Free Ports in the Atlantic World

2021 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Latin American ◽  
Atlantic World ◽  
18Th Century ◽  
The West ◽  
Tax Havens ◽  
Free Port ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Early Modern Era ◽  
Foreign Merchants

Free ports played an important role in fostering inter-imperial and international connections and commercial interactions in the Atlantic world during the early modern and modern periods. While “free port” is an expansive term, sometimes used to delineate areas where illegal smuggling occurred, places that were free of ice, or locales that welcomed foreign migration, the studies cited in this article pertain to the imperial legal and commercial definition of free ports. That is, ports established by the state that exhibited lower customs duties than did the rest of the polity or existed outside of normal customs laws while welcoming foreign merchants to exchange at least some proscribed set of goods. Traditionally, it has been understood that free ports have existed in some form since Antiquity, but that the free port of Livorno, established by the Medici in the late 16th century, constitutes the earliest and most-successful example of a free port in the early modern era. Free ports spread across the Mediterranean, the Atlantic, and the globe in the ensuing centuries. Beginning substantively in the 15th century, European powers extended their commercial and imperial networks across the Atlantic Ocean, often violently encountering and interacting with peoples in North and South America, the West Indies, and the west coast of Africa. While military, commercial, intellectual, and migratory movements fostered the so-called “Atlantic World” by connecting these far-flung geographical locales, many European metropoles initially attempted to limit their subjects’ commercial interactions to within their Atlantic imperial realms. However, early modern Atlantic empires employed free ports beginning in the 17th and 18th centuries, especially in the Caribbean, as a means of providing exceptions to their generally closed commercial systems and strategically allowing foreign merchants to trade in certain places. Some metropolitan European ports also became “free.” The heyday of colonial Atlantic, especially Caribbean, free ports occurred in the mid- to late 18th century as Atlantic empires promulgated various reforms in response to the Seven Years’ War and other European imperial conflicts. The number of Atlantic free ports declined in the 19th century as doctrines of more universal free trade took root and as Latin American countries gained independence, meaning that European powers could trade directly to these locations without having to skirt Spanish imperial commercial restrictions. Atlantic free ports experienced a revival in the late 19th and 20th centuries, evolving into various “special economic zones” such as export-processing zones, tax havens, and foreign-trade zones. The studies cited here imply that some Atlantic free ports encompassed entire islands, especially smaller ones like Sint Eustatius. Much of the literature on free ports focuses on Italian and Mediterranean ones, but interest in Atlantic free ports is growing. Extant texts pertaining to Atlantic free ports usually consider specific ports or empires, with little substantive comparative work (the major exceptions being scholarship on Dutch, Danish, and Swedish free ports). Some studies provide useful analysis of free-port proposals that were never realized but were debated intensely.

scholarly journals Why was there no capitalism in early modern China?

2017 ◽  
Vol 37 (1) ◽  
pp. 167-188 ◽  
Author(s):  
TIAGO NASSER APPEL
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Public Debt ◽  
18Th Century ◽  
Modern China ◽  
Military Force ◽  
Early Modern Europe ◽  
The West ◽  
Late Imperial China ◽  
Late Imperial ◽  
Early Modern China

ABSTRACT In this paper, we ask the following question: why couldn’t Early Modern China make the leap to capitalism, as we have come to know it in the West? We suggest that, even if China compared well with the West in key economic features - commercialization and commodification of goods, land, labor - up to the 18th century, it did not traverse the path to Capitalism because of the “fact of empire”. Lacking the scale of fiscal difficulties encountered in Early Modern Europe, Late Imperial China did not have to heavily tax merchants and notables; therefore, it did not have to negotiate rights and duties with the mercantile class. More innovatively, we also propose that the relative lack of fiscal difficulties meant that China failed to develop a “virtuous symbiosis” between taxing, monetization of the economy and public debt. This is because, essentially, it was the mobilization of society’s resources - primarily by way of public debt or taxes - towards the support of a military force that created the first real opportunities for merchants and bankers to amass immense and unprecedented wealth.

scholarly journals Lutheran Clergy in an Orthodox Empire. The Apppointment of Pastors in the Russo-Swedish Borderland in the 18th Century

Perichoresis ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 57-75 ◽  
Author(s):  
Antti Räihä
Keyword(s):  
Political Culture ◽  
Early Modern ◽  
Canon Law ◽  
18Th Century ◽  
Actual Process ◽  
Local Society ◽  
Old Swedish ◽  
History Of ◽  
Early Modern Era ◽  
Modern Era

Abstract The history of the parishioners’ right to participate in and influence the choice of local clergy in Sweden and Finland can be taken back as far as the late Medieval Times. The procedures for electing clergymen are described in historiography as a specifically Nordic feature and as creating the basis of local self-government. In this article the features of local self-government are studied in a context where the scope for action was being modified. The focus is on the parishioners’ possibilities and willingness to influence the appointment of pastors in the Lutheran parishes of the Russo-Swedish borderlands in the 18th century. At the same time, this article will offer the first comprehensive presentation of the procedures for electing pastors in the Consistory District of Fredrikshamn. The Treaty of Åbo, concluded between Sweden and Russia in 1743, ensured that the existing Swedish law, including the canon law of 1686, together with the old Swedish privileges and statutes, as well as the freedom to practise the Lutheran religion, remained in force in the area annexed into Russia. By analysing the actual process of appointing pastors, it is possible to discuss both the development of the local political culture and the interaction between the central power and the local society in the late Early Modern era.

