User Login
British assimilation of culture very rough
Many of the European world’s first interactions with other cultures were through the early trade industry of the 1700 and 1800 hundreds. During this time ships from Britain were sailing to farther and farther ports and discovering new land and vast new opportunities through interactions with the local cultures, two of the most primary to trade being the orient and the newly discovered America. In the relatively untouched New World Europeans discovered a strange indigenous man with confusing customs and a seemingly heathen demeanor but with an abundance of precious furs ready for trade with the already bustling ports of China. Through the expansion of a trade system with both of these seemingly eccentric peoples Europeans gained not only wealth but precious information, inventions, and an understanding of foreign identities. In Eastern Origins of Western Civilization, the author John Hobson quotes the 1600’s philosopher Francis Bacon,
“…The three most important world discoveries were printing, gunpowder, and the compass. Strikingly, all
three were invented in China. (Novum Organum, 1620) Noteworthy too is that it was the Chinese who
discovered around 1000 the magnetic north and true north were not one and the same.” (pg. 57)
Trade between Europe and China dates a far back as the 1500’s with Europe’s main export being silver that was exchanged for luxurious commodities such as silk textiles. With the introduction of the East Indian trading company in the early 1600’s Britain became a major force behind trade between the eastern and the western world and the trade between it and China boomed. China in turned then fueled a global exchange cycle of gold and silver that tied much of the trading systems together. Hobson discusses China’s vital role in early trade,
“This global arbitrage system saw the constant shifting of silver into China which was then exchanged for gold. This in turn was exported abroad principally to Europe where it was exchanged for silver and then sent back to China where it was exchanged for gold…Interestingly, even after the 1640’s , when arbitrage profits diminished, silver still poured into China because of the continuing strong demand for its products.” (pg. 67)
It is not surprising that with this long history of trade between two world super powers of China and Britain that numerous ideas and inventions would be assimilated by both cultures. It maybe more surprising to some however that history points to the majority of the assimilation being by Britain at the expense of their Chinese fellow merchants, upon further inspection this point seems natural, of the two China is by far the more ancient civilization.
