Crusade against the Pope

Chapter 385 Coffee Trade and Tea Trade

There are many stories about the origin of coffee, but one of the more popular ones is that a 9th-century Ethiopian shepherd named Kaldi first observed the coffee plant after seeing his flock gain energy from chewing coffee leaves.

This statement is obviously problematic as it did not appear before 1671.

In fact, it was narrated by Antoine Faustus Nairon, a Maronite professor of Oriental languages.

But no matter what, this actually indirectly confirms a fact, that is, people at that time believed that the origin of coffee was in Ethiopia.

The most credible history of coffee drinking can be traced back to the accounts of Ahmed Jafar in Yemen in the mid-15th century.

Here Sufis roast and brew coffee to refresh themselves for religious ceremonies.

Yemen's geographical location is actually just across the sea from Ethiopia, and combined with later biological evidence, it is sufficient to determine that coffee beans originated in Ethiopia.

With the answer in hand, the journey to find coffee became quite easy for the expedition team sent from Jerusalem.

Six years ago, an expedition that set out from the port of Montereal County discovered the plants that Gellis described not long after arriving in Abyssinia.

The refreshing effect and bitter taste of coffee easily conquered the members of the expedition team and even became a trend in a small circle.

For Jerusalem, this is undoubtedly a new commodity with unlimited potential.

Whether for personal use or export to Europe,

But problems followed. The yield of wild coffee was too low, and to artificially cultivate this plant, very suitable water and heat conditions were required.

It requires a growth temperature between 20°C and 25°C, and a large temperature difference between day and night.

The annual precipitation should reach between 1500mm and 2500mm, but it is divided into two seasons: rainy and dry.

As for the soil, it must also be acidic soil rich in organic matter and well-drained.

Even the altitude must be between 600 and 2000 meters.

With such stringent requirements, Jerusalem naturally cannot grow it on its own.

Therefore, the kingdom could only hope to buy land in Ethiopia to build plantations, but the Zagwe Dynasty was a free country and directly and decisively rejected the foreigners' demand to buy land.

Later, Jerusalem's attempt to purchase coffee berries was regarded as a sucker by the other party, who directly called out a very high price before they were willing to expand the scope of cultivation.

Even though the Kingdom of Jerusalem gritted its teeth and adopted a small amount of coffee beans, it was simply not enough to meet domestic demand, let alone export to Europe.

Although Gellis later proposed to open plantations in Yemen, considering that the kingdom's own strength is not enough to penetrate deep into the Arabian Peninsula, it can only be decided.

Under such circumstances, the coffee trade can only remain in a half-dead state.

"The current Zagwe Dynasty is not the traditional Solomon Dynasty of Abyssinia. Their foreign policy tends to be conservative, and they are not happy with us entering their territory too much."

"On the other hand, they believe that only Abyssinia is suitable for growing coffee. As the party with the export monopoly, they naturally don't need to rush to expand the plantations. Instead, they can charge a high price and earn dozens of times the profit."

"That is indeed true. At least at the moment, apart from Yemen, we have not found a third area that matches the description given by the prophet."

At this point, Jose poured another cup of tea for Mr. Delfino.

When talking about this, Mr. Delfino naturally had some thoughts. After all, he was also a smart man.

"But what the Abyssins don't know is that besides coffee, there is another drink that can refresh people, right?"

Or old man Delfino, looking at the reddish-brown tea in the cup, he keenly sensed the business opportunity.

"But, you said that this thing is produced from peach blossom stone?"

Even though old man Delfino was known among the Venetians for his adventures and long stays overseas, when he mentioned the Peach Blossom Stone, he still trembled a little because of the cruelty of distance.

Today, everyone has a certain idea of ​​how big the earth is.

Although Gellis did not directly publish the global map, everyone still knows how far it is from Jerusalem to Quanzhou Port in Taohuashi.

Measured on a globe, the distance is a full 1600 leagues, or 8800 kilometers, more than three times the distance from Venice to Jerusalem.

And if you sail along the coastline, according to Gellis's private statement, it would be a full 3200 leagues.

This number alone is enough to make many people gasp.

"Indeed, although the distance is far, Peach Blossom Stone has better advantages than Abyssinia."

"what?"

"They don't prohibit foreign trade, or they are eager to export a large amount of goods. At the same time, the annual output of the drink you are drinking in the Song Dynasty south of Taohuashi is actually at least 20 million pounds."

"How many, how many?"

Old man Delfino was stunned. He couldn't believe that the number he heard was true.

"Ten million pounds." Joss repeated the unit slowly.

Old man Delfino couldn't believe that this number was true, because 1 million pounds, this number, was close to tons.

The population of Venice was only about 3, and at most , and its annual grain consumption was only tons.

In other words, this is clearly a luxury that only the rich can drink, but its output is on the same level as bulk traded grain.

The wealth of Taohuashi shocked the old man, causing him to subconsciously ask again: "Where did you get this number from?"

"prophet."

Hearing this word, the old man restrained his expression and stopped questioning. Since it was said by the prophet, it must be true.

Now Delfino understood why Jose brought out the tea leaves from Taohuashi and compared them with coffee.

Even though the journey to Taohuashi is long, the local production is there, and the price must be much cheaper than the coffee that is exported sparingly.

At the same time, in terms of refreshing effects, tea and coffee are substitutes, which means that when the kingdom is able to import tea, Ethiopia must also lower the price accordingly in order to be able to export coffee, otherwise they will directly lose the coffee market in Jerusalem.

