Major States and Empires In 1500 A.D.

Assignment icon.Image of scowling woman and pretzelImagine that it is 1500 A.D and that you are a local producer one of the following goods:

    • Paper
    • Compass
    • Silk
    • Porcelain
    • Gold
    • Salt
    • Textiles

Sales are slow because everyone in your area already has plenty of your product, and there are lots of competitors. You start to think that, if you could sell to new territories, you would be able to increase your sales dramatically. You do not want to leave home because travel is dangerous and hard along the existing travel routes.

Instead, you decide to create a short advertisement that you can send to distant lands in order to generate interest in your product, and hopefully attract some traders who will do the hard work of moving your product.

Your advertisement should contain the following items:

  • A catchy slogan which attracts the attention of the reader
  • A visual image of your product
  • A sentence describing why this product is valuable to all areas of the world
  • Two sentences indicating at least two practical uses of your product
  • Directions from at least three other countries to you, using the trade routes that you explored in this topic. For example, if you are in Germany, provide directions for traders from Italy, India, and Egypt.

Remember, your livelihood depends on the distribution of your product, so be creative! Before you begin, access the Trade Route Advertisement Checklist to make sure you have included all of the needed items required for full credit. You may need to use resources outside of this course to complete this assignment. If so, please submit a Works Cited document. If you need assistance, visit the Developmental Module for information on citing any resources that you used.

Options to create your advertisement include the following:

  1. Hand-draw the assignment and then take a picture of it for submission to the assignment’s dropbox.
  2. Hand-draw the assignment and then scan it for submission to the assignment’s dropbox.
  3. Utilize a paint or graphics program to create the advertisement. You can then submit your work to the assignment’s dropbox.

Once you have completed your advertisement, submit your work to the dropbox.