The Pre-modern World: Trade, Food and Disease
The noodles in your bowl and the potato in your curry both travelled a long way. Many things we think of as 'ours' came from far away, carried by traders and travellers.
Long before modern times, societies were linked by trade, travel and migration. The silk routes carried silk, pottery, spices, ideas and religions across Asia, Europe and Africa. After Columbus reached the Americas, foods such as the potato spread to the world, and germs such as smallpox helped European conquest.
In the figure : From ancient trade to the Irish potato famine of the 1840s.
Rule 1 : Trade and ideas travel together — Goods, money, religions and skills moved along the same routes.
- Easy : Silk routes linked China, India, Central Asia, Europe and northern Africa.
- Medium : Buddhism spread from eastern India along these routes.
- Exam-type : Cowries from the Maldives reached China and East Africa as currency.
Rule 2 : Conquest, disease and the shrinking world — In the sixteenth century sea routes to Asia and America opened. Silver from American mines enriched Europe, and diseases such as smallpox weakened the people of America, who had no immunity.
- Easy : Smallpox spread ahead of the Europeans and killed whole communities.
- Medium : Plantations in America used slaves captured in Africa to grow cotton and sugar.
- Exam-type : The centre of world trade moved westwards towards Europe.
Many foods we call 'our own' (potato, tomato, chilli, maize) came from America only about five centuries ago.
Thinking European conquest of America was only due to guns. Diseases like smallpox were the most powerful 'weapon'.
Memory clue : Silk, Spice, Germ — goods and ideas went one way, germs went with them.
What happened before? (The Irish potato famine, 1845-1849) The potato, brought from America, made it possible for Ireland's poorest peasants to feed their families from small plots. Over time many became so dependent on it that it was almost their only food.
What happened next? (The Irish potato famine, 1845-1849) When disease destroyed the potato crop in the mid-1840s, the poor were left without food. The textbook says about a million people died of starvation, and about twice that number left Ireland in search of work.
Spot the difference
| Item | From where | Effect |
|---|---|---|
| Silk routes | China to Europe | Trade and spread of religions |
| Potato | America | Better diet for Europe's poor |
| Smallpox | Europe | Weakened America's people, aided conquest |
Practice questions
- 1What were the silk routes?
- 2Name two foods that came to Europe and Asia from America.
- 3Which disease helped the conquest of America?
- 4What is meant by El Dorado?
- 5Why did smallpox harm America's people so badly?
- 6Why was Ireland's poor badly hit when the potato crop failed in the 1840s?
- 7Explain how the world 'shrank' in the sixteenth century.
- 8Give cause and result: potato blight in Ireland.
Show answers (try them yourself first)
- 1Overland and sea routes linking Asia, Europe and northern Africa.
- 2Potato and maize (also tomato, chilli).
- 3Smallpox.
- 4A fabled city of gold that Europeans searched for in South America.
- 5Long isolation meant they had no immunity to diseases from Europe.
- 6They depended almost entirely on potatoes for food.
- 7European sailors found sea routes to Asia and America, linking continents that had little contact before.
- 8Cause: dependence on one crop destroyed by disease. Result: mass starvation and large-scale emigration.
The Nineteenth-Century World Economy
If your city grows and food in nearby farms is not enough, shops start bringing wheat from far away by train. In the nineteenth century Britain did this on a world scale.
Economists describe three flows: of trade (goods), labour (migration) and capital (investment). After the Corn Laws were scrapped, Britain imported cheap food, farms and railways spread across the world, and about 50 million Europeans emigrated to America and Australia. Railways, steamships, the telegraph and refrigerated ships made this possible.
In the figure : From the Corn Laws to a global agricultural economy by 1890.
Rule 1 : Cheaper food changed farms and migration — When food could be imported more cheaply than grown in Britain, farmland at home was left uncultivated and workers moved to cities or overseas, while new lands were cleared elsewhere.
- Easy : Corn Laws had limited grain imports; industrialists and city people forced their abolition.
- Medium : Railways, harbours and settlements needed capital, mostly from London.
- Exam-type : In west Punjab canals created the Canal Colonies to grow wheat and cotton for export.
Rule 2 : Technology and social change together — New technology followed economic needs. Refrigerated ships let meat travel long distances, so the poor in Europe could add meat, butter and eggs to bread and potatoes.
- Easy : Before the 1870s animals were shipped live and many died or lost weight on the way.
- Medium : Then animals were slaughtered at the starting point and sent as frozen meat, lowering prices.
- Exam-type : World trade multiplied about 25 to 40 times between 1820 and 1914.
Trade, labour and capital flows moved together; a change in one changed the others.
Thinking technology alone made the global economy. It also needed colonisation, capital and migration.
