The Dutch Republic as Example of Maritime Transport Services Clusters in Preindustrial Europe (ca. 1650-1800)

By means of a comparative analysis of the ‘Dutch case’ with the Saintonge in South-West France and Bohuslän in South-West Sweden, this paper analyses the rise and decline of maritime services clusters in preindustrial Europe. The leading question for this comparative analysis is: Was the ‘Dutch case’ exceptional or can similar developments be recognised in other parts of Europe as well? A survey of the regional economic origins of communities of maritime transporters is combined with analyses of their operations and institutions. Relying on primary sources, the paper addresses the contribution of a great many ‘anonymous’ people, that literally connected the ‘nodes’ in international maritime trade networks, but whose contribution to the preindustrial European economy has been assumed a priori rather than thoroughly investigated.

Un ponte tra ottomani e cristiani. Il network degli ebrei di Ragusa tra Balcani e Adriatico (1585-1635)

The research analyzes the network of the Ragusan Jews between the end of 16th and the begin of 17th century. It focalized the social and economic links of the Sephardic group as “trait d’union” of the Adriatic-Balkan trade networks. The research is focused on time frame 1585-1635 in chronological continuity to the studies of Alberto Tenenti, indeed he was the first scholar to draw the attention to the turning point of the trade structure in the Republic of Ragusa in the year 1590 because the arise of the Sephardic merchants.

Venetian Trading Firm of the Soranzo Brothers (1406-1434) and Its Commercial Network

This paper contributes to the discussion of merchant networks in late medieval Europe by presenting a case study of the Soranzo fraterna, a Venetian trading firm which comprised brothers Donado, Giacomo (Jacopo), Piero, and Lorenzo Soranzo and operated in the first half of the 15th century, specializing mainly in the import of raw cotton from Syria. The author applies the methodology of so-cial network analysis (SNA) in order to reconstruct the egocentric (ego-centered) network of ties linking the Soranzo firm (“the ego”) with its partners and clients (“alters”).

Textiles Market in 16th-Century Seville: Business and Mercantile Groups

This work offers a new interpretation about the main groups implicated in the textile trade in Seville during the 16th century, proposing a new chronology concerning the substitution processes happened between them and the nature of the importance of those groups. This is specially clear in the longer endurance of the activity of castilian and mainly burgalese merchants in the importation of canvas, and also is remarkable the growing importance of the Castilian producction of clothes and silk (also in the Valencian case), covering an increasing share of the Peninsular and the American demand, existing cases of cooperation between those different groups.

Genoa: Colonizing and Colonized City? The Port City as a Pole of Attraction for Foreign Merchants (16th-18th centuries)

As Michel Balard pointed out with reference to the late Middle Ages and to the relations between Genoa and overseas cities, “Genoa, a colonizer in the East, is colonized by the Orientals”. The aim of this work is to verify whether and to what extent this concept is applicable also to the modern age and whether it involved a wider geographic area than the one examined by this French historian. In particular we outline the features of the presence of foreign merchants in Genoa between the 16th and 18th centuries as a phenomenon complementary to the better known “diaspora” of Genoese businessmen.

Economic and Social Aspects of the Trade of Luxury Goods between Africa and Europe: Ostrich Feather

In Europe, in the Middle Ages, ostrich feathers were used for the decoration of military headgear, as a representation of the high lineage of the possessor and his military virtues. They were imported from the coasts of West Africa, from Egypt and Syria into Italian and Spanish ports and from there exported to England and continental Europe. Venice, at the end of the fourteenth century, began to color feathers and soon the new fashion was spread throughout Europe. During the fifteenth century, even women began to use ostrich feathers on their hats or in their fans. When European ships reached America, Central Africa and the islands of the Indian Ocean, a huge amount of exotic bird feathers became available and ostrich feather fad spread through the population.

Il sistema degli scambi nel Mediterraneo occidentale tra XIV e XV secolo e il porto di Roma

Between the 14th and 15th centuries, a dense network of trade relations was active in the maritime basin of the western Mediterranean. The three regional areas that overlooked this sea, the Iberian and Provencal, the Italian and the African, and all the islands that were present in it, were equipped with numerous and important landing points and were connected by a dense network of exchanges. The essay takes into consideration the characteristics of this network of economic and cultural connections, and analyzes, particularly through the use of the Datini Archive, the role of the port of Rome in this system of exchanges and the links that merchants and bankers who acted in this city entertained with the Iberian mercantile centers.

North Italian Ports and the Levant in the 16th and 17th Centuries

The chapter analyzes, from a diachronic perspective, the role of trade with the Levant in the port industries of Genoa, Livorno, and Venice in the 16th and 17th centuries. An historical period in which the international trade system underwent substantial changes. From the expansion of the Atlantic routes to the official claim by the United Provinces and English, to the Italian Mariner crisis and the gradual advance of Nordic fleets along the Western Mediterranean routes. The Atlantic ships had an increasing influence on Genoa’s port industry. It was, however, Livorno who gained the most advantage from the presence of Dutch and English merchant ships along routes which met at Alexandretta in San Giovanni of Acre, at Constantinople, and most of all, at Smyrna.

Markets and Merchants: Commercial and Cultural Integration in Northwest Europe, 1300-1700

Between the thirteenth and seventeenth centuries commerce in northern Europe expanded and contracted. The long term net effect of the trade increase was an overall substantial impact on the economy and on the culture of the lands around the North and Baltic Seas. The development of interdependent markets can be indicated by examining the tendency of prices to converge in different places. Relying on previous research and novel ways of constructing indices using price data from a number of ports in northern Europe it is possible to confirm both the long term direction, with ups and downs, toward market integration as well as the emergence in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries of regional markets in certain food grains.

Les réseaux négociants européens et les échanges entre la France et l'Europe du Nord (XVIIe-XIXe siècles)

France was a country that had great agricultural potential and natural resources that allowed it to not be dependent on external markets, especially raw materials from the North. French ports, however, maintained close relations with the Baltic countries where they marketed many products and obtained supplies of naval stores and, depending on the economic situation, cereals. This paper proposes to revisit the French trade with the Baltic over a period of two centuries by using the Sound Toll Accounts whose entire data is now available to the research community. As we will see, several evidences are to be reconsidered.