Historically, caravans connecting
East Asia and
Europe often carried luxurious and lucrative goods, such as silks or jewelry. Caravans could therefore require considerable investment and were a lucrative target for bandits. The profits from a successful journey could be significant, comparable to those generated by later European
spice trade. The luxurious goods brought by caravans attracted many rulers along important trade routes to construct
caravanserais. These were roadside stations which supported the flow of commerce, information, and people across the network of
trade routes covering Asia, North Africa, and
southeastern Europe, and in particular along the
Silk Road. Caravanserais provided water for human and animal consumption, for washing, and for ritual
ablutions. They kept
fodder for animals and had shops for travelers where they could acquire new supplies. Some shops bought goods from the traveling merchants. Some of the first caravans on the Silk Road were sent out by
Emperor Wu of Han in the 2nd century BCE, when this vast network of roads was 'born' and as China began exporting large quantities of silk and other goods west, particularly destined for the
Roman Empire. However, the volume a caravan could transport was limited even by Classical or Medieval standards. For example, a caravan of 500 camels could only transport as much as a third or half of the goods carried by a regular
Byzantine merchant sailing ship. Present-day caravans in less-developed areas of the world often still transport important goods through badly passable areas, such as seeds required for
agriculture in arid regions. An example are the
camel trains traversing the southern edges of the
Sahara Desert. ==See also==