1433 - Zheng He arrives in Great Zimbabwe

In the early fifteenth century, Admiral Zheng He commanded the greatest expeditionary fleets the world had ever known. The Ming Dynasty invested heavily in expanding Chinese influence, especially its third emperor, Yongle, who outfitted a fleet to be commanded by his longtime supporter, Zhenge He. Born Ma Ho during the turbulent western wars between the Mongols and the Mings, he had been captured at ten and forced into the Ming army commanded by young Yongle. Ma Ho proved successful at all he did, and he was selected to become head eunuch with a new name, Zheng He.

In 1404, Zheng He was placed in command of the fleet dispatched to bring in the nations to the south as tributaries under the emperor’s influence. Among the 317 ships in the fleet were 62 “treasure ships,” said to be over 180 feet long and loaded with gifts of tea, silk, porcelain, and manufactured goods. In addition to the thousands of sailors, crews also included scholars and cutting-edge technology such as gunpowder rockets and cannons as well as magnetically-driven compasses for navigation. For the next 30 years, Zheng He would command seven expeditions through Indonesia, India, Arabia, and the east coast of Africa.

While pushing southward on the African coast past Mogadishu to Malindi and Zanzibar, Zheng He heard the traders’ discussion of an inland empire so rich with gold that it rivaled the legendary wealth of Mali. Messengers back to China had brought further news of the Xuande emperor’s disinclination toward these expeditions, and Zheng He feared this might be his last. Deciding to go for broke, Zheng He led an excursion inland to contact this empire while the main fleet explored the coast, mapping much of Madagascar. It was very different to take up an expedition on land, but Zheng He had already defeated the Kingdom of Kotte inland on Sri Lanka.

Zheng He and his smaller boats followed rivers to the Kingdom of Zimbabwe, a term referring to the stone fortresses built at defensive positions throughout the plateau. Zheng He trekked to its greatest city with towering stone walls over 30 feet tall. Though impressive even by the standards of China, the kingdom in the south was clearly in a state of decline. The land was turning arid, and much of the gold in the rivers had given out, prompting one prince, Nyatsimba Mutota, to move northward in conquest for new resources, especially valuable salt.

The kingdom struck Zheng He as an enormous new partner with its control of the gold and ivory of the entire region. He won favor with Mutota with gifts and dispatched scholars and craftsmen to show irrigation techniques for improved crop yields as well as methods for upgrading mines. Mutota was so impressed that he began collecting engineers, bringing them from China, Arabia, and later Europe. The most important exchange was with China for gunpowder and cannons, which furthered the Mutapa people’s position as the military superpower of the region.

Through the years, invention solved problems as they arose. As the miners needed to dig deeper into the earth for gold, iron, and copper, engineers developed pumps to use suction to clear the shafts of water. With the struggle for food for a large population, labor-saving devices were of the utmost importance, pushing the development of engines. Factories sprang up around the rivers driven by waterwheels. Threats of deforestation were overcome by the discovery of massive coal reserves to the west; coal in turn proved to burn more efficiently than wood and allow for leaps forward with metallurgy.

By 1700, the Zambezi River was the industrial center of the world. Steam-driven ships brought in textiles and other raw materials, then exported manufactured goods back to ports as far away as China and the Americas. The expansive Mutapa Empire dominated Africa south of the equator, serving as a balance between European influence in the northwest and Muslim influence in the northeast. Mutapan trade colonies would become thriving cosmopolitan centers for centuries to come all along the southern Atlantic and Indian Oceans.

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In reality, Zheng He died in 1433 in Calicut, India. By then, expeditions had started to go out of fashion with the emperor as policies turned back toward isolationist Confucian ideals. Soon the size of ships was legally restricted to prevent reckless gambling on oversea ventures.

Sources on Zheng Ha

What if Napoleon's Suicide Attempt had Succeeded?

This article first appeared at Today in Alternate History.

