This situation made, little by little, the German cities to league in defensive associations. There were already earlier confederations: the Swabian, the Westphalian, the Rhenish Leagues, which were mainly composed by southern and central German cities and were seeking for political power in the administration of the country. Those leagues were directed against the territorial lords and tried to find ways to protect trade routes. However, these leagues had no organization, no real economic cohesion, and most of the times, some towns suspected their allies for profiting from the situation. That is why these associations of towns became gradually less significant. On the other hand, a great northern confederation based on purely commercial foundations started to take shape and was going to have a future completely different from the others. This Confederation was the Hanse of the North German cities or the Hanseatic League (Hay 122-123, Cheyney 19-20).
The imperial control over the north cities was even looser than that of central and south Germany. The geography of the territory played the greatest role in order for mercantile enterprises to seem boundless. Towns favorably situated on harbors or rivers, like Hamburg, Rostock, and Lubeck, became great by developing new lines of trade, and by capturing and monopolizing the commerce of others, mainly that of Slavonic traders along the Baltic shores or that of Scandinavian traders (Cheyney 20).
It can hardly be expected that a specific date can be given for the League's origin because the League was rather the result of a natural growth than an artificial creation. The year 1252,when Hamburg and Lubeck obtained common rights in the Flemish city of Bruges, may be taken as the beginning of deliberate joint action ábroad, although there are instances of the possession of common privileges in Netherlands earlier in the century (Cheyney21).
Various agreements between the cities reflect the spirit of searching for security. In 1259, Lubeck, Rostock, and Wismar specified that if any of those cities allowed pirates or robbers to dispose of their products in it, that city should be proscribed and held by the other member cities as equally guilty with the outlaws (Cheyney 21). Numerous similar agreements for joint protection against pirates, robbers, and feudal lords, are going to be signed in the future. In 1265, the Law of Lubeck, according to which a group of north German cities agreed to be subject to one common code, marks the beginning of a process of internal coherence. By 1300, there was such a network of town agreements and frequent gatherings of cities that was evident that the foundations of the League had already been laid (Du Boulay 16-18, Cheyney 20-21).
The full formation of the German Hanse, however, came about 1356. In the mid 14th century the North sea and English trade was controlled by Cologne, Dortmund, Hamburg, and Emden. Also the Baltic and the Russian trade were in the hands of Lubeck, Danzig, Rostock and Riga while many other commercially important German cities like Brunswick, Luneburg, Magdeburg, Goslar were also members of the League. By 136O, the League included fifty-two towns according to the earliest known membership list whereas later, at the time of great development, there were about eighty cities. However, the number of participants was never fixed, since towns would slip out of or into the League according to circumstances. At one time, some towns were admitted to the League, at another time they were expelled while, in some cases, cities deliberately withdrew, as it happened later with the League of Nations in the 20th century (Waley 68-69, Previte 853-854, Cheyney 24.-25, Du Boulay 26-28).
The League's ambitions grew with its power. In 1367,the League took military action for the first time. The interests of the League were immediately threatened by the expansion of the state of united Denmark under Waldemar IV. In a matter of few years, the king of Denmark brought under his power several of the towns of the League and he also secured control over regions in which the League enjoyed great trading privileges. The League replied with a great confederation which included even Norway and Sweden, important countries of Scandinavia. A great conference of the representatives of the cities was called at Cologne and the League's towns finally decided to make war against Denmark. In addition, it was agreed that each town should offer military forces, supplies and money, and if any failed to do so, she would be expelled from the League. In this war Hansa won a signal victory. Being successful in naval and military operations the League captured Copenhagen and most of the Danish towns and on 24 May 1370 dictated the Treaty of Stralsund. According to this treaty the League acquired all the commercial privileges in the region of the Baltic and also considerable political influence in the northern territories. In Denmark, Norway, and Sweden, the Hanseatic traders shared power with local officials in the town councils and they became a state within a state. In Norway, specifically, German monopoly of trade and manipulation of governmental power will continue down to the 16th century. After the Treaty of Stralsund was signed, the Hansa dominated the Baltic commerce and the Sound fisheries. The League had a great share of English trade, maintained a powerful position in Flanders, and also controlled foreign and internal commerce of Germany. From then on, the Hansa became one of the great European powers of the 14th century. It retained an organization that enabled it to obtain and preserve valuable advantages in other countries and to control much of the internal policy of its members (Cheyney, 23). The League possessed its own flag, sent diplomatic representatives abroad, and made treaties with Scandinavian kingdoms, Poland, and England, like an independent state (Hay 204-205 and 208-209, Previte 853, Cheyney 22-23).
