To break the monopoly of rival hostile powers over rare and expensive kitchen commodities, the Christian kingdoms of Europe in the hope of finding alternative trade routes, explored the seas and beyond to reach the Indies which was believed to be source of spices and other valuable goods. Portugal and Spain led the European powers in the search for those goods. In the course of their explorations vast uncharted lands in the world such as the Americas were discovered. They found India and also came to know the “Secret Spice Islands” which is also called the Moluccas Islands in South East Asia.

The Portuguese under Afonso de Albuquerque sent an expedition of three ships to Moluccas that were commanded by Antonio de Abreu, Simao Afonso Bisigudo and Francisco Serrao.  In his return trip in 1512 Serrao was ship wrecked in Hitu Island in Northern Ambon where he was later able to establish a good relation with the Sultan who was impressed by his martial skills. Serrao later allied himself with the Sultan of Ternate.  Impressed by the flourishing spice trade of Moluccas, Serrao sent a letter to Ferdinand Magellan, his cousin, in Portugal to join him in Moluccas.

Ferdinand Magellan who lost favor with King Manuel I of Portugal, went to Spain in search for a new life. He believed that he could succeed where Christopher Columbus before him had failed. The later tried to reach the Indies by sailing west but he was instead drifted to the Bahamas. Magellan had been to the spice rich islands of Moluccas on a Portuguese sponsored exploration in 1501. He was able to seek audience with King Charles I of Spain and proposed to him a westward sea route to the Spice Island of Moluccas. Magellan was able to convince the king that a sea route that was free of control of a rival sea power would give Spain a competitive edge in the Spice Trade.

Image via Wikipedia

Magellan set sail for an expedition to Moluccas with 5 ships with a crew of 273. It left San Lucar de Barrameda on September 20, 1519. Magellan took the west route, crossed a strait at the tip of South America which is now named after him and ventured the vast expanse of the Pacific Ocean.  Mutiny, ship wrecks and desertions reduce the number of ships to three when Magellan reached Cebu on March 1521. His needless intervention of a local dispute among rival chieftains got him involved in a battle in Mactan where he was killed by a chieftain named Lapu-lapu. Juan Sebastian de Elcano took over the command of the remaining crew of 2 ships on the expedition’s final leg to the Moluccas.

Sebastian de Elcano reached Moluccas on November 6, 1521. He was able to deal diplomatically with the ruler of Tidore who was a rival to the Sultan of Ternate. Elcano filled the two ships with cargoes of spices for their voyage back to Spain. However, Trinidad was intercepted by the Portuguese and it was later destroyed by a storm. Victoria, the only remaining ship managed to get through and made its way back to Spain via the Indian Ocean and Cape of Good Hope sea routes.  Victoria made it to Spain on September 6, 1522 with only 18 remaining crew. Among the survivors was Juan Sebastian de Elcano.

 In going to a point that is the Moluccas by taking a west route from Spain instead of the usual east route and returning to Spain through the Indian Ocean, Magellan’s voyage during the Age of Exploration was the first to circumnavigate the world. It proved that the earth is round, and validated early scientists’ theory regarding the actual shape of the earth.

The growing of spices to other parts of the world later made the erstwhile rare and expensive commodities as common and cheap kitchen items that are available almost anywhere in the world. And Moluccas Island lost its significance as a trade destination so that it became an economic backwater of Asia. It is now called Maluko in Indonesia. It is divided into two parts the Northern Maluku and Maluko. It has a population of 2 million people which is less than 1% of the total population of Indonesia.

Long ago men spent most of their time looking for food. They ate anything they could find. Some lived mostly of plants. They ate fruits, steams, and leaves of some plants and the roots of others. When food was scarce, they ate the bark of trees. If they were lucky, they would find a bird’s nest with eggs. People who lived near the water ate fish or anything that washed ashore, even rotten whales. Some people also ate insects and small animals like lizards, that were easy to kill.

Later, men learned to make weapons. With weapons, they could kill larger animals to eat. These early people had big appetites. If they killed an animal, they would drink the blood, eat the meat, and chew the bones. When they finished the meal, there was nothing left.

At first men wandered from place to place to find their food. But when they began to grow plants, they stayed in one place and ate what they could grow. They tamed animals, trained them to work, and killed them for meat. Life was a little better then, but there was still not much variety in their meals. Day after day people ate the same foods.

Gradually men began to travel greater distances. The explorers who sailed unknown seas found new lands. In these lands they found new foods and spices and took them back home.

The Portuguese who sailed around the stormy Cape of Good Hope to reach China took back “Chinese apples”, the fruit we call oranges today. Later, Portuguese colonist carried orange seeds to Brazil. From Brazil oranges were carried to California, the first place to grow oranges in the United States. Peaches and melons also came from China. So did a new drink, tea.

