Estates of the Realm ..
Alcohol in Middle Ages ..
Apothecary - 18th C ..
Aromatari - perfumers ..
Crime & Punishment in Anglo-Saxon England ..
Aromatari - perfumers
Some medieval merchants dealt with fragrances and were then “aromatari” and perfumers; they were experts in some aspects of modern chemistry, known as alchemy until the Renaissance. There is someone, though, who thinks that: “True alchemy and true alchemists have always existed, they exist today and will always exist.”
The itinerant sellers from Friuli, and especially spice and fragrance sellers of the past, were real alchemists, because they produced medications for the cure of the body, such as ointments, plasters, creams and powders. Other sellers were alchemists in a broader sense, because they were quite flexible in changing their activity according to the market’s new conditions. The seller of threads and fabrics started dealing with gloves, scarves, sacred pictures or soaps and cosmetics, if the market requested it. They were caught by an “external and internal change”, as alchemy imposed. The vendors had a precarious life, lived in conditions of constant uncertainty. Tied to market conditions, they sustained a succession of new beginnings (new products, new markets, new cities, new families, new languages)
http://www.medievalists.net/2014/08/pedlars-alchemists-friuli-history-itinerant-sellers-alpine-reality/
The itinerant sellers from Friuli, and especially spice and fragrance sellers of the past, were real alchemists, because they produced medications for the cure of the body, such as ointments, plasters, creams and powders. Other sellers were alchemists in a broader sense, because they were quite flexible in changing their activity according to the market’s new conditions. The seller of threads and fabrics started dealing with gloves, scarves, sacred pictures or soaps and cosmetics, if the market requested it. They were caught by an “external and internal change”, as alchemy imposed. The vendors had a precarious life, lived in conditions of constant uncertainty. Tied to market conditions, they sustained a succession of new beginnings (new products, new markets, new cities, new families, new languages)
http://www.medievalists.net/2014/08/pedlars-alchemists-friuli-history-itinerant-sellers-alpine-reality/
Guild Society & Guild Merchant
The Guild Merchant and Other Guilds and Freemasonry
Modified from S. Perkins Pick
Social-religious, craft and merchant guild societies were differently constituted and varied very greatly in their membership, rules and objects. However, they also overlapped, and in many instances the merchant guilds embraced brethren of the other guilds within its membership.
Extant records remain of a few Anglo-Saxon guilds, dating to the beginning of the eleventh century in England. These appear to have been of a social-religious character, with the chief objectives of the salvation of the soul, psalm singing, feasting, escorting the dead to the grave, and other matters of common religio-social interest. Admitted by a solemn entrance oath, members contributed to a common fund for mutual assistance in distress—exhibiting a common sympathy for self-preservation, protection of each other's trades, and social intercourse. Fines were imposed for neglect of duty and for misconduct.
The Merchant Guild—"Gilda Mercatoria" or "Gilda Mercatorum"—whose history begins with the Norman Conquest, was most important of the early guilds.
Town charters and other records indicate that medieval merchant guilds prevailed in in about one hundred and fifty different towns in the British Isles. By the middle of the fifteenth century merchant guilds had acquired almost absolute control over the whole trade of the land. In many towns some form of merchant guild continued down to the eighteenth century. In some towns in Scotland modified forms persist to the present day.
Leicester’s records comprise an important item in the history of guilds. The first roll dates from October 9th, 1196. In 1107 the first Norman Earl of Leicester, in exchange for a consideration, had allowed the citizens to enroll themselves in a Guild Merchant for mutual protection and for the regulation of matters entrusted to them for the good government of the town. Records for other towns show that one or two had merchant guilds previous to 1107.
Generally, in return for an annual payment, permission was granted to cities and towns by the king. Privileges were stated in the grants, and typically consisted of the exclusive right of trading within the district.
.....
"The Ipswich Records describe the burgesses’ actions upon receiving the charter for establishing a Guild Merchant in a grant made by King John in A.D. 1200. Assembled in the church- yard of St. Mary-le-Tower, the whole community elected various officers to manage the business of the Guild, including management of town matters. These officers were pledged to ensure that the bailiffs treated rich and poor justly and without fear or favour. They elected a fit man to be Alderman of the Guild Merchant, ordaining that the Alderman, and all future Aldermen, should have the monopoly of buying and selling stone and marble. The Alderman was on oath to make a return annually of all profits.
In some towns the Master, Wardens or Keepers occupied the role of the Aldermen."
....
Guild membership required payment of initiation fees—either a money charge, a bull, bear, wine, or some other commodity (doubtless consumed at the guild’s festive gatherings). Allowance was generally made in favour of the relatives of guildsmen. At most locations a new member was required to find sureties, who were responsible for the fulfilment of his obligations to the guild, good conduct, and the production of good and honest work. A new member took an oath of fealty to the fraternity, swearing to observe its laws, to uphold its privileges, not to divulge its councils, to strictly obey its officers, not to aid any non-guildsman under cover of the newly-acquired freedom. Each surety were expected to make good, at personal cost, the new members’ unmet standards—such as failure to complete commissioned work. The sureties were also responsible for the payment of dues.
These conditions have many points in common with current Masonic aims. ....
"There are many Freemasons of to-day who appear to think that the term "Free," as applied to Mason, was exclusively used by operative stone masons in medieval times; whereas it was also used to designate many other tradesmen who were members or brethren of the various Guilds, or in other words by those who were made "Free" of the Guilds. The Freedom of the Merchant Guild in most cases carried with it the freedom of the town, and gave the brethren rights of participating in the benefits of property belonging to the Freemen. In connection with this subject it is interesting to note, that although the properties belonging to the old Guilds have been taken possession of by the Crown, that belonging to the Freemen has in most instances still remained to them. In the case of Leicester there was a division made in the eighteenth century, part of the estate going to the ordinary burgesses and part to the Freemen.
With respect to candidates for initiation into Freemasonry, brethren will remember that one of the first questions put is an enquiry as to the station in life which is occupied by them, " Are you a 'Free Man'?" &c. An illustration of the advantages of being a Freeman, and of its ancient use, is given in the Hereford papers, in which it is stated that the townsmen of Hereford" looked down with contempt upon natives and rustics of ancient time who pay to their lords corporal services of divers kinds, they are not of our condition neither shall they have our laws and customs," &c.
Villeins and serfs were expressly excluded from becoming burgesses and holding office in many towns, and were prevented from. entering the Guilds, either Craft or Merchant.
It is curious to note that in some cases certain rules had to be enacted to prevent brethren from disposing of their Guildship. For instance, in A.D. 1296 it was ordained by the Guild Merchant of Andover that no one in the future shall sell or give away his Guild except to a relative within the third degree: those of this relationship admitted were to pay half a mark to the Guild: but if the father give it to his son the payment shall be only 2 shillings. In other cases the Guildship was granted for life without hereditary succession. A parallel for this may still be found in Leicester today, in the fact that sons of Freemen can easily obtain their freedom together with a life interest in the property belonging to them, while others can only obtain it by a seven years apprenticeship to a Freeman — an obsolete system now very rarely carried into practice.
