Europe is a desolate place compared to the Near East and China. The bubonic plague is still raging. In England, Henry IV has killed Richard II. In France, there are internecine wars between the followers of the Duke of Burgundy and those of the murdered Duke of Orleans. The Hundred Years’ War is about to break out. A Muslim still reigns in Grenada. The Scottish king James I is a prisoner of the English. The most flourishing regions of Europe are Florence, Pisa, Siena, and Venice. Yet from the end of the 15th century, for the next five centuries, the West will dominate the world.
