Between east and west : the Moluccas and the traffic in spices up to the arrival of Europeans

Up to & including the Age of Discoveries, the wealth of the East was thought in Europe to consist primarily of spices & aromatics. Cloves, nutmeg, mace, & sandalwood all were thought to come from a few small islands in easternmost Indonesia, which no European reached before 1500. Yet supplies of these luxury products were reaching China, India, western Asia, & the Mediterranean lands more than a thousand years earlier. This study of Moluccan spices opens with their natural history & nomenclature, & the discovery of the Islands by Europeans near the opposing (& controversial) limits of Spanish & Portuguese jurisdiction. Donkin traces the expanding interest & long-distance trade in cloves, nutmeg, & sandalwood, first to India & then to the adjacent Arabo-Persian world. The medieval West & China lay on the margins of diffusion, the former in touch with the Levant, the latter with the trading world of South East Asia. Frontmatter List of Maps (page xi) List of Figures (page xiii) Acknowledgments (page xv) Prologue (page xvii) CHAPTER 1: NATURE, NOMENCLATURE, AND DISCOVERY OF THE MOLUCCAS BY EUROPEANS Natural History (page 1) Discovery of the Moluccas by Europeans (page 24) Notes (page 32) CHAPTER 2: INDIA Age and Area (page 47) Notes (page 72) CHAPTER 3: THE ARABO-PERSIAN WORLD Nomenclature (page 85) Notes (page 96) CHAPTER 4: THE MEDIEVAL WEST Spices and Aromata (page 105) Notes (page 130) CHAPTER 5: CHINA AND SOUTH EAST ASIA People and Ships (page 143) Notes (page 174) Epilogue (page 187) Bibliography of Works Cited (page 191) Indices (page 239) Persons (page 241) Places and Regions (page 247) Biological Categories: Orders to Species (page 257) Ethnics (page 259) Titles of Works Quoted in the Text (page 263) General (page 267) Donkin (historical geography, U. of Cambridge) begins his study of spices and sandalwood from the eastern Indian Ocean archipelago with their natural history and oriental nomenclature, and the discover of the Moluccas by Europeans. Then he traces the expanding interest and long-distance trade in cloves, nutmegs, and sandalwood, first apparently to India at an indeterminately early date, and from there to the adjacent Arabo-Persian world, the Medieval West, and China. Annotation ©2004 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR