How did the Crusades produce a quite different effect than the one originally intended?
• Contact with the fabulous wealth of the Muslim East by the Crusaders stirred in the hearts of the Western Europeans a hunger for the East’s wealth. At first they tried to steal or plunder the East’s wealth–though that did not long last as a possibility once the Muslims got their act together. • But what the Crusaders were surprised to find was that some of the Muslims were interested in trading with Europe: the East’s wealth in gold, jewels, exotic spices, silks, and fine crafts–in exchange for the West’s wealth in timber, fish, wool and other basic raw materials scarce in the harsh semi-desert environment of the East. • Thus by the late 1200s trade replaced military conflict as the basis for relations between the Muslim East and the Christian West. Trade had a wonderous effect on the culture of the West. • The Italians were the first to benefit. At first such Italian port cities as Venice and Genoa began to gather wealth in the shipping of Crusaders to and from the East. Then by t
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