Labs / History
Silk Road Relay
No single caravan crossed the whole Silk Road — the same bale passed hand to hand through oasis and steppe cities, and every middleman added transport, a markup, and the cost of what raiders stole. Click cities to choose the route and watch a bale worth 50 denarii in China arrive in Rome worth many times more.
at caravan 50 dRome price 0 dmarkup 0×lost 0%
What to try
- The steppe road is shorter but wide open — does routing through it make Rome cheaper, or just lose more goods?
- Push every merchant's markup to 60%. How many hands does it take to turn 50 denarii into a fortune?
- Switch off bandit raids. How much of the final price was really just insurance against theft?
- Close the passes with raiders still active. Which route survives, and what does that do to the price in Rome?
- If silk in Rome cost roughly its weight in gold, which mattered more: the distance, the middlemen, or the danger?