Silk Roads by Peter Frankopan (Chapters 9-13)

Chapter 9: The Road to Hell
Genghis Khan and the Mongols build a great land empire -- history's largest -- in the 13th century. This chapter details reasons for GK's success, effects (both good and bad) of being conquered by the Mongols, rise of the Mamluks in Egypt (vs. Mongols), outcome/effects of the Crusades for Europe.

Some key bits:

• Mongols were great learners/borrowers, "copying designs for catapults and siege engines created for the Crusaders in the Holy Land and using them against targets in East Asia in the late thirteenth century. Control of the Silk Roads gave their masters access to information and ideas that could be replicated and deployed thousands of miles away." (157)
• Fear of the Mongols led to them being called Tartars, "a reference to Tartarus – the abyss of torment in classical mythology" (159)
• Not GK, but his son Ogodei is responsible for the "dramatic attacks on Russia and the Middle East and the invasion that brought Europe to its knees." 
• Threat of Mongols brought Christians together: "Where priests and princes in Europe had failed to reunite popes and patriarchs, the Mongols had succeeded: attacks from the east, and the very real threat that they would be repeated, had brought the church to the point of full reunion."
• Europe was repeatedly spared attacks because "neither Anatolia nor Europe was the focus of their attention simply because there were fatter and better targets elsewhere" like Beijing, Baghdad, and Egypt which had been taken by the Mamluks, fellow steppes-nomads and former slaves, who dealt the Mongols their first big defeat at Ayn Jalut in Palestine, 1260: 
• "Put simply, Europe was not the best prize on offer. All that stood in the way of Mongol control of the Nile, of Egypt’s rich agricultural output and its crucial position as a junction on the trade routes in all directions was an army commanded by men who were drawn from the very same steppes: this was not just a struggle for supremacy, it was the triumph of a political, cultural and social system. The battle for the medieval world was being fought between nomads from Central and eastern Asia."
• After attempts to ally with the Mongols against the Mamluks failed, Europe eventually gave up their crusading focus on the Holy Land. 

Chapter 10: The Road of Death and Destruction

This chapter covers successes of the Mongols, which came about partly as a result of good timing: encouraging trade, religious tolerance, growth of states (like Russia), safety and the rule of law, opening Europe to new horizons, and improving maritime trade links. But the most impactful result was disease/plague.

• As trade with the Levant/Holy Land closed off due to Mamluk control, Italians kept trying to make connections to Asia, looking for other trade opportunities and "resumed large-scale slave trading, buying captives to sell on to Mamluk Egypt, in defiance of attempts by the papacy to ban the trafficking of men, women and children to Muslim buyers." 
• The Black Sea became a major trade zone, largely due to Mongols' keeping taxes low: "Mongols’ success lay not in indiscriminate brutality but in their willingness to compromise and co-operate...."
• Mongols' theme was unity, overriding tribal identities and exercising "remarkable broad-mindedness when it came to the question of faith." In fact, under Mongol protection, Christianity started to regain footing in Asia and spread east. 
• Mongols laid the groundwork for the rise of the Russian state: "the Mongols’ system of government ... laid the ground for Russia’s transformation into a fully fledged autocracy by empowering a small handful of individuals to lord it over the population, as well as over their peers." 
• Europe was transformed as "Asia as a whole entered into Europe’s field of vision" and classical texts were rediscovered. A sense of "new horizons opening up." 
• Causes and deep effects of the Black Plague: "despite the horror it caused, the plague turned out to be the catalyst for social and economic change that was so profound that far from marking the death of Europe, it served as its making. The transformation provided an important pillar in the rise – and the triumph – of the west."
• increased wages in Europe, empowering the peasantry and weakening the landed classes
• demand for luxury goods, and Europe's productivity (to the point that they became exporters of something other than slaves!)
• better diets, health, and life expectancy than before 
• faster economic growth and urbanization in Northern Europe (which had been further behind and where competition wasn't hampered by traditional forces like guilds)
• Are the roots of the modern industrial revolution in the Black Plague? 
• "As modern research is increasingly making clear, the roots of the industrial revolution of the eighteenth century lay in the industrious revolution of the post-plague world: as productivity rose, aspirations were cast upwards and levels of disposable wealth increased along with opportunities to spend it." 
• Rise of the Ottomans, who conquered Constantinople in 1453
• Problems arising in the 14th century: climate change (cooling, volcanic activity) combined with a global financial crisis as "the precious-metal supply that had provided a common currency linking one side of the known world with the other – albeit not always in standard unit, weight or fineness – broke down and failed: there was not enough money to go round." 
• Other things: Guangzhou's importance as a trade center; the accounts of European traveler Francesco Pegolotti; innovations in credit and the use of silver in a monetized economy; Asia's growth and ambition, too (Timur's conquests in Central Asia, Zheng He's voyages); Jews escaped the Reconquista in Spain to be welcomed by the Ottomans in Constantinople.

