In Ansary's ch. 4 the carriers who linked constellations came from well-placed, resource-poor margins, not from the rich centres. Egypt "had plenty to trade but little incentive to go trading"; the world came to it. Petra, too harsh to farm, grew rich on a gorge traders had to pass; Crete's key resource was location; the Greeks, on an arid rocky interior, faced the sea and became traders, pirates and colonists. A centre that is self-sufficient waits; a margin that is not goes out and carries. For a story meant to travel, the likely carriers are the positioned and under-resourced, which is where recruitment should look.

Evidence 5 passages

• groundsSource document

  But no, the Egyptians had plenty to trade but little incentive to go trading. They were so rich the world came to them.

• backsSource document

  It was situated in an environment too harsh to support farming, or even herding.

• groundsSource document

  They were oriented less toward their own hinterland and more toward the open waters, the lands they faced looking out.

• backsSource document

  You have to fill your belly before you can indulge in spices, and the primal necessities could only be gotten from the urban agricultural civilizations of the great river valleys

• groundsSource document

  Because they were so inherently rootless, spice traders developed cultural styles distinct from those of the sedentary people with whom they traded. They tended to favor portable gods, associated more with ideas than places.

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