The League's historical importance will be valued centuries later, in the l9th century, when the German interest for a policy of domination in the sea and colonial expansion was awakened. The only earlier experience of powerful maritime activity that Germans had was the Hanseatic League. In response to this interest, therefore, the Germans begun studying the records of the meetings of the League, the Hanserecessen, which has been one of the main historical sources of the League (Barraclough 162-164 and 167, Cheyney 23).
From the study of the Hanserecessen it appears that between 1363 and 1400 there were twenty-four full diets of delegates of the cities. Gradually, the meetings became less frequent and most of the times larger cities represented groups of smaller ones. The regular assembly (Hansetage), which began to be held in about that period, dealt to some extent with military and political issues but they were mainly concerned with commercial interests. The assemblies provided for the improvement of trade routes (harbors and rivers) and for the protection of merchants and their products. They also opened up new lines of trade, they arranged settlements for various disputes among merchants and finally they drew up a seebuch, that is an almanac showing harbors, lighthouses and other information useful to navigators. During those meetings, there were attempts to subdivide the League into regional groups. However, there were curious weaknesses. First of all, there was no common seal; usually only twenty towns sent always representatives because the smaller gave proxies to the big centers (Hamburg, Lubeck); there was no common treasury and no regular contributions. Therefore the effectiveness of the League was due to the sum of the resources of a few important towns (Cheyney 23-24, Hay 122-123).
Of these, Lubeck was incontestably the most important. Assemblies were summoned by Lubeck, where eventually the representatives of the cities normally met, whereas Lubeck's seal was mostly used on the documents of the League. Some other influential cities on German and Polish territory were Hamburg, Cologne, Danzig, Bremen, Hanover, Gronigen. Merchants of the League, though, had also established settlements and enjoyed trade privileges in many towns of England, France, Russia, and the Scandinavian kingdoms. Of all these outlying settlements, four were of unusual importance. They were the foreign "factories" of the League known as Kontoren and they were located at Bruges, London, Novgorod, and Bergen. Those were the four bases of Hanseatic trade in Western and Eastern Europe and therefore they have to be discussed in more detail (Pirenne 148, Previte 852-853).
Bruges, in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, had a position that no other town had in Medieval Europe. It was the most important commercial center in Europe outside the Mediterranean Sea. Its geographical position coincided with the crossroads of the main European commercial lines. At Bruges north met south, and east the west. The city was located at the head of navigation and there was no line of trade that did not connect in some way with Bruges so that it was called "Venice of the North". However, in reality this is a misnomer, because Venice never enjoyed the international importance which made the Flemish port unique. The power of Venice was due essentially to her shipping and owed nothing to the foreigners as opposed to Bruges which existed mainly because of its foreign clientele. The majority of the ships of the Flemish port belonged to ship owners from abroad. When in the 12th century the mastery of the North and the Baltic Sea passed to German cities, the excessive commercial activity in the area gave an impetus to the fortunes of Bruges. Little by little, the Kontor founded by the Hansards at Bruges, became and remained until the end of the Middle Ages, the most important of all those that memebrs of the League they possessed outside Germany (Thompson 132-134, Pirenne 145-146, Cheyney 25, Hay 379-380).
The other outlying agent of the League in Western Europe was the well-known "steelyard" in London. Just above the London Bridge, the German merchants had bought land and during the 13th and 14th centuries covered it with warehouses, offices, buildings for treasure, storage houses, all closed in with gates, a fact that gave it a character of a separate fortification within England. Early German traders landed their steel there and that is why it was called the steelyard. At the beginning, with their journeymen, servants, and clerks coming and going, the Germans made up a community of about 300 persons which was governed by its alderman, an elected officer. Later, as the community became more numerous, counselors and a clerk were also appointed. They exercised much influence, and ultimately came to carry on most of the communication of the merchants with the other national governments. Within their city the people lived a closely regulated life. No one was allowed outside after nine o' clock at night; there were to be no women in the establishment; each person had to have his armor and weapons ready for use in case of riot, and to do his part in defending the city against enemies (Cheyney 28). Similar "steelyards" existed on a smaller scale in Boston, Yarmonth, Lynn, and other towns in England but they were of less importance (Zimmern 120-122, Cheyney 26-28).
In Eastern Europe, the Russian city of Novgorod was the third important commercial center of the Hanseatic League. The city had its group of merchants living under the rule of their alderman, its German church, its dwellings, warehouses, hospitals etc. in more or less the same manner as in London. In Novgorod the German merchants of the League comprised the link, in the long trade routes of Europe, between northern, on the one hand, and eastern and southern European territories, on the other (Zimmern 122 , Cheyney 25).
