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Socio-economic Development of the Hansa Route through Centuries or What was Hansa?

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Socio-economic Development of the Hansa Route through Centuries or What was Hansa?. Dr. oec. Assoc. Prof. Viesturs Pauls Karnups. Introduction. The Hanseatic League (Hansa) was formed around the middle of the 12 th century by German seafaring merchants. - PowerPoint PPT Presentation
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Socio-economic Development of the Hansa Route through Centuries or What was Hansa? Dr. oec. Assoc. Prof. Viesturs Pauls Karnups
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Page 1: Socio-economic Development of the Hansa Route through Centuries or What was Hansa?

Socio-economic Development of the Hansa

Route through Centuries or What was Hansa?

Dr. oec. Assoc. Prof. Viesturs Pauls Karnups

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The Hanseatic League (Hansa) was formed around the middle of the 12th century by German seafaring merchants.

Since there were no navies to protect their cargoes, no international bodies to regulate tariffs and trade, and few ports had regulatory authorities to manage their use, the merchants banded together to establish tariff agreements, provide for common defense and to make sure ports were safely maintained.

Introduction

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In 1241 the German towns of Lübeck and Hamburg concluded a pact providing joint control of the route between the Baltic and the North Seas.

The union was strengthened in 1252, when commercial treaties were negotiated with the region of Flanders.

Other mercantile leagues of German towns gradually accepted the hegemony of Lübeck and its allies, and the Hansa League came into existence.

Hanse was a medieval German word for "guild," or "association," derived from a Gothic word for "troop," or "company."

Hansa

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Throughout the 13th century, the Hanseatic League remained an organisation of merchants.

To be more exact, it was an organisation of German merchants.

Merchants who were not German and did not belong to the Hansa (so-called non-Germans were forbidden from joining the League) faced severe trade restrictions in the Baltic.

The Livonian towns refused to permit direct trading between foreign merchants within their walls.

Hansa

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The Hanseatic League began to evolve into a network of towns around the turn of the 14th Century.

It became a "powerful compact of cities" in the 14th Century, "with far-reaching trade agreements and almost total control of North European trade."

In 1280, Lübeck and Visby united to secure peace along the trade routes to Gotland (Sweden) and Novgorod (Russia).

This was the beginning of the city Hansa. Two years later, Riga joined them, and become the

first Hanseatic City in Livonia. Tallinn was the next Livonian city to join the group.

Hansa

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The original network, which linked Lübeck, Westfalia, Saxony and Gotland, quickly spread east with the conquest of Livonia in the early 13th century.

The league became so profitable and so powerful that it lasted over three centuries.

At its peak, the Hanseatic League covered the entire North Sea and Baltic Sea Regions and it stretched hundreds of miles inland along rivers from the Rhine to the Daugava.

Though Hansa relations were primarily economic in nature, the League also became a formidable political and military power in subsequent centuries.

The Baltic Region that is known today as Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania became a viable economic unit in the world market and participant in European politics via the relationships fostered by the Hansa.

Hansa

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One by one, the cities in Livonia joined the Hanseatic League.

Estonian cities which belonged to the Hanseatic League at some point in the history of the League include: Tallinn (Revel), Pärnu (Pernau), Tartu (Dorpat), Viljandi (Fellin), Narva, Haapsalu, Rakvere, and Paide.

Latvian cities belonging to the Hansa included Riga, Cēsis (Wenden), Ventspils (Windau), Kuldiga (Goldingen), Valka (Walk), Valmiera (Wolmar), Limbazi (Lemsal), Koknese (Kokenhusen), and Straupe (Roop).

Livonia had its own Hanseatic parliament (diet).

Hansa

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On the whole Estonian and Latvian cities reaped huge benefits from Hanseatic trade.

Their connections to the Hansa were stronger than Lithuanian contacts because there was a large proportion of Germans in Livonia.

Not all of Hansa's effects were rosy -- the local population of Livonia slowly became subject to German feudal lords, who demanded rent from peasants and sold their surpluses to merchants in the cities for profit.

Hansa

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Main trade routes to the East after 1346

Harbours of Tallinn, Pärnu and Riga from Novgorod

Traditional roads and rivers

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The Eastern Baltic provided large quantities of grain to European merchants, but the majority of the products coming out of Riga were shipbuilding materials such as flax for sail-making, hemp for ropes, timber from the Daugava Basin and the upper course of the Dnepr and wax.

From Russia, furs, leather, wax and rye were exported through the Livonian cities.

Hansa

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In 1346 the Hanseatic League granted the right of emporium to Riga, Tallinn and Pärnu.

The right of emporium entitled the city to demand that all goods destined for Russia be unloaded, weighed and reloaded when passing through the city.

The idea behind this law was that merchants would be encouraged to sell their goods in Riga rather than bothering to reload them.

As a result, only one sixth of the goods that went into Riga as late as the 18th Century went on to other cities.

A similar law was passed in Tartu, requiring merchants to unload their goods and offer them for sale for a minimum of four days before they could move on.

Hansa

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In today’s Lithuania, the Hanseatic League had a kontor in Kaunas (Kovno).

In today’s Russia, Kaliningrad (Königsberg) was a Hansa city, whilst there were kontore at Poskov (Pleskau) and Novgorod, which was the main trading centre.

There was also a kontor at Polotsk in today’s Belarus.

Hansa in Lithuania and Russia

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Main trading routes of the Hanseatic League

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The earliest written reference of Narva is in the First Novgorod Chronicle, which in the year 1172 describes a district in Novgorod called Nerevsky or Narovsky konets (yard).

According to historians, this name derives from the name of Narva or Narva River and indicates that a frequently used trade route went through Narva, although there is no evidence of the existence of a trading settlement at the time.

The favourable location at the crossing of trade routes and the Narva River was behind the founding of Narva castle and the development of an urban settlement around it.

The castle was founded during the Danish rule of northern Estonia during the second half of the 13th century, the earliest written record of the castle is from 1277.

Narva

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A town developed around the stronghold and in 1345 obtained Lübeck City Rights from the Danish king, Valdemar IV.

The castle and surrounding town of Narva became a possession of the Livonian Order in 1346, after the Danish king sold its lands in Northern Estonia.

Trade, particularly Hanseatic long distance trade remained Narva's raison d'être throughout the Middle Ages.

In the second half of the 14th century, Narva received the right to set up warehouses in locations on the trade route between the Hansa league and Russia

However, due to opposition from Tallinn, Narva itself never became an important part of the Hanseatic League and also remained a very small town – its population in 1530 is estimated at 600–750 people.

Narva and Hansa

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Valmiera and its surroundings have been one of the longest-inhabited regions of Latvia.

Archeological evidence indicates the site was inhabited 9,000 years ago.

Valmiera was first mentioned as a town in a chronicle dating back to 1323.

The actual founding of the town probably occurred at least 40 years earlier when the master of the Livonian Order Wilken von Endorp constructed a castle (Wolmar) and Catholic church on the banks of the river Gauja.

Valmiera

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Because Russia was an important trade source, Hansa moved to the east.

Valmiera, being on the international thoroughfare from Western Europe to the major Russian towns of Pskov and Novgorod, became a member of the Hanseatic League in 1365.

Valmiera, which was also located at the geographical centre of Livonia, held more than 30 meetings of Hansa representatives between 1385 and 1500, deciding on economic issues relating to the Hanseatic League.

Valmiera as a Hansa town

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The Hanseatic city seal with the coat of arms of Valmiera is in the center of the coin's obverse. Its left side reflects an element of St. Simanis' Church interior, while its right part bears some details of the Vidzeme brooch.

The coin's reverse is divided into two parts by a water body. At the top of it, there is a silhouette of St. Simanis' Church with the name VALMIERA semi-circled above it on the right. A reflection of the ship of Hanseatic days with semi-circled inscription HANSEATIC CITY below it is at the bottom of the reverse.

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The Hansa Wall is a mural enhancing house facades in the centreof Valmiera, created as a reminder of the city’s medievalheritage, which has virtually all been lost. It includes a fragment of a 1570 map by Abraham Ortelius, a picture of a cog — the characteristic means of transport in the heyday of the Hanseatic League, and the earliest coat of arms of Valmiera, preserved in the form of an impression from 1524.

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In the 11th and 12th centuries, the region around Cēsis was populated by the Lettigalians and Livs of Vidzeme.

Their lands were known as Idumeja and Tālava.

From 1237 to 1561 Cēsis developed into one of the major centres of German power in the Baltic, as it became the capital of the Livonian Order and its Master’s residence.

Cēsis

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Due to its location near the Gauja trade route, the city flourished in the late 14th and early 15th centuries and in 1367, the city joined the Hanseatic League.

Cēsis organised special events for the Hanseatic cities of Livonia.

On several occasions, the city hosted the Livonian Landtag.

Cēsis was the place where Western European and Russian merchants traded.

The city mint, erected in the late 15th century, produced shillings and phennigs.

Cēsis as a Hansa town

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The Hanseatic coat of arms of Cesis is featured in the centre. A pattern of Gothic ornaments is placed to right and the pointed arch to the left of the central motif.

The Cesis Castle, topped by the inscription CESIS, is depicted in the upper part. The reflection of a Hanseatic ship is featured in the lower part. The inscription HANZAS PILSETA (Hanseatic city) is placed in a semicircle beneath it.

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The heyday of the Hanseatic League lasted through the 15th Century. The chief reasons for the decline of the Hanseatic League was the

development of new social and national structures in Europe. By the 16th Century internal dissension, curtailment of freedom by

the German princes, growth of centralised foreign states and consequent loss of Hanseatic privileges, advances of Dutch and English shipping, and various changes in trade all operated against the league.

The Baltic cities profited from increased competition between the Hansa, the Nordic Union (Scandinavian merchants) and Dutch traders on the Baltic Sea.

The Age of Exploration finally drew world trade away from the Baltic in the 17th and 18th centuries.

The Diet of the crippled Hanseatic League had its final meeting in 1669.

Hansa


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