Comparing Land & Sea Based Empires DBQ
Question 1
Compare how maritime and land-based empires built and maintained power during the early modern period.
Mughal Emperor Akbar the Great receives gifts from the Ambassadors of Badakhshan. Their honoring him with gifts reflects their alliegence to him and the use of the tribute system to govern nearby conquered territories.
This map shows the large colonial holdings of Spain in Spanish America and the trade routes that they used to transport the silver they mined to markets all over the world. Their trade took the silver they mined back to Europe, into the Indian Ocean, and to east Asia.
This shows Kazak ambassadors offering tribute to the Emperor Qianlong of the Qing Dynasty. This shows how the tribute system was used to maintain control over nearby conquered lands. The Kazaks are bowing down before the emperor in respect and to show their subjugation.
But still these evil Turks did not cease at any hour of the day or the night bombarding the gate, where the repairs had been made, with all their force: their whole strength was concentrated on this gate, with shots from their great cannon, which had a circumference of fifteen palme,* from their other cannon, and also from great numbers of guns, countless bows and many hand guns which continually fired at those who were making the repairs.
*Roughly 12 feet
Diary of Nicolo Barbaro, a Venetian surgeon present at the Siege of Constantinople by the Ottoman Empire, 1453
- Esteem most highly family devotion and brotherly submission, in order to give due importance to human moral relations.
- Cultivate peace and concord in your neighborhoods, in order to prevent quarrels and litigations.
- Do away with errant teachings, in order to exalt the correct doctrine.
- Lecture on the laws, in order to warn the ignorant and obstinate.
- Explain ritual decorum and deference, in order to enrich manners and customs.
- Warn against sheltering [army] deserters, in order to avoid being involved in their punishment.
- Promptly pay your taxes, in order to avoid being pressed for payment.
The “Sacred Edict,” which was adopted by the Qing Dynasty as a set of rules to govern all territories under the emperor’s control, c. 1670
The great application of the Dutch Provinces to the fishing trade off the coasts of England and Scotland employs an incredible number of ships and seamen and supplies most of the Southern parts of Europe with a rich and necessary commodity.
Lastly, I shall mention the mighty advance they have made towards controlling the whole commerce of the East Indies through their successes against the Portuguese and their many wars and victories against the natives. The Dutch have forced the natives to sign treaties of commerce, exclusive to all other nations, and to allow forts to be built upon straits and passes that are the entrances into the shipping lanes of the islands of Indonesia. This has been achieved by so many of their people and mariners manufacturing every year so many great ships for such voyages.
By its conduct and application, the Dutch East India Company has managed Indonesia like a commonwealth rather than a trade. They have raised a state in the Indies, governed by a company, but otherwise functioning like a sovereign state, making war and peace with the greatest local king
Sir William Temple, Observations upon the United Provinces of the Netherlands, c. 1668
The maintenance of this monopoly on trade with the American colonies has until now been an important, or perhaps the only, aim of British dominion over her colonies. The Spanish war, which began in 1739, was principally a colony quarrel. Britain’s main objective in the war was to prevent the search of British ships which carried on an illegal trade with the Spanish colonies. This whole experience is, in reality, a bounty which has been given in order to support a monopoly.
From Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations, 1776
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