The story of the sixteenth-century's epic contest for the spice trade, which propelled European maritime exploration and conquest across Asia and the Pacific

Spices drove the early modern world economy, and for Europeans they represented riches on an unprecedented scale. Cloves and nutmeg could reach Europe only via a complex web of trade routes, and for decades Spanish and Portuguese explorers competed to find their elusive source. But when the Portuguese finally reached the spice islands of the Moluccas in 1511, they set in motion a fierce competition for control.

Roger Crowley shows how this struggle shaped the modern world. From 1511 to 1571, European powers linked up the oceans, established vast maritime empires, and gave birth to global trade, all in the attempt to control the supply of spices.

Taking us on voyages from the dockyards of Seville to the vastness of the Pacific, the volcanic Spice Islands of Indonesia, the Arctic Circle, and the coasts of China, this is a narrative history rich in vivid eyewitness accounts of the adventures, shipwrecks, and sieges that formed the first colonial encounters -- and remade the world economy for centuries to follow.

• We started tracking this book on June 15, 2024.
• This book was £9.49 when we started tracking it.
• The price of this book has changed 2 times in the past 405 days.
• The current price of this book is £11.39 last checked 6 hours ago.
• This book is at its lowest price in the past 90 days.
• This lowest price this book has been offered at in the past year is £9.49.
• The lowest price to date was £9.49 last reached on June 15, 2024.
• This book has been £9.49 one time since we started tracking it.
• The highest price to date was £12.99 last reached on February 8, 2025.
• This book has been £12.99 one time since we started tracking it.

• HistoryAsia
• HistoryWorld

• Publication Date: April 9, 2024
• Text-to-Speech: Disabled
• Lending: Disabled
• Print Length: 388 Pages
• File Size: 443 KB