Chapter 11: The Road of Gold. This chapter talks about the discovery of the New World, which led to literally a "Golden Age" of gold/silver flowing from the New to the Old World. Also, motivations behind the voyages of discovery, effects on Europe, Native Americans, Africans, etc. There wasn't a lot I didn't know about already, but as elsewhere in the book, some of the framing/context statements were really great. Some highlights: 

• The rise of the west was built on "the capacity to inflict violence on a major scale. The Enlightenment and the Age of Reason, the progression towards democracy, civil liberty and human rights, were not the result of an unseen chain linking back to Athens in antiquity or a natural state of affairs in Europe; they were the fruits of political, military and economic success in faraway continents." 
• Exploration from the Iberian peninsula was "driven in part by attempts to access the gold markets of West Africa." (Provides background information on Wangara traders, Timbuktu, Mansa Musa)
• The first "discoveries" were islands off the Atlantic coast: "Of crucial importance were the island groups in the eastern Atlantic, which facilitated exploration, providing harbours and havens that could serve as bases for taking on provisions and fresh water and enabling ships to sail further from home with greater security." 
• "The real breakthrough came when entrepreneurial ships’ captains realised that in addition to trading oil and skins and looking for opportunities to buy gold, there were easier and better opportunities on offer. As had proved the case many times before in the history of Europe, the best money was to be had in the trafficking of people. The African slave trade exploded in the fifteenth century: it proved highly lucrative from the outset."
• Columbus' voyages were disappointments, until his fortunes first changed with the "pearl bonanza" -- "In 1498, while exploring the Paria peninsula in what is now northern Venezuela, Columbus came across locals wearing strings of pearls around their necks and shortly afterwards discovered a set of islands with astonishingly rich oyster beds."
• Columbus et. al. liked to show off their weapons: "their instruments of death, which had evolved from centuries of near-incessant fighting against both Muslims and neighbouring Christian kingdoms in Europe."
• c.f. Silk Roads: "The sea lanes to Europe now became thick with heavily laden ships from the Americas. This was a new network to rival those across Asia, in both distance and scale, and soon surpassed them in value: scarcely imaginable quantities of silver, gold, precious stones and treasures were carried across the Atlantic."
• Economic exploitation: "It was as if a highly tuned engine had been switched on, pumping the riches from Central and South America directly to Europe." 
• Cultural effects on Europe: "A New World had been discovered overseas, but a new world was also being created at home, one where vibrant new ideas were encouraged, where new tastes were indulged, where intellectuals and scientists jostled and competed for patrons and funding. The rise in disposable incomes for those directly involved in the exploration of the continents and the wealth they brought back funded a cultural transfusion that transformed Europe."
• Effects on religion: "Europe’s new wealth gave it swagger and confidence, and also reinforced faith in a way that the recapture of Jerusalem had been expected to do. To many, it was entirely obvious that the seemingly limitless fortune yielded from the Americas was an affirmation of God’s blessings and had been ‘ordained by the Lord on high, who both gives and takes away kingdoms from whomever and in whatever way he wishes’. The dawn of a new era, a veritable Golden Age, caused the fall of Constantinople to the Turks in 1453, which had prompted wailing, breast-beating and tears in the streets of Rome, to be forgotten."
• Reinventing the past: "The task now was to reinvent the past. The demise of the old imperial capital presented an unmistakable opportunity for the legacy of ancient Greece and Rome to be claimed by new adoptive heirs – something that was done with gusto. In truth, France, Germany, Austria, Spain, Portugal and England had nothing to do with Athens and the world of the ancient Greeks, and were largely peripheral in the history of Rome from its earliest days to its demise. This was glossed over as artists, writers and architects went to work, borrowing themes, ideas and texts from antiquity to provide a narrative that chose selectively from the past to create a story which over time became not only increasingly plausible but standard. So although scholars have long called this period the Renaissance, this was no rebirth. Rather, it was a Naissance – a birth. For the first time in history, Europe lay at the heart of the world."

Chapter 12: The Road of Silver.  This chapter is about the effects of the New World's riches on Eurasia: revival of monarchy with greater centralization and tax revenues, increased trade, etc. 

• Portugal's aggression in Asia: Vasco da Gama = Alexander the Great, "opening up a new and unfamiliar world in the east" for Portugal that rivaled or exceeded Spain's discoveries in the western hemisphere. "Columbus spoke of potential; da Gama had delivered results." Da Gama story about sinking a ship of Muslims returning from the hajj to India shows Portugal's aggressive and antagonistic behavior. Erasmus quote on Muslims vs. Christians. 
• But this was no clash of civilizations! Venice fearing for its future, losing its strangle-hold on trade to the east; turned to Muslim Egypt and the Ottomans for help! 
• The initial burst of Portuguese exploration had been accompanied with swaggering violence and brutal intolerance. It did not take long, however, for things to settle down and for the initial swashbuckling rhetoric about the triumph of Christianity and the demise of Islam to give way to a more sanguine and realistic approach. With commercial opportunities aplenty, attitudes to Islam, Hinduism and Buddhism quickly softened – just as they had done in the Crusader states, as bluster was replaced by acknowledgement that a heavily outnumbered minority needed to establish a working relationship to ensure its survival....[U]nlike in the Americas, the discovery of the route to the east generally became a story of co-operation rather than conquest. The result was a huge increase in trade from east to west."
• Old trade routes continued and even "thrived thanks to rising demand in Europe," and also were less risky than the new sea routes.
• The rise of the Ottomans as challengers to the Portuguese in Asia. Sefer Reis was an Ottoman pirate, for example.
• Rise of Mughal India: "Gold and silver taken from the Americas found its way to Asia; it was this redistribution of wealth that enabled the Taj Mahal to be built. Not without irony, one of the glories of India was the result of the suffering of ‘Indians’ on the other side of the world."
• Horse trade and the renewal of trade across Central Asia.
• Silver mines at Potosi --> tons of silver being sent to Asia (esp. China!) in return for exports, spices, horses, etc. 
• Manila as "the world's first global city"
• Adam Smith: "the discovery of America and that of a passage to the East Indies by the Cape of Good Hope, are the greatest and most important events recorded in the history of mankind"

Chapter 13: "The Road to Northern Europe" This chapter details the shift in power from southern to northern Europe, from Italy/Spain/Portugal to the Dutch and English. Some especially interesting or surprising parts: 

