y ago

During the 19th century there was an attempt to establish a silk industry in New England. The industry failed, but the White Mulberry (morus alba), imported to serve as the food source for the silkworms, is thriving in North America. It's invasive in many areas and has displaced the native mulberry, morus rubra.

y-curious 3y ago

Super cool article, thank you. These 2 guys significantly changed the world and we don't know who they are.

exhilaration 3y ago

I'm curious, is there a list somewhere of these world-changing industrial espionage incidents? Here's two more I remember off the top of my head. Not sure why the top results are the Smithsonian Magazine but here are some links: Samuel Slater brings cotton mill technology to America in 1789: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/how-industrial-espionage-started-americas-cotton-revolution-180967608/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/how-industrial-esp... Robert Fortune learns Chinese tea production methods and brings them to British India in 1848: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/the-great-british-tea-heist-9866709/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/the-great-british-tea... Someone (maybe you!) should write a book about this!

morkalork 3y ago
>“Foreigners seemed to prefer having a mixture of Prussian blue and gypsum with their tea, to make it look uniform and pretty, and as these ingredients were cheap enough, the Chinese [have] no objection to [supplying] them as such teas always fetch . . . a higher price!” This quote and the preceding paragraph about the distrust of the Chinese tea manufacturers are quite something. I hadn't considered the "made in China" stereotype for quality had been around for centuries.
- mjhay 3y ago
  Historically (before ~1800 let's say) China was known for its very high-quality goods. In fact, the Silk Road trade and later trade with the Spanish was almost exclusively Chinese goods flowing out and gold and silver specie flowing in - mainly because their domestic production was good enough that foreign goods couldn't compete. This was enough of a thing that the Romans became concerned at the amount of specie flowing out of the empire to pay for silk and other Chinese goods.
  - fluxinflex 3y ago
    This is was the reason for the Opium Wars with the English. The English wanted Chinas tea but the Chinese didn't want anything from the English so the English were bleeding gold and silver into China. So the English forced Opium onto the people of China against the will of the King of China. China rebelled, the English conquered and forced the Chinese to open their ports and accept Indian-grown opium as trade for Chinese tea. That continued until the English found the secret plants that made the Chinese tea. They stole those plants and planted them in India.

nologic01 3y ago

It is interesting how concepts of commercial secrecy and rule of law evolve over the centuries. In modern terms we might call this "knowledge transfer incident" a form of commercial espionage / intellectual property theft. It is unclear if the affected entity ever imposed sanctions or other form of punishment on the perpetrator (presumably they did notice that there was no longer demand for their silk in certain markets??). It also appears that the perpetrators promptly established a monopoly of their own (on the basis of somebody else's know-how which is also somewhat odd with today's eyes :-). Somehow it is all predicated on very sparse communication between different parts of the world. The flip side is that in today's hyper-connected world you might be able to tell if a secret has leaked just by triangulation.

peteradio 3y ago
You might have a pretty good clue of who did what but today's winning strategy is to never admit any fault and form coalitions of protection. I suspect that is the winning strategy always, just stonewall, its not particularly honorable but what has that ever won anybody, an honor trophy? You can get trophys by cheating too, and much more!

peteradio 3y ago

Silk has been produced for 3-4k years, can you imagine what a son-of-a-bitch that was back then? Was silk like gold and bitcoin? Somehow valuable because its such a bitch to produce? Feels like all of it is a goof on the people who accept it at face value.

Avicebron 3y ago
Silk definitely had(has) the immediate day to day use case of a comfortable fabric to wear, I can imagine that alone drove up demand. I'm sure it being difficult to produce increased it's value. Sure gold and bitcoin are stores of value and currency, but we don't usually make our boxers out of them.
giraffe_lady 3y ago
Silk has unique characteristics as a material, and in a pre-plastic pre-industrial world with relatively few viable fabric materials (and all of them profoundly labor-intensive by modern standards) it would have been valuable regardless. Obviously its rarity, social connotations, and mysterious origins had a huge effect on its value. But like gold, its characteristics alone are enough to cause people to go through the trouble to acquire it initially, enough for those other factors to take over.
- peteradio 3y ago
  IMO we shouldn't have started wearing clothes to begin with, it was a bad call. If my ancestors could have just held off on that I'd have nice thick fur right now.
  - whythre 3y ago
    I mean… if you stick to the areas that mimic the early hominid climate you don’t really need them. Lots of modern tropical tribes wear functionally zero clothing.
mistrial9 3y ago
silk materials relate to a sensual world, where the touch, feel and quality of the physical embodiment is valued highly.. It is possible that English-style commerce downplays this sensual value, preferring all forms of money, e.g. rare coins, stamps, securities and financial agreements, as higher value. It is an example of a polarity. There is a rumor that Bill Gates will not pay for art because "that is not worth money" .. he famously had giant digital screens hung in his thirty thousand square foot home, displaying reproductions of famous art without paying for them. Yet, he has spent millions of dollars building and acquiring software patents, which are applied with attorneys to generate many times that income. I suggest that is directly reflective of that cultural difference.

ptsneves 3y ago

Byzantine history is so important to understand the modern world. It gives us the context for the orthodox/west divide; it gives us an example of a economic and intellectual superpower needing to live with the realities of barbarian neighbors, and being destroyed! It shows us great statecraft lasting a thousand years. It even shows us why generals and senior civil servants were eunuchs and how the next best thing was celibate people. This is the reason why catholic priests should be celibate and therefore the answer against nepotist corruption. We all know how nepotism is a serious issue in states everywhere in the world. I became a fan of the Byzantines and seriously found team Roman Catholic to be a bunch of barbarians. I say team Roman Catholic because this small book[1] makes Byzantine history and trivia so humorous. [1] https://global.oup.com/academic/product/a-cabinet-of-byzantine-curiosities-9780190625948?cc=ru&lang=en& https://global.oup.com/academic/product/a-cabinet-of-byzanti...

