Today I am writing about silk, I will focus on the production of silk, the history of silk, the silk roads, and how the Chinese secret of silk spread across the world.
The legend
Legend is that Empress Hsi Ling Shi, wife of Emperor Huang Ti (also called the Yellow Emperor), was the first person to accidentally discover silk as weavable fibre. According to legend the Empress was sipping tea under a mulberry tree when a cocoon fell in her tea an started unraveling. It was then that she found that silk was a weavable and strong fibre.
How they make it
They make silk by raising the silkworms until they're in their cocoons and then put all off the cocoons in boiling hot water to kill the silkworms inside then they weave 7 to 8 strings of silk together. After that workers have to painstakingly collect all of the clumps and debris. Watch a video about how silk is made here.
How it came to Europe
The Roman Empire knew of and traded in silk. Silk came to Europe in CE 550 when monks working for the emperor Justinian smuggled silkworm eggs to Europe in hollow bamboo walking canes.
Silk roads
The silk road was the ancient trading route from Europe to Asia. It has taken on a mythological status and the reality is unclear. For example historians cannot agree on length and route some say 4000 miles some say 7000 miles. One thing we do know is it is over 10,000 years old because silk was found in Egyptian tombs, a long way away from were it would have been made in China. The silk road went from china to the Mediterranean, and was probably not just a one road but a network of roads used by merchants and traders. Although the Romans loved silk and bought it from the Chinese
they thought it grew on trees like cotton. This was because they had never met the Chinese . All their trading was done through middlemen who would take the silk from the Chinese and give it to the Romans. A man called Ying Yang was sent to visit Rome but was put off when he was told it would take two years to get there! When he got back to china he found out that it was a lie told to him by the middlemen because they did not want to lose their place in the business. The silk roads were in my opinion like a giant market were everyone would have something to trade and exchange for goods. As well as silk the Chinese also traded teas, salt, sugar, porcelain and spices. Other travellers would trade cotton, ivory, wool, gold and silver.
He learned the mercantile trade from his father and uncle. Marco Polo was not the first European to reach China [see Europeans in Medieval China.]
Mulberries 
Silk
Silkworm, Bombyx Mori and silk cocoon 
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