April 13, 1814 -

The surrender of the leaders in Paris effectively ended the War of the Sixth Coalition. The Sénat conservateur then passed the Emperor's Demise Act, and Napoleon Bonaparte was officially deposed from power. Undeterred, he mustered his forces in the nearby canton of Fontainebleau and prepared to march on the capital. Although the rank and file might well have followed him, his marshals mutinied. In his despair, Napoleon committed suicide swallowing a pill that he had carried after nearly being captured by the Russians during the retreat from Moscow.

The sudden release of triumph across the British Empire was only matched by the scale of panic felt in the United States of America. Basking in her glorious victory on the continent of Europe, Great Britain would quickly re-focus her resources on the military sideshow they had dismissively called "the American War." A rapid escalation would trigger a series of tumultuous events that led up to New English Independence Day, the succession of the entire northeast region on January 5, 1815, during the Hartford Convention.

Although President James Madison was hardly Napoleon Bonaparte, it was during his second term that the War of 1812 raged, and Canada became victim to American campaigns. King George III was still on the throne, determined to push British interests primarily through exclusive trading arrangements. Even though many red-blooded members of the British elite still sought revenge for the American Revolution, their goal was always to break-up the nascent republic rather than re-occupy its territory. This disruptive approach of unsettling their former colonies was self-evident in the manipulative dealings with slaves and native Americans, and the primary role of the Royal Navy in leading the campaign. However, the capitulation of Napoleon was an opportunity for the British government to send its war-hardened veterans to North America before the end of military season ended.

It was decided that seizing control of the Great Lakes was the show of strength that would force the outcome. This was achieved through a hard-fought naval triumph at Lake Champlain followed up by victory on land at Battle of Plattsburgh. Due to the geography, it was unthinkable that these forces could conquer, let alone re-colonise, the continental United States, especially since the American population of five million had grown to match that of the British Isles and become proudly independent. However, the Tories still had their moment of satisfaction because news of their military achievements swung opinion at the Hartford Convention. This enabled arch-Federalist Harrison Gray Otis to win the argument for succession. After all, with the notable exception of John Adams, the United States had been dominated by Virginia planters, almost to the point of tyranny. While no one could speak ill of George Washington, the hero of the young country, the policies of Thomas Jefferson and his protege James Madison had infuriated New England. The unequal Treaty of Ghent redrew the map satisfying many of the British war aims. This provoked fury in the rump United States, and one man, General Andrew Jackson, began to plan for a third war with the Tories that would expel Great Britain from North America altogether.

Author's Note

In reality, the potency of Napoleon's pill had weakened with age. He survived to be exiled to Elba, while his wife and son took refuge in Austria. Weary of war, Britain agreed to the terms of the Treaty of Ghent to end the War of 1812 in North America.



Addendum - War of 1832

Having lost the Michigan Territory, the Jeffersonian-endorsed James Monroe lost control of the Democratic-Republican Party, prompting Georgian William H. Crawford to win the presidential election of 1816. Many argued that he had been the Secretary of War during the bleakest times of the fight, although supporters stated that things could have gone even more badly, such as Jackson's heroic victory at New Orleans (though it was technically an illegal battle with the war already ended by the Treaty of Ghent). Crawford noted that the final military action of the war had actually been the capture of the Nautilus, an East India Company brig, by the USS Peacock. If the United States were going to compete with Britain for land, it would need to stand up to them at sea as a world naval power.

The expansion of the United States Navy was timely with the next conflict, the Spanish War (1818-1820). General Jackson invaded Florida, pursuing escaped slaves and outlaws into the chaotic region where Spanish influence had all but disappeared due to exhaustion during the Napoleonic Wars. With American ships threatening Spanish islands in the Caribbean, Spain was quick to accept terms of the surrender of Florida. With the Crawford Doctrine telling Europeans to "leave America for the Americans," the American Navy added a good deal of threat to colonies.

Although physically unwell (Jackson had two bullets permanently lodged in his body), his applauded efforts in the war prompted his election to the presidency in 1824. He and Crawford had broken over the issue of national banking laws, especially in the fallout of the Panic of 1819. Expansionism meanwhile turned northwestward along with the removal of Native Americans to Indian Territory. New Englanders in the Federated States decried the rapid expansion of slavery, but Americans dismissed them with vocal derisive language.

