China trade

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

China trade describes in historical studies the trade relations between the Empire of China and Europe, especially in the early modern period . For a long time, trade with China was only indirect and was embedded in trade with India , before the 16./17. Direct trade contacts were established in the 19th century.

history

There have been indirect trade relations between China and the Mediterranean world since ancient times , with the most important land routes being known as the Silk Road since the late 19th century . The main route in China led from Xi'an via Lanzhou to the west, then divided into a northern route (north of the Taklamakan via Turfan ) and a southern route (via Dunhuang and Yarkand ), which met again in Kashgar . It went on via Marakanda through northern Persia, then via Mesopotamia and Syria to the Mediterranean Sea to Antioch . Branches of the Silk Road also led to India and, with the routes further west, formed a wide-ranging trade network. Luxury goods such as silk were mainly exported from China. Pliny the Elder puts the annual expenditure on goods from India, China and Arabia at 100 million sesterces.

Just like the maritime trade routes (between China and India on the one hand and between the Mediterranean and India on the other) trade was carried out through intermediaries. In late antiquity these were not least Persians , in the Middle Ages it was Muslim, especially Arab traders. Since the Middle Ages, as a result of the Arab conquests, trading with India was no longer possible for Christian traders, and goods from China only reached Europe indirectly via Arab intermediaries.

In order to eliminate these middlemen, at the turn of the 15th to the 16th century the Europeans endeavored to discover the sea ​​route to India around Africa. The trip to India was first made by the Portuguese Vasco da Gama in 1498. Subsequently, the Portuguese established bases on the African coast and in the Indian Ocean. This ultimately resulted in a Portuguese overseas empire, the Estado da India with its headquarters in Goa . The opening of the Asian maritime region by the Portuguese laid the foundation for the subsequent European expansion in the Asian region. The Portuguese, however, faced serious competition from the 17th century; the Dutch and the English with their trading companies ( East India Companies ) should eventually outstrip the Portuguese in India trade .

The Portuguese conquered Malacca in 1511 and controlled the western sea route to the Spice Islands ( Moluccas ). Indirectly, the gate to the Chinese Empire opened for them. A first Portuguese embassy to the Chinese Emperor Zhengde under the leadership of Tomé Pires in 1517 failed catastrophically, but the Portuguese later managed to establish diplomatic relations. In the late 16th and early 17th centuries, they functioned as important intermediaries in the Chinese trade. In 1557 the Portuguese established a branch in Macau , which was officially approved by the Chinese in 1582. For the imperial government, the (small) Portuguese presence in the Chinese sphere of influence apparently did not pose a threat to its interests, so that this limited opening of trade was permitted by the imperial administration, which was always suspicious in this regard.

Historical map of Southeast Asia from 1713

Since the 17th century, China has been firmly involved in reciprocal transcontinental trade. The most important Chinese export was initially still silk, but later also made-to- order Chinese porcelain and, from the 18th century, tea in particular ; spices were imported from East India, among other things. As with the Indian trade, the Portuguese faced serious competition in the Chinese trade over the course of time. The Dutch East India Company never had good relations with the Chinese imperial court and was not allowed to settle on the mainland, but the company was very active through illegal trade and middlemen. Around 1640 it even largely controlled the Japanese trade , in which China was also involved. Due to the increased demand for tea in Europe in the 18th century, direct trade relations between China and Europe intensified. In this context, the British East India Company was the fiercest competitor of the Dutch, just as they were now competing in the Indian market primarily in the textile goods sector.

The entire trade in Chinese tea was carried out via the port of Canton , other ports were closed to Europeans from 1760 to 1842 (so-called "Canton system"). The British East India Company has been exporting tea from Canton to Europe on a regular basis since the early 18th century, with tea making up around a quarter of total exports around 1750. The gains that came with it resulted in the British eventually trumping the Dutch. In India, after their victory in the Seven Years' War (1756 to 1763) , the British were even able to assert themselves as a quasi-colonial leading power over France and the Mughal emperors who were still formally ruling .

Silver money from Spanish America ( viceroyalty New Spain and viceroyalty Peru ) played an important role in the global trading system of the early modern period , with which Europeans paid well into the 18th century and which thus flowed into the early modern world economy. In China there was a chronic silver shortage, whereas gold (in contrast to Europe) was less valuable in relation to it. Due to the increase in the movement of goods with Europe, the amount of money increased and led to rising government revenues. However, any disruption to the silver circulation hit the Chinese economy hard, especially since the Chinese insisted on silver payment . The British financed the tea trade with the resources obtained in India. The company in turn shipped tea and raw cotton obtained in India to England. This created a complex, mutually influencing economic system.