• England-Ottoman alliance: "At a time when most of Europe looked on with horror as Turkish forces were all but knocking on the gates of Vienna, the English backed a different horse." Allying with anyone against Spain and Portugal, Elizabeth I stood apart in being willing to work with the Ottomans. "Positive views of the Ottomans and of the Muslim world spread into mainstream culture in England." Nonetheless, England achieved little success: "By the start of the seventeenth century, there was little to show for the attempts to emulate the success of the Spanish and the Portuguese."
• Spain as profligate lottery winner: Meanwhile, despite all the wealth from the Americas, Spain fell into debt: "It was like a lottery winner that had gone from rags to riches – only to squander the prize money on luxuries that were unaffordable."
• Meanwhile, the Dutch launched a plan: "Suddenly free from military pressure and with a window of opportunity presenting itself, the Dutch threw themselves into international trade, seeking to build connections with the Americas, Africa and Asia."
• Violence underpinned the rise of the west: "Discussions about Europe in this period emphasise that the Enlightenment and the Age of Reason saw a coming of age where ideas of absolutism were replaced by notions of freedom, rights and liberty. But it was Europe’s entrenched relationship with violence and militarism that allowed it to place itself at the centre of the world after the great expeditions of the 1490s."
• The Age of Religious Wars (religion as justification): "Fighting, violence and bloodshed were glorified, as long as they could be considered just. This was one reason, perhaps, why religion became so important: there could be no better justification of war than its being in defence of the Almighty."
• Europe's forts: "One reason why the domination of Africa, Asia and the Americas was possible was the centuries of European practice in building fortifications that were all but impregnable. Castle-building had been the staple of European society since the Middle Ages...."
• European instability: "The great irony, then, was that although Europe experienced a glorious Golden Age, producing flourishing art and literature and leaps of scientific endeavour, it was forged by violence. Not only that, but the discovery of new worlds served to make European society more unstable. With more to fight over and ever greater resources available, stakes were raised, sharpening tensions as the battle for supremacy intensified. The centuries that followed the emergence of Europe as a global power were accompanied by relentless consolidation and covetousness. In 1500, there were around 500 political units in Europe; in 1900, there were twenty-five. The strong devoured the weak."
• The Scientific Revolution and Enlightenment are labels glossing over the larger forces of militarization: "Similarly, although the names of scientists like Galileo Galilei, Isaac Newton and Leonhard Euler have become famous to generations of schoolchildren, it can be all too easy to forget that some of their most important work was on the trajectory of projectiles and understanding the causes of deviation to enable artillery to be more accurate.69 These distinguished scientists helped make weapons more powerful and ever more reliable; military and technological advances went hand in hand with the Age of Enlightenment."
• Exceptionalism of warfare in Europe: "It was not that aggression did not exist in other societies. As numerous examples across other continents would show, any conquest could bring death and suffering on a large scale. But periods of explosive expansion across Asia and North Africa, such as in the extraordinary first decades of the spread of Islam or during the time of the Mongol conquests, were followed by long periods of stability, peace and prosperity. The frequency and rhythm of warfare was different in Europe to other parts of the world: no sooner would one conflict be resolved than another would flare up. Competition was brutal and relentless. In that sense, seminal works like Thomas Hobbes’s Leviathan were quintessential texts that explained the rise of the west. Only a European author could have concluded that the natural state of man was to be in a constant state of violence; and only a European author would have been right."

Silk Roads by Peter Frankopan (Chapters 1-8)

Bloomsbury's Teacher Notes (pdf)

Preface frames things in a way that aligns with History 8. A few gems: 

• Between Europe and East Asia is the "crossroads of civilization," "the world's central nervous system." 
• Classical history of Rome was "twisted and manipulated to create an insistent narrative where the rise of the west was not only natural and inevitable, but a continuation of what had gone before" (xviii).

Chapter 1: The Creation of the Silk Road

• Persian Empire sprang up from the "crucible" of the Fertile Crescent: open, urban, highly educated, "a beacon of stability and fairness"
• Alexander the Great and the quest to expand to the EAST: legacy of cities to "defend against the threat posed by tribes of the steppes"
• Hellenism: statues of the Buddha as a response to Greek influence of the cult of Apollo
• Han China's campaign to the west (re: horses of Xinjiang, tribute to Xiongnu/Yuezhi/Scythians) opened the way for the "moment of the birth of the Silk Roads"
• Rome's reorientation to the east led to its greatness (Egypt, silk, tax revenues, commercial exchange with India, Trajan's PERSIA CAPTA)
• Rise of Sasanid Persia as Rome declined

"Seeing Rome as the progenitor of western Europe overlooks the fact that it consistently looked to and in many ways was shaped by influences from the east."

Chapter 2: The Road of Faiths

The biggest take-away is this sentence: "The struggles between different faiths were highly political" (29) as different rulers often used religion to legitimize their regimes. A few highlights:

• Spread of Buddhism to central Asia with Kushan Empire (Afghanistan today) and to China's Northern Wei (China) was for political legitimacy
• Buddhism's evolution as reflected in Lotus Sutra, key role played by Sogdian merchants
• Brakes on Buddhism's spread toward the west of its birth came with the rise of Sasanian Persia and its revitalization of Zoroastrianism.
• Christianity's "early progress was far more spectacular and more promising in the east" until Sasanian Zoroastrianism hardened in the 3rd century as a response to the threat Constantine's defense of Christianity. As Rome was a rival to Persia, Constantine's conversion "compromised Christianity's future in the east." (interesting!)

