Legal historian Jurriaan Wink of Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and Vrije Universiteit Brussel shows that the home front played a crucial role.
The role of the home front
Previous research has mainly approached trade as a relationship between merchants and the authorities at their destination. Wink shifts the focus: to the practical, diplomatic and legal support merchants and skippers from Kampen, Utrecht and Zutphen received abroad from their home cities and rulers: their home front.
The home front secured trade privileges such as safe-conducts, improved infrastructure, and warned of dangers. Cities sent envoys, assisted with damage claims, and launched legal proceedings to defend their citizens’ rights. Merchants and skippers were therefore never on their own when trading abroad.
‘Support from the home front offered merchants and skippers extra security. Travel became safer, market conditions more favourable, and in case of trouble they could rely on diplomatic and legal assistance. The home front made trade more attractive and profitable,’ explains Wink.
He concludes that the home front was a key factor in long-distance trade, alongside the efforts of merchants themselves and the provisions offered by foreign authorities.
Relevance for past and present
The research demonstrates that international trade was never just a matter between a merchant and their destination. To truly understand medieval trade, the home front must be included: the backing merchants and skippers received from their city or ruler. The study also sheds new light on regions often overlooked, such as Overijssel, Utrecht and Guelders. As Wink notes: ‘It also shows that support from authorities to citizens abroad is not a modern invention, but a centuries-old practice.’
Extensive source research
Wink based his findings on a wide range of sources: correspondence between cities, rulers and foreign authorities, municipal accounts, charters, legal cases and chronicles. Together, they reveal the extensive efforts authorities made to support their citizens abroad.
Wink will defend his PhD thesis on this research at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam on 22 September.