Ages 8 to 14 years. Empires were made from the growth and sale of spices and the age of discovery was launched in pursuit of them. Exciting text and historic images explain to children how spices were used to cure the sick, flavour foods, and make perfume. Other topics include: What is a commodity?; What is a spice?; where spices originated and where they are grown today; how different spices are harvested, manufactured, and processed; the historical and modern spice trades; ancient peoples and how they used spices, from flavouring and preserving their foods, to the mummification of bodies!; how the Crusades changed European tastes; how the spice trade encouraged explorers and colonies; slavery and the spice trade.