New Silk Roads: A Reawakening?

High School History Review: Peter Frankopan’s “The Silk Roads”

Astute observers of Eurasian affairs over the past decade have been talking excitedly about the “new Silk Road” for some years now. While this may evoke images of pastoral, nomadic caravans, these analysts are most likely referring to China’s highly ambitious, “One Belt, One Road” initiative.

Championed by the emergent Chinese superpower, the project promises to link together the established (and enormous) markets of East Asia together with the markets of Europe, Africa, and the Greater Middle East too.

Policy analysts and students of international relations will surely be grappling with the implications for decades to come.

Peter Frankopan’s chronicle of the history of the Middle East, through the prism of East-West trade, therefore, could not be more timely. Providing a complete survey dating back from the time of King Hammurabi through to the present day, Frankopan allows us to dive into the ancient trade routes, and imagine what a newly reconstructed Silk Road might look like in the future.

Frankopan crafts a particularly engaging picture of the evolving and cosmopolitan Persian Kingdoms of antiquity. He explains how the rivers of the so-called “Fertile Crescent” helped nurture not only the rise of centralized bureaucracies and successive cultural explosions, but also the facilitation of long distance trade. It is revealed that the Persians, long known for their internal trade and road systems, had trade routes spanning from Anatolia, to Egypt, to India. Thus, while we remember Cyrus and Darius traditionally through the eyes of their Greek adversaries, the importance of the Persian Empire as the foundation of a global trading system truly adds a new and valuable dimension to an established history that has already been quite well documented.

This unique approach is also applied by Frankopan to the Hellenistic period. Rather than focus on Alexander himself, or his tactics on the battlefield, emphasis is given instead to cultural dissemination, through the same winding routes that were established by the Persians, and later to resume their high volume trade. Frankopan notes how during this age, “Ideas, themes and stories coursed through the highways, spread by travelers, merchants and pilgrims…” (8). Building to a certain crescendo of trading frenzy during the overlapping reins of the Han dynasty in the East and the Romans in the West, one realizes how crucial peace and political stability are to global trade. Certainly, as the large scale movements of peoples from the Eurasian steppes began to pressure the trading routes all along the south of the grasslands, both order and centralized control began to disintegrate, and with it, the trading wealth that had brought knowledge and wealth to the Mediterranean from as far away as Vietnam.

The withering of Imperial Roman control to the western half of Anatolia, is seen as a loss of centralization that had far reaching ramifications for trade and religion. Christianity, which had been adopted by Roman leaders, now ruling from Constantinople, had made inroads into Central Asia and Africa during this time. Frankopan relates in a fascinating historical vignette how the Christian kingdom of Ethiopia actually mounted an assault on a Jewish kingdom located on the Southeastern tip of the Arabian Peninsula. Thus, it is clear the diffusion of ideas and merchandise, while not in the same quantities as before, still occurred without this centralization and peace brought by imperial authority in the Eastern Mediterranean.

Frankopan next delves into the rise of Islam as it expanded in the 7th century to occupy most of the key cities and routes linking the far western Chinese imperial outposts to the European termini of Toulon, Barcelona, Constantinople, and other cities on the northern shore of the Mediterranean. Frankopan delves into the structure of Islamic conquests, describing Islamic territorial emergence as, “… an almost perfect model of expansion … the threat of military force led to negotiated settlements as one province after another submitted to the new authorities … By and large, the existing majority populations were allowed to get on with their business …” (86). Thus, as Frankopan reveals, the early Islamic dynasties, namely the Umayyads and the Abbasids, were able to mirror the Persians and the Parthians before them in being able to consolidate the vast expanse between what was then a blossoming Europe, and the ancient Middle Kingdom. We see how disarray in the Middle East provided opportunities for outside powers to gain strategic control of trading points, and then for these outside powers to wrestle with each other for control over said regions, mirroring the later imperial “great game” between Britain and Russia in the Middle East region.

Yet, with the consolidation of temporary Muslim control over the region, we see how cities such as Baghdad and Damascus became some of the wealthiest in the world. The author also demonstrates the shifting of power in the Middle East from modern day Iran, eastward towards the aforementioned cities, as well as Egypt and even Islamic Spain.

By the time of the Mongol conquest however, unified Islamic control had been brought to an end, and the Crusades had also wrested key cities in Palestine from Muslim control, although Frankopan does indeed examine the rich cultural diffusion that occurred as a result of the punitive crusades. The author also notes with authority that, “Fundamental to European expansion [during this period] was the stability that the Mongols provided across the whole of Asia … the rule of law was fiercely protected when it came to commercial matters” (184). Frankopan demonstrates, therefore, that consolidation and widespread regional coordination, such as in the Mongol period, generally led to a flourishing in trade.

Of course, a part of the book that I found interesting was how the discovery of the Americas helped shape the Silk Road. Frankopan weaves in the expansion of the sea trade, and wealth being brought to Europe, as a rebalancing that favored all the areas formerly on the periphery of the great caravan routes. Today, we see an extension of this, with Western Europe and East Asia, both on the maritime periphery of Eurasia, continuing their reign as the economic powerhouses of the world, along with North America. Frankopan, in delving into the natural tendency to link trade routes through this region of the world, seems to insinuate optimism regarding the reestablishment of these routes. He does note with interested the rise in wealth of states such as Kazakhstan, and Azerbaijan, which has gone relatively unnoticed in prominent foreign policy circles. Thus, we may truly be going “full circle” in regard to trading routes, as large exporters in Southeast and East Asia try to find new ways to connect with the markets that lay to their west. Frankopan’s book, while rather comprehensive, leaves the reader nonetheless with a desire to learn more about how these trade routes, and the Silk Road, were actually perceived by successive Chinese dynasties, and among Chinese leaders today. Perhaps, a companion book is needed to examine the Eastern termini of these great routes.

Yet, with China, India, Russia and the EU all investing in projects in the central domain of Eurasia, it is clear that the region holds major promise for rapid economic development in the decades to come. The largest question is what will this mean for the global trading system? Frankopan’s insightful and nuanced glance at the past may now clarify our views regarding the prospects for the 21st century Silk Road of the future.