nerdponx 3y ago
One thing I learned recently is that 12th Century Fourth Crusade actually culminated in sacking Constantinople and establishment of the "Latin Empire", as the intended successor of the Byzantine Empire, which only existed for a brief time before it was recaptured by a rump state founded by exiled Byzantine aristocrats. Apparently (and understandably) this led to major deterioration in East-West Christian relations, and furthermore the resulting weakening of the Byzantine Empire is what might have enabled the Ottoman Empire to eventually conquer the Byzantine Empire in the 15th Century. The level of geopolitical chaos involved in such an event is unimaginable today. Even the messiest of 20th century wars seem downright orderly by comparison.
- qwytw 3y ago
  The Fourth Crusade was preceded by: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massacre_of_the_Latins https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massacre_of_the_Latins which was a reaction to the empire becoming near completely dominated by westerns both economically and (to a lesser degree) politically. The last coup attempt/civil war (which was also a near permanent issue in the empire) before the massacre was between a French Princess ruling the empire as a regent for her underage son and her stepdaughter who was married to a Frankish nobleman from the Outremer (he was -the second highest ranking official in the empire and seemingly the heir apparent together with his wife). Had they succeeded the Empire would probably have had its first Latin Emperor (or at least co-Emperor) without even being directly conquered. Of course instead it ended with late emperor's cousin* murdering (he forced the 12 year old emperor to sign her mothers death warrant and before having him assassinated soon after). mothers everyone and taking the throne for himself after he masterfully utilized the widespread public hatred towards the Latins amongst the general population.. *Andronikos Komnenos, who was in his middle 60s at the time and while being quite a terrible person had a very interesting life. Amongst other things (while in exile due all kinds of scheming) he seduced the former queen of Jerusalem (who happened to be his niece..) and up having two children with her after they ran away to the Turkish Sultanate of Damascus. Eventually she was captured by the emperor who used her to lure Andronikos into Constantinople and then (unfortunately for the emperor's son) decided pardon him and exile him to a remote province instead of executing him.

vrglvrglvrgl 3y ago

[dead]

infamia 3y ago

Byzantine history is interesting and vastly underappreciated (IMO). If you'd like to learn a bit more, the "12 Byzantine Rulers" podcast is a good place to start. It starts off a touch stiff, but loosens up and is great overall. https://12byzantinerulers.com/ https://12byzantinerulers.com/

bjackman 3y ago
I can also recommend the History of Byzantium podcast for anyone that wants to to extremely deep into the timeline. I've listened to all 265 episodes so far, and I'm still thrilled every time a new one comes out!

m00dy 3y ago

It is so fascinating that I can find "ottoman" keyword at least 6 times on this thread even-though this smuggling had happened way before the ottomans concurred the Byzantine.

cgio 3y ago
Your comment would have upped the incidence of said keyword by 33% at the time it was published.

cubefox 3y ago

Perhaps a naive question: What was so special about silk? It seems it was just a luxury article for the rich. I assume unlike today, not many people had a lot of disposable income to spend on luxury products. So I don't understand how silk could have been economically relevant compared to other non-luxury goods.

Jun8 3y ago

It seems there's a lot of interest for Byzantine History on HN, that's fantastic! My friends and I have run a book club for the past four years on Ancient History with focus on the Eastern Roman Empire. Most books we read were kind of dry. Here's a list of books I found readable and engaging if you want to delve deeper: * Byzantium trilogy by Norwich. If you don't want to get all three, I suggest getting The Apogee (2nd volume). Fantastically readable and solid historical work with a generous side of gossip. * Alexiad by Anna Komnene. Written around 1140 after Anna was deposed to a convent, this biography of her father, Alexios, has an immediacy that history books cannot match. The end will probably bring you to tears. * Anecdota (Secret History) by Procopius. For pure titillation factor cannot be beat! Severe attack against Justinian, Theodora, Belisaurus, and his wife Antonina. "Severe" is an understamenet really, here's Procopius on Theodora's depraved youth: On the field of pleasure she was never defeated. Often she would go picnicking with ten young men or more, in the flower of their strength and virility, and dallied with them all, the whole night through. When they wearied of the sport, she would approach their servants, perhaps thirty in number, and fight a duel with each of these; and even thus found no allayment of her craving. Once, visiting the house of an illustrious gentleman, they say she mounted the projecting corner of her dining couch, pulled up the front of her dress, without a blush, and thus carelessly showed her wantonness. And though she flung wide three gates to the ambassadors of Cupid, she lamented that nature had not similarly unlocked the straits of her bosom, that she might there have contrived a further welcome to his emissaries. So, she fit the full Messalina archetype. Full text available at Fordham (https://sourcebooks.fordham.edu/basis/procop-anec.asp https://sourcebooks.fordham.edu/basis/procop-anec.asp). Here's an interesting paper on the depiction of Theodora in the Secret History (https://www.mcgill.ca/classics/files/classics/2004-09.pdf https://www.mcgill.ca/classics/files/classics/2004-09.pdf) * Chronographia by Michael Psellos covers the reigns of 14 emperors and empresses in a 100 time period

mr_toad 3y ago
I’m not convinced that Procopius wasn’t just writing erotic fiction.
- rippercushions 3y ago

emmelaich 3y ago

Related, the Melvyn Bragg podcast on Marco Polo is excellent https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01hxpxh https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01hxpxh

Khaine 3y ago

There is a great podcast (https://thehistoryofbyzantium.com https://thehistoryofbyzantium.com) that is carrying on from Mike Duncan's excellent history of Rome podcast. They just got up to the 4th Crusade sack of Constantinople.