Brethren might lose their freedom from various causes. For instance, if a brother continued to do bad work after having been twice fined in respect thereof, he was liable to be expelled from the Guild, and would not afterwards be allowed to again carry on such business, for which the brethren had decreed he had not shewn proper honesty and capacity. Each Guild had its own peculiar powers and enactments, defining privileges and prescribing rules of conduct for its brethren. In the Leicester Records many instances are given of brethren of the Guild having been fined for wrong doing: for example, in using shoddy material in the making of woollen goods; for selling below the standard prices fixed by the Guild in council; for trading outside their calling; for telling untruths about brother members of the Guild, and for a number of other offences against their rules. The Guilds had also drastic powers over those outside their membership who transgressed against their rights. In the same Records a case is mentioned of a woman against whom several convictions for unlawful trading had previously been recorded, who was then sentenced to have her ears cut off, with certain other fearful threats against her, should she ever return to the town again. It is even said that the Alderman of the "Corpus Christi" Guild, which had taken the place of the Guild Merchant of Leicester, had power to fine or punish members of the Town Council, and even the Mayor himself, for misdemeanours.
The Guildsmen of Andover enacted a decree of ex-communication against brethren who were guilty of serious offences, commanding "that no one receive him nor buy and sell with him, nor give him fire or water, nor hold communication with him under the penalty of the loss of one's freedom." From this it will be seen that the gentle art of boycotting is not a modern discovery.
Turning to the social side of the Guildship, we find there was much conviviality among the brethren at the regular meetings, or on those days specially appointed as festivals, on which occasions much eating, drinking and merry-making took place. At Ipswich the brethren came together once a year, "familiarly to feast and to refresh their bodies with food and dainties." At Yarmouth they regaled themselves with "frometye, rost byffe, green gese, weale spyce cake, good bere and ale," which feast was usually held on Trinity Sunday, at the cost of four of the brotherhood successively, at which feast all private quarrels and emulation were heard and ended to the glory of God, and mutual love amongst neighbours. Here again we have another illustration which somewhat forcibly reminds us of the annual festivities of Masonic Lodges. It is difficult to conceive any better object than is indicated by the amicable settlement of all differences, which, when happily effected, led to the reunion of the brethren.
The bond of union between members of the same fraternity is forcibly expressed by an old Yarmouth chronicler, who says, "Laudable and praiseworthy is the bond of amity and friendship among mere natural men, how much more especially is that which is amongst Christians who be tied by the strongest bonds of faith and religion; but, above all, by those Christians which be of one fraternity bound and linked together by solemn oath." It should be borne in mind that the Guilds in medieval days in this country would be composed entirely of members of the Christian faith, and in this they materially differed from Freemasonry of our own day, which may embrace all men who admit a Godhead, without reference to any particular creed.
In addition, therefore, to the protection of their several trades and other secular matters, brethren of the Guilds, in accordance with their undertaking, exercised great charity towards each other, by instituting and paying for priests to pray for the souls of departed brethren, by relieving brethren when in sickness, distress and poverty, by adjusting quarrels without litigation, by abstaining from slander and malicious imputations against the brethren, and other good works, of which these precepts are among the most prominent, and which have even remained the most treasured principles of Freemasonry of today.
With regard to the privileges of Guilds, some of which have already been stated, it is interesting to further note that none but brethren " Free of the Guild "were allowed to carry out handicraft works; to keep a shop; to sell things by retail.
Guildsmen had also the first right of purchasing goods and merchandise, and if the merchant declined to accept the price offered by the Guild, they were not allowed afterwards to sell their goods to any other persons outside the Guild, but had to go away with their belongings to the next town, where a similar experience might await them. The Guild had also the right of fixing the retail price at which articles and goods were to be sold by their own members, who were liable to severe punishment if they transgressed against the rule and disposed of their goods below the fixed rate. These trade rules led to continual disputes, not only with those outside, but also between the brethren themselves, and as time went on it became increasingly difficult to administer their own laws and regulations.
It will be readily understood that all these trade and other privileges were not granted to Guilds without corresponding responsibilities being thrown upon their brethren. In addition to the annual grant paid by them to the king or earl, as the case might be, they also discharged a considerable portion of the expense incurred in the upkeep of the town walls, towers, ditches or other fortifications, streets and bridges. A common form of oath included, for instance, " I will lot and scot "—that is to say, I will bear my lot and pay my scot—" with my goods and chattels to the community in the quantity that I shall be assessed, according, to my power." The Guilds had also to assist during the visits of the king or queen or lord of the town, also to pay portions of royal fines, and satisfy many other claims which were periodically made upon them.
In some cases non-Guildsmen and outsiders were allowed to sell goods, upon condition that some toll was paid to the Guild. There was also some relaxation of rules granted at fair times, which enabled outsiders to trade within the restricted areas of towns and dries.
A good example of how selfishly the Guilds acted at times is shown by the following: "Also no foreign fishmonger, who brings fish to the market to sell, shall cut up his fish to sell, except with the permission of the stewards or bailiffs; and no foreigner can have license to do this if any guildsman has any fish to sell." Here is another example of an iniquitous rule: A non-Guildsman could not enter into partnership with a member of the brotherhood, nor was the former allowed to share profits with the latter in return for capital lent.
In Dublin the penalty for breaking the laws of the Guild was L40, one-half of which was paid to the heads of the Guild whose trade the breach affected, and the other half of the fine was handed over, part to the city and part to the finder of the offender, as a reward for services rendered.
To return to some of the curious rules of Guilds, which, as before pointed out, varied very greatly in different towns, it is interesting to note the following instances: No brother was allowed to keep more than one shop for retailing goods, wine, beer, or any other merchandise.
Bull-baiting being a favourite sport, it was enacted that no butcher be allowed to kill a bull until it had first been baited for the amusement of the people. No brother of the Guild was liable to be arrested by a common porter. It was an offence to entice from another any workman or servant, Journeymen were not allowed to be employed as such until they reached the age of twenty.
These instances are sufficient to illustrate how much medieval Guild methods and ideas differed from those of our own day.
It should be pointed out that Craft Guilds do not appear to have been established until some time after the Guild Merchant. They had, however, similar exclusive powers over the regulation of their own particular trades or industries, and held the monopoly of working in them. The Craft Guilds were subservient to the Guild Merchant, although brethren of the former were admitted to membership of the latter.
