Question

The Italian merchants sometimes sailed across the Mediterranean Sea to Syria, where they could buy black pepper that had been grown on the southwest coast of India. The tiny dried black peppercorns were the perfect item to trade, because the small ships of the time could carry enough to make a nice profit. From India the pepper was shipped across to Arabia, where camel caravans would carry it all the way to Syria. The Italians could purchase enough pepper in Syria to carry with them to the next Champagne fair. Every count whose cook added the bite of costly black pepper to his food knew he was getting a taste of far distant lands. As late as 1300, Jean de Joieville, a French writer who had actually lived in the Muslim world, still believed that these spices came from the outer edges of the Garden of Eden, located somewhere along the river Nile. There, people “cast their nets outspread into the river, at night; and when morning comes, they find in their nets such goods as . . . ginger, rhubarb, wood of aloes, and cinnamon.”
–Sugar Changed the World,
Marc Aronson and Marina Budhos

Which details from the text support the central idea of this passage? Check all that apply.

(A)- “sailed across the Mediterranean Sea to Syria”
(B)- “grown on the southwest coast of India”
(D)- “From India the pepper was shipped across to Arabia”

Answer 1

Answer:

A). “Sailed across the Mediterranean Sea to Syria.”

B). “Grown on the southwest coast of India.”

D). "From India the pepper was shipped across to Arabia”

Explanation:

The given passage is taken from 'Sugar Changed the World' that primarily focuses on displaying that how the trade of various goods and spices(rhubarb, wood of aloes, cinnamon, pepper corns, etc.) assisted in connecting the world together in a single thread. The above details not only support but strengthen this idea that how trading has led to development of transportation means and establish relationships among countries through these trading of spices. Thus, options A, B, and D are the correct answers.

Answer 2

In the Middle Ages, spices that are now ordinary were rare imports from faraway places.