Jackson nearly achieved his "Canadian War" in 1827 when tensions between Upper Canada and Lower Canada escalated being the British governor and the French-speaking locals of had been Quebec. Popular reformer Louis-Joseph Papineau had been elected speaker of the assembly in 1815, but Governor George Ramsey, Earl of Dalhousie, called for new elections in 1827 in an attempt to bump him out. Jackson offered to liberation, but Britain simply responded to petitions for change with the withdrawal of Governor Dalhousie.

His war finally came in 1832 with the new election. Newspaper publishers had been arrested on vague grounds, and three people were killed by British troops when they opened fire on a protesting crowd. Jackson called it a repeat of the early days of the American Revolution with arrests and the Boston Massacre. Although Papineau wanted only approval of his Ninety-two Resolutions for reform, Jackson-inspired revolutionaries led to conflict and ultimately a declaration of independence. Jackson dispatched his navy for the St. Lawrence River and coordinated generals in Ohio to seize the Great Lakes region. Britain responded with its own navy, and battles continued up and down the North American east coast for years. Riding the call for war, Jackson was elected to an unprecedented third term as president.

New England's Federated States fought to remain neutral, though it suffered numerous incursions from both sides. As the war dragged on through the 1830s, both sides became exhausted with Britain troubled by financing such a large-scale and distant war while Jackson becoming increasingly dictatorial, only narrowly winning reelection in 1836. New England at last was able to broker peace with Quebec's independence and the purchase of Upper Canada by the United States (including large payments to those who had suffered in the war). Britain maintained it colonies along the Atlantic with the exception of Labrador.

The United States proclaimed it as a great victory, and new warhawks began turning their heads toward Mexico for further conquest in the 1840s.

Guest Post: Maratha Supremacy of India Assured

This post originally appeared on Today in Alternate History.

14 January, 1761 - Reinforcement Arrive at Battle of Panipat

"Death strikes where his shadow falls" ~ Ahmad Shah Abdali (father) described by veteran Bollywood actor Sanjay Dutt who played the Afghan founding father and hero in the film Panipat

The timely arrival of reinforcements commanded by Peshwa Balaji Baji Rao tipped the balance in an epic battle fought between the Maratha Empire versus Afghan forces and their Muslim allies from the North Indian kingdoms. The invaders were chased all the way back to Kabul, ending the dream of Pashtun leader Ahmad Shah Durrani to found a modern state of Afghanistan. Ironically, the invasion of Northern India by the Durrani Empire was triggered by the angry reaction to the Marathas driving his son Tamir Shah Abdali out of Kashmir.

Panipat was more a crisis of leadership than an ultimate military showdown. Having emerged as the successor to the Mughals, the Maratha were a truly formidable force, comprising fierce soldiery and modern long-range, French-made artillery. However, the combination of bickering of internal politics and their weak, fractured leadership during the current Peshwa's rule had brought into question their claim of hegemony over the whole of Hindustan. Their hard-fought victory answered all of these questions, and they were now the undisputed masters of India with their influence spreading beyond the sub-continent. It consolidated the Maratha power through the authority of the Peshwa over the other Maratha chieftain. Internal enemies were severely punished. In simple terms, the Marathas had finally succeeded in replacing the Mughals as the strong central power in India. Even more significant in the long run of history was the re-installation of a Hindu ruler after nearly six hundred years.

The foreign invasion had come at the worst possible time. With the rising threat from European powers, it was rather fortunate that the Maratha had established their control of all the smaller powers in India. This was because the Empire would soon face a protracted series of Anglo-Maratha Wars as the British East India Company sought to expand out of Bengal, their foothold in India. As events were to transpire, the Marathas would prevail and Anglo influence would be restricted to the cities of Bombay, Calcutta and Madras. The result was that British India was a constrained strip of land just like Portugese India. Imperial interest from Britain would now move on to fresh pickings in China and Japan.

