This is an abstract
from the lecture Dr María del Carmen Borrego Plá gave at Williams & Humbert
the other evening. Her topic was “Return Traffic: the links between three
continents” and one she is uniquely expert on, having a doctorate in history
and being part owner with her mother of Bodegas El Maestro Sierra.
Dr Borrego focused her lecture on the
exceptional “network of interests and exchanges” which was created from the
start of the XVI century between Spain, the “Indies” and Asia. These
interchanges, which have rarely been studied in depth, have been mainly centred
on luxury products and those relevant to nutrition and the pharmacopeia. Many
of our modern day customs have derived from these connections between the three
continents without us being aware of it. This was the earliest economic
globalisation and it is very similar to current globalisation theories.
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| Dr Borrego addressing over 80 people in the area of the bodega where they store the Anadas |
She stressed the “luxury mentality of the
Renaissance” and the nature of the products involved, which were considered to
be of high value, and which arrived in Castile mainly via Venice and
Constantinople. The fall of the latter into the hands of the Turks, who decided
to cease trading with Europe, was the turning point where Spain and Portugal
decided to search out their own products. Dr Borrego explained how Spain and
Portugal in the days of the great navigators also decided to go to China
following the papal allocation of their own new Atlantic shipping routes,
through which Spain would go on to discover a new continent.
Commercial efforts in the Indies as well as
China and the Philippines as strategic enclaves of the Spanish trading network
are some of the historic milestones she addressed, as well as the route of the
well-known “Manila Galleon” which gave Spain entry to the Philippines and
vice-versa.
Studies of the products traded reveal a wide
range; imported from the Indies were maize, potatoes, cacao and tobacco, to
mention just a few examples, and exported from Spain; livestock, various crops,
and of course wine, while from Asia, lacquer, silk and spices were imported.
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| Dr Borrego with Jesus Medina Garcia de Polavieja, director of Williams & Humbert |
In the end we would find that Sherry would
become one of the central threads in this network and exchange of trade routes
and cultures. It was transported by ship in containers made of wood, ceramic or
leather and mostly sent to Mexico since winemaking was difficult there on
account of problems with pruning techniques. Sherry was already highly valued
and was even used as a means of payment with the older wine having a higher
commercial value than the younger.
These wines from Jerez arrived in the
Philippines by the route of the aforementioned Manila Galleon (also known as
the China Ship or the Acapulco Galleon). This route would link Spain with the
Philippines and connect the ports of Seville, Veracruz, Acapulco and Manila. It
was a complicated route, a mix of land and sea crossings. In the case of the
Philippines it involved sailing from the Atlantic into the Pacific, the ocean
they referred to as the Sea of Silk and Silver for the huge quantities of these
goods which crossed its waters.
Dr Borrego also described how the tobacco
pouches from the Indies came wrapped in Chinese silk. This silk, then so cheap
that tobacco was wrapped in it, was used by the girls in the tobacco factory in
Seville to make their own shawls. This unprecedented exchange of culture and
trade also affected Sherry labelling (especially Manzanilla) which frequently used
representations of these women in their shawls, thus reflecting the links
between these three continents through three products; tobacco, silk and wine.
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