Memory clue : T-L-C — Trade, Labour, Capital: the three flows.
What happened before? (Repeal of the Corn Laws, 1846) As Britain's population and cities grew, food grain prices rose. Landed groups had won laws restricting corn imports, and industrialists and city dwellers, unhappy with high food prices, campaigned against them.
What happened next? (Repeal of the Corn Laws, 1846) Once the Corn Laws were scrapped (1846), food could be imported more cheaply than it could be produced at home. British farming could not compete; vast areas were left uncultivated, and thousands of men and women lost work and went to the cities or overseas.
Spot the difference
| Flow | Meaning | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Trade | Movement of goods | Wheat, cotton |
| Labour | Migration for work | Europeans to America and Australia |
| Capital | Long-distance investment | London money for railways |
Practice questions
- 1Name the three flows of international economic exchange.
- 2What were the Corn Laws?
- 3About how many Europeans emigrated to America and Australia in the nineteenth century?
- 4What are Canal Colonies?
- 5Why was live shipping of animals costly?
- 6How did refrigerated ships change diets in Europe?
- 7Why did lands far away like America and Australia need migrants?
- 8Link the chain: abolition of Corn Laws, then? Then? Migration.
Show answers (try them yourself first)
- 1Trade, labour and capital.
- 2Laws allowing the British government to restrict corn imports.
- 3About 50 million.
- 4Areas of west Punjab irrigated by new canals and settled by peasants from other parts of Punjab.
- 5They took up much ship space and many died, fell ill or lost weight.
- 6Cheaper meat arrived, so the poor could add meat, butter and eggs to their diet.
- 7Labour was in short supply there while new farmland was being cleared to meet Britain's food demand.
- 8Cheap imports, British farming could not compete, land left uncultivated, workers lost jobs, so they moved to cities or overseas.
Colonialism, Rinderpest and Indentured Labour
When a shopkeeper controls the only well in a village, everyone must work for him. Colonisers did something like this in Africa: they took control of what people needed to live.
In 1885 European powers met in Berlin and divided Africa between them. In the 1890s rinderpest, a cattle disease, killed about 90 per cent of cattle and helped colonisers force Africans to work for wages. Indentured labour means a worker bonded by a contract; many Indians were taken to plantations in the Caribbean, Mauritius and Fiji.
In the figure : From the partition of Africa to the end of Indian indenture.
Rule 1 : Colonialism changed livelihoods — In Africa land and cattle gave people a living, so few worked for wages. Europeans wanted labour for mines and plantations and used taxes, new inheritance laws and compounds to force people to work.
- Easy : Rinderpest arrived in the late 1880s with infected cattle imported to feed Italian soldiers in Eritrea.
- Medium : It killed about 90 per cent of the cattle and destroyed African livelihoods.
- Exam-type : Planters and mine owners then controlled the scarce cattle and forced Africans into wage work.
Rule 2 : Indentured migration and India's trade — Poor Indians from regions such as eastern Uttar Pradesh and Bihar left on contracts, often misled by agents. Meanwhile India's cotton cloth exports fell and raw material exports rose, and Britain's trade surplus with India helped balance its deficits with others.
- Easy : Indentured workers went to the Caribbean, Mauritius, Fiji, Ceylon, Malaya and Assam.
- Medium : Cotton textiles fell from about 30 per cent of India's exports around 1800 to below 3 per cent by the 1870s.
- Exam-type : Workers made new cultural forms such as Hosay in Trinidad and chutney music.
Expanding trade also meant a loss of freedom and livelihoods for many colonised people.
Thinking indentured labour was freely chosen with full knowledge. Many were misled or even forced by agents.
Memory clue : Cattle, Tax, Compound — three tools colonisers used to force Africans to work.
What happened before? (Rinderpest in Africa, 1890s) Africa had plenty of land and cattle, and people rarely worked for wages. Europeans who wanted labour for mines and plantations were short of workers and had used heavy taxes and changed inheritance laws to push people into wage work.
What happened next? (Rinderpest in Africa, 1890s) Rinderpest, carried in by infected cattle in the late 1880s, reached Africa's Atlantic coast in 1892 and the Cape five years later, killing about 90 per cent of the cattle. With cattle scarce, planters, mine owners and colonial governments took control of what was left and forced Africans into the labour market.
Spot the difference
| Topic | What happened | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Berlin, 1885 | Powers divided Africa | Straight-line borders |
| Rinderpest | Cattle plague | Loss of livelihood, forced wage work |
| Indenture | Contract labour from India | Harsh life, abolished in 1921 |
Practice questions
- 1Where and when did European powers divide Africa?
- 2What is rinderpest?
- 3What is indentured labour?
- 4Name two destinations of Indian indentured workers.
- 5Why did few Africans work for wages in the late nineteenth century?