Chapter 3: The Road to a Christian East

The kicker for me was this sentence: "Indeed, even in the Middle Age, there were many more Christians in Asia than there were in Europe" (55). This chapter explains the rise of Christianity in the east (Persia and far beyond, even to Kashgar at the edge of China!) up until the 7th century, often at the expense of Zoroastrianism, Judaism, and Buddhism. Other key nuggets:

• Fall of Western Rome: environmental issues
• Rome-Persia alliance and 125-mile fortified wall b/w the Caspian and Black Seas couldn't hold back the migration pressure from the east; Alaric's sack of Rome (47)
• Xiongnu/Huns and Attila (some amazing stories on pp. 48-49)
• Echoes Bryan Ward-Perkins, author of The Fall of Rome, and the End of Civilization -- the collapse did bring a "Dark Age"
• Rome's collapse "took the sting out of Christianity in Asia" and saw a rising/strengthening Persia softening attitudes toward Christianity, though debates roiled about doctrine and heresy.
• A good paragraph on Sogdian (Afghan) traders on p. 56
• Borrowings of religious symbolism (like halos); Gnosticism's fusion of Christian-Buddhist thought

Chapter 4: The Road to Revolution

Despite Christianity's success, the stage was set for Islam's successful emergence in the 7th century. "Muhammad's warnings of imminent doomsday struck and powerful chord [and his] preaching certainly fell on fertile ground" (72)

• Turmoil in the previous century: plague, pressure from aggressive Turks to the east of Persia, ongoing conflict between Persia and Rome (extinguishing the sacred fire story on p. 64, Persia's takeover of Jerusalem in 614, religious wars, etc.)
• Reasons for Islam's success: message of unity (esp. vs. Byzantine/Persian manipulation), timing of Persia's collapse, success attracted supporters, pyramid-scheme allocation of booty, Rome and Persia's too-little-too-late response

Chapter 5: The Road to Concord

This chapter is about the unity that Islam brought to the Afro-Eurasian world, and the Golden Age that emerged:

“The chain of events that began with the intense rivalry between the Roman Empire and Persia had extraordinary consequences. As the two great powers of late antiquity flexed their muscles and prepared for a final showdown, few could have predicted that it would be a faction from the far reaches of the Arabian peninsula that would rise up to supplant both. Those who had been inspired by Muhammad truly inherited the earth, establishing perhaps the greatest empire that the world has seen, one that would introduce irrigation techniques and new crops from the Tigris and Euphrates to the Iberian peninsula, and spark nothing less than an agrarian revolution spanning thousands of miles. The Islamic conquests created a new world order, an economic giant, bolstered by self-confidence, broad-mindedness and a passionate zeal for progress. Immensely wealthy and with few natural political or even religious rivals, it was a place where order prevailed, where merchants could become rich, where intellectuals were respected and where disparate views could be discussed and debated. An unpromising start in a cave near Mecca had given birth to a cosmopolitan utopia of sorts.”

• Muslim relations with Jews/Christians, and how alliances with Jews and Christians helped Islam expand
• p. 81: The idea that Muhammad was illiterate was a defense to insulate him from accusations of plagiarism! There's a claim that the "Qur'an haas as its base a Christian lectionary ... that was adapted and remoulded." 
• Arab expansion as "an almost perfect model" that produced great wealth
• p. 87: "“So close, in fact, did Islam seem that some Christian scholars thought its teachings were not so much those of a new faith as a divergent interpretation of Christianity.” (!?)
• Tours (732) is often touted as a close escape; if Charles Martel hadn't won, Europe might have become Muslim! But from the Muslim p.o.v., western Europe held few prizes, as "wealth and rewards lay elsewhere." As a result, they didn't keep fighting for it but rather turned attention elsewhere instead. 
• Talas river brought Muslims to the edge of China and spurred revolt against Tang Dynasty China. 
• "The least of my territories ruled by the least of my subjects provides a revenue larger than your whole dominion," said the Caliph to the 9th century Emperor in Constantinople (LOL!)
• Islam brought a period of unity in trade, wealth, information/knowledge: Baghdad, paper-making skill, maritime trade system, Chinese envy, translations from various sources to consolidate wisdom while Christian Europe "withered in the gloom ... and a dearth of curiosity."

