The excerpt below is from Amin Maalouf’s The Crusades Through Arab Eyes, 1984. “What they [the Franks] learned from the Arabs was indispensable in their subsequent expansion. The heritage of Greek civilization was transmitted through Arab intermediaries. In medicine, astronomy, chemistry, geography, mathematics, and architecture, the [Franks] drew their knowledge from Arab books, which they assimilated, imitated, and then surpassed ... In the realm of industry, the Europeans first learned and then improved upon the processes used by the Arabs in papermaking, leather-working, textiles ...”

What does this excerpt illustrate about the medieval world?

a
the economic decline of the Muslim empires during the Middle Ages
b
the effects of religious laws handed down by Muslim empires
c
the effects of cultural diffusion from the Arab world to Europe
d
the superiority of European technology during the Middle Age