What was the Afroeurasian trading world before Columbus?

CCOLUMBUS DID NOT SAIL WEST ON A WHIM. To understand his and other Europeans’ explorations, we must first understand late medieval trade networks. Historians now recognize that a type of world economy, known as the Afroeurasian trade world, linked the products and people of Asia, Africa, and Europe in the fifteenth century. The West was not the dominant player before Columbus, and the European voyages derived from a desire to share in and control the wealth coming from the Indian Ocean.

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The Taking of Constantinople by the Turks, April 22, 1453The Ottoman conquest of the capital of the Byzantine Empire in 1453 sent shock and despair throughout Europe. Capitalizing on the city’s strategic and commercial importance, the Ottomans made it the center of their empire. (Bibliothèque nationale de France)