“This disdain for science and scholarship baffled Muslim commentators, who had great respect for Ptolemy and Euclid, for Homer and Aristotle. Some had little doubt what was to blame. Once, wrote the historian al-Mas ūdī, the ancient Greeks and the Romans had allowed the sciences to flourish; then they adopted Christianity. When they did so, they ‘effaced the signs of [learning], eliminated its traces and destroyed its paths’. 92 Science was defeated by faith. It is almost the precise opposite of the world as we see it today: the fundamentalists were not the Muslims, but the Christians; those whose minds were open, curious and generous were based in the east – and certainly not in Europe.”

Chapter 6: The Fur Road

This chapter is about trade to the north and the steppes of Eurasia, especially the Volga Bulghars, the Khazars, and the Rus'. "Moving from place to place did not mean that life in tribal societies was disordered," and there were great economic contributions made by the steppes' peoples: horses, grains, hazelnuts, falcons, swords, wax, honey, etc. But "Above all else, however, was the trade in animal pelts.... According to one historian, perhaps as many as half a million pelts were exported from the steppes every year" (aka the "fur road").

Vivid nuggets: 

• Ibn Fadlan's 10th-century travel account with details about the Volga Bulghars
• The story of Khazaria (with its capital at Atil) and the kaghan's conversion to Judaism, as detailed in correspondence between Hasdai ben Shaprut and the Khazar king; the Khazar's Moses coin as a defiant statement of identity
• The role of Jewish merchants as trade brokers (like the Sogdians)
• Rayy as an axis city between the steppes and settled peoples
• Vikings: "in the Viking age the bravest and toughest men did not head west; they headed east and south ... It was the lure of trade and riches in the Islamic world that initially spurred Vikings to set off on the journey south" where they founded a permanent state (Rus'), unlike ephemeral forays to the west. The coin record shows that "the amount of silver coins brought back from trading with the lands of Islam numbered in the tens and perhaps even hundreds of millions."

This chapter makes me want to read lots more about the history of Eurasian steppes people!

Chapter 7: The Slave Road

Slaves were in high demand, an economy supported by Viking Rus' markets (along with slaves from sub-Saharan Africa and taken from Turkic tribes). Comparisons to Rome: "One account that talks of a caliph and his wife owning a thousand slave girls each, while another was said to own no fewer than four thousand. Slaves in the Muslim world were as ubiquitous – and silent – as they were in Rome." 

Slave markets thrived across eastern Europe, abetted by Jewish merchants, and the rise of the European economy was "funded by large-scale human trafficking." This trade began to change nature in the 10th century, as the Khazars and Viking Rus' switched over to "protection rackets" and taxing other goods that flowed through their cities. 

Constantinople = Byzantines vs. Turks: By the 10th century, Baghdad had begun to decline, internal unrest led to the rise of the Fatimids, the Rus' were dominant on the western steppe, and their "attention began to turn away from the Muslim world to the Byzantine Empire and to the great city of Constantinople." Meanwhile, to the east, various Turks began to rise up as "beneficiaries of the weakening centre in Baghdad," chief among which were the Seljuks, who might have been Jewish or Christian, but converted to Islam after taking over Baghdad. The decisive clash came at Manzikert in 1071, where the Turks defeated the Byzantines to win Anatolia (before hoping to hit their real target, Egypt/Fatimids). After a couple decades of peace between the two sides, Byzantine Emperor subsequently called on Pope Urban II for help, setting off a call-to-arms to capture the Holy Land. 

This passage was striking to me, as I think he's implying that the rise of western Europe was fueled by human-trafficking!

"In the eighth to tenth centuries, the base commodity for sale had been slaves. But as the economies of western and eastern Europe became more robust, galvanised by huge influxes of silver coinage from the Islamic world [as payment for slaves], towns grew and their populations swelled. And as they did so, the levels of interaction intensified, which in turn led to the demand for monetisation, that is to say, trade based on coinage – rather than, for example, on furs. As this transition happened and local societies became more complex and sophisticated, stratification developed and urban middle classes emerged. Money, rather than men, began to be used as currency for trade with the east" (126).