Thankfully, the new growth of stronger Maratha leadership that followed filled a critical gap. This had been woefully missing ever since the death of the Peshwa's late father, Balajirao. A big part of this resurgence was Sadashiv Rao Bhau, the victorious commander at Panipat. Under Peshwa Vishwasrao, he would ensure that the reinvigorated Maratha rule from Pune would be based upon the sound principles of honesty,ethical and fair way of governing a country captured in Swaraj. This ideology had been developed by Chatrapati Shivaji and would serve Hindustan well over the coming centuries and long after the dissolution of the British and Portuguese Empires.

Author's Note from Wikipedia

In reality, Peshwa Balaji Baji Rao arrived too late due to the extended celebration of his second marriage.

Panipat was the last major battle between South Asian-headed military powers until the creation of Pakistan and India in 1947. The outcome weakened both sides inadvertently accelerating the paramountcy of the British East India Company.

Addendum

After its humbling defeat at Buxar thanks to aid from the Dutch to the Bengal Army, the East India Company returned the favor to its old rival by edging into its sphere of influence in Indonesia. While able to tap into the valuable sandalwood trade, the islands proved as troublesome to the British as they did for the Dutch. Colonial wars weakened interest from both mother-nations thanks to small returns on expensive conflict. Maintaining spheres of influence on largely jungle territory was largely a matter for cartographers while the real money settled on a few plantations. Britain's national attention turned to more important dealings, such as satiating the demands for expansion by colonists in North America. After much political struggle to find a balance between self-rule and control by London, Massachusetts was the first colony to be granted dominion status in 1787 with Virginia and South Carolina to follow.

The East India Company's greatest goal was control of the trade with China. The amount of money to be made was immense, yet it proved largely one-sided. Confucian ideals prevented many Chinese from being interested in foreign goods. The similar Shinto beliefs in Japan had prompted the Company to give up attempts to trade there a century before. Trade ships from Europe had to bring a great deal of coinage in largely empty holds. Upon their return, they would make handsome profits selling Chinese porcelain, spices, textiles, and especially tea. It was an outrage to traditionally minded mercantilists, but the promise of high returns prompted a staggering growth of banking in London and other Company ports. The trade deficit did prompt some captains to attempt to smuggle opium, which had been declared illegal by the Chinese emperor several times through the 18th century. Scandal at discovery bruised Chinese opinions of the British, ending the attempts in fears that the Dutch would be granted a monopoly.

Struggling to find goods to trade in China, the East India Company surged into the Pacific following Captain Cook's explorations. Furs proved to be the best commodity, which led to a rapid settlement of the western coast of North America along with British ports established in Hawaii as well as colonies in Australia and New Zealand. Over-hunting led to a decline in the fur trade as the nineteenth century continued, just as British manufactures proved to be a new option. Mass-produced goods came at such a low price that Chinese buyers could not refuse them. Even Japan reopened as a market with several shoguns welcoming improved British designs on the old guns they had received from the Dutch and Portuguese. Fueled by intercontinental banking, the East India Company began establishing steam-driven factories to produce goods on the site of raw materials, industrializing all through its holdings. The need to communicate readily prompted the Company to invest in undersea telegraph lines and ultimately worldwide radio.

To this day, the re-branded EICo serves as one of the major players in international trade with focuses on banking, telecommunications, and international economic relations.

Guest Post: Rum Row

Comic series Rum Row asks, what if Prohibition had taken a literal upward turn?

From the Kickstarter campaign:

To avoid dry laws, rumrunners and patrons alike have taken to the sky. Hot air balloons and dirigibles now serve as speakeasies and black markets for alcohol. The press has coined these flying bars above New York City as "Rum Row."

Check out the story unfolding in their video.

Oct 31, 305 - Picts Trick Romans on Samhain

Constantius Chlorus, Augustus of the western Roman Empire alongside Galerius in the east, faced a humiliating defeat at the hands of Pictish Celts while campaigning north of Hadrian's Wall, largely ending the Constantine line.

The Roman forces had advanced past the Firth of Forth, razing villages and sending refugees ever deeper into lands where the harvest was already beginning to wane. As the native population became more desperate, the Romans grew better stocked by ransacking the provisions that fleeing Picts had left behind. One band of warriors determined the best way to end the Roman advance would be assassination: this unstoppable army would be tossed into chaos and at best hurry to retreat to winter quarters.

