Sugar Changed the World, Part 2: Central Ideas Answers

Read the passage from Sugar Changed the World.THE WORLD’S FIRST TRUE UNIVERSITYToday, few people have heard of Jundi Shapur. But in its time, it was an exceptional university. Jundi Shapur was built in what is now Iran sometime between the 400s and mid-500s A.D. We can only guess the dates, but we do know more about the school. It was the meeting place of the world's great minds. In 529, Christians closed the school of Athens—the last link to the academies of Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle. The remaining Greek scholars moved to Jundi Shapur. Jews joined them, as did a group of Christians called Nestorians, who had their own ancient and scholarly traditions. Persians added their voices, and one of their learned doctors set off for what is now India, to gather and translate the wisdom of the Hindus. The school created the very first teaching hospital in the world, a place where the sick were treated and young doctors learned their craft, as well as a fine observatory to track the heavens. At Jundi Shapur the best scholars west of China all gathered to think and study together. By the 600s, the doctors at the school were writing about a medicine from India named sharkara or, as the Persians called it, shaker—sugar. Indeed, scholars at Jundi Shapur invented new and better ways to refine cane into sugar. Since the school had links with many of the great civilizations of Asia, the Mediterranean, and Europe, word of sugar and the experience of tasting its special sweetness began to spread.

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Read the passage from Sugar Changed the World.After the Egyptians crushed cut cane and captured the juice, they boiled and strained the liquid, let it settle, then strained it again. The cane juice was now poured into molds with holes in the bottom, so that all the liquid could drain out, leaving only a powder. That powder was then mixed with milk and boiled again. After one round of these steps, the process was repeated all over again. As a result of all this effort and care, Egypt was known for the "whitest and purest" sugar.

Read the passage from Sugar Changed the World.In the 1100s, the richest Europeans slowly began to add more flavor to their food—because of a series of fairs and wars. A smart count in the Champagne region of France guaranteed the safety of any merchant coming to sell or trade at the markets in the lord's lands. Soon word spread, and the fairs flourished. Starting around 1150, the six Champagne fairs became the one place where Europeans could buy and sell products from the surrounding world—a first step in connecting them to the riches and tastes beyond. Fortress Europe was slowly opening up.

Read the passage from Sugar Changed the World.The vast Muslim world was wonderful for the growth of knowledge. The Greeks had developed a level of practical experience and technical understanding a thousand years more advanced than anyone else nearby. The Muslims began to translate some of these ancient Greek texts. From India, Muslims learned of the zero, which allowed them to invent what we still call "Arabic” numerals. And because the Koran, the sacred book of Islam, is written in Arabic, scholars throughout the Muslim world learned to read Arabic and to share their knowledge. The Muslims swept past Jundi Shapur and learned the secrets of sugar. As they conquered lands around the Mediterranean Sea, they spread word of how to grow, mill, and refine the sweet reed.

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Read the passage from Sugar Changed the World.In the 1100s, the richest Europeans slowly began to add more flavor to their food—because of a series of fairs and wars. A smart count in the Champagne region of France guaranteed the safety of any merchant coming to sell or trade at the markets in the lord's lands. Soon word spread, and the fairs flourished. Starting around 1150, the six Champagne fairs became the one place where Europeans could buy and sell products from the surrounding world—a first step in connecting them to the riches and tastes beyond. Fortress Europe was slowly opening up.

Read the passage from Sugar Changed the World.The traders who came up from Italy offered items they had bought [from] Muslims, which were not available in Europe: fruits such as oranges, apricots, and figs; dyes such as cochineal, which produces a rich red; rare fabrics such as cotton and raw silk. Many of the fabrics that we know of today came to Europe via the Muslims, and their names still show their origins: damask from Damascus, muslin from Mosul, gauzes from Gaza.