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Spices have been decisive in the history of the world, because of the search of spices is that continents were discovered and spices were also the beginning of the history of commerce in the world.

The first mention of spices in the Bible is in Genesis, in the story of Joseph, where he was sold in slavery by his brothers to spice merchants.

The spice trade developed throughout the Middle East in around 2000BC with cinnamon, black pepper, ginger, cassia, and clove. Because of the lack of refrigeration, meat would rapidly go wrong and spices were used to cover its taste so soon it became more than a luxury (because of its place of origin: Africa, spices were very expensive)a necessity.

Black pepper was the most common spice but the most exclusive was saffron

From the 8th til the 15th century, Venice held the monopoly of spice trade with the Middle East making the region extremely wealthy.

It was because of the outrageous prices for spices from the Venice merchants and the control of trade routes that made Portuguese navigator Vasco de Gama to sail to India in 1499, also trying to find the Spice Islands, almost at around the same time that Christopher Columbus returned from the New World describing that many new and unknown spices were available there.

Today,San Martin, an island in the Caribbean, still holds the tradition of trading with spices, but in the present they trade them for dollars, nevertheless, it is one place where you can find every spice existent in the world.

Learn more about this author, Brenda Lachman.
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