The warriors chose to strike during the festival of Samhain. While Roman eyes were dazzled by the bonfires lit to keep wicked spirits at bay, a small group of Pict soldiers adopted the ancient practice of guising: wearing a masked costume to approach a neighbor's house. Under the half-moon, they roamed wearing cow heads and hides amid a small herd of stray cattle, which was eagerly snatched up by Roman scouts. Once inside the Roman camp, the band evaded sentries long enough to make it to the luxurious tents of the augustus and his generals. There they shrieked and attacked, slaying all they could reach before Roman swords cut them down.

While tactically questionable, the attack did have profound strategic value. The son of Constantius by his first wife, Constantinus, was among the dead. His father, himself ill, announced the retreat to Eboracum (today's York) to mourn. It was a bitter turn of irony as Constantinus had joined the campaign to escape the courts of Rome where he feared other contenders might be planning to eliminate him. By January, the brokenhearted father also passed, leaving behind two younger sons from his second wife who would join ranks with their uncle Maxentius on his rise to sole domination of the Roman Empire. Maxentius devoted himself to public works projects, emphasizing acceptance in polytheism of numerous gods of northern Europe and west Asia while remaining critical of the monotheistic Christians (although not as fervent in persecution as his predecessor Diocletian).

The ongoing Roman turmoil was far from the Picts in the north, who found a degree of peace from Roman incursion as the German tribes grew and began to ransack the Mediterranean. The Germanic Anglo-Saxons soon moved into the isles in conquest of the Britons, but the Picts were able to hold them off at the Battle of Dun Nechtain in 685. Nothing, however, could stop the onslaught by Norse vikings, which changed the face of Britain forever, much as the Romans had done before. However, just as with the Romans, the native populations stayed on even as the conquerors themselves declined.

Descendants of the Picts live on in communities all over the world, still celebrating Samhain alongside many neighbors who have their own observances of the days growing shorter. Many of the customs among the bonfires connect to good luck or making mischief. Spooky-faced lanterns are made by carving out turnips or gourds. Players compete in being the first to bite an apple from a tub of water or a scone suspended by a string. More serious observers meet with the presiding druids in the sacred groves for a night of divination while the veil to the spirit world is at its thinnest.

Most popular of all customs is guising, in which children in costumes go house-to-house asking for sweets or coins. Upon answering the door, the children cry the traditional, "Hullo, Constantine!" The people of the house then assure them they are not Romans and give out the goodies.



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In reality, Constantius's campaign was largely ineffectual. He died afterward, endorsing Constantine as his successor. Rome soon broke into civil war with Maxentius, whom Constantine defeated at the Battle of Milvian Bridge. Constantine pushed the Edict of Milan, legalizing Christianity, which would become the state religion in 391 under the Theodosius I. Samhain and similar holidays would be replaced with All Hallows' Eve, although many of the practices continue much the same as they have for thousands of years.

1325 – Mansa Musa’s Pilgrimage by Sea

Musa I, the tenth Mansa of the Mali Empire, continued the Muslim traditions of his predecessors: professing faith, praying five times daily, donating to charity, and fasting. None of the previous emperors had met the fifth pillar by personally traveling the Hajj to Mecca. Musa vowed to be the first, and he certainly had the resources needed to do it.

Musa is often referred to as the richest man in history. The Malian Empire had grown wealthy from the trade routes of the southern Sahara and the vast gold fields of western Africa. It expanded rapidly through warfare as well as exporting its law and culture to nearby regions, using taxes on trade and the natural resources of salt, copper, and especially gold to finance expansion and effective administration. All gold nuggets in the empire belonged to the mansa, building a tremendous treasury as the people collected nuggets to trade for gold dust or coins that may be used as currency, effectively allowing anyone to journey to the gold fields for work.

A pilgrimage to Mecca would be a difficult one of 4,000 miles across blistering deserts, but Musa became inspired to avoid them altogether. During his studies of the Q’uran, Musa read, “Hast thou not seen how the ships glide on the sea by Allah's grace, that He may show you of His wonders? Lo! therein indeed are portents for every steadfast, grateful” (31:31). Musa could only imagine the sights of God to be seen while at sea, since after all “Allah is He Who created the heavens and the earth, and causeth water to descend from the sky, thereby producing fruits as food for you, and maketh the ships to be of service unto you, that they may run upon the sea at His command, and hath made of service unto you the rivers” (14:32). Musa informed his advisors of his decision, who began to work on a plan to meet their majesty’s wishes.

