Ramana Vidyalaya (CBSE) Sholinganallur

Answer Key –13

The Making of the Global World

Name: Date: Grade

& Section: X Subject: History
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Section A - Answer the following questions briefly:
1. “The silk routes are a good example of vibrant pre-modern trade and cultural links between
distant parts of the world.” Explain.
● The name ‘silk routes’ points to the importance of West-bound Chinese silk cargoes along
this route.
● Historians have identified several silk routes, over land and by sea, knitting together vast
regions of Asia, and linking Asia with Europe and northern Africa till the fifteenth
century.
● Chinese pottery also travelled the same route, as did textiles and spices from India and
Southeast Asia.In return, precious metals – gold and silver – flowed from Europe to Asia.
● Trade and cultural exchange always went hand in hand. Early Christian missionaries
almost certainly travelled this route to Asia, as did early Muslim preachers a few
centuries later.
● Much before all this, Buddhism emerged from eastern India and spread in several
directions through intersecting points on the silk routes.

2. “Food offers many examples of long distance cultural exchange.” Support your answer with
three examples.
● Traders and travellers introduced new crops to the lands they travelled.
● Even ‘ready’ foodstuffs in distant parts of the world might share common origins.
● Take spaghetti and noodles. It is believed that noodles travelled west from China to
become spaghetti. Arab traders took pasta to Italy in the fifth century.
● Many of our common foods such as potatoes, soya, groundnuts, maize, tomatoes, chillies,
sweet potatoes, and so on were only introduced in Europe and Asia after Christopher
Columbus accidentally discovered the vast continent that would later become known as the
Americas.
● In fact, many of our common foods came from America’s original inhabitants – the
American Indians
3. "The new crops could make the difference between life and death for people." Explain with
an example from Ireland.

● Potatoes are one of the common foods introduced in Europe only after the discovery of
the Americas.
● Europe’s poor began to eat better and live longer with the introduction of the humble
potato.
● Ireland’s poorest peasants became so dependent on potatoes that when disease destroyed
the potato crop in the mid-1840s, hundreds of thousands died of starvation.

4.Describe the main features of the pre-modern world before the sixteenth century. How
did it change with the discovery of new sea routes to America?
● The pre-modern world shrank greatly in the sixteenth century after European sailors found
a sea route to Asia and also successfully crossed the western ocean to America.
● For centuries before, the Indian Ocean had known a bustling trade, with goods, people,
knowledge, customs, etc. criss-crossing its waters.
● The Indian subcontinent was central to these flows and a crucial point in their networks.
The entry of the Europeans helped expand or redirect some of these flows towards
Europe.
● After the discovery of the Americas , from the sixteenth century, its vast lands and
abundant crops and minerals began to transform trade and lives everywhere.
● Precious metals, particularly silver, from mines located in present day Peru and Mexico
also enhanced Europe’s wealth and financed its trade with Asia.

5.How did smallpox prove as the most powerful weapon of the Spanish conquerors in the
early modern phase? Explain.
● The Portuguese and Spanish conquest was not just a result of superior firepower or military
weapons.
● In fact, the most powerful weapon of the Spanish conquerors was the germs such as those
of smallpox that they carried on their person.
● Because of their long isolation, America’s original inhabitants had no immunity against
these diseases that came from Europe, but the conquerors were highly immune to this
disease.
● Smallpox in particular proved a deadly killer.
● Once introduced, it spread deep into the continent, ahead even of any Europeans reaching
there. It killed and decimated whole communities, paving the way for conquest.
 6.How did Europe emerge as the centre of world trade despite India and China?

● Until well into the eighteenth century, China and India were among the world’s richest
countries.
● They were also pre-eminent in Asian trade.
● However, from the fifteenth century, China is said to have restricted overseas contacts
and retreated into isolation.
● China’s reduced role and the rising importance of the Americas gradually moved the
centre of world trade westwards.
● Europe now emerged as the centre of world trade but until the nineteenth century,
poverty, hunger, disease spread and religious conflicts were common in Europe.
Thousands therefore fled Europe for America.
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Section B - Give very short answers to the following questions:

1. Who were the various groups of people that traveled vast distances from ancient times? Why did they
travel?
From ancient times, travellers, traders, priests and pilgrims travelled vast distances for
knowledge, opportunity and spiritual fulfillment, or to escape persecution.

2. What types of items did travelers carry with them?

They carried goods, money, values, skills, ideas, inventions, and even germs and diseases.

3. What were cowries, and what role did they play in trade?
Cowries are sea shells which were used as a form of currency in China and East Africa. It was
abundant in Maldives.

4. Give the extent of the silk route.

Historians have identified several silk routes, over land and by sea, knitting together vast regions
of Asia, and linking Asia with Europe and northern Africa till the fifteenth century.

5. What were the twin benefits of the silk route?

● Trade - Chinese pottery also travelled the same route, as did textiles and spices from India
and Southeast Asia.In return, precious metals – gold and silver – flowed from Europe to
Asia.
● Cultural Exchange - Christian Missionaries, Muslim preachers and Buddhists monks spread
their religious teachings and faith along this route.
● Traders and travellers introduced new crops to the lands they travelled.

6. Who is credited with the introduction of these foods to Europe and Asia? Why?
● Christopher Columbus
 ● He founded the sea route to the Americas which introduced many of our common foods
such as potatoes, soya, groundnuts, maize, tomatoes, chillies, sweet potatoes in Europe and
Asia

7. Why is the introduction of these foods significant in terms of agricultural practices?

● New crops were cultivated in the field.
● Change in dietary habits of the people.

8. Name the two sea routes discovered in the fifteenth century which shrunk the pre-modern world.
● Christopher Columbus discovered a sea route to the Americas in 1492.
● Vascodagama introduced a sea route which connected Europe to India in 1495.

9. Why was the Americas considered to be an important trading place in the sixteenth century?
Availability of vast lands and abundant crops and minerals

10. Which precious metal was particularly important in enhancing Europe’s wealth during this period?
Precious metals, particularly silver, from mines located in present day Peru and Mexico also
enhanced Europe’s wealth and financed its trade with Asia.

11. What was considered the most powerful weapon for the conquest of America? Why?
It was the germs such as those of smallpox that they carried on their person.
Because of their long isolation, America’s original inhabitants had no immunity against these
diseases that came from Europe.Small pox killed and decimated whole communities, paving the
way for conquest.

12. What were some of the major challenges faced by Europeans until the nineteenth century which made
them flee to America?
● Poverty and hunger were common in Europe.
● Cities were crowded and deadly diseases were widespread.
● Religious conflicts were common, and religious dissenters were persecuted.

13. What crops were primarily grown on American plantations during the eighteenth century, and for
which markets were they intended?
Cotton and sugar for European markets.

14. Which countries were among the world’s richest until well into the eighteenth century?
China and India

15. What significant change did China make in its overseas contacts from the fifteenth century onward?
From the fifteenth century, China is said to have restricted overseas contacts and retreated into
isolation.