Humanity has gradually mastered the surface of the Earth. It cost him great sacrifices, but neither the harsh nature, nor the warlike tribes, nor the disease could already reverse this process.
The great silk road
Until the 2nd century BC. the path from Europe to Asia ended at the spurs of the Tien Shan, which hid the civilization of China. Everything was changed by the visit of the Chinese ambassador Zhang Qian to Central Asia, who was amazed at the unprecedented wealth of these lands in his country.
Gradually, small sections of trade roads were combined into a gigantic highway 12 thousand kilometers long, linking East and West. However, the Great Silk Road should not be viewed as a single route.
When approaching Dunhua, a city on the outskirts of the Great Wall of China, the path forks, bordering the Taklamakan Desert from the server and south. The northern road led to the Ili River valley, and the southern one led to Bactria (northern Afghanistan). Here the South Road again diverged into two directions: one went to India, the other to the West - to Iraq and Syria.
The Great Silk Road is not a journey of people, but of goods that passed through many hands before reaching the buyer. Silk, due to its lightness, high cost and great demand, was an ideal product for long-distance transportation. At the final destination of the Silk Road - Rome - the price of this fabric was three times the price of gold.
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Empires appeared and disappeared, establishing their control over the transit of wealthy caravans, but the arteries of the Great Silk Road continued to feed the markets of the largest continent.
In the middle of the XIV century, along with goods along the Great Silk Road, death flowed. An epidemic of bubonic plague from the depths of the Gobi, paved the way with corpses and caravan routes, reached Europe.
The Cambridge Encyclopedia sums up a terrible result: about 60 million people, or 25% of the world's population - this is the number of victims of a deadly epidemic, such is the price of trade ties between Europe and Asia.
Greenland
The most remarkable thing in this story is that the largest island on the planet was discovered by a fugitive criminal - Eirik, nicknamed the Red. The Norwegian Viking got tired of the Icelandic exile and in 982 he sailed with his fellow tribesmen to the west. Eirik called the discovered land Greenland ("Green Country"), not because of the riot of vegetation: he believed that if the island had a good name, then people would be drawn there.
Eirik managed to persuade some of the Icelanders to move to the "Green Country". In 985, a flotilla of 25 ships sailed to the coast of Greenland. They sailed with whole families, with belongings, utensils and even cattle.
It was the triumph of Red Eirik: from a hunted outcast, he turned into a master of vast possessions.
The first settlers of Greenland found abandoned homes on the east coast. Most likely, they belonged to the indigenous population of the island - the ancestors of the modern Inuit, who for unknown reasons left their habitats.
The arrangement of life was not easy given by the Vikings. In order to have the necessary minimum, they had to enter into trade relations with Europe: bread and building materials were delivered to the colonists from the continent, and whalebone and skins of sea animals were sent in return.
However, by the end of the XIV century, the colonies fell into decay - almost all of their population died out. Perhaps the reason for this was the Little Ice Age, which created unbearable conditions for life on the island.
Greenland eventually became a springboard for the further advance of the Vikings to the west. After the death of Eirik the Red, his sons dared to sail to the ends of the Earth and reached the shores of America.
The last written record of the Greenland Vikings dates back to 1408. It tells the story of a wedding in Hwalsi Church. The ruins of this church have survived to this day, as a monument to the dedication of the first European conquerors of the impregnable North.
West coast of Africa
From the beginning of the 15th century, Portuguese sailors intensified their exploration of the west coast of Africa. In the midst of the Reconquista, the kings of Portugal were in need of new sources of fame and fortune.
But there was another reason - Turkish rule in the Eastern Mediterranean, which blocked the traditional merchant routes to Asia.
To understand the complexity and significance of the expeditions undertaken by the Portuguese along the West African coast, it should be remembered that no European had ever crossed the equator by that time.
Moreover, Europe continued to live on the notions of Ptolemaic geography, according to which the inhabited world ended with an ocean washing the western outskirts of Africa. In 1482, Diogo Kan crossed the equator and reached the mouth of the Congo River, simultaneously refuting Ptolemy's hypothesis about the obstruction of the tropics.
