Crossing the Silk Road, Marco Polo brought elements of Western culture to the East and Eastern culture back to the West.
Because of his exploration for trade of what is today modern China, Indonesia, Mongolia, Sri Lanka, and India, the east experienced Western culture.
Furthermore, his journeys were documented in the Book of the Marvels of the World which presented to Europeans the Asian cities and countries.
A reason why the Civil War lasted four years is that the Union had to fully conquer the South.
I believe a majority of major battles happened in these places because the British had control of them at some point. New York also served as the British base of operations so they probably wanted to break Britain's hold on these cities.
<span>In 1492 Italian Spanish navigator Christopher Columbus reached the Americas and claimed the new lands for Castile. </span>