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Most
of the spices that were traded in Southeast
Asia came from the “spice islands”
which are now some of the islands of Indonesia
. Each spice grown on the island
was harvested in a different way. But there are a few specific spices
that were traded all the time, and were the most sought after in the
spice trade. Those spices were ginger, cinnamon, mace, nutmeg, pepper,
and cloves. Each spice was also used for a different purpose, which
will be explained.
-Ginger-
This native spice of India
and China grows
best in shaded, tropical and sub- tropical places, which means that
they need a hot and humid place. Ginger has bamboo like stems and leaves,
but the soil and climate really decide the taste and look of it. Ginger's
root is stubby and the skin is a pale greenish white to a beige color.
The brisk smell of fresh ginger can be a mild or an extremely strong
smell. It is sold and stored in many different forms such as, whole
raw root, whole fresh root, dried root, powdered root, steamed ginger,
and pickled ginger. Once it is planted it starts to sprout in 10 days
but they harvest it after around 9 months. Ginger was thought of a medicine
that could cure the plague, but it was never really proven.
Nutmeg
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-Nutmeg- Nutmeg comes from Moluccas
, which is now one of the islands
of Indonesia
. It is grown on the nutmeg tree. This tree also makes another spice
called mace. Before the nutmeg seeds can be planted in a plantation,
they must first be planted in a nursery bed for six months. Once it
is actually planted the tree takes five years to fully flower. When
it is fully mature it can produce up to 2,000 nutmegs a year. The fruit
was collected by poking at it with a long pole attached to a basket,
which looks like a lacrosse stick. Nutmeg was used for medicinal and
magical purposes. For instance, it was thought to protect people from
evil and dangerous spirits.
Mace
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- Mace- Mace is the other spice that comes
from the nutmeg tree, it is the red aril, which is a fleshy covering
around the pit seed, that's between the shell and the fruit's interior.
But the mace is not attached to the pit or the shell. Its uses are the
same as that of nutmeg. Mace was first broken into “blades” and ground
up, and then it was shipped to where it needed to go.
-Cloves-
Cloves originated from North Moluccas
. Cloves are unopened immature flower buds that come from a tropical
tree. Before the buds open the cloves are picked. Once they were picked
the cloves were placed onto a palm mat to dry out. Once the cloves are
dry they have a very strong taste that sometimes overpowers the food
that it is put on. There is a story about courtiers in China
, around 400bc, putting cloves on their tongue
so that they wouldn't talk to the emperor, for fear of insulting him.
Cloves
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- Pepper- Pepper was known as the “King
of spice” among the Europeans. In the Middle Ages pepper was the core
of European spice trade. Pepper is of a vinous plant species that is
actually a fruit called peppercorns. They ground the peppercorns up
to get fine pepper. There are three different types of pepper: Black
pepper, White pepper, Green pepper. The black pepper is the hottest
of the three and green pepper is the mildest; it has a fresher taste
than the other two peppers. The pepper that we usually use today is
Black pepper
-Cinnamon- Cinnamon is the inner bark of a tropical evergreen tree.
There were really only two kinds of cinnamon sold through the spice
trade: Cassia cinnamon, and Zylanicam cinnamon (also known as Ceylon
cinnamon). Ceylon cinnamon is lighter in weight and sweeter in taste
than Cassia cinnamon. Cinnamon is hand harvested and grown on the coastal
strip near Colombo, where it grows best.
Colombo
All of these spices where constantly being traded in the spice trade.
Each one with a different use and technique for growing, but all connected
by the spice trade and by the people who bought and sold them.
The demand for spice was outrageous because everyone wanted to get in
on the trading. They wanted to get in on the trading for several reasons,
but there were only 5 really important ones. Theses five reasons were:
1. Magical reasons, such as for spells, like people thought that certain
spices made evil spirits go away.
2. Perfumes and in fragrances. People used it in such things because
people didn't bathe that much and they needed to somehow smell decent.
3. To make food taste good and to keep food fresher longer since they
didn't have any refrigerators.
4. Poisons
5. The final reason was that people thought that spices could be used
as medicine.
But
the main reason was to keep meat from getting rotten and to make meat
that was rotten taste better. They had to make their meat taste better
do to the fact that they could not just throw their meat out since it
was expensive and they weren't rich enough to keep on buying it. So
they would put spices over it to make it smell and taste better than
if there was nothing on it at all.
The second most important reason for the demand of spices was because
spices where thought to have medical uses. For instance, ginger was
used to try and cure the plague, but unfortunately ginger really didn't
help at all.
-Connection-
There were many reasons for the demand of spices from1500 to 1700 and
those reasons are why the spice trade was so powerful. The spice trade
connected people, who had never had contact with one another before,
together. For instance people from Portugal
where interacting with people from modern
day Indonesia .
For these reasons it is evident that spices had a lot to do with global
contact.
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