Overview
This lavishly illustrated volume of essays introduces a fascinating array of subjects, each exploring an aspect of the far-reaching “mercantile effect” and its impact across western Asia in the early modern era. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries the increased movement of merchants and goods from China to Europe brought desirable commodities to new markets, but also spread ideas, tastes, and technologies across western Asia as never before. Through the newly-established Dutch, English, and French East India companies, as well as much older mercantile networks, commodities including silk, ivory, books, and glazed porcelains were transported both east and west. The Mercantile Effect shows a fascinating array of trade objects and the customs and traditions of traders that brought about a period of intense cultural interchange.
Full Product Details
Author: Melanie Gibson ,
Sussan Babaie ,
Melanie Gibson
Publisher: GINGKO
Imprint: Gingko Library
Dimensions:
Width: 25.10cm
, Height: 1.80cm
, Length: 24.50cm
Weight: 1.024kg
ISBN: 9781909942103
ISBN 10: 1909942103
Pages: 160
Publication Date: 15 October 2017
Audience:
College/higher education
,
Postgraduate, Research & Scholarly
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active
Availability: Out of stock
The supplier is temporarily out of stock of this item. It will be ordered for you on backorder and shipped when it becomes available.
Reviews
`The avenues which bridged bodies of land and water and across which people, ideas, and artefacts moved, the codes which made communication along these avenues possible, and the outcomes of this movement and communication constitute the little-explored bedrock of early modern history. The material hybrids growing out of this bedrock of transcontinental and transoceanic liquidity are even less understood as they defy disciplinary pigeonholing. The Mercantile Effect captures unexpected glimpses of a vast and shifting landscape and brings them into focus; this is what the future of art history looks like.' George Manginis, Benaki Museum, Athens; `From paper fans and gold watches to aromatics and stimulants, art objects, exotic artefacts but also artists, styles and patterns moved freely between the Ottoman lands, Europe and Western Asia between the 16th to 18th centuries. This fine collection of stimulating essays is a fascinating introduction to some of commodities, tastes and ideas that flowed around the Middle East in the premodern era and proves once again how the study of small-scale artefacts and even everyday items powerfully adds to the larger story of trade and exchange.' Julia GonnellaDirector, Museum of Islamic Art, Doha.
Author Information
Melanie Gibson is the senior editor of the Gingko Library Arts Series. Sussan Babaie is the Andrew W. Mellon Reader in the Arts of Iran and Islam at the Courtauld Institute of Art, University of London.