scholarly journals International Slavic Studies: Concepts, History and Evolution

2021 ◽  
Vol 0 (0) ◽  
Author(s):  
Wenfei Liu
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
18Th Century ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
The West ◽  
The Status ◽  
History Of ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Formal Establishment ◽  
Slavic Studies

Abstract This paper departs from the definition of Slavistics and reviews the history of international Slavic studies, from its prehistory to its formal establishment as an independent discipline in the mid-18th century, and from the Pan-Slavic movement in the mid-19th century to the confrontation of Slavistics between the East and the West in the mid-20th century during the Cold War. The paper highlights the status quo of international Slavic studies and envisions the future development of Slavic studies in China.

Religion and Race in the Early Modern Iberian Atlantic

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jessica L. Delgado ◽  
Kelsey C. Moss
Keyword(s):  
Latin America ◽  
Early Modern ◽  
Spanish America ◽  
Colonial Latin America ◽  
The West ◽  
New Directions ◽  
Religion And Race ◽  
Early Modern Era ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Modern Era

This chapter reviews the scholarly treatment of religion and race in the early modern Iberian Atlantic world and colonial Latin America and suggests new directions for research. Through a critical reflection of the place that Spain and colonial Latin America have held in histories of race in the West, the chapter challenges historians of the Americas to rethink their understanding of the relationship between religion and race in the early modern era. It highlights processes and ideologies visible in Spanish America and calls for investigation into similar dynamics in the Anglophone colonies.

scholarly journals The early modern transmission of the ancient Greek romances: a bibliographic survey

2019 ◽  
Vol 15 ◽  
pp. 1
Author(s):  
Kirsten Ricquier
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Early Modern ◽  
18Th Century ◽  
Genre Theory ◽  
Prose Fiction ◽  
Ancient Greek ◽  
Secondary Literature ◽  
Classical Philology ◽  
Early Modern Era ◽  
Modern Era

This contribution offers a new, critical bibliography of translations and editions of the five extant Greek romances in the early modern era, from the beginning of printing to the eighteenth century. By consulting catalogues of libraries, digitalised copies, and secondary literature, I expand, update and correct earlier bibliographies. I identify alleged editions and include creative treatments of the texts as well as incomplete versions. As an interpretation of my survey, I give an overview of broad, changing tendencies throughout the era and filter the dispersion over Europe in a wider area and period than was available so far, in order to get a more complete picture of their distribution. Furthermore, I point to some peculiar (tendencies in) combinations, among the lemmata themselves, as well as with other stories.Kirsten Ricquier studied Classical Philology at Ghent University (Belgium). She is currently a researcher at this institution funded by the European Research Council Starting Grant Novel Saints under the supervision of Professor Koen De Temmerman. Her research concerns the afterlife of ancient prose fiction in medieval Greek hagiography and the early modern era, the classical tradition (particularly in the long 18th century), and genre theory.

scholarly journals A phylogeography of the second plague pandemic revealed through the analysis of historical Y. pestis genomes

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maria A. Spyrou ◽  
Marcel Keller ◽  
Rezeda I. Tukhbatova ◽  
Elizabeth A. Nelson ◽  
Aida Andrades Valtueňa ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
18Th Century ◽  
Genomic Region ◽  
Archaeological Sites ◽  
Black Death ◽  
Initial Wave ◽  
Low Diversity ◽  
Early Modern Era ◽  
Modern Era ◽  
Late Stages

The second plague pandemic (14th - 18th century AD), caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis, is infamous for its initial wave, the Black Death (1346-1353 AD), and its repeated scourges in Europe and the vicinity until the Early Modern Era. Here, we report 32 ancient Y. pestis genomes spanning the 14th to 17th century AD through the analysis of human remains from nine European archaeological sites. Our data support an initial entry of the bacterium from Eastern Europe and the absence of genetic diversity during the Black Death as well as low diversity during local outbreaks thereafter. Moreover, analysis of post-Black Death genomes shows the diversification of a Y. pestis lineage into multiple genetically distinct clades that may have given rise to more than one disease reservoir in, or close to, Europe. Finally, we show the loss of a genomic region that includes virulence-associated genes in strains associated with late stages of the second plague pandemic (17th - 18th century AD). This deletion could not be detected in extant strains within our modern dataset, though it was identified in a today-extinct lineage associated with the first plague pandemic (6th - 8th century AD), suggesting convergent evolution during both pandemic events.