In America the explorers found new foods, too. Here the Spanish explorers tasted hot chocolate for the first time. They had no name for this new drink, so they borrowed the Mexican word “chocolate”. They found both white and sweet potatoes. They also found corn (sometimes called maize), peanuts, and tomatoes. Columbus himself found pineapple in the West Indies and took it back with him to Europe. There it had to be grown in hothouses because the climate is so cold.

As populations increase, men are looking for ways to make the land produce more food. And they are always looking for sources of new foods both on the land and in the sea. Seaweed is a very nourishing food. Today, seaweed farms are being implemented specially by Japanese investors.

Diet may be used to distinguish different societies besides the manner of acquiring the food. Those northern social groups still hunt seal and have a high meat diet compared to their southern counterparts. Much of what Canadians eat has become more international over the years as more foreign immigrants bring their cooking expertise to this country. There are references to Quebec cuisine and the type of meat found in certain  regions. So the Lac St Jean region which is familiar with deer is likely to incorporate that in their meat pies and not another meat source. As the region develops and people continue to move into the larger city centers there will be a mixing of foods just as there are a mixing of different peoples.

Canadians have their emblematic foods that are selling points for Canadian traditions like maple syrup and fiddlehead sprouts and have been able to incorporate  incoming expertise of other food dishes that are still traditional elsewhere. These foods are a unifying force that allow parent culture members a chance to explain the origin of their foods and they were originally prepared. There are now varieties of cabbage containing meat dishes, meat or vegetable filled dumplings. Even spices previously associated to certain regions, like cumin and cardamon are increasingly being used for their health properties besides the taste they impart.

Canadians can be proud of their heritage even though we have become less popular over the years because of our stance in wars generated for economic interests, outdated language laws supposed carbon taxes and a failed health system. I don’t think there are any wars that are not generated for economic interests these days. Language should be a parental choice and not imposed by government.The country has been popular with its means of employment although I would not credit the telemarketing industry as one deserving much praise for its pressure tactics and cold call selling.

So there are good jobs and bad that characterize Canada’s work force as there is a desire for new party politics because the government is continually dipping its hands into the pockets of lower wage earners while the rich is less affected. This is linked to the fact that south of the border the same is occuring, jobs have disappeared and there are more part-time jobs than full time ones forcing people to move in with their relatives in order to save on rent.

In a sense the country is satisfied with the conservative way of things even though we may be spending more on military equipment for future wars than we really need; the country has managed relatively well through the recession, the economy is improving slightly but I never really felt at home with conservatism, perhaps it’s because of the meaning behind the name even though there There has been a reference to progressive conservatism. That almost sounds contradictory in itself. The liberals have lost their clout over recent years probably due to a disenchantment over party politics, the uncountability of spending taxpayer money and having a leader who has so far sounded more of an academic that someone ready to take on the economic losses that the country has absorbed. There is an association to who one votes for as there is other countries where one can understand a person’s philosophy based on his political standards. There is onecomplicating factor and that is voting conservative does not mean one is voting just for what is conservative.

      Spice trade is a commercial activity of ancient origin which involves the merchandising of spices, incense, herbs, drugs and opium.[1] Routes to convey these goods came about as a result of this commercial activity. Spice was channeled by merchants through the Silk Road. The silk road is an extensive interconnected network of trade route across the Asian continent connecting East, South and Western Asia with the Mediterranean world, as well as North and Northeast Africa and Europe.[2] Introduction of religious beliefs and innovative ideas as well as the travel of armies and ordinary persons from one place to another were also carried out along this route. At first the spice trade was mostly conducted overland. Later, as seafaring skills improved, people were then able to transport goods also by sea. Nations that controlled the trade and the passage where goods were transported became rich and powerful.

      Alexander the Great’s conquest of Persian Empire (550-330BC) resulted to the meeting of Asian and European cultures. Trade between Asia and Europe also developed. During the time of the Macedonian Empire (800-146BC) the port city of Alexandria in Egypt served as the shipment point for the exchange of goods between Asia-Africa and Greece. The Greek Ptolemaic dynasty of Egypt (305-30BC) developed trade with India using the Red Sea ports. Later the Roman Empire (27BC-476AD) supplanted the Greeks, and took over most of their territories. Roman control over Greek possessions in the Middle East and parts of Africa expanded the length and coverage areas of the Silk Road.

      Cordial relationship of the Roman Empire with the Kingdom of Axum (400BC-1000AD) of East Africa in the mid-seventh century also facilitated the business of the spice trade with Rome getting an access to the ports of Arabian Peninsula, the eastern shores of Africa as well as India. The Africans of Axum shared with the Roman merchants the knowledge of sailing they developed by riding the seasonal monsoon of the Arabian Sea. This technique minimize the risk of sailing in the sea and of the length of time goods were transported to their destination.