It has already been pointed out that the freedom of the Guild Merchant generally carried with it the freedom of the town, but in some cases certain rules were adopted to prevent the indiscriminate election of "Freemen," which rules were made with the object of preventing any Guildsman from being admitted to the freedom of the town, unless his application was supported by the Guild to which he belonged.
The constitution of the Guilds, particularly that of the Guild Merchant, as already stated, varied greatly, and depended very largely on the size of the town or city, as to the number of companies which were established. For instance, the Guild Merchant of Devizes consisted of three companies, viz., the Company of Drapers, the Company of Mercers and the Company of Leather-sellers. Into these three companies all the various trades were divided. At Dorchester tradesmen were divided into five companies, viz.. Merchants, Clothiers, Ironmongers, Fishmongers and Shoemakers and Skinners. At Ipswich the trades were, as late as Queen Elizabeth's reign, divided into four companies, and in order to show what varied trades were allied, the following list is given: 1-The Mercers. "All maryers, shipwrights, boke bynders, prynters, fyshemongers, swordsetters, cooks, ffletchers, arrow- hed-makers, phisitians, hatters, cappers, mercers, merchants " and several others. 2—The Drapers. "All joyners, taylors, carpenters, innholders, ffremasons, bryckelayers, tyiers, carryers, casket-makers, surgeons, clothyers" and five others. 3—The Taylors. "All cutlers, smyths, barbers, chandlers, pewterers, mynstrells, pedlars, plumbers, pynners, millers, millwrights, cowpers, shermen, glasiers, turners, tynkers, taylors" and two others. 4— The Shoemakers. "All curryers, color-makers, sadlers, poynters, coblers, skynners, tanners, butchers, carters and labourers." It was ordered that each company shall have an Alderman and two Wardens. All new comers had to become members of one of these companies at the discretion of the Bailiffs.
Attention should be directed to the trade "ffremason" which is included above in the Drapers Company. This is the only instance the writer has met with in the lists of trades, where masons are designated " ffremasons," but there are possibly many others to be found. As to whether any special importance should be given to this instance depends upon several matters, among which may be mentioned the late date of the companies, which had just been re-divided up in Queen Elizabeth's reign, and also the method of construction usually adopted in important buildings at this and prior to this date. Those who have noticed the churches in the neighbourhood of Ipswich, and in fact those of the eastern counties generally, will remember that the walling usually consists of flint work and free-stone dressings — that is to say, the traceried windows, parapets and mouldings generally are of wrought free-stone. It may therefore be argued that the term "ffremason" was an abbreviation of free- stone-mason, in order to distinguish them from the walling masons. However, this is one of those debatable points which may be argued in many ways. The fact that other masons are mentioned in the Ipswich re-division of trades, is certainly noticeable and may give the name "ffremason" a special character and meaning, this being the period of decline in the Guilds, and possibly also of the rise of Speculative Freemasonry.
Taking a rapid survey of the Guilds as they •were evolved in this country from about A.D. 1000, it will be seen that from small beginnings their operations, influence and power were gradually extended, until in the middle of the fifteenth century they had acquired almost absolute control over the whole trade of the land. To these organizations, therefore, may be attributed the credit of all the beautiful work which was carried out during mediaeval times, the excellence of which, in the opinion of most thoughtful people, will never again be equalled. From various causes a decline now set in, which gradually undermined the power of the Guilds. Prosecutions of defaulting brethren and others became more and more frequent as trade and commerce was forcibly widened. In some cases special laws were made to prevent brethren of the Guilds from carrying on a trade surreptitiously. Travelling Scotchmen, it appears, had to be watched with particular care. For instance, at Carlisle an order was made "that no brother of the Guild shall at any time suffer either Scotsmen or others to retail in his house, &c., &c., any commodity which may be prejudicial to the company of Merchants." Other persons not being Guildsmen were proceeded against for carrying on the trade of a grocer or a draper. As years passed by, it became more and more difficult to keep the various trades within the restricted compass of the Guilds, the brethren of which had no doubt, with a great amount of selfishness, kept such a tight hold on the methods of trading, that their exclusiveness brought with it its own condemnation. The Guilds, therefore, rapidly declined in a large number of towns and cities where, as a result, trade and commerce increased, but in some cities where the Guilds were particularly strong, the brethren struggled on until their trades were practically stifled. The tyranny of the Guilds was such in these cases, as to kill all enterprise and drive away trade to those places where the Guild laws had been relaxed, or perhaps to one of those free towns like Birmingham, Manchester, or Leeds, which were not hampered with the rigid protection exercised by Guilds, and prospered in consequence.
In comparatively modern days, therefore, the trade functions of the Guilds became quite obsolete, until the whole system was altered into that of fraternities of a social-religious character, established under the titles of patron saints, on whose festival or feast-days a solemn procession through the town, followed by a banquet, formed almost the last phase of these wonderful organizations.
To fully comprehend the importance of the rapid changes which were taking place in the sixteenth century, not only in Guild methods of conducting trade, but also in religious matters, with which the Guilds were closely allied, it is interesting to note how quickly events followed each other. The following illustration of what occurred in Leicester is only an example of this far reaching movement.
Leicester Abbey was dissolved in A.D. 1537. The College of St. Mary in the Newarke, the fraternities of the Grey Friars, the Augustinian Friars and the Black Friars were suppressed in 1545. The parish churches were stripped of all their adornments and imagery, and the priests' vestments, hangings, rood lofts and altars were sold in 1547. Lastly the whole of the religious Guilds were dissolved and made to suffer the same fate in 1548. Among these may be instanced the Guild of St. Margaret, St. Mary and St. Katherine, St. George's Guild, the Trinity Guild, the Guild of St. John the Baptist, the Guild of the Assumption and lastly the great Guild of Corpus Christi, the most wealthy of them all, which had gradually absorbed the old Merchant Guild. The whole of the valuable properties and possessions of these religious bodies was confiscated to the Crown, in accordance with various Acts of Parliament and Protestant worship was decreed for use in place of the elaborate ritual of the Church of Rome.
After the final dissolution of the Abbeys, Monasteries, Guilds and other religious houses it was evidently thought that this country might develop into a nation of thieves and robbers, unless some religious services were kept rigorously going. Consequently in Leicester it was decreed, in A.D. 1558 or only a few years after the dissolution of the Guilds by the Municipal body sitting in Common Hall, "that at least one person from every house in the town must attend each of the services held on Wednesdays and Fridays, under a penalty of four pence." These services were of course in addition to those of Sunday.