Finally, the fourth major outlying settlement of the League was the city of Bergen in Norway. Bergen was completely under the power of the League because the Hanse had obtained a monopoly of all the exchangeable products of the region. At the height of its prosperity the League had in Bergen twenty-two separate "yards", each one with storing and shipping facilities while about 3.000 German inhabitants in the area represented fifty-eight towns. The German presence was so strong that when some English merchants tried to break the League's monopoly in the area by establishing a settlement, their houses were ruined, they themselves were thrown overboard to drown and their goods were seized by the German inhabitants (Zimmern 122-123, Cheyney 25-26).
The outlying settlements of the Hanseatic League in Bruge, London, Novgorod, and Bergen were typical of the organization of early modern commerce. Trade was carried on not by individuals under international law or national commercial treaties, but by merchants living in a foreign city as a group under special privileges. These privileges were not difficult to obtain. The merchants were welcome to rulers, nobles, and clergy, For the government, their activity meant an opportunity to make imports and also to export various goods; for the nobles, it meant an opportunity for luxury and convenience; and for the clergy, an opportunity to acquire more property, since the merchants made great donations to the church (Zimmern 123-124).
The British open-door policy, for almost twenty years, was another "invitation" to the merchants of the League. In 1260 the king of England gave to all North German cities full permission to trade in the region. In 1303, Edward I issued the Carta Mercatoria (Merchants Charter), a document so liberal in its terms that it may be considered as the primary force for the commercial penetration of the German merchants of the League in England. According to the Charter, the king of England offered to the merchants: Freedom of entry into England with their goods, residence there, and departure with such goods as they may have bought from Englishmen or other foreigners in any town (Cheyney 29). Similar invitations or favorable responses to requests for permission to trade were made also by other rulers and governments (Daenell 48-52, Cheyney 29-31).
The Hanseatic League occupied, in Northern Europe, a position comparable with that occupied by the big Italian ports in the Mediterranean. Like them, it served as a mediator between West and East. In the Mediterranean Sea, Venice, Genoa, and Pisa dominated Western Europe's commercial links with Byzantium, Syria, Egypt and the other lands. In the North Sea, though, the most active route was between Bruges and London, while at the end of this axis were the Hanse towns of the Baltic and the North Sea. However, it has to be made clear that the Italian centers arid the Hanseatic ports were very different. In the first, the Byzantine and Moslem worlds furnished commerce with an industry perfected in the course of thousands of years of civilization. On the other hand, the lands that the Hansa had to exploit, were still in the process of colonization and in a state of primitive barbarism. The Hansa members had also to face a northern climate, a soil covered mostly with f'orests, and a sea totally inaccessible during the winter, because of the ice (Waley 78-79, Daenell 52-56). Nevertheless, the Hanseatic League will operate successfully until the late 15th century when it began to decline because it could not compete with the Dutch commercial expansion to the North. The League will never be officially abolished but the last meeting of its representatives will take place in 1669.
Nevertheless, in view of all the difficulties which the League had to conquer: deplorable conditions of circulation, inadequate means of transportation, general insecurity, and an insufficiently organized monetary system, it is impossible not to admire the magnitude of the results obtained. They are all very remarkable because the state governments themselves contributed nothing to them, beyond protecting sometimes merchants for fiscal reasons. Therefore the progress accomplished in the domain of international commerce by the Hanseatic League is to be explained solely by the energy, the spirit, and the ingenuity of the merchants themselves, which explains why their contribution is difficult to be estimated. The development of industry and commerce completely transformed the appearance and, in reality, the very existence of the late medieval society. At the same time the North Sea and the Baltic Sea became the scenes of a great trade while Europe was covered with German towns from which the activities of a new middle-class radiated in all directions.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Barraclough, G. The Origins of Modern Germany. Oxford, 1946.
Cheyney, P. Edward. The Dawn of a New Era. New York, 1962.
Daenell, Ernst. The Hanse and the Mercantile Marine. New York, 1962.
Du Boulay, F. R. Germany in the Later Middle Ages. London, l983.
Hay, Denys. Europe in the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries. London, 1966.
Pirenne, Henri. Economic and Social History of Medieval Europe. New York, 1937.
Shorter Cambridge Medieval History. Cambridge, 1962.
Thompson, J.W. Economic and Social History of Europe in the Later Middle Ages. New York, l931.
Waley, Daniel. Later Medieval Europe. New York, l964.
Zimmern, Helen. The Hansa Towns. New York, 1889.
Other Links:
The Hanseatic League and its Decline by Prof. Rainer Postel, Bundeswehr Universität
Hansischer Geschichtsverein
Back to Cover
Get your own Free Home Page