Sino-British relations were not free from tension. In 1793 the lavishly organized Macartney Mission failed to establish favorable relationships with the Qing dynasty , which had ruled China since 1644 . Trade with China even resulted in a negative trade balance to the disadvantage of the British due to Chinese trade restrictions and the limited sales opportunities for British products on the Chinese market . This was the central reason for the smuggling of opium , on which the British Company had a monopoly, into China, which began in the second half of the 18th century . In China, opium was paid for with silver, which the British in turn used to buy tea, as the Chinese government strictly controlled the export of tea and only accepted silver money as payment. It was only around 1850 that tea seeds were successfully smuggled from China and cultivated in India. In the 19th century increasingly other British companies were active in the China trade, such as Jardine, Matheson & Co .

The Chinese government tried again and again to stop the opium trade, which was the trigger for the 1st Opium War from 1839 to 1842 and which ended with a defeat for the Chinese. With the peace treaty of 1842 , among other things, the opening of the Chinese market for opium from India was forced. Furthermore, the Chinese had to cede Hong Kong to the British and allow trade in five other ports. This marked the beginning of the “ unequal treaty ” era , which increasingly undermined the authority of the Chinese central government and was intended to do immense damage to the empire.

literature

  • KN Chaudhuri: The Trading World of Asia and the English East India Company, 1660-1760. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1978.
  • Chris Nierstrasz: Rivalry for Trade in Tea and Textiles. The English and Dutch East India Companies (1700-1800). Palgrave, Basingstoke 2015.
  • Ulrich Pfister: China trade. In: Enzyklopädie der Neuzeit 2 (2005), Col. 687–690.
  • Wolfgang Reinhard : The submission of the world. Global history of European expansion 1415–2015. Beck, Munich 2016.

Remarks

  1. ↑ On the Silk Road, see Peter Frankopan : Light from the East. Berlin 2016; Valerie Hansen: The Silk Road. A history with documents. Oxford 2016.
  2. ↑ On the overland routes between East and West, see Raoul McLaughlin: Rome and the Distant East. Trade Routes to the Ancient Lands of Arabia, India and China. London / New York 2010, p. 61ff.
  3. ↑ Pliny, Natural History 12, 84.
  4. ↑ See also Roderich Ptak: The maritime silk road. Munich 2007.
  5. ↑ Peter Feldbauer: The Portuguese in Asia 1498-1620. Essen 2005.
  6. ↑ See for example Stephan Conermann: South Asia and the Indian Ocean. In: Wolfgang Reinhard (Hrsg.): History of the world. Empires and oceans 1350–1750. Munich 2014, here p. 472ff .; Roderich Ptak: The maritime silk road. Munich 2007, p. 272ff.
  7. ^ Jürgen G. Nagel: Adventure long-distance trade. The East India Companies. 2nd edition Darmstadt 2011.
  8. ↑ Cf. Serge Gruzinski: Dragon and Feather Snake. Europe's reach for America and China in 1519/20. Frankfurt am Main 2014, pp. 85ff.
  9. ↑ Wolfgang Reinhard: The submission of the world. Global history of European expansion 1415–2015. Munich 2016, p. 143.
  10. ^ Ulrich Pfister: China trade. In: Enzyklopädie der Neuzeit 2 (2005), here Col. 689.
  11. ↑ Chris Nierstrasz: Rivalry for Trade in Tea and Textiles. The English and Dutch East India Companies (1700-1800). Basingstoke 2015, p. 54ff.
  12. ↑ Chris Nierstrasz: Rivalry for Trade in Tea and Textiles. The English and Dutch East India Companies (1700-1800). Basingstoke 2015, p. 124ff.
  13. ^ Michael Greenberg: British Trade and the Opening of China, 1800-1842. Cambridge 1951, p. 41ff.
  14. ^ Ulrich Pfister: China trade. In: Enzyklopädie der Neuzeit 2 (2005), here Col. 689.
  15. ^ Stephan Conermann: South Asia and the Indian Ocean. In: Wolfgang Reinhard (Hrsg.): History of the world. Empires and oceans 1350–1750. Munich 2014, here p. 494f.
  16. ↑ Cf. KN Chaudhuri: The Trading World of Asia and the English East India Company, 1660-1760. Cambridge 1978, p. 385ff.
  17. ^ Sarah Rose: For all the Tea in China. London 2009.
  18. ↑ Stephen R. Platt: Imperial Twilight. The Opium War and the End of China's Last Golden Age. New York 2018.