Lecture 17: 1492—Globalization and Fusion Cuisines

1492—Globalization and Fusion Cuisines......................................

Lecture 17

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his lecture is partly about exploration and the expansion of the

economy, but it is mostly about how the desire for spices and other

luxury items connects the entire globe. This lecture is also about

how plants, animals, and diseases were, for the fi rst time in human history,

transported across continents—not just from the Americas to Europe,

but also from Asia, Africa, and Europe to everywhere. In this lecture, you

will learn that the globalization of the food supply was probably the most

important event in human history since the discovery of agriculture.

The Venetian Spice Trade Monopoly

 In the mid-15th century, the Venetians had pretty much monopolized

the spice trade. They picked up spices and luxury goods like silks,

gold, drugs, and dyestuff in the eastern Mediterranean and brought

it to the rest of Europe. The Venetians used galleys—which are big,

rowed, fl at-bottomed ships that can hold a lot of cargo—to hold

onto their monopoly. Spices and silks don’t take up much room, so

the Venetians armed these ships and fi lled them with guns to protect

their trade.

 The Venetians captured a long stretch of land extending down the

Dalmatian coast all the way to Corfu in Greece, Crete, and Cyprus for

a while to serve as stopping off points and to provide friendly harbors

in case they’re chased by pirates or hostile Turks. The Venetian state

supported these enterprises. They built themselves a maritime empire

with colonies that were basically military garrisons.

 The importance of this model is that it was imitated by the

Portuguese. Portugal faces the Atlantic, in which galleys are not of

much use, which meant that they were forced to develop a different

kind of sea-worthy vessel—and they did. They also had to develop

methods of navigation that were more sophisticated than those used

in the Mediterranean.