On the coast of the Gulf of Guinea, Portuguese sailors found what they set out on such a long journey for - large deposits of gold. The news about the found gold spread quickly and already Spanish, British, Dutch businessmen are sailing here to organize mines in the hope of getting fabulous profits.
But the Portuguese are attracted further: by the end of the century, they get to the southern tip of Africa. Now a direct route opens up for sailing to the shores of India, which Vasco da Gama will soon use.
In 1442, black men and women were brought to Lisbon. This was the delivery of the first batch of African slaves. From now on, "black gold" becomes the most popular commodity, first in the European and later in the American market.
At the same time, on the Cape Verde Islands (Cape Verde), a new phenomenon for humanity is emerging - a mixture of Europeans and Africans. This is how the Creoles appeared. According to historians, this is due to a banal reason - the almost complete absence of white women in the Portuguese colonies.
America
Instead of answering many questions, the discovery of America seems to have puzzled the Europeans even more: the inhabited world was not pumped here, but continued further to the West - into a frightening unknown. Nevertheless, the pioneers too self-confidently began to master the alien environment, irrevocably upsetting the natural and cultural balance of both continents.
Thanks to the "Columbus Exchange" (Alfred Crosby's term), animals, crops, technologies and diseases migrated to a much greater extent in the western direction, radically changing the appearance of the New World. One of the diseases - malaria - was destined to affect the geopolitical map of North America.
Malaria was brought to the New World along with African slaves, but since the latter were immune to infection, it was mostly Europeans who died of the disease. The zone of distribution of carriers of the disease - malaria mosquitoes - humid tropics. As a result, it formed a conditional geographic line, above which mosquitoes did not breed.
To the south of this line were the slave states, and to the north were slave-free territories, where mainly European settlers were sent. Today this line almost coincides with the so-called Mason-Dixon Line, which separates Pennsylvania from the states of West Virginia and Maryland located to the south.
The development of vast territories of the New World allowed Europe to cope with the overpopulation problem that threatened it in the future. However, the expansion of Europeans on both American continents led to the largest humanitarian and demographic catastrophe in the history of mankind.
The Indian Reservation Act, which appeared in the United States in 1867, was only a formal step towards the preservation of Aboriginal people. The Indians were often sent to places completely unsuitable for farming. A number of Native American organizations claim that from 1500 to 1900 the Native American population fell from 15 million to 237 thousand people.
Antarctica
Antarctica, like an alluring and at the same time repulsive forbidden fruit, slowly and gradually let the sailors approach. Dirk Geeritz in 1559 reaches 64 ° S. sh., James Cook in 1773 - 67 ° 5 ′ S. sh. Caught among icebergs near Tierra del Fuego, the English navigator declares that there is no southern continent.
For almost half a century, Cook's skepticism discouraged the search for the sixth continent. But in 1820 Bellingshausen and Lazarev manage to reach 69 ° 21 ′ S. sh. - now such a treasured land is at a cannon shot distance. Only the Norwegian expedition of Karsten Borchgrevink in 1895 made the first recorded landing on the southern continent.
According to the "Treaty on Antarctica", signed in 1959, only 7 states declare claims to certain sectors of the continent - Great Britain, Norway, France, Chile, Argentina, Australia and New Zealand. But everyone has different territorial appetites.
If France claims a narrow strip of land - Adelie Land, occupying 432,000 km², Australia counts on almost half of the area of Antarctica. At the same time, Chile, New Zealand, Great Britain and Argentina dispute practically the same territory.
Each of the countries is trying to look to the future of the southern continent. The British, for example, are serious about developing the Antarctic shelf rich in hydrocarbons. It is possible that Antarctica may be populated in the near future. Already today, due to global warming, tundra begins to form on the most distant land areas from the pole, and in 100 years, scientists predict the appearance of trees here.