      During the Islamic conquest around (AD 632-750) the Arabs had much control of the silk route in Asia. They tapped spice sourced from region in the Far East linking to the secret Spice Island of Maluko and Banda in today’s Indonesia. Spice products were then shipped to trading emporiums in India and from there they were shipped westward across parts of East Africa and Near East passing through the Read Sea and the Persian Gulf.

           From the 8th  until the 15th  century the republic of Venice and the neighboring city state of Genoa monopolized spice trade with the Middle East. Their trade on spice made them phenomenally rich. Spices were the most demanded product at that time. The rise of the Ottoman Empire (1299-1923AD) and the fall of Christian city of Constantinople (now Istanbul) in 1453 made the Muslim Turks in control of the sole spice trade route, and they were in a position to charge hefty taxes on merchandise bound for the west. To get around the hold of the lucrative spice goods by an expansionist and a non-Christian power, European powers made an attempt to find alternative routes to Africa that were not under the control of the Ottoman Turks. 

      The Portuguese Empire was the earliest European seaborne empire to grow from spice trade. Portugal was the first country to circumnavigate Africa since the 15th century under Henry the Navigator. Bartolomeu Dias circumnavigated the Cape of Good Hope at the southern tip of Africa in 1488. Later, Vasco da Gama under order from Manuel I of Portugal rounded the Cape of Good Hope with four vessels and successfully sailed to Kozhikode, an Indian City of Kerala.

      The Portuguese had complete control of the African sea route and as such, the Spanish, if they had any hope of competing with Portugal for the lucrative spice trade had to find an alternate route to reach India. To profitably venture into the land of the spices, navigators attempted to enlist the support of the monarchs of the Spanish crown by way of an alternative route. The first attempt was made by Christopher Columbus who working for the Spanish crown attempted to reach India by sailing westward instead of eastward by way of Africa as usually done by the Portuguese. He ended up making a landfall in what is today called the Bahamas Islands. Believing that he in fact reached India Columbus named the inhabitants there “Indians”.

      In 1500 Portuguese Navigator Pedro Alvarez Cabral attempted to trace Vasco da Gama’s route to India, but he was blown to a land that was now called Brazil. After claiming possession of the region for Portugal, he was able to successfully reach India and return to Portugal. Columbus and Cabral’s accidental landings into those huge land mass had made it known to the Europeans that there was a big uncharted continent across Europe, Asia and Africa.

      The first attempt of the Spaniards to reach India by sailing west failed because Columbus thought that the land he landed in was India. A Portuguese navigator Ferdinand Magellan, continued the quest to reach the Spice Island by sailing west instead of east. On October 20 1520, Magellan with a fleet of five ships left San Lucar de Barrameda. He sailed past the vast land of what is now South America by crossing what is now called the Strait of Magellan. Beyond it they discovered the vast expanse of the Pacific Ocean. On March 16, 1521 the ships reached the Philippines where Magellan was killed in a battle with the natives on April 27. Nevertheless, the survivors of the expedition were able to reach the Spice Island and effectively established the first westward spice trade route to Asia from Europe. Upon returning to Spain in 1522 aboard the last remaining ship of the expedition, the Victoria, the starving survivors became the first humans to circumnavigate the world. The voyage of Magellan also opened the Pacific coast of the Americas for explorations of the Europeans. By being able to reach a destination to the east by sailing westward the voyage of Magellan also proved to the people of the world at that time that the earth is in fact round.

       The ushering of the era of the age of discovery (1415-1542AD) and the spread of Christianity to other parts of the world were consequences of the spice trade. The age of discovery paved the way to the discovery and eventual settlement of the American continent by the Europeans.

                                                    Notes

1. Bell Warwick, Rome, in the East (2000) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/spice-trade
2. Vadime Eliseef, “Approaches Old and New to the Silk Road”, The Silk Roads: Highways of Culture and Commerce, (Berghahn Book, 2009) 1-2, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/silk-road

                                               References

1. Silk Road, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/silk-road (accessed July 22, 2010)
2. Spice Trade, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/spice-trade (accessed July 22, 2010)

www.fisk-knives.com/Mace.jpg  A Mace Club, Medieval Weapon.

In 1982, I married a man with the surname of Mace. On our wedding day I happily took his surname and made it mine. I have now been a Mace for 28 years. I have given birth to two Maces and we have two granddaughters, who are Maces. Oh and I still have that Mace husband of mine. Until the time I met my husband, I had never heard of the last name of Mace.