The Guilds disbanded; their trade monopolies gone; their Roman Catholic Christian doctrines prohibited. What more natural as the outcome of all this than the spontaneous growth of Freemasonry on a broader basis? A society where men of high ideals could meet together in peace and seclusion, without being trammelled by religious creeds on the one hand, or the selfish clamourings of trade rights on the other. With regard to the first great principle: It was now sufficient for candidates to admit their belief in God. This broad distinction on religion doubtless included then, as now, the great bulk of the human race. By a stroke of what may be termed Masonic genius the Godhead was called "The Great Architect of the Universe," or "The Grand Geometrician of the Universe," or some other equally broad description was used, practically admitting all creeds and all nationalities. When it is considered what a great religious upheaval was in progress at the period now under review, it can easily be understood what an immense stride towards the successful inauguration of new societies it must have been, to have found a common ground so far as religious differences were concerned. With regard to the second great principle: It was doubtless quite as necessary to prevent the formation of any societies which might have a tendency to act with great selfishness in matters of trading. Here again the Masonic genius of the day saw that this was only possible, by the new society prohibiting all material advantage coming within the expectations of any new member. The question, therefore, "Do you seriously declare on your honour that unbiassed, &c., &c.," and " uninfluenced by mercenary or other unworthy motives, you freely and voluntarily offer yourself, &c.," is very material, clearly indicating that Freemasonry must be entirely disassociated from any idea of personal material gain—a condition quite different from the principles of the old Trade Guilds, which were very largely kept going for the purpose of protecting trading rights and for self advantage.
In conclusion, consider what would be likely to happen when all these social-religious clubs were disbanded and their properties confiscated. The brethren were of course prohibited from holding meetings under the former conditions, and it would take some years to organize any new society to properly fill the places of those disbanded. Therefore the question is again submitted "What was more likely, as the ultimate outcome, than the formation of this new social-religious Guild of Freemasonry?" Are not historians too apt to be seeking the origin of such societies in records of distant ages and foreign countries, when possibly the real cause of their existence may be found in the ordinary desires of human beings to meet together in convivial fashion and for purposes of common good ?"
http://www.seattlemasons.org/papers/guildmerchants.html .
Taking a rapid survey of the Guilds as they •were evolved in this country from about A.D. 1000, it will be seen that from small beginnings their operations, influence and power were gradually extended, until in the middle of the fifteenth century they had acquired almost absolute control over the whole trade of the land. To these organizations, therefore, may be attributed the credit of all the beautiful work which was carried out during mediaeval times, the excellence of which, in the opinion of most thoughtful people, will never again be equalled. From various causes a decline now set in, which gradually undermined the power of the Guilds. Prosecutions of defaulting brethren and others became more and more frequent as trade and commerce was forcibly widened. In some cases special laws were made to prevent brethren of the Guilds from carrying on a trade surreptitiously. Travelling Scotchmen, it appears, had to be watched with particular care. For instance, at Carlisle an order was made "that no brother of the Guild shall at any time suffer either Scotsmen or others to retail in his house, &c., &c., any commodity which may be prejudicial to the company of Merchants." Other persons not being Guildsmen were proceeded against for carrying on the trade of a grocer or a draper. As years passed by, it became more and more difficult to keep the various trades within the restricted compass of the Guilds, the brethren of which had no doubt, with a great amount of selfishness, kept such a tight hold on the methods of trading, that their exclusiveness brought with it its own condemnation. The Guilds, therefore, rapidly declined in a large number of towns and cities where, as a result, trade and commerce increased, but in some cities where the Guilds were particularly strong, the brethren struggled on until their trades were practically stifled. The tyranny of the Guilds was such in these cases, as to kill all enterprise and drive away trade to those places where the Guild laws had been relaxed, or perhaps to one of those free towns like Birmingham, Manchester, or Leeds, which were not hampered with the rigid protection exercised by Guilds, and prospered in consequence.
In comparatively modern days, therefore, the trade functions of the Guilds became quite obsolete, until the whole system was altered into that of fraternities of a social-religious character, established under the titles of patron saints, on whose festival or feast-days a solemn procession through the town, followed by a banquet, formed almost the last phase of these wonderful organizations.
To fully comprehend the importance of the rapid changes which were taking place in the sixteenth century, not only in Guild methods of conducting trade, but also in religious matters, with which the Guilds were closely allied, it is interesting to note how quickly events followed each other. The following illustration of what occurred in Leicester is only an example of this far reaching movement.
Leicester Abbey was dissolved in A.D. 1537. The College of St. Mary in the Newarke, the fraternities of the Grey Friars, the Augustinian Friars and the Black Friars were suppressed in 1545. The parish churches were stripped of all their adornments and imagery, and the priests' vestments, hangings, rood lofts and altars were sold in 1547. Lastly the whole of the religious Guilds were dissolved and made to suffer the same fate in 1548. Among these may be instanced the Guild of St. Margaret, St. Mary and St. Katherine, St. George's Guild, the Trinity Guild, the Guild of St. John the Baptist, the Guild of the Assumption and lastly the great Guild of Corpus Christi, the most wealthy of them all, which had gradually absorbed the old Merchant Guild. The whole of the valuable properties and possessions of these religious bodies was confiscated to the Crown, in accordance with various Acts of Parliament and Protestant worship was decreed for use in place of the elaborate ritual of the Church of Rome.
After the final dissolution of the Abbeys, Monasteries, Guilds and other religious houses it was evidently thought that this country might develop into a nation of thieves and robbers, unless some religious services were kept rigorously going. Consequently in Leicester it was decreed, in A.D. 1558 or only a few years after the dissolution of the Guilds by the Municipal body sitting in Common Hall, "that at least one person from every house in the town must attend each of the services held on Wednesdays and Fridays, under a penalty of four pence." These services were of course in addition to those of Sunday.
The Guilds disbanded; their trade monopolies gone; their Roman Catholic Christian doctrines prohibited. What more natural as the outcome of all this than the spontaneous growth of Freemasonry on a broader basis? A society where men of high ideals could meet together in peace and seclusion, without being trammelled by religious creeds on the one hand, or the selfish clamourings of trade rights on the other. With regard to the first great principle: It was now sufficient for candidates to admit their belief in God. This broad distinction on religion doubtless included then, as now, the great bulk of the human race. By a stroke of what may be termed Masonic genius the Godhead was called "The Great Architect of the Universe," or "The Grand Geometrician of the Universe," or some other equally broad description was used, practically admitting all creeds and all nationalities. When it is considered what a great religious upheaval was in progress at the period now under review, it can easily be understood what an immense stride towards the successful inauguration of new societies it must have been, to have found a common ground so far as religious differences were concerned. With regard to the second great principle: It was doubtless quite as necessary to prevent the formation of any societies which might have a tendency to act with great selfishness in matters of trading. Here again the Masonic genius of the day saw that this was only possible, by the new society prohibiting all material advantage coming within the expectations of any new member. The question, therefore, "Do you seriously declare on your honour that unbiassed, &c., &c.," and " uninfluenced by mercenary or other unworthy motives, you freely and voluntarily offer yourself, &c.," is very material, clearly indicating that Freemasonry must be entirely disassociated from any idea of personal material gain—a condition quite different from the principles of the old Trade Guilds, which were very largely kept going for the purpose of protecting trading rights and for self advantage.