Chapter 8: The Road to Heaven
This chapter is about the Crusades:

• The success of the First Crusade was allowed by Muslims, as "There was unspoken acquiescence in Baghdad and Cairo, based on the feeling that perhaps Christian occupation might be better than either Shīa or Sunnī rivals having control of the city" (134). 
• First Crusade unleashed anti-Semitism.
• First Crusade wasn't a success as far as Byzantium was concerned, since western European crusader kings (Bohemond, e.g.) didn't live up to agreements to turn over captured lands to the Emperor, instead keeping the wealth/power of conquest for themselves. This began a period of increasing anti-western sentiment in Constantinople, animosities between western/eastern Christians, rivalries between Byzantines and Italians, etc. 
• Dissenting voices: Roger of Sicily, who didn't want to stir up trouble with Muslims, "causing friction and interrupting trade."
• "[A]lthough the Muslims had long dominated the Mediterranean, they were about to lose control of the waves to a new set of rivals: the city-states of Italy were the latest additions to the great trading networks of the east" (136)
• Italian city-states (esp. Venice) grew rich and powerful by controlling supply lines to the precarious Crusader kings in the eastern Mediterranean, who granted them all kinds of concessions (fees, tax revenues and exemptions, favorable trade agreements, etc.)
• More about money/profit than religion, as Bernard of Clairvaux's call to arms for the Second Crusade illustrates: "To those of you who are merchants, men quick to seek a bargain, let me point out the advantages of this great opportunity. Do not miss them!"
• This was *not* a clash of civilizations! "By and large, however, for all the fiery rhetoric on both sides, relations were remarkably calm and considered. Indeed, in western Europe, there was considerable curiosity about Islam." Contacts with the east spurred scientific/intellectual achievements (Adelard).
• Led to "the economic and social blossoming of Europe in the twelfth century." Cities like Antioch, Acre became important trade centers for buying spices, textiles, and other exotic goods from the east.
• Muslims got rich too! Ramisht of Siraf
• How the whole thing unraveled for the crusaders in later Crusades: loss of Jerusalem to Saladin, antagonistic and overly-aggressive behavior towards Muslims, in-fighting to the point that greedy Venetians attacked a fellow Christian city of Zara and then went on to besiege Constantinople itself!

"The sack and capture of the biggest and most important city in Christendom showed that the Europeans would stop at nothing to take what they wanted – and needed – to get closer to the centre of where the world’s wealth and power lay.... From the very outset, men such as Bohemond had shown that the Crusades – which promised to defend Christendom, to do the Lord’s work and deliver salvation to the many who took the cross – could be hijacked for other purposes. The sack of Constantinople was the obvious culmination of the desire of Europe to connect and embed itself in the east" (151).

MSON conference take-aways

Overall, this was disappointing and a waste of time. But a few take-aways:

• powerful connections can be made with students in virtual environments; remote learning is like studying abroad
• the concept of "functionally absent"
• I didn't attend this guy's session, but I watched his talk and learned something about what to make of the diversity wheel. And I was also struck by his reasoning for having students less reading, more video-watching.
• A bunch of useful rubrics from BlendEd (engagement, curiosity, tenacity, resourcefulness, etc.)
• OWLs and Swivl

Some sessions to watch later:

• Zoom tips and tricks
• Making screencasts count
• Assessing student engagement (+ article)

Some other jottings: 

• Setting expectations: MSON guide
• Things to investigate: mentimeter, padlet, nearpod, commonlit.org, escape room assessments, flipboard for news articles
• Podcasts with soundtrap: https://www.soundtrap.com/edu/
• Virtual whiteboards:

• https://whiteboard.fi   
• miro.com
• https://jamboard.google.com/

COVID-19 School

Sam Khok school students use old ballot boxes repurposed into partitions to help limit the spread of Covid-19 during class on Wednesday, July 1, in Pathum Thani, Thailand. The Thai government recently eased isolation restrictions and reopened schools nationwide. Athit Perawongmetha/Reuters