Selvedge 128: Routes

Trade tariffs, which raise the price of imported goods to protect domestic industries, have dominated headlines throughout 2025. Yet this economic strategy is nothing new. In the late Middle Ages, English monarchs Edward III and Henry VII imposed high export tariffs on raw wool to discourage its sale to Flemish weavers. Centuries later, during the Industrial Revolution, Britain levied steep duties on imported Indian cottons to protect its developing textile industry.

Trade and textiles have always been intertwined. In this issue, we explore the East–West exchanges that have shaped material culture for centuries. From the early modern period, long-distance maritime trade by South Asian and Middle Eastern dhows (ships with a long, thin body and slanted triangular sails) created a dynamic network linking people, cultures, and civilisations from Southeast Asia to the eastern coast of Africa.