Salt
Salt was once most valuable mineral that humans extracted . In ancient greek salt used to be currency and soldiers used to get paid by salt .The word salary originated from the latin words for salt and soldier (Salt paid to the soldier = salary) .
Why is salt so precious ?
Animals love salt .Salt is one the most essential component in maintaining pH value and mineral salt contains traces of calcium ,magnesium and various minerals .Readily consumable salt used to be in very short supply and we are hard wired to have liking for salt . Every FMCG company uses salt to trick our brains to spend more on junk foods .
Salt and politics
Salt taxes were introduced by governments all over the world and this lead to many protests and political changes across the world .One of the reason behind the french revolution is attributed to the raise in slat tax .In India also Gandhi started salt satyagraha to protest against salt taxes .
Salt as a preservative
Salt can preserve things for long .Chlorine in the salt ionises water molecules in microbes and de-stabilises the cell chemistry .
Salt helped human beings to preserve meat and fruits .This in-turn helped in long expeditions ,big wars and exploration .
Many roads were created in Europe to transport salt and salt roads created the first network of roads in Europe .
Spices as preservatives
Like salt ,pepper(and spices) also has some very unique capabilities .In India some of the spiciest food comes from the hottest/humid regions like Rajastan,Andhra,TN etc .
Microbes thrive in hot and humid climates .Adding spices makes it tastier and keep it fresh for few more hours .
Karam is the old tamil word for spicy flavour .The word curry originated from it.
Evolution of spices
Spices are very unique to tropical climates .Some of the spices requires unique climatic conditions and it is not easy to cultivate in non-tropical climate .
Chemical compounds that form spices are plant’s evolutionary tricks to keep away mammals from eating them .Usually the seeds gets digested in animal stomach and does not get dispersed .Plants evolved to create certain chemical compounds that can irritate the mucus membrane in mouth and stomach of animals .Birds doesn't have mucus membrane and can consume large amounts of chilly pepper . Additionally these compounds protects plants from insects ,fungus and other microbes .Some of the compounds are known to have strong antibiotic effects .
In India western ghats (Konkan to Kerala) is home to some the unique spices in the world .Bio-diversity in these rain forests forced the plants to evolved to various spices with strong flavours to attract birds and scare away insects .
Black gold and shipping
Pepper used to reach Europe from china and silk route during BC .Jewish and arabs with the help of trade winds were able to reach the Malabar cost and procure spices from south India and far east .
Arbs and Jews had the monopoly of entire pepper trade to Europe and the arbs controlled the supply chain from India .
Muziris
Hisotry of pepper trade is incomplete without the history of Muziris .Muziri was the one of the world’s busiest port during the last century of BC and initial few centuries of AD .The location of this port is not certain .There are detailed descriptions about the port in Greek,Jewish and Arab history and folk songs .
Tamil classical works during sangham period talks about the trading vessels visiting muziris and trading pepper and gold .
Ilango Adikal the Jain poet who wrote chillpathikaram has written about the port in his classical works .He was the prince of Kodungaloor and it is speculated that the muziris is kodungaloor .
Greek produced the map of the world in BC and it has muziris plotted in south of greek
Arabs controlled the supply chain and Jewish traders with vast network of trade routes controlled the supply from Arabia to Europe .Rise of ottoman empire and the capture of Constantinople strained the relationship between islamic world and Europe .This forced the Europeans to find an alternative supply route for spices .
Arabs with its formidable naval power controlled the arabian sea and trade winds helped the arabs to sail faster and safer way to India .
Portuguese were the first to find the route to Malabar cost through cape of good hope in south africa . Legend is that an arab ship due to rough weather lost its way and crashed near Cape of good hope and the Portuguese caught the arabs and tortured them to find the exact route to muziris .
Opium + Salt + Pepper
Salt and pepper helped the Europeans to stock meat and preserve fish for even bigger expeditions .
Opium was part of spice trade .Many anthropologists are of the opinion that opium usage enabled sailors to take more risks and sail through through some of the roughest oceans around Africa .
Opium wars was one of the the most ridicules war British ever initiated . Like today ,there was huge balance of payment issue with British and Chinese .British forced china to accept opium as payment for the goods and china rejected it and that resulted in war .How ridicules is that. ? ..Drugs as payment??? .
Change in diet and spice trade
Spice trade driven expeditions introduced variety of crops to different parts of the world .Some of the crops introduced to India by Portuguese are
- Cashew Nuts
- Pineapple
- Tapioca
- Green chiles (chiles that we have with lemon for good luck got introduced in 16th century 😳)
- Citrus
- Rubber
- Papaya
- Corn
- Ground nuts
- Tomato
- Maize
- Kidney Bean
- Guava
- Tobacco
- Tea
Most of these have become the part of regular Indian diet and many have become staple food for millions .Tapioca saved millions from starvation in India and Africa .
