[257] The city of Rome was sacked by the Visigoths in 410.
[258] Luther is characteristically careless about his chronology. By the "Turkish Empire" he means the Mohammedan power.
[259] So sol man die Deutschen teuschen und mit teuschen teuschenn, i.e., made Germans (Deutsche) by cheating (teuschen) them.
[260] See Cambridge Mediæval History, I (1911), pp. 244 f.
[261] Such a law as Luther here suggests was proposed to the Diet of Worms (1521). Text in Wrede, Reischstagsakten, II, 335-341.
[262] Cf. Luther's Sermon von Kaubandlung und Wucher, of 1524. (Weim. Ed. XV, pp. 293)
[263] Spices were one of the chief articles of foreign commerce in the XVI Century. The discovery of the cape-route to India had given the Portuguese a practical monopoly of this trade. A comparative statement of the cost of spices for a period of years was reported to the Diet of Nürnberg (1523). See Wrede, op. cit., III, 576.
[264] The Zinskauf or Rentenkauf was a means or evading the prohibition of usury. The buyer purchased an annuity, but the purchase price was not regarded as a loan, or it could not be recalled, and the annual payments could not therefore be called interest.
[265] The practice was legalised by the Lateran Council, 1512.
[266] The XVI Century was the hey-day of the great trading-companies, among which the Fuggers of Augsburg (see above, p. 97, note 5) easily took first place. The effort of these companies was directed toward securing monopolies in the staple articles of commerce, and their ability to finance large enterprises made it possible for them to gain practical control of the home markets. The sharp rise in the cost of living which took place on the first half of the XVI Century was laid at their door. The Diet of Cologne (1512) had passed a stringent law against monopolies which had, however, failed to suppress them. The Diet of Worms (1521) debated the subject (Wrede, Reichstagsakten II, pp. 355 iff.) "in somewhat heated language" (ibid., 842), but failed to agree upon methods of suppression. The subject was discussed again at the Diet of Nürnberg (1523) and various remedies were proposed (ibid., Ill, 556-599).