The journey north to the Mediterranean and then across it would indeed be much quicker than traveling by land. However, it would bring the king unnervingly close to violent Christian nations. Even if the planned fleet stayed close to the northern coast of Africa with its many Muslim harbors, its treasures would be an enormous target for the Iberian kingdoms fighting their Reconquista wars, the Italian city-states with their powerful navies, and the long-time rivals of the caliphs, the Byzantines.

It was suggested, then, that the king should travel south. Scholars had known for thousands of years that the entire world was encircled by a great river Ocean. In fact, Musa’s predecessor had sent two fleets of hundreds of ships to sail west to find Ocean’s edge and never returned. Rather than sailing west, the king could simply travel around Africa and up the Red Sea to make landfall near Mecca. The problem was, much of that corner of the map had not been filled in. On the west coast, ancient mariners had journeyed to dense forests where roamed men completely covered in hair. On the east coast, Arabic traders had long been in contact with Swahili cities. No one knew what lay between the two, however.

Musa built shipyards and dispatched advance ships to map the coast and make contact with locals to establish ports for fresh water and supplies. His efforts made Mali a new center of naval activity, drawing experienced sailors and shipbuilders from all over the Mediterranean and beyond with promises of exorbitant pay. In 1324, Musa himself set out in a fleet of hundreds of ships, stopping at the prepared places along the journey to tour Allah’s wonders and bless the people there. Along with markets in the west, Musa established mosques and universities, which became centers of local learning. Musa toured the enormous stone city of Great Zimbabwe as a guest of the king, who himself controlled the local gold trade and had much more interest in Musa’s gifts of salt than gold, becoming a rich new market for Musa’s merchants. The route took the mansa through numerous other great cities of the African east coast, where he left behind imams to teach on his return journey after completing the Hajj.

The ports established by Mansa Musa proved to be a great boon to the already-rich empire’s growth. Mali came to dominate the vast stretch of Africa from the Senegal River to the Niger with numerous colonies southward and their influence via trade route even further. Adopting the science and religion of Arabia, Africa became known as the Muslim Continent and a center of the world economy, although hit notoriously hard by the bubonic plague.

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In reality, Mansa Musa traveled by land, following the established trade routes across the North African deserts. When his party arrived in Egypt, he was so generous with his gold (80 camels of his baggage train were each dedicated to carrying 300 pounds), that it devastated the Egyptian economy with hyperinflation. It is said that, returning through Egypt, that Musa was apologetic and purchased back much of the gold with goods to reestablish its value. Mali and other African empires would later be eclipsed by European colonialism.

75 BC - Julius Caesar Slain by Pirates

Chaos in Rome during Sulla’s attempts to become dictator-for-life spread chaos throughout the Mediterranean world. Many Romans were driven abroad to wait out the power struggle while armies of defeated veterans sought mercenary work in a depressed economy. The lack of central authority in the wide sea caused pirates to prey on the sea lanes in hopes of seizing valuable cargo to resell or even a Roman citizen for ransom.

Such was the case of young Gaius Julius Caesar. Following his father’s death in 85 BC, sixteen-year-old Julius became the head of the family. Caesar soon gained a lofty position as the high priest of Jupiter under the administration of Marius, but when Sulla gained power, he fled Rome to join the army fighting rebel nations to the east. Upon Sulla’s death, Caesar returned to Rome and worked to restore his family’s fortunes through law. He was headed toward Rhodes to study oratory when Cilician pirates captured his ship.

Caesar proved to be a snobby prisoner. When they suggested they could get 20 talents (roughly $1 million in 2019) for the head of such an old family, Caesar laughed at them and demanded they ask for 50 talents. He virtually took command of the bandits, giving suggestions on how to conduct themselves and reassigning rations with better food. Finally he began telling the pirates that, as soon as they let him go, he would return with an army to kill them and take back the gold. One pirate had grown weary of the young Roman’s boasts and, in a misguided spurt of anger that cost the crew piles of gold, hit him across the skull with a wooden baton. Caesar died during the resulting seizure.