As a Navy family we traveled and we were always the only Maces at each command. Yes, there were Smiths, Jones, Bakers, Rodrigues, Brooks and many other common and less than common surnames around but we were always the only Maces. It became a game for me at each new command to search the phone book for Maces.

The only state we found with more than it’s fair share of Maces was Utah, my husbands home state. There you can throw a stick and hit a Mace. Our home of Pensacola, Florida has three Maces listed, us and our two adult children.

In our early years of marriage, I asked my Mace husband where his name came from and we did some research which I have recently updated. Here is what I found out about the history and the use of the word or name of Mace.

The earliest definition of the word Mace has it’s origins in the Celtic culture and means: The son of the rock.

The word Mace may refer to many different types of things and includes the following:

1. Mace as a Medieval Weapon: The Mace Club a weapon with a heavy head on a solid shaft used to bludgeons opponents. The Mace Flail a spiked weapon on a chain.

2. Mace as a unit of measurement :  An English term used for a traditional Chinese measurement of weight.

3. Mace spice: A cooking spice obtained from the dried covering of nutmeg. It gives the flavor of nutmeg with a hint of pepper. It can be used for some desserts and to add flavor to beef or pork roast.

4. Mace spray: A type of tear gas used mainly by law enforcement, commonly confused with pepper spray

5. Mace businesses : There is a Mace Construction Firm in the UK and a Mace chain of convenience stories in the UK and Ireland.

You can claim to live in Mace, if you are currently living in or have lived in these two places:

1. Mace Commune in Normandy, France. Named after Hill 262 in Normandy during the World War Russia, the hill was known as “ The Mace “.

2. A small town in the United States known as Mace, Indiana.

Here are a few other uses for the word or name Mace.
 

1. A Ceremonial Mace : An ornamented object used in civic ceremonies.

2. The Mace : In debates, competitions can be named “ The Mace “ after the above named ceremonial mace.

3. Mace a game : Mace: The Dark Ages , is a fighting game for arcades and the Nintendo 64 system.

4. MGM-13 Mace : A United States tactical surface-to-surface missile.

5. Mace Windu: A character in the popular Star Wars movies.

As surprised as I was by my updated research, I still found the old saying to be true. A Mace by any name is still a Mace.
 

 The MGM-13 Mace. Image via Wikipedia

 The Maces. Christmas 2009. Photo by PR Mace

This cultural diffusion brought many good and bad things to Western Europe. This included foods, ideas, religion, plants, and household products. However, this also brought along slavery to the new world which became a big issue in the future. The social and economic transformation that occurred in the Atlantic world helped bring new ideas which led a path to a rise in economic status, but eventually brought them down.

Western Europe began expeditions in hopes of finding new trade routes, conquering new lands, and spreading the religion of Christianity. The main countries include Spain, England, and Portugal. Along this journey, they stumbled to new lands which they referred to as the new world or the Atlantic world. When they arrived, they sought riches and fortune. After finding plantations such as corn and potato, they wanted to bring it back to their home in hopes of making money. This eventually led to a big trade route. They began using native slaves (Native Americans) to work on these plantations. Corn became a very popular and important in Europe. As a result, Europeans began capturing more slaves in Africa. Eventually, African Americans were the main source of workers because many of the Native Americans died. They would then ship the slaves over to the Atlantic world to work. This was also known as the Atlantic slave trade.        

Economically, countries in Western Europe were the richest in the world. Their success in finding gold, silver, and crops located in South and North America today were a famous in Europe. This trade, which brought items from the new world to the old world was known as the Columbian Exchange. Due to the findings of new crops and food, the population sky rocketed as years went by. The demand for food was very high, but they only had so much to hand out to the public. This caused the price of food to rise which led to Europe’s economic downfall. The need for food brought down Europe’s economy due to supply and demand. This period of time was known as The Great Dying because many could not afford food. Also, silver and gold would cost very expensive. Only nobles or people with a high status could afford them. Silver was a very important product that was used in world wide trades.

Socially, Europe became very successful in trades, but when they arrived to the Atlantic world they took something they would have never wanted back to their country. They traded diseases; this includes measles, tuberculosis, typhus, smallpox, influenza, and syphilis. Also, Europe’s social connections with other countries were not good, especially in Africa and South America because they took slaves from there. The demand of crops, led to capturing slaves and bringing them back to the new world to work on. These people hated the Europeans because they worked and tortured them to death.

The transformation in the Atlantic world as a result of Western Europe was not a good thing. As a result of their greed many suffered while they enjoyed the glory. Europe benefited from this greatly which made them to be a very strong and powerful country in the future. But, their greed led to arguments, and eventually brought them down. The quote, “Everything that goes up must come down” by George Burns stood true as Europe slowly lost power and control.

So incorporate these naturally organic aphrodisiacs into your life and see if you have an increased libido for more adult activities!