Chapter 27

FOOTNOTES:[a]Macpherson's Annals of Commerce, vol. i. p. 270. Meyer ascribes the origin of Flemish trade to Baldwin count of Flanders in 958, who established markets at Bruges and other cities. Exchanges were in that age, he says, chiefly effected by barter, little money circulating in Flanders. Annales Flandrici, fol. 18 (edit. 1561).[b]Matthew Westmonast, apud Macpherson's Annals of Commerce, vol. i. p. 415.[c]Such regulations scared away those Flemish weavers who brought their art into England under Edward III. Macpherson, p. 467, 494, 546. Several years later the magistrates of Ghent are said by Meyer (Annales Flandrici, fol. 156) to have imposed a tax on every loom. Though the seditious spirit of the Weavers' Company had perhaps justly provoked them, such a tax on their staple manufacture was a piece of madness, when English goods were just coming into competition.[d]Terrâ marique mercatura, rerumque commercia et quