Flanders.—Our attention is next directed here. The woollen manufactures commenced probably in the latter half of the tenth century (960). At first the sales were mostly to the French, whose thrifty habits enabled them to purchase fine woollen cloths for wear. On account of the scarcity of coin the trade was mostly carried on by barter, to facilitate which Baldwin, Earl of Flanders—who seems to have exceeded most of the sovereigns of that period in desiring the real interest of himself and his subjects—set up weekly markets, and established regular fairs at Bruges, Courtray, Torhout and Mont-Casel, at all which he exempted the goods sold or exchanged from paying any duties on being brought in or carried out. The new trade was thus greatly extended, and it continued to flourish for several centuries—largely due to its being widely known through the fairs of Europe.
France.—Much of the European commerce of the middle ages was transacted at the celebrated fairs of Champagne and Brie. There the merchants of Italy, Spain and France congregated. From far distant climes the Genoese transported thither bales of goods; and busy traders came to meet in open market the infant efforts of Belgian manufacturers from Yprès, Douai, and Bruges. Burgundy sent cloth, Catalonia leather, and the Genoese and Florentines brought silks; while at all the seaports along their coasts vast cargoes were unshipped and placed on the backs of mules to wend their way to the place appointed for the fair.
These fairs would begin with the sale of cloth, perhaps for seventeen days; the cloth merchants would settle their accounts prior to the silk merchants entering upon their bargains. In the middle of it all the great cry “Ara” was raised, as a signal for the money-changers to take their seats, and for four weeks they sat for the benefit of the various nationalities who wished to realize their gains in their native coin.
After the conclusion of the fair a busy time of fifteen days was set apart for those who had not yet settled their accounts, and to rectify disputes; which time was extended in favour of the representatives of more distant people who wished to go home and return before finally completing their books. The Genoese bursar at these fairs had always a month allowed him before settling his accounts.
Bent (in his “Genoa: how the Republic Rose and Fell,” 1881) from whom we have drawn some of the preceding details says (p. 106) these fairs in southern France were not without their political significance. Besides bringing hither their merchandise, the Italian traders imported into these towns their spirit of independence and their love of republicanism. It was from the south of France that the seeds of liberty, equality, and fraternity spread northwards. No greater stronghold of the rights of the third estate existed than at Marseilles. To this day the influence of this fact is strong on the politics of France. And the principles inculcated by the independent traders of Italy took deep root here under the eyes of despotism, and found a truly favourable soil in which to develop. The French revolution, and the state of France as it is to-day, may owe their first source to these very times when a Genoese merchant would repair to these fairs, proud and boastful of his own freedom, of his vote in the General Council, and of a government which owned no royal master; and all this could be said with a sneer at the people over whom the banner of the lilies held despotic sway.
North of Europe.—Towards the close of the tenth century periodical public markets or fairs were established in the northern portions of Europe, and were used for a purpose altogether new in these higher latitudes, but arising out of the rapine and hostilities peculiar to the period. In several of the North German towns the merchandise brought to them consisted of slaves taken in the wars—many of which were believed to have been fermented for the simple purpose of carrying off captives. Helmold relates that he saw 7,000 Danish slaves at one time exposed for sale in the market at Mecklenberg. The common price of ordinary slaves of either sex was about a mark (or 8 oz.) of silver; but some female slaves for their beauty or qualifications were rated as high as three marks. (Vide Thorkelin’s “Essay on the Slave Trade,” pp. 4-9.)
We arrive at the close of the sixteenth century. The city of Antwerp had at this period arrived very nearly at the summit of its wealth and glory, which Anderson (“Hist. of Commerce,” ii., p. 25) considers it had acquired by two principal means:—
I. By the grants of free fairs for commerce, made formerly by the sovereigns of the Netherlands—two of which fairs lasted each time six weeks—whither merchants resorted from all parts of Christendom with their merchandise, custom free. At these fairs vast concerns were managed, not only in merchandise, but in bills of exchange with all parts of Europe.
II. It had become the entrepot of the commerce between the southern and northern ports of Europe, and especially of the Portuguese merchants. This drew the German and other merchants to settle there; and the merchants of Bruges largely removed thither after the Archduke Maximilian had (about 1499) reduced their city. The fairs were aided by, and themselves aided, this development.
