Weeks Edwin Lord Arrival of a Caravan Outside The City of Morocco

A caravan (from Persian ) is a group of people traveling together, often on a trade expedition. Caravans were used mainly in desert areas and throughout the

Silk Road The Silk Road was a network of Asian trade routes active from the second century BCE until the mid-15th century. Spanning over , it played a central role in facilitating economic, cultural, political, and religious interactions between the ...

, where traveling in groups helped in defense against bandits as well as in improving

economies of scale In microeconomics, economies of scale are the cost advantages that enterprises obtain due to their scale of operation, and are typically measured by the amount of Productivity, output produced per unit of cost (production cost). A decrease in ...

in trade.

Description

Historically, caravans connecting

East Asia East Asia is a geocultural region of Asia. It includes China, Japan, Mongolia, North Korea, South Korea, and Taiwan, plus two special administrative regions of China, Hong Kong and Macau. The economies of Economy of China, China, Economy of Ja ...

and

Europe Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...

often carried luxurious and lucrative goods, such as silks or jewelry. Caravans could therefore require considerable investment and were a lucrative target for bandits. The profits from a successful journey could be significant, comparable to those generated by later European

spice trade The spice trade involved historical civilizations in Asia, Northeast Africa and Europe. Spices, such as cinnamon, cassia, cardamom, ginger, pepper, nutmeg, star anise, clove, and turmeric, were known and used in antiquity and traded in t ...

. The luxurious goods brought by caravans attracted many rulers along important trade routes to construct

caravanserai A caravanserai (or caravansary; ) was an inn that provided lodging for travelers, merchants, and Caravan (travellers), caravans. They were present throughout much of the Islamic world. Depending on the region and period, they were called by a ...

s. These were roadside stations which supported the flow of commerce, information, and people across the network of

trade routes A trade route is a Logistics, logistical network identified as a series of pathways and stoppages used for the commercial transport of cargo. The term can also be used to refer to trade over land or water. Allowing Good (economics and accounting ...

covering Asia, North Africa, and

southeastern Europe Southeast Europe or Southeastern Europe is a geographical sub-region of Europe, consisting primarily of the region of the Balkans, as well as adjacent regions and Archipelago, archipelagos. There are overlapping and conflicting definitions of t ...

, and in particular along the

. Caravanserais provided water for human and animal consumption, for washing, and for ritual ablutions. They kept

fodder Fodder (), also called provender (), is any agriculture, agricultural foodstuff used specifically to feed domesticated livestock, such as cattle, domestic rabbit, rabbits, sheep, horses, chickens and pigs. "Fodder" refers particularly to food ...

for animals and had shops for travelers where they could acquire new supplies. Some shops bought goods from the traveling merchants. Some of the first caravans on the Silk Road were sent out by

Emperor Wu of Han Emperor Wu of Han (156 – 29 March 87BC), born Liu Che and courtesy name Tong, was the seventh Emperor of China, emperor of the Han dynasty from 141 to 87 BC. His reign lasted 54 years – a record not broken until the reign of the Kangxi ...

in the 2nd century BCE, when this vast network of roads was 'born' and as China began exporting large quantities of silk and other goods west, particularly destined for the

Roman Empire The Roman Empire ruled the Mediterranean and much of Europe, Western Asia and North Africa. The Roman people, Romans conquered most of this during the Roman Republic, Republic, and it was ruled by emperors following Octavian's assumption of ...

. However, the volume a caravan could transport was limited even by Classical or Medieval standards. For example, a caravan of 500 camels could only transport as much as a third or half of the goods carried by a regular

Byzantine The Byzantine Empire, also known as the Eastern Roman Empire, was the continuation of the Roman Empire centred on Constantinople during late antiquity and the Middle Ages. Having survived the events that caused the fall of the Western Roman E ...

merchant sailing ship. Present-day caravans in less-developed areas of the world often still transport important goods through badly passable areas, such as seeds required for

agriculture Agriculture encompasses crop and livestock production, aquaculture, and forestry for food and non-food products. Agriculture was a key factor in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created ...

in arid regions. An example are the camel trains traversing the southern edges of the

Sahara Desert The Sahara (, ) is a desert spanning across North Africa. With an area of , it is the largest hot desert in the world and the list of deserts by area, third-largest desert overall, smaller only than the deserts of Antarctica and the northern Ar ...

References

*Kevin Shillington (ed)
"Tuareg: Takedda and trans-Saharan trade"
in: ''Encyclopaedia of African History'', Fitzroy Dearborn, 2004, *T. Lewicki, "The Role of the Sahara and Saharians in Relationships between North and South", in: ''UNESCO General History of Africa: Volume 3'', University of California Press, 1994, * Fernand Braudel, ''The Perspective of the World,'' vol III of ''Civilization and Capitalism'' 1984 (translated from the French) ;Antiquity and Middle Ages
The Trans-Saharan Gold Trade 7th-14th Century
Metropolitan Museum of Art *René Mouterde, André Poidebard, « La voie antique des caravanes entre Palmyre et Hît, au IIe siècle après Jésus-Christ, d'après une inscription retrouvée au Sud-Est de Palmyre (1930) », ''Syria'', vol. 12, No. 12–22, 1931, pp. 101–115 (available online at
Persee.fr
*Ernest Will, « Marchands et chefs de caravanes à Palmyre », ''Syria'', vol. 34, No. 34-3-4, 1957, pp. 262–277 (available online at
Persee.fr
;17th century * René Caillié ''Journal d'un voyage à Temboctou et à Jenné, dans l'Afrique centrale, précédé d'observations faites chez les Maures Braknas, les Nalous et autres peuples; pendant les années 1824, 1825, 1826, 1827, 1828: par René Caillié. Avec une carte itinéraire, et des remarques géographiques, par M. Jomard, membre de l'institut.'' Imprimé à

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

en mars 1830, par l'imprimerie royale, en trois tomes et un atlas. Une réédition en fac-similé a été réalisée par les éditions Anthropos en 1965
downloadable version
** modern edition: ''Voyage à Tombouctou''. 2 vols. Paris: La Découverte, 1996 ;20th century * Lattimore, Owen (1928/9) ''The Desert Road to Turkestan''. London, Methuen and Co; & various later editions. Caravan logistics and organization is discussed in Chap. VIII, "Camel-Men All" * Tuladhar, Kamal Ratna (2011). '' Caravan to Lhasa: A Merchant of Kathmandu in Traditional Tibet.'' Kathmandu: Lijala & Tisa. . ;Contemporary caravans *Julien Brachet, « Le négoce caravanier au Sahara central: histoire, évolution des pratiques et enjeux chez les Touaregs Kel Aïr (Niger) », ''Les Cahiers d'outre-mer'', No. 226–227, 2004, pp. 117–136 (available online at
Com.revues
) *Michel Museur, « Un exemple spécifique d'économie caravanière : l'échange sel-mil », ''Journal des africanistes'', vol. 47, No. 2, 1977, pp. 49–80 (available online at
Persee.fr
*M'hammad Sabour and Knut S. Vikør (eds),

', Bergen, 1997

oogle Cache Last Retrieved Jan. 2005.

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Caravan (travellers) Trade routes

Description

See also

References

Further reading

External links