YYV5C1 God Damn Religion…Dr Patricia Crone's "Meccan Trade and the Rise of Islam" excerpt p.145-146

Patricia Crone, in her Meccan Trade and the Rise of Islam, adds a practical reason that is too often overlooked. “Mecca was a barren place, and barren places do not make natural halts. This is especially true when there are famously green environments close by. Why should caravans have made a steep descent into the barren valley of Mecca when they could have stopped at Ta’if? Mecca may have had a modest well and humble sanctuary, but Ta’if not only had vastly superior ones, they had a ready food supply, too. Furthermore,” Dr. Crone reports, “there was no commodity available in Arabia that could be transported such a distance, through such an inhospitable environment, and still be sold at a profit large enough to support the growth of a city in a peripheral site bereft of natural resources.”

As the most credible researcher on the subject, Professor Crone points out, “Some Muslims maintain it was famous for camel herding; yet that’s not possible in a barren environment.” Jay Smith augmented her findings by stating, “According to the latest research by Kister and Sprenger, the Arabs engaged in the trade of leather and clothing; hardly items which could have founded a commercial empire of international dimensions. Moreover, Mecca couldn’t have been a center for either as there was insufficient pasture and water for animals or crops. But the real problem with Mecca is that there simply was no international trade taking place in Arabia, let alone in Mecca, in the centuries prior to Muhammad’s birth.”

Greek and Roman trade between India and the Mediterranean was entirely maritime after the 1st century CE. One need only look at a map to understand why. It made no sense to ship goods across such distances by land when waterways were available to serve the purpose.

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