Rome was horrified when they heard the news. The Caesars fell on especially hard times and would never gain much prominence in the republic, though their friends kept the family afloat. The murdered ambitious young heir became a common trope in Roman satyr plays and Mediterranean literature in the centuries to come. At the time, the death of Caesar caused public outcry for safety at sea. Following his triumphant return to Rome from the Mithridatic wars, Pompey the Great launched a campaign that destroyed over 800 ships and eliminated pirate strongholds along the Asian coast.

With the sea safe again, the Roman economy surged. Pompey served as an effective leader after the troubled times, working to moderate political enemies and reform government corruption. He dealt effectively with rivals, such as Marcus Licinius Crassus, the famous richest man in all of Rome. Crassus, too, had an impressive list of successes with victories in the Servile Wars against Spartacus, although it was nothing compared to Pompey’s. He had spent most of his lifetime accumulating wealth with shrewd schemes such as buying up buildings ruined by fire, repairing them with his army of slaves, and reselling them at tremendous profit. He even sped up the rate of success by founding his own fire brigade and running with them to buildings on fire; there, he would offer to buy the building while still on fire and then send his men to put it out before any more damage was done. If owners did not sell, Crassus and his firemen would watch cheering as the building burnt to the ground.

Not wanting to deal with Crassus’s scheming in Rome, Pompey orchestrated him being dispatched as governor of Syria. Crassus used Roman military might in new money-making schemes, such as looting the Hebrew Temple in Jerusalem. The seemingly boundless wealth of the Parthians lay to the east, but Crassus doubted that he had the forces to take such an empire since it had taken three wars to settle Mithridates in Asia Minor. Instead, he focused on trade. During his interviews with merchants and ambassadors, he learned that much of Parthia’s wealth was actually derived as middle-men in the trade with India and, even farther east, China with its mysterious shining fabric silk.

Working with Roman-ally king Artavazdes II of Armenia, Crassus became determined to cut the Parthians out of their trade on the “Silk Road.” Starting from Damascus, Crassus built a literal road through Armenia with ports on the Caspian Sea to lead to a new route north of the Parthian border. Crassus invested much of his own fortune in the quasi-military action, which was easily recouped once merchants eagerly began taking his route, cheaper despite the tolls and much faster thanks to Roman engineering. In Bactria, Crassus’s agents met with agents of the court of the Han, who were already working to establish trade relations westward after the efforts of Emperor Wu decades before. The Chinese were eager to trade for horses of the stronger western stock, and Crassus was happy to supply them for a profit.

Crassus became incalculably wealthy and in fact never returned to Rome, living as a virtual god in the east. Silk poured into Roman culture along with other Chinese items like noodles, which proved to store better than bread for traveling legions. Romans exported valuable metals and bondservants, bolstering the Chinese noble class. Crassus left behind a tradition of Roman expansion by trade, such as the trade fleet that journeyed south around Parthia by sea following the conquest of Egypt by Mark Antony and the clearing of silt from the Ptolemaic canals.

Along with the economic trade came the exchange of ideas. Chinese gods joined the Roman pantheon while arches and aqueducts fashioned with concrete were built across China. Confucianism became very popular among Roman intellectuals, who found its practice matched Stoic ideals well. Many Daoists adopted a form of the Socratic method, furthering their experiments in alchemy and medicine. Perhaps the most widely known adaptation is the magnetic compass, a Chinese divining mechanism that sailors in the cloudy north found to be a useful tool for navigation.

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In reality, Caesar was well liked by his pirate captors, who thought he told great jokes. They were apparently surprised when he followed through on his promise to catch and execute them. Caesar rose to power with the conquest of Gaul, forming a triumvirate with Pompey and Crassus. Seeking military honors to match those of Caesar and Pompey, Crassus died in a misguided campaign against Parthia that would begin two and a half centuries of conflict and interrupt the flow of goods from the east.