DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.57079#0017
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1
INTRODUCTION
During the Middle Ages it was through the
markets of Italy that the rich products of
the East found their way into Christendom.
Italian merchants indeed played the first
part in mediaeval Levant commerce.1 Eng-
land’s connexion with them was of very old
standing.2 First the Florentines were the
chief Italian traders ; they were succeeded
by the Genoese, and in the fifteenth century,
the Mediterranean trade with England fell
almost exclusively into the hands of the
Venetians. Indeed, already in the fourteenth
century the Venetian merchants in England
1 Heyd : Geschichte des Levantehandels im Mittelalter
(1879) Band I. Vorwort, page vi. Rogers: History
of Prices, I. p. 147; Cunningham: The Growth of
English Industry and Commerce, I. p. 184.
2 Schanz : Englische Handelspolitik, I. pp. m-130.
1
B
1
INTRODUCTION
During the Middle Ages it was through the
markets of Italy that the rich products of
the East found their way into Christendom.
Italian merchants indeed played the first
part in mediaeval Levant commerce.1 Eng-
land’s connexion with them was of very old
standing.2 First the Florentines were the
chief Italian traders ; they were succeeded
by the Genoese, and in the fifteenth century,
the Mediterranean trade with England fell
almost exclusively into the hands of the
Venetians. Indeed, already in the fourteenth
century the Venetian merchants in England
1 Heyd : Geschichte des Levantehandels im Mittelalter
(1879) Band I. Vorwort, page vi. Rogers: History
of Prices, I. p. 147; Cunningham: The Growth of
English Industry and Commerce, I. p. 184.
2 Schanz : Englische Handelspolitik, I. pp. m-130.
1
B