Anti-Catholicism and Anti-Popery

2021 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
North Atlantic ◽  
Atlantic World ◽  
18Th Century ◽  
Atlantic History ◽  
19Th Century Literature ◽  
The North ◽  
Close Analysis ◽  
Interdisciplinary Approaches ◽  
The Relationship

It is hard to overestimate the extent to which anti-Catholicism structured the Atlantic world. As much as Catholicism itself was a transatlantic force (see the separate Oxford Bibliographies in Atlantic History article “Catholicism” by Allyson M. Poska), the counter-response to Catholicism had a pervasive influence, especially in the Protestant-dominated North Atlantic (see “Protestantism” by Carla Gardina Pastana). It was, as Chris Beneke and Christopher Grenda have observed, “nimble and ubiquitous” (The First Prejudice, p. 15). The past decade has witnessed significant growth in the scholarship on anti-Catholicism. The most important overall advancement is our growing understanding that anti-Catholicism was more than just a knee-jerk prejudice. It was a complex, varied, and protean phenomenon that warrants close analysis. To a great degree, the growing sophistication of the historiography on anti-Catholicism across the Atlantic basin builds on the work of historians of early modern England and Britain, who have been carefully documenting and analyzing the phenomenon since the 1970s. Because this work is relatively narrow in its geographic scope—often limited to a particular county or region, individual, group, or theme—it is not covered here; but this historiography has been hugely important in providing a foundation for the works that are represented. The bibliography covers scholarship on anti-Catholicism from the 17th through the 20th centuries with a necessary focus on the North Atlantic world. It pays special attention to the British context not only because the literature is most developed for that region but also because it was the British who were most responsible for transferring anti-Catholic ideas, identities, institutions, and policies across the ocean. That said, historical examination of anti-Catholicism in the Dutch world is growing and is thus represented here as well. Overall, the works were selected either for their influence on studies of anti-Catholicism in the Atlantic world in various times and places, or because they adopt a wide geographical lens and deal directly with the Atlantic dimensions of anti-Catholicism. Indeed, one of the trends in the historiography is a shift from early modern and nation-centric studies to transnational investigations that include the 19th and 20th centuries (scholarship on the 18th century, while growing, still lags somewhat behind the early modern and 19th-century literature.) Other trends include efforts to distinguish anti-Catholicism from its closely related corollary, anti-Popery, and to explore the relationship between them; growing calls for interdisciplinary approaches to the study of anti-Catholicism; analysis of cross-fertilization of various forms of anti-Catholicism evident in the Atlantic world; and a commitment to studying how those targeted by anti-Catholicism navigated the systemic oppression it created.

Conclusion

Atlantic Wars ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 274-278
Author(s):  
Geoffrey Plank
Keyword(s):  
Economic Growth ◽  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Early Modern ◽  
Indigenous Peoples ◽  
Atlantic World ◽  
Racial Hierarchy ◽  
Mass Migration ◽  
Territorial Boundaries ◽  
Early Modern Era ◽  
Modern Era

The conclusion contrasts Atlantic warfare in the early modern era with the pattern that developed over the course of the nineteenth century. In the nineteenth century Europeans and their descendants continued to dominate the ocean and, in the Americas, they increasingly achieved supremacy on land. Improved transportation, mass migration from Europe, and economic growth facilitated this change, along with a tacit agreement among national states and empires that they would not ally themselves with indigenous peoples, slaves, or maroons outside their own internationally recognized territorial boundaries. Africans relied on European firearms and became vulnerable when weapon technologies changed in the second half of the century. The violence of the early modern era laid the foundations for the racial hierarchy that was erected in the nineteenth century, but in the earlier period warfare had not divided the peoples of the Atlantic world so simply.

Eastern Christians, Islam, and the West: A Connected History

2010 ◽  
Vol 42 (3) ◽  
pp. 475-478 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bernard Heyberger
Keyword(s):  
Middle East ◽  
Mass Media ◽  
Early Modern ◽  
The West ◽  
Islamic World ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Mass Media ◽  
Early Modern Era ◽  
Modern Era

When I was preparing my PhD in 1993, the subject “Eastern Christians” or “Christians in the Islamic World” was almost nonexistent in the mass media or in scholarly works. In fact, I prepared my thesis not under the supervision of a specialist in the Middle East but rather under that of a specialist in European Catholicism during the early modern era.

Identity and Coexistence in the Eastern Mediterranean, ca. 1600

1998 ◽  
Vol 18 ◽  
pp. 113-130 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eric Dursteler
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Ottoman Empire ◽  
Eastern Mediterranean ◽  
The Political ◽  
The West ◽  
The Many ◽  
Historical Trajectory ◽  
Early Modern Era ◽  
Modern Era ◽  
East West

Of the many European states that interacted with the Ottoman Empire in the early modern era, few did so as extensively as the Most Serene Republic of Venice,La Serenissima. The two empires shared a lengthy border and a common historical trajectory for almost 500 years, during which time the political and economic fortunes of both were intimately intertwined. While occasionally interrupted by brief periods of open hostility, for the most part this relationship was characterized by peaceful coexistence. Venetian historiography at present, however, is unable to explain this reality. Rather, in painting the picture of Venice’s relations with the Ottoman Empire, scholars have relied on broad strokes that depict a series of rather simple, binary relationships—East/West, Muslim/Christian, Venetian/Turk. This dichotomy is readily apparent in the titles of important monographs on the topic:Islam and the West, Europe and the Turk, Venezia e i turchi.

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