ABSTRACT
In both the Americas and Africa, the author traces political consolidation, increased agricultural output, population growth, and monument building. Though these regions addressed in this chapter had no connection with each other (when crops were exchanged between Africa and the Americas), this chapter traces significant trade and cultural interactions within these regions. It also explores the relationship between humans and the environment in our discussion of Easter Island. Muslim merchants would over time introduce Asian rice (there had previously been an African version grown in West Africa), citrus fruits, and cotton to West Africa. West Africa would witness three large empires: Ghana, Mali, and Songhay. The Mali Empire from the thirteenth to sixteenth century came to cover much of West Africa, and especially the Niger River basin. Horses had been in West Africa since the last centuries bce but only became important militarily in the thirteenth century.