In conclusion, consider what would be likely to happen when all these social-religious clubs were disbanded and their properties confiscated. The brethren were of course prohibited from holding meetings under the former conditions, and it would take some years to organize any new society to properly fill the places of those disbanded. Therefore the question is again submitted "What was more likely, as the ultimate outcome, than the formation of this new social-religious Guild of Freemasonry?" Are not historians too apt to be seeking the origin of such societies in records of distant ages and foreign countries, when possibly the real cause of their existence may be found in the ordinary desires of human beings to meet together in convivial fashion and for purposes of common good ?"
http://www.seattlemasons.org/papers/guildmerchants.html .
Hanseatic League
History Network Podcast >> .
Hanseatic League
Fair Trade?: A Look at the Hanseatic League
Here's a quick look at the rise and fall of the one of the most powerful organizations of the Late Middle Ages...
Fair Trade?: A Look at the Hanseatic League
Here's a quick look at the rise and fall of the one of the most powerful organizations of the Late Middle Ages...
Hanseatic League - London Kontor
Close to the present-day Cannon Street station sat the London base of the Hanseatic League - a powerful trading network for hundreds of years, stretching all the way from the East of England to the heart of Russia. It was one of the most successful trade alliances in history - at its height the League could count on the allegiance of nearly 200 towns across northern Europe.
London was never formally one of the Hanseatic cities, but it was a crucial link in the chain - known as a kontor or trading post. The community of German merchants who lived on the banks of the Thames were exempt from customs duties and certain taxes.
“At any given time they probably had about 15% market share of English imports and exports.”
Merchants' Guilds and Monopolies
Late-14th-Century Guilds and Monopolies
Medieval Guilds and Craft Production
http://employees.oneonta.edu/farberas/arth/ARTH200/artist/guilds.html
The Guild System in the towns, which were the location of trade, manufacturing, crafts, and specializations of various sorts, and which were traded with the people on the Manors for much of the food and related agricultural items that the townspeople needed.
Even with emerging appreciation and recognition of property rights and legal contract relationships for commerce and exchange in the towns, the economic system was one of strict regulation of prices, production, and employment through the craft and professional guilds.
The structure of the Manorial and Guild Systems also meant that the economic focus, the political loyalties, and social relationships tended to be limited to extremely narrow geographical confines. Little attention and few political or economic ties connected the various parts of Europe for the most part during this long period of history – other than the periodic “Free Fairs.”
https://fee.org/articles/how-medieval-towns-paved-the-way-for-capitalism/
Local craft guilds regulated the quality and price of items manufactured in a town, from pewter to barrels or bedcovers, and controlled who could make and sell them. Richer ‘merchant’ guilds controlled wholesale trade in towns, and the most powerful of them (the Merchants of the Staple and the Merchant Adventurers) operated at a national and even international level.
In York (which has the best surviving late medieval records of any English provincial town or city), there were about 60 guilds in the late 15th century. Ranging from bakers, butchers and carpenters to specialist parchment-makers, embroiderers and barber-surgeons, their members – rich and poor alike – were all formally admitted ‘freemen’ of the city. Such a status was almost always earned following a long apprenticeship.
Only freemen could operate their own shop or business in the city. Outsiders could trade only as toll-paying market stall-holders.
Such rigidly restrictive practices were intended to protect local interests. But they also stifled innovation and enterprise, so that commerce increasingly fled the ancient, guild-controlled towns.
http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/learn/story-of-england/medieval-part-2/commerce/
The tailors of London and their guild, c.1300-1500
http://www.medievalists.net/2013/02/the-tailors-of-london-and-their-guild-c-1300-1500/
Medieval Guild, Anyone?
http://kevinclarkcomposer.com/2013/05/medieval-guild-anyone/
When population falls to the degree that it did in Europe during the Black Death years of 1346 to 1353, several things happen. First, the amount of farmland brought under cultivation drops. Second, the price of grain falls because of a decrease in demand. At the same time, wages rise as the number of available workers decreases. In other words, the demand for labor increases, forcing up its price. Other results include a drop in land value and, perhaps, in the cost of non-agricultural goods.
https://guidebookstgc.snagfilms.com/5670_guidebook.pdf
https://www.thegreatcoursesplus.com/films/title/late-14th-century-guilds-and-monopolies
Merchants & Markets
Market sound effects
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WdMlKVio0LA
https://www.youtube.com/user/TheMSsoundeffects/videos
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_England_in_the_Middle_Ages
Medieval Economics
http://www.petesqbsite.com/sections/tutorials/tuts/m_econ.htm .
http://www.petesqbsite.com/sections/tutorials/tuts/m_econ.htm .
Candle Making ..
The marketplace
“Ribs of beef and many a pie!” you hear someone call over your shoulder. Turning, you see a young lad walking through the crowd bearing a tray laden with wooden bowls of cooked meats from a local shop.
All around him people are moving, gesturing, talking. So many have come in from the surrounding villages that this town of about 3,000 inhabitants is today thronged with twice as many. Here are men in knee-length brown tunics driving their cattle before them. Here are their wives in long kirtles with wimples around their heads and necks. Those men in short tunics and hoods are valets in a knight’s household. Those in long gowns with high collars and beaver-fur hats are wealthy merchants. Across the marketplace more peasants are leading in their flocks of sheep, or packhorses and carts loaded with crates of chickens.
Crowds are noisy. People are talking so much that chatter could almost be the whole purpose of the market – and in many ways it is. This is the one open public area in the town where people can meet and exchange information. When a company performs a mystery play, it is to the marketplace that they will drag the cart containing their stage, set and costumes. When the town crier rings his bell to address the people of the town, it is in the marketplace that the crowd will gather to hear him. The marketplace is the heart of any town: indeed, the very definition of a town is that it has a market.
What can you buy? Let’s start at the fishmongers’ stalls. You may have heard that many sorts of freshwater and sea fish are eaten in medieval England. Indeed, more than 150 species are consumed by the nobility and churchmen, drawn from their own fishponds as well as the rivers and seas.
But in most markets it is the popular varieties which you see glistening in the wet hay-filled crates. Mackerel, herring, lampreys, cod, eels, Aberdeen fish (cured salmon and herring), and stockfish (salt cod) are the most common varieties. Crabs and lobsters are transported live, in barrels. In season you will see fresh salmon – attracting the hefty price of four or five shillings each. A fresh turbot can cost even more, up to seven shillings.
Next we come to an area set aside for corn: sacks of wheat, barley, oats and rye are piled up, ready for sale to the townsmen. Then the space given over to livestock: goats, sheep, pigs and cows. A corner is devoted to garden produce – apples, pears, vegetables, garlic and herbs – yet the emphasis of a medieval diet is on meat, cheese and cereal crops. In a large town you will find spicerers selling such exotic commodities as pepper, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, liquorice, and many different types of sugar.
These are only for the wealthy. When your average skilled workman earns only two shillings (2s) in a week, he can hardly afford to spend four shillings (4s) on a pound of cloves or 20 pence (20d) on a pound of ginger.
The rest of the marketplace performs two functions. Producers come to sell fleeces, sacks of wool, tanned hides, furs, iron, steel and tin for resale further afield. The other function is to sell manufactured commodities to local people: brass and bronze cooking vessels, candlesticks and spurs, pewterware, woollen cloth, silk, linen, canvas, carts, rushes (for hall floors), glass, faggots, coal, nails, horse shoes and planks of wood.
Planks, you ask? Consider the difficulties of transporting a tree trunk to a saw pit, and then getting two men to saw it into planks with only a handsaw between them.
Everyone in medieval society is heavily dependent on each other for such supplies, and the marketplace is where all these interdependencies meet.
Haggling
Essential items such as ale and bread have their prices fixed by law. Yet for almost everything that’s been manufactured you will have to negotiate. Caxton’s 15th-century dialogue book is based on a 14th-century language guide, and gives the following lesson in how to haggle with a cloth vendor:
“Dame, what hold ye the ell (45 inches) of this
cloth? Or what is worth the cloth whole?
In short, so to speak, how much the ell?”
“Sire, reason; ye shall have it good and cheap.”
“Yea, truly, for cattle. Dame, ye must me win.
Take heed what I shall pay.”
“Four shillings for the ell, if it please you.”
“For so much would I have good scarlet.”
“But I have some which is not of the best
which I would not give for seven shillings.”
“But this is no such cloth, of so much money,
that know ye well!”
“Sire, what is it worth?”
“Dame, it were worth to me well three shillings.”
“That is evil-boden.”
“But say certainly how shall I have it without
a part to leave?”
“I shall give it ye at one word: ye shall pay five
shillings, certainly if ye have them for so many
ells, for I will abate nothing.”
And so you open your purse, which hangs from the cords attached to your belt and find five shillings. Except that there is no shilling coin in the late 14th century. The smallest gold coins are the half-noble (3s 4d) and the quarter-noble (1s 8d), so if you have one each of these, you can make up the sum. Alternatively you will have to make it up from the silver coins: groats (4d), half-groats, pennies, halfpence and farthings (¼d).
Regulations
A well-run market is crucial to the standing of a town. Thus it is heavily regulated. The actual policing tends to be undertaken by the town’s bedels or bailiffs, who enforce regulations like “no horses may be left standing in the marketplace on market days” and “every man is to keep the street in front of his tenement clean”. Most towns have between 40 and 70 regulations, and those breaking them are taken to the borough court and fined.
There are reasons to be grateful for the supervision of trade. Short measures are a notorious problem, and turners normally have to swear to make wooden measures of the appropriate size. Clerks in borough courts will tell you of cooking pots being made out of soft metal and coated with brass, and loaves of bread baked with stones in them to make them up to the legally required weight.
Wool is stretched before it is woven, to make it go further (but then it shrinks). Pepper is sold damp, making it swell, weigh more, and rot sooner. Meat is sometimes sold even though it is putrid, wine even though it has turned sour, and bread when it has gone green.
If you are the victim of malpractice, go straight to the authorities. The perpetrator will be pilloried – literally. The pillory is the wooden board which clasps the guilty man’s head and hands, and shamefully exposes him to the insults of the crowd.
A butcher selling bad meat can expect to be dragged through the streets of the town on a hurdle and then placed in the pillory with the rotten meat burnt under him. A vintner caught selling foul wine is dragged to the pillory on a hurdle, forced to drink a draught of the offending liquor, and then set in the pillory where the remainder is poured over his head.
The sweetness of the revenge makes up for the sourness of the wine.
Shopping in the 14th century will often remind you of how much we have in common with our medieval forebears. It will likewise alert you to the huge differences between us. We are not the same as our ancestors. Look at how young they are – the median age is just 21 – and look at the meagre diet of the poor, their rotten teeth as they smile, their resilience in the face of death.
Consider how rough and smelly the streets are, and how small the sheep and cattle are in the marketplace. When a fight breaks out over some stolen goods, and the bedels rush to intervene, you may see how the spirit of the people is so similar to our own and yet how much the process of managing that spirit has changed. For if the stolen goods are of sufficient value, the thieves will be summarily tried and hanged the same day. This is what makes history so interesting – the differences between us across the centuries, as well as the similarities.
At dusk – just before the great gates of the city are closed for the night, and you see everyone leaving the adjacent taverns – you may begin to think that Auden was on to something. To understand ourselves, we must first see society differently – and to remember that history is the study of the living, not the dead.
Prices in the 1390s
Ale, ordinary: ¾d–1d per gallon
Wine from Bordeaux: 3d–4d per gallon
Bacon: 15d per side
Chicken: 2d each
Cod, fresh: 20d each
Sugar, loaf of: 18d per lb
Apples: 7d per hundred
Eggs: 33d for 425
A furred gown: 5s 4d
* Prices from the account books of Henry of Lancaster, Earl of Derby.
Wages/salaries in the 1390s
The king’s physician: £40 per year
Officers in the royal household: £20 per year
Mason: £8 per year (6d per day)
Carpenter: 4¼d per day
Thatcher: 4¼d per day
Labourer: 3¼d per day
Valets in a lord’s household: £1 10s per year
Manservant in a yeoman’s household: £1 per year
Maidservant in a yeoman’s household: 10s per year
In old money, there were 12 pence (d) to the shilling (s) and 20 shillings to the pound (£).
The marketplace
“Ribs of beef and many a pie!” you hear someone call over your shoulder. Turning, you see a young lad walking through the crowd bearing a tray laden with wooden bowls of cooked meats from a local shop.
All around him people are moving, gesturing, talking. So many have come in from the surrounding villages that this town of about 3,000 inhabitants is today thronged with twice as many. Here are men in knee-length brown tunics driving their cattle before them. Here are their wives in long kirtles with wimples around their heads and necks. Those men in short tunics and hoods are valets in a knight’s household. Those in long gowns with high collars and beaver-fur hats are wealthy merchants. Across the marketplace more peasants are leading in their flocks of sheep, or packhorses and carts loaded with crates of chickens.
Crowds are noisy. People are talking so much that chatter could almost be the whole purpose of the market – and in many ways it is. This is the one open public area in the town where people can meet and exchange information. When a company performs a mystery play, it is to the marketplace that they will drag the cart containing their stage, set and costumes. When the town crier rings his bell to address the people of the town, it is in the marketplace that the crowd will gather to hear him. The marketplace is the heart of any town: indeed, the very definition of a town is that it has a market.
