Spices, scents and silks were at the centre of world trade for millennia. Through their international trade, humans were pushed to explore and then travel to the far corners of the earth. Almost from their inception, the earliest great civilizations - Egypt, Sumer and Harappa - became addicted to the luxury products of far-off lands and established long-reaching trade networks. Over time, great powers fought mightily for the kingdoms where silk, spices and scents were produced. The New World was accidentally discovered by Columbus in his quest for spices. In this book, eminent horticulturist and author James Hancock examines the origins and early domestication and culture of spices, scents and silks and the central role these exotic luxuries played in the lives of the ancients. The book also traces the development of the great international trade networks and explores how struggles for trade dominance and demand for such luxuries shaped the world.

This publication tells the story of the silk, scent and spice trade routes. Both a history and travelogue, this book is filled with color photographs, illustrating the author's journeys along routes once traced by trade caravans and vessels. Besides exotic merchandise these routes also carried new ideas, technologies and religions across vast distances, shaping the history of humanity. The oldest route was the Incense Trail, which linked the frankincense-producing regions of Arabia with the empires of antiquity. The Silk Road was the longest of the routes, stretching across mountains, desert and the steppes of Central Asia, joining the markets of China with those of Europe and the Middle East. The Spice Route connected the great civilizations of Europe, India and the Orient for over 2,000 years. Arab dhows, Chinese junks and Spanish galleons would sail this route laden with precious spices from Southeast Asia and the treasures of the Orient. Their trade of these routes bred international rivalries and conquests, and the search for these riches impelled Columbus to cross the Atlantic and Magellan to circumnavigate the globe.--Publisher's description.

This book examines the relationship between the fine arts and economics —the contribution of various art forms toward economic growth and development, and the impact of economic factors on the creation of art.Xavier Greffe identifies the economic factors that can affect the emergence, flourishing, and disappearance of artistic activities. He begins with an analysis of the artistic markets where the players cannot be measured by standard economic yardsticks. The cast of characters include users who are initially unaware of the kind of satisfaction they can gain from unknown works of art, producers who do not know whether their upfront costs in the commissioning of new art and design will be covered, and the artists who are more interested in letting the creative muse guide their endeavors than in creating specifically defined works on demand. The book then explores the various dynamics that influence the development of the artistic sector: a revolving compromise between heritage and creation; a continuous passage between an original work of art and the products of cultural industries; and a permanent shift between profit and nonprofit institutions.Greffe provides a way to evaluate art from an economic perspective —that explains both the creation and development of creative movement, without judging the existence of works of art only in terms of economic logic.

In recent decades, there has been a new surge of interest in the history and legacies of the Silk Roads both within academic and public discourses. A field of Silk Roads Studies has come into its own. Consciously mirroring the temperament of its subject, the field has moved out of the narrow niches of particular disciplines to become a truly interdisciplinary endeavor. New research findings about the historical operations of the Silk Roads and interpretations of their legacies for the modern and contemporary world have broken down geographical and temporal divides that once demarcated the Silk Roads as primarily pre-modern and Old World-centered conduits of globalization. In light of these developments, the time is ripe to begin formulating a new definition of the contour of Silk Roads Studies and laying a new foundation for further work in this field. Silk Roads: From Local Realities to Global Narratives brings together leading scholars in multiple disciplines related to Silk Roads studies. It highlights the multiplicity of networks that constituted the Silk Roads, including land and maritime routes, and approaches the Silk Roads from Antiquity to China’s One Belt One Road Initiative from Afro-Eurasia to the Americas. This holistic approach to understanding ancient globalization, exchanges, transformations, and movements - and their continued relevance to the present - is in line with contemporary academic trends toward interdisciplinarity. Indeed, the Silk Roads is such an expansive topic that many approaches to its study must be included to represent accurately its many facets. The volume emphasizes exchange and transformation along the Silk Roads - moments of acculturation or hybridization that contributed to novel syncretic forms. It highlights the multiplicity of networks that constituted the Silk Roads, including land and maritime routes, and approaches to the Silk Roads from Antiquity to China’s One Belt One Road Initiative from Afro-Eurasia to the Americas.

A sensory journey though time, interpreting social (and political) history through the scents used by people from the Ancient Egyptians to Coco Chanel.

Lunar July half, ghost door wide open, the mother gave birth to me in July, but grandma was scared, said my life made seven words, is a short-life ghost, can not live seven days to die, in order to save me, grandma called three elder brothers to cheat me into the coffin, said this is the local custom, but I unexpectedly saw a little girl in the coffin......