Business Practices of Medieval Cultures
Business practices are important for maintaining the status of every civilization. Efficient business practices help organize the financial structure of every culture. If a culture lacks standard business practices, it will be almost impossible for that specific culture to remain economically sound. Several ancient cultures during the medieval times utilized fascinating business practices: two cultures in particular were the Chinese and people the land of Ceylon. Though the Chinese emperor, and the people from the land of Ceylon utilized different methods of business practices within their cultures, each culture eventually depended on interactions from merchants outside of their culture, in order to maintain wealth and efficient business. Imports were a particular service that helped initiate business practices within Medieval China. Imports were important to the Chinese culture, because without imports, the Chinese would not be enabled to conduct their commercial business transactions, which depended on their unique lending business practice. The medieval Chinese lending practice is based on the act of loaning money. Every borrower, is mandated to sign a written agreement with the lender. The written contract includes a statement of the debt the borrower owes, which is based off of the amount that the lender gives(J. Bentley, H. Ziegler, 2011, p.294). This transaction is recorded by imprinting a mark on the index finger and middle finger together of both the lender and the borrower (J. Bentley, H. Ziegler, 2011, p.294). It was important for the lender to keep record of the transaction , and the borrowers to pay the lender, because the if the debtor denies that he ever borrowed money and the lender showed the prints confirming that the debtor borrowed a specific amount of money, then the borrower would receive twenty blows of the cane on the back and you would be ordered to pay a penalty of twenty million copper coins(J. Bentley, H. Ziegler, 2011, p.294).