What can you buy? Let’s start at the fishmongers’ stalls. You may have heard that many sorts of freshwater and sea fish are eaten in medieval England. Indeed, more than 150 species are consumed by the nobility and churchmen, drawn from their own fishponds as well as the rivers and seas.
But in most markets it is the popular varieties which you see glistening in the wet hay-filled crates. Mackerel, herring, lampreys, cod, eels, Aberdeen fish (cured salmon and herring), and stockfish (salt cod) are the most common varieties. Crabs and lobsters are transported live, in barrels. In season you will see fresh salmon – attracting the hefty price of four or five shillings each. A fresh turbot can cost even more, up to seven shillings.
Next we come to an area set aside for corn: sacks of wheat, barley, oats and rye are piled up, ready for sale to the townsmen. Then the space given over to livestock: goats, sheep, pigs and cows. A corner is devoted to garden produce – apples, pears, vegetables, garlic and herbs – yet the emphasis of a medieval diet is on meat, cheese and cereal crops. In a large town you will find spicerers selling such exotic commodities as pepper, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, liquorice, and many different types of sugar.
These are only for the wealthy. When your average skilled workman earns only two shillings (2s) in a week, he can hardly afford to spend four shillings (4s) on a pound of cloves or 20 pence (20d) on a pound of ginger.
The rest of the marketplace performs two functions. Producers come to sell fleeces, sacks of wool, tanned hides, furs, iron, steel and tin for resale further afield. The other function is to sell manufactured commodities to local people: brass and bronze cooking vessels, candlesticks and spurs, pewterware, woollen cloth, silk, linen, canvas, carts, rushes (for hall floors), glass, faggots, coal, nails, horse shoes and planks of wood.
Planks, you ask? Consider the difficulties of transporting a tree trunk to a saw pit, and then getting two men to saw it into planks with only a handsaw between them.
Everyone in medieval society is heavily dependent on each other for such supplies, and the marketplace is where all these interdependencies meet.
Haggling
Essential items such as ale and bread have their prices fixed by law. Yet for almost everything that’s been manufactured you will have to negotiate. Caxton’s 15th-century dialogue book is based on a 14th-century language guide, and gives the following lesson in how to haggle with a cloth vendor:
“Dame, what hold ye the ell (45 inches) of this
cloth? Or what is worth the cloth whole?
In short, so to speak, how much the ell?”
“Sire, reason; ye shall have it good and cheap.”
“Yea, truly, for cattle. Dame, ye must me win.
Take heed what I shall pay.”
“Four shillings for the ell, if it please you.”
“For so much would I have good scarlet.”
“But I have some which is not of the best
which I would not give for seven shillings.”
“But this is no such cloth, of so much money,
that know ye well!”
“Sire, what is it worth?”
“Dame, it were worth to me well three shillings.”
“That is evil-boden.”
“But say certainly how shall I have it without
a part to leave?”
“I shall give it ye at one word: ye shall pay five
shillings, certainly if ye have them for so many
ells, for I will abate nothing.”
And so you open your purse, which hangs from the cords attached to your belt and find five shillings. Except that there is no shilling coin in the late 14th century. The smallest gold coins are the half-noble (3s 4d) and the quarter-noble (1s 8d), so if you have one each of these, you can make up the sum. Alternatively you will have to make it up from the silver coins: groats (4d), half-groats, pennies, halfpence and farthings (¼d).
Regulations
A well-run market is crucial to the standing of a town. Thus it is heavily regulated. The actual policing tends to be undertaken by the town’s bedels or bailiffs, who enforce regulations like “no horses may be left standing in the marketplace on market days” and “every man is to keep the street in front of his tenement clean”. Most towns have between 40 and 70 regulations, and those breaking them are taken to the borough court and fined.
There are reasons to be grateful for the supervision of trade. Short measures are a notorious problem, and turners normally have to swear to make wooden measures of the appropriate size. Clerks in borough courts will tell you of cooking pots being made out of soft metal and coated with brass, and loaves of bread baked with stones in them to make them up to the legally required weight.
Wool is stretched before it is woven, to make it go further (but then it shrinks). Pepper is sold damp, making it swell, weigh more, and rot sooner. Meat is sometimes sold even though it is putrid, wine even though it has turned sour, and bread when it has gone green.
If you are the victim of malpractice, go straight to the authorities. The perpetrator will be pilloried – literally. The pillory is the wooden board which clasps the guilty man’s head and hands, and shamefully exposes him to the insults of the crowd.
A butcher selling bad meat can expect to be dragged through the streets of the town on a hurdle and then placed in the pillory with the rotten meat burnt under him. A vintner caught selling foul wine is dragged to the pillory on a hurdle, forced to drink a draught of the offending liquor, and then set in the pillory where the remainder is poured over his head.
The sweetness of the revenge makes up for the sourness of the wine.
Shopping in the 14th century will often remind you of how much we have in common with our medieval forebears. It will likewise alert you to the huge differences between us. We are not the same as our ancestors. Look at how young they are – the median age is just 21 – and look at the meagre diet of the poor, their rotten teeth as they smile, their resilience in the face of death.
Consider how rough and smelly the streets are, and how small the sheep and cattle are in the marketplace. When a fight breaks out over some stolen goods, and the bedels rush to intervene, you may see how the spirit of the people is so similar to our own and yet how much the process of managing that spirit has changed. For if the stolen goods are of sufficient value, the thieves will be summarily tried and hanged the same day. This is what makes history so interesting – the differences between us across the centuries, as well as the similarities.
At dusk – just before the great gates of the city are closed for the night, and you see everyone leaving the adjacent taverns – you may begin to think that Auden was on to something. To understand ourselves, we must first see society differently – and to remember that history is the study of the living, not the dead.
Prices in the 1390s
Ale, ordinary: ¾d–1d per gallon
Wine from Bordeaux: 3d–4d per gallon
Bacon: 15d per side
Chicken: 2d each
Cod, fresh: 20d each
Sugar, loaf of: 18d per lb
Apples: 7d per hundred
Eggs: 33d for 425
A furred gown: 5s 4d
* Prices from the account books of Henry of Lancaster, Earl of Derby.
Wages/salaries in the 1390s
The king’s physician: £40 per year
Officers in the royal household: £20 per year
Mason: £8 per year (6d per day)
Carpenter: 4¼d per day
Thatcher: 4¼d per day
Labourer: 3¼d per day
Valets in a lord’s household: £1 10s per year
Manservant in a yeoman’s household: £1 per year
Maidservant in a yeoman’s household: 10s per year
In old money, there were 12 pence (d) to the shilling (s) and 20 shillings to the pound (£).
Salt
Salt Production, Use Hx [Medieval Professions: Salt Boiling] - Kobe > .
