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    Procopius chronicled the reign of Justinian I in his eight-volume work "History of the Wars of Justinian" published in 552 CE. One volume describes how Byzantine monks brought silkworm eggs to Constantinople, allowing the Byzantine Empire to begin silk production and end their reliance on importing silk through Persia or other enemies. The monks explained that silkworms naturally produce silk and taught locals to care for the eggs by keeping them warm under dung until the silkworms hatched and could feed on mulberry leaves, establishing silk manufacture in the Byzantine Empire.

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    Procopius chronicled the reign of Justinian I in his eight-volume work "History of the Wars of Justinian" published in 552 CE. One volume describes how Byzantine monks brought silkworm eggs to Constantinople, allowing the Byzantine Empire to begin silk production and end their reliance on importing silk through Persia or other enemies. The monks explained that silkworms naturally produce silk and taught locals to care for the eggs by keeping them warm under dung until the silkworms hatched and could feed on mulberry leaves, establishing silk manufacture in the Byzantine Empire.

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    Procopius chronicled the reign of Justinian I in his eight-volume work "History of the Wars of Justinian" published in 552 CE. One volume describes how Byzantine monks brought silkworm eggs to Constantinople, allowing the Byzantine Empire to begin silk production and end their reliance on importing silk through Persia or other enemies. The monks explained that silkworms naturally produce silk and taught locals to care for the eggs by keeping them warm under dung until the silkworms hatched and could feed on mulberry leaves, establishing silk manufacture in the Byzantine Empire.

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    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as docx, pdf, or txt
    90 views2 pages

    Primary Source 1

    Uploaded by

    Victoria Kokareva
    Procopius chronicled the reign of Justinian I in his eight-volume work "History of the Wars of Justinian" published in 552 CE. One volume describes how Byzantine monks brought silkworm eggs to Constantinople, allowing the Byzantine Empire to begin silk production and end their reliance on importing silk through Persia or other enemies. The monks explained that silkworms naturally produce silk and taught locals to care for the eggs by keeping them warm under dung until the silkworms hatched and could feed on mulberry leaves, establishing silk manufacture in the Byzantine Empire.

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    History History of the Wars The Roman Silk Industry Book VIII Section 17 The Byzantine Greek

    historian Procopius served as secretary to Belisarius, the noted general of Justinian I. He

    chronicled the reign of Justinian in the eight-volume History of the Wars of Justinian, published

    in 552. The first four volumes discuss the Byzantine wars against the Persians in the east and

    the Moors and Vandals in North Africa. Volumes 5–7 describe the campaigns against the

    Ostrogoths in Italy. The last volume presents an overview of events throughout the empire up to

    the year 554.

    In this excerpt Procopius describes how the Byzantine Empire secured the ability to

    manufacture silk, a secret closely guarded by China. Long-distance trade in silk from East Asia

    to the Roman Republic via the Silk Road officially began in the second century B.C.E., and

    China was known to the Romans as Serica, "The land of silk." The Romans continued to import

    silk from Parthian and Sassanian middlemen until the sixth century, when silkworms were

    smuggled into Constantinople, initiating silk production in the Byzantine Empire. Constantinople,

    at the crossroad between East and West, controlled the manufacturing and import of silk into

    Western Europe for many centuries, even after the Byzantine Empire had lost much of its power

    in the 13th century.

    About the same time there came from India certain monks; and when they had satisfied

    Justinian Augustus that the Romans no longer should buy silk from the Persians, they promised

    the emperor in an interview that they would provide the materials for making silk so that never

    should the Romans seek business of this kind from their enemy the Persians, or from any other

    people whatsoever. They said that they were formerly in Serinda, which they call the region

    frequented by the people of the Indies, and there they learned perfectly the art of making silk.

    Moreover, to the emperor who plied them with many questions as to whether he might have the

    secret, the monks replied that certain worms were manufacturers of silk, nature itself forcing
    them to keep always at work; the worms could certainly not be brought here alive, but they

    could be grown easily and without difficulty; the eggs of single hatchings are innumerable; as

    soon as they are laid men cover them with dung and keep them warm for as long as it is

    necessary so that they produce insects. When they had announced these tidings, led on by

    liberal promises of the emperor to prove the fact, they returned to India. When they had brought

    the eggs to Byzantium, the method having been learned, as I have said, they changed them by

    metamorphosis into worms which feed on the leaves of mulberry. Thus began the art of making

    silk from that time on in the Roman Empire.

    Copyright © 2023 Infobase Learning. All Rights Reserved.

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