- 6How did Indian agents mislead migrants?
- 7Explain how rinderpest helped European colonisers conquer Africa.
- 8Give a cause and result for the fall of India's cotton textile exports.
Show answers (try them yourself first)
- 1At Berlin in 1885.
- 2A fast-spreading cattle disease.
- 3A worker bonded by contract to work for an employer for a fixed time.
- 4Any two of Trinidad, Guyana, Mauritius, Fiji.
- 5They had land and livestock to live on and few goods that wages could buy.
- 6They gave false information about destinations, travel, work and conditions.
- 7It killed most cattle, destroying livelihoods; by controlling the scarce cattle colonisers forced Africans to work for wages.
- 8Cause: Britain imposed tariffs and its mills grew. Result: India's exports shifted to raw materials such as cotton and indigo.
Inter-war Crisis and the Post-war World
If everyone in a village borrows from one rich neighbour and he suddenly asks for all the money back, everyone is in trouble at once. That is how the world slipped into the Great Depression.
The First World War (1914-18) was the first modern industrial war and left Britain in debt and the US as a lender. In the 1920s the US had mass production, then the Great Depression (from about 1929) wiped out farm prices, jobs and banks. After the Second World War, the Bretton Woods conference (1944) created the IMF and the World Bank.
In the figure : From the First World War to the Bretton Woods institutions.
Rule 1 : From war to Depression — The war changed who owed whom. In the 1920s mass production, as in Henry Ford's assembly line, lifted the US, but farm overproduction and the sudden recall of US loans broke the system around 1929.
- Easy : The war killed about 9 million and injured about 20 million, mostly working-age men.
- Medium : Ford's assembly line made a car every three minutes; car output in the US rose from 2 million (1919) to over 5 million (1929).
- Exam-type : By 1933 over 4,000 US banks had closed; Indian wheat prices fell by 50 per cent between 1928 and 1934 and jute prices by over 60 per cent.
Rule 2 : Rebuilding the world economy — Leaders learnt that mass production needs mass consumption, steady jobs and government action. The Bretton Woods system fixed exchange rates, with the dollar tied to gold. Later developing countries demanded a fairer order, and fixed rates ended in the 1970s.
- Easy : The IMF deals with external surpluses and deficits; the World Bank financed reconstruction.
- Medium : The dollar was fixed at $35 per ounce of gold.
- Exam-type : Developing countries formed the G-77 and asked for a new international economic order.
Glut in farm goods plus sudden withdrawal of US loans turned a downturn into a world depression.
Thinking the Depression hit only the US. It spread to Europe, Latin America and India because economies were linked.
Memory clue : War, Boom, Bust, Bretton — the four steps of the inter-war story.
What happened before? (The Bretton Woods conference, July 1944) Economists and politicians looked back at the inter-war years. They concluded that mass production needs mass consumption and steady jobs, and that markets alone could not guarantee full employment, so governments must step in. The Second World War, in which at least 60 million people are believed to have died, made rebuilding urgent.
What happened next? (The Bretton Woods conference, July 1944) The July 1944 conference at Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, set up the IMF and the World Bank, which began operating in 1947, and a system of fixed exchange rates. From 1950 to 1970 world trade grew by over 8 per cent a year.
Spot the difference
| Period | Key feature | Result |
|---|---|---|
| 1914-18 | First industrial war | Britain in debt, US a lender |
| 1920s | Mass production and consumer boom | US prosperity, then 1929 crash |
| 1944-47 | Bretton Woods institutions | Stable growth for the industrial world |
Practice questions
- 1Why is the First World War called the first modern industrial war?
- 2Who pioneered the assembly line in cars?
- 3In which years did the Great Depression run?
- 4What are the 'Bretton Woods twins'?
- 5Why did farmers' incomes fall in the 1920s?
- 6Why was India's peasantry hit hard by the Depression?
- 7Explain the two lessons the Bretton Woods planners drew from the inter-war years.
- 8Give cause and result: the withdrawal of US loans in 1928-29.
Show answers (try them yourself first)
- 1Industrial nations used machine guns, tanks, aircraft and chemical weapons made by large-scale industry.
- 2Henry Ford.
- 3From about 1929 to the mid-1930s.
- 4The IMF and the World Bank.
- 5Overproduction caused a glut and prices fell, so farmers produced even more, worsening the glut.
- 6Farm prices fell sharply but the colonial government did not reduce revenue demands, so peasants fell into debt.
- 7First: mass production needs mass consumption, so steady full employment and government action. Second: governments should be able to control flows of goods, capital and labour.
- 8Cause: US lenders panicked at the first sign of trouble. Result: countries dependent on US loans faced crisis, European banks failed and world trade fell.
Inter-war Crisis and the Post-war World
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