Age of Exploration

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Age of Exploration

• Why Europe?

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Why Not China?

• sailing Indian Ocean and Chinese seas since 1st
  century BC!
• invented the compass
• astronomy and celestial navigation
• armed junks

Chinese junk
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Zheng He (1405-33)
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Why Not Arabs?

• Sinbad the Sailor!
• dominated Mediterranean and Indian Ocean since 9C
• ancient Greek science (Ptolemy)
• latitude!
• navigation instruments

Arab dhow
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The 15th-century Muslim World
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Arab Science
Ptolemy (2nd century AD)
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quadrants and astrolabes
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Indian Ocean Trade
I commend the merchants to you, for they are the
courtiers of the horizons and Gods trusted
servants on earth. Mohammed
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Ibn Battuta (14C)
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Prince Henry, the Navigator
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Mapping Africas Coast
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Bartholomew Dias (1487)
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Vasco da Gama (1497-1502)
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(No Transcript)
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15th-Century Navigation
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Europes Disadvantages
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Love of The East
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Collapse of the Mongol Empire
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Turkish Threat
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Search for Prester John