Anderson,+Bills,+Cho,+Manzaneres

= **__﻿Group 1: Intro to Trade__** = = **__Intro__** =
 * ======A long time ago, ** long distance trade ** was only a small fraction of overall trade======
 * Long distance trade, for the most part supplied luxury goods such as silks, gold, spices, and other expensive goods.
 * These goods were very valuable relative to weight. Merchants would carry them across hundreds of thousands of miles to make substantial profits.
 * **Commercial goods** like raw wool and cotton were traded over medium distances because their worth was not associated with their weight.
 * Transportation cost was justified because the raw material was more valuable after being put into finished products like clothes and blankets
 * Textbook Review

= **__World Trade: Historical Analysis__** =
 * Historians have many questions about international trade history.
 * They debate about how much government involvement should occur in economic markets.
 * In a **free market economy**, there would be no regulation by the government concerning trade.
 * Societies, on the other hand, regulate trade somewhat to serve the greater good of the society.
 * In times of war, the government will ration food and necessities to make sure every member of the society has access to the basics to survive.
 * Market economies have not always been a part of the exchange of goods and services.
 * The Government regulated trade in the early societies of ** Egypt **, ** Mesopotamia **, and ** China. **



**__Trade Networks__**

 * Long distance merchants encouraged trade between the societies they lived in.
 * In order to create far-flung networks of trade, merchants formed ** "trade diasporas " **, networks of interconnected communities in major cities throughout Africa, Europe, and Asia.
 * During the height of the Roman Empire, traders from Rome sailed the Mediterranean Sea and the Indian Ocean, occasionally continuing all the way to China.
 * Usually these traders weren't ethnically Roman. Many were Jews, Greek-speaking Egyptians, and Arabs.
 * The Roman traders left heritage in their **diasporas** and created religious communities of Jews, Christians, and Muslim Arabs.
 * The merchants were marginal to the societies they visited rather than a part of them. They did not occupy positions in the center of the host society.
 * They were regulated by their hosts and were forced to make a reasonable profit in exchange for benefits in port cities.
 * Trade Routes

**__Trade in the Americas before 1500__**

 * There were two major trade networks in the Western Hemisphere.
 * The North to South network ran along the pacific coast and in the spine of the Andes Mountains.
 * The North American region had the smallest networks of trade in 1500.
 * The East to West network rose to heights of 15,000 feet in altitudes along mountains.
 * The North to South network received very little traffic, while East to West received virtually none.
 * Only traffic passing through would be the rare exception of voyages, such as Leif Eriksson and Marco Polo, who arrived in China during the Ming Dynasty.
 * Before 1500, the largest part of exchange economy were **local transactions** -there weren't many long distance transactions.
 * The Americas also were not a part of the Arab trading zone before 1500.

= __Trade in the Inca Empire__ = ==
 * The early 15th century Incas engaged in a lot of trade, but was regulated by the government
 * In the 1400's, the Inca was self-sufficient and most trade was internal.
 * The trade in the empire was wide, however.
 * Only the northern region had official traders.
 * Trading included crops, medicine, feathers, and animal skins.
 * Gold working was common in highland regions.
 * The state and the semi-divine rulers controlled this trade.
 * The Incas used ** //quipu// ** to keep track of accounts and records which helped maintain organized trade.

Fun Game About Aztecs!



__**Trade in Central America and Mexico**__

 * Trade occurred between cultures.
 * The kings tightly controlled trade.
 * The Aztecs had large marketplaces; the one in Tenochtitlan had 40,000-50,000 merchants meet every five days..
 * The Tenochtitlan market had many shops, such as medicine shops, food and drink shops, and barbers.
 * Pack animals and people carried goods.
 * The Aztec government regulated the market place.
 * Although the Mayans dominated the Yucatan Peninsula through 900 CE, the Aztecs and Mayans did not work together in the trade network. ** They stayed separate **.
 * Aztec video