Eksperiment med saltudvinding - Salt extraction - Ribe VikingeCenter > .
Salt - Vīta Domī >> .
Salzman/Saltzman (salt merchant)
Salt, Salter, Sulter, Saltman and Salterman, this is an English surname of two possible origins. The first is occupational and describes an extractor or seller of salt, the derivation being from the Olde English pre 7th century world "sealt" meaning salt. The surname from this source is first recorded towards the middle of the 13th century (see below), and Thomas le Selter appears in the Subsidy Rolls of Sussex in 1296, whilst John Saltman is recorded in the Pipe Rolls of Suffolk in 1327. The second distinct possibility is that the name derives from the pre 7th century Olde French words "saltere or sautere", meaning a psalter.
Waller may also be an occupational name for someone who boiled sea water to extract the salt, from the Middle English well(en), meaning "to boil."
Trade - Romans to Coronavirus
Romans > .
Europe after decline of Western Roman Empire > .
Mongols & Silk Road - Pax Mongolicā > .
Pax Mongolica to Europa Universalis: Mackinder 4/5 - Geop > .Black Death & retreat of China > .
New trade routes in 15thC, 16thC > .
New technologies in 19thC > .
Gold Standard & 1st Golden Age of Trade (1880s - 1914) > .
Great War, Spanish Flu, Great Depression, Russian Revolution > .
Post-WW2 > .
Before the Mongols' rise, the Old World system consisted of isolated imperial systems.
The Pax Mongolica ("Mongol Peace"), less often known as Pax Tatarica ("Tatar Peace"), is a historiographical term modelled after the original phrase Pax Romana which describes the stabilizing effects of the conquests of the Mongol Empire on the social, cultural and economic life of the inhabitants of the vast Eurasian territory that the Mongols conquered in the 13th and 14th centuries. The term is used to describe the eased communication and commerce the unified administration helped to create and the period of relative peace that followed the Mongols' vast conquests.
...
At its height, the Mongolian empire stretched from Shanhaiguan in the east to Budapest in the west, from Rus' in the north to Tibet in the south. This meant that an extremely large part of the continent was united under one political authority. As a result, the trade routes used by merchants became safe for travel, resulting in an overall growth and expansion of trade from China in the east to Britain in the west. Thus, the Pax Mongolica greatly influenced many civilizations in Eurasia during the 13th and 14th centuries.
Under the Mongols new technologies and commodities were exchanged across the Old World, particularly Eurasia. Thomas T. Allsen noted many personnel exchanges occurred during the Mongol period. There were many significant developments in economy (especially trade and public finance), military, medicine, agriculture, cuisine, astronomy, printing, geography, and historiography, which were not limited to Eurasia but also included North Africa.
On the Silk Road caravans with Chinese silk; pepper, ginger, cinnamon, and nutmeg came to the West from the Spice Islands via the transcontinental trade routes. Eastern diets were introduced to Europeans as well. Indian muslins, cottons, pearls, and precious stones were sold in Europe, as well as weapons, carpets, and leather goods from Iran. Gunpowder was also introduced to Europe from China.
In the opposite direction, Europeans sent silver, fine cloth, horses, linen, and other goods to the near and far East. Increasing trade and commerce meant that the respective nations and societies increased their exposure to new goods and markets, thus increasing the GDP of each nation or society that was involved in the trade system. Μany of the cities participating in the 13th century world trade system grew rapidly in size.
Along with land trade routes, a Maritime Silk Road contributed to the flow of goods and establishment of a Pax Mongolica. This Maritime Silk Road started with short coastal routes in Southern China. As technology and navigation progressed these routes developed into a high-seas route into the Indian Ocean. Eventually these routes further developed encompassing the Arabian Sea, Persian Gulf, Red Sea, and the sea off East Africa.
Along with tangible goods, people, techniques, information, and ideas moved lucidly across the Eurasian landmass for the first time. For example, John of Montecorvino, archbishop of Beijing founded Roman Catholic missions in India and China and also translated the New Testament into the Mongolian language. Long-distance trade brought new methods of doing business from the far East to Europe; bills of exchange, deposit banking, and insurance were introduced to Europe during the Pax Mongolica. Bills of exchange made it significantly easier to travel long distances because a traveller would not be burdened by the weight of metal coins.
Islamic methods of mathematics, astronomy, and science made their way to Africa, East Asia and Europe during the Pax Mongolica. Methods of paper-making and printing made their way from China to Europe. Mongol elements including the ʼPhags-pa script made numerous appearances in western art (see Mongol elements in Western medieval art). Rudimentary banking systems were established, and money changing and credit extension were common, resulting in large amounts of merchant wealth.
...
The conquests of Genghis Khan (r. 1206–1227) and his successors, spanning from Southeast Asia to Eastern Europe, effectively connected the Eastern world with the Western world. The Silk Road, connecting trade centres across Asia and Europe, came under the sole rule of the Mongol Empire. It was commonly said that "a maiden bearing a nugget of gold on her head could wander safely throughout the realm". Despite the political fragmentation of the Mongol Empire into four khanates (Yuan dynasty, Golden Horde, Chagatai Khanate and Ilkhanate), nearly a century of conquest and civil war was followed by relative stability in the early 14th century. The end of the Pax Mongolica was marked by the disintegration of the khanates and the outbreak of the Black Death in Asia which spread along trade routes to much of the world in the mid-14th century.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pax_Mongolica
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silk_Road .
The conquests of Genghis Khan (r. 1206–1227) and his successors, spanning from Southeast Asia to Eastern Europe, effectively connected the Eastern world with the Western world. The Silk Road, connecting trade centres across Asia and Europe, came under the sole rule of the Mongol Empire. It was commonly said that "a maiden bearing a nugget of gold on her head could wander safely throughout the realm". Despite the political fragmentation of the Mongol Empire into four khanates (Yuan dynasty, Golden Horde, Chagatai Khanate and Ilkhanate), nearly a century of conquest and civil war was followed by relative stability in the early 14th century. The end of the Pax Mongolica was marked by the disintegration of the khanates and the outbreak of the Black Death in Asia which spread along trade routes to much of the world in the mid-14th century.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pax_Mongolica
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silk_Road .
Trade in Medieval England
https://regia.org/research/misc/costs.htm
Anglo-Saxon England - Coinage
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coinage_in_Anglo-*Saxon_England*
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_English_penny_(c._600_%E2%80%93_1066)
Early Anglo-Saxon coins
https://www.britannica.com/topic/coin/Coins-of-the-British-Isles-colonies-and-Commonwealth
Anglo-Saxon and Early Norman Agricultural Economy
Agricultural periods - Anglo-Saxon
Silk Road > .
https://youtu.be/tzPi6D0dEoc?t=134
Medieval England
Birmingham Market ~1300
https://youtu.be/JZq9cBzrIVI?t=1m16s
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