Chapter 21
  • Home
  • Long distance trade considering diplomacy and missionary impulse.
  • Missions of Marco Polo and Ibn Battuta
  • Taxation and Standing Armies
  • The centralization process of Hongwu and Yongle.
  • Humanist Concept of the Rennaissance
  • Impact of Bubonic Plague
  • Voyages of Zheng He
  • Impact of Christopher Columbus

Compare the missions of Marco Polo and Ibn Battuta.

Picture

Marco Polo's Journey

  • Polo first traveled to China with his parents.
  • From Venice, Italy
  • He gained the trust of the great Khan by his story telling skills.
  • The great Khan also enjoyed the stories he told from the various regions of his empire.
  • Kublai gave Polo diplomatic missions
  • Somehow, Polo was imprisoned and one of the other prisoners was a poet and recorded all his stories. That's how his stories spread all across Europe and the world.
  • Polo's stories and information of the places he traveled to inspired many other merchants to participate in the economy of the Eastern Hemisphere.

Ibn Battuta's 

Ibn was the qadi and adviser to the Sultan of Delhi.
  • Supervised affairs of wealthy mosques and heard cases of law.
  • Strictly enforced Islamic standards of justice

Very cruel 
  • Lashed
  • Cut off hands

In East and West Africa, he offered advice about governments
  • He consulted about how Muslims should rule, women's dress, and proper relationships between sexes

Comparisons: Marco polo's journey vs. Ibn Battuta's mission

Both Marco Polo and Ibn Battuta traveled long distances from their home. Both also held political positions. Marco Polo took diplomatic journeys and Ibn Battuta traveled to Muslim states to oversee how the Islamic law was being put into place.
However Ibn was not a merchant with mercantile views as Marco. Ibn went out to check on Islamic states on his own. Marco was sent by the great Khan to a diplomatic journey.

College Board Themes

Creation, Expansion & Interaction of Economic Systems
    Agriculture, Pastoralist, Trade & Commerce, Labor Systems,
    Industrialism, Capitalism, Socialism

Develop & Transformation of Social Structure
     Gender Roles, Family & Kinship, racial & Ethnic Construction
     Social – Economic Classes

Why they apply:
  • Marco Polo was a merchant from the beginning to end. 
  • Ibn Battuta was deeply involved with the social aspect of peoples lives due to his legal credentials.
  • Battuta oversaw that all Social Structure was in line with the Sharia (Islamic law)

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.