Jewish merchants formed part of the business elite of the Caucasus, engaged in both trade and industrial activities. They owned caravanserais, trading houses, public buildings and land. Successful merchants were also often engaged in charity. Itinerant Jewish merchants (radhanites) were involved in commerce between the Islamic East and Christian Europe along the Great Silk Road as early as the beginning Middle Ages and created a commercial network running from China and India to Europe. Jewish merchants travelled around the world and were fluent in many languages.