China's goods undercut local markets 400 years ago

The more things change ...

Spain-China trade beginning in the sixteenth century centered on silver and silk cloth, but soon became silver and anything else. “Spain had its own silk weavers and dressmakers … (but) the scale of Chinese textile production was so much bigger that Europeans couldn’t compete.” Spanish silk importers “sold silk from China – silk that had crossed two oceans! – in Spain for less than silk produced in Spain.”

But Yuegang silk merchants became more informed of Spanish fashions. “(T)hey acquired samples of Spanish clothing and upholstery, and in China made perfect knockoffs of the latest European styles. Into the galleons went stockings, skirts, and sheets; vestments for cardinals and bodices for coquettes; carpets, tapestries, and kimonos; veils, headdresses, and passementeries” along with spices and jewelry. – Charles G. Mann, 1493.

Mann’s 1491 is an exceptional, informative read. His 1493, while not breaking as much new ground, is, for a fan of readable, non-academic history, excellent. European traders and colonists took to the New World and to the Old not only germs and steel, but also animals, insects and plants, all of which made the present world.