The Boston Tea Party, which later influenced the world, was actually the same. The British East India Company, which monopolized the world's tea trade, dumped tea in North America and was resisted by North American smugglers. This led to Americans choosing to drink coffee for a long time after the independence of the United States, instead of drinking tea like their ancestors.

Delfino, who has been in business for a long time, knows what it means to be a substitute for each other. He has imagined a lot in his mind, but then reality brings him back to the original.
"I understand that, but... if the Saracens, I mean the Arabs, are the second-hand sellers, I'm afraid they won't be so easy to resell the cheap tea to us."

As middlemen in trade between the East and the West, although the Arabs' martial ethics are very poor, they should not be underestimated in business.

The largest Arab caravans of this period had tens of thousands of camels.

When such a caravan moves on land, it is like a moving city.

As monopolists, they are extremely ruthless in bidding for goods.

Take cinnamon as an example. Cinnamon produced in Southeast Asia is just a part of the bark, but the Arabs exaggerated it as a precious treasure obtained from the dragon's nest. Its price in Europe was comparable to gold, although the Venetians also made a lot of money from it.

But it was the Arabs' success that made Delfino feel even more heartbroken.

"This brings us to another plan of the prophet."

"I mean, in the past, the prophet Moses parted the sea to allow the Israelites to escape from Egypt to Canaan. Then, after that, the prophet Gairis planned to part the land so that you and I could take a ship from the Adriatic Sea directly to Taohuashiquanzhou Port, which is on the Sinai Peninsula."

Delfino didn’t think about the canal in the Isthmus of Suez for a moment, but the scripture echoed in his mind. He was a little dazed for a moment and found it hard to believe that what Jos said was true.

[Moses stretched out his staff over the sea, and the Father caused the sea to recede overnight, and the sea became dry land. The water was divided.]

[The Israelites walked on dry land in the middle of the sea, and the water formed a wall on their right and on their left.]

The Father said to Moses, "Stretch out your hand over the sea, that the water may flow back over the Egyptians and their horses and chariots. Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and at daybreak the sea flowed back over the Egyptians' horses and chariots and horsemen. The Lord brought the sea back over them. The water came back and covered all the army of Pharaoh, so that no one survived.

Delfino said something subconsciously.

"Prophet, do you want to ask Heavenly Father for help like this?!"

Delfino couldn't help but tremble at the thought that perhaps one day he would be able to see the true face of God in this world.

Even though he was not a devout man, he was looking forward to the scene where the prophet would split the land, which would answer all his doubts.

It was not until he noticed the irresistible smile on Jos's face that he came to his senses and escaped from that state of absolute devout belief.

"What? What's the problem?"

Jose then talked to Delfino about the specific process and expressed the hope that the Venetians could provide sufficient financial support during this process.

Although he realized what was going on, his previous state of trembling faith still prevented Delfino from remaining absolutely rational in the negotiation of certain conditions. Instead, he subconsciously gave up many of his interests in the hope of getting some promises from Garys.

After Delfino left the room, Jose couldn't help but laugh out loud, and then his wife, the granddaughter whom Delfino married, came out from another room with a look of resentment on her face.

"Grandpa, is he being fooled by you?"

Listening to his little wife's words, Jos said openly: "What can we do? Your grandfather has so much money. If he doesn't spend more, it will be troublesome for him to go to heaven in the future."

Seraphina was so angry when she heard her husband's nonsense that she kicked him lightly, but that didn't mean she was against her husband doing so.

After all, in her eyes, this was indeed for Delfino's own good.

Give more gold coins to the kingdom, give more gold coins to Garys, and there will be many rewards waiting for her grandfather in the future.

This is true whether it is economic benefits in this world or the blessings of heaven.

Previously, the profits made by their Delfino family from their participation in the construction of the Kingdom of Jerusalem Bank were already shocking enough.

The Kingdom of Jerusalem has not yet explicitly stated that it will issue paper money, but various bills backed by gold have in fact begun to serve as paper money.

In order to promote the rapid development of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, Garys did a lot of ruthless work.

He directly implemented the deficit economic policy in this era.

In the Middle Ages, most countries, or most political entities, were lucky enough to live within their means. In fact, they had no economic policies at all.

But the Kingdom of Jerusalem, because its goods were relatively unique, could crush the quality of goods from other surrounding areas.

In addition, the kingdom itself has a relatively sparse population, so the market for various commodities in the kingdom is relatively promising in the short term.

In this case, in the short term, almost all the factories built will not be at risk of losing money.

The faster the expansion, the more rapid the economic development of the kingdom.

The restrictions on factory construction naturally include the investment funds that the country can mobilize. As for manpower, it can be solved by absorbing immigrants from the pilgrim group.

This involves a simple economic model.

That is, building a factory by taking on debt is much more efficient than living within one's means.

First assume that 100 units of currency can build a factory, and each factory can provide an annual return of 5 currencies.

A country invests 1000 currency in building a factory in the first year, and continues to invest 1000 currency plus the annual return of the factory in the second year to build new factories. After 10 years, it will have about 122 factories.

And if the country builds factories every year by incurring 10% debt in a deficit economy, then its total investment each year will not only include the return (5 currency/factory per year), but will also increase the debt funds by 10%.

In the third year, the funds used to invest in factory construction will be as much as 1386 currencies. By the tenth year, about 10 factories will have been built.

By investing only 10% more debt each year, you can get twice the actual number of factories as the former.

In the eyes of the ancients, this was actually no different from magic.

Even if 10% of the debt is invested each year, the total debt will only be 2568 currencies.

With 235 factories and an annual return of 1175 coins, it would only take two years to pay off the debt without investing in new factories.

Then you get double the productivity of your workshop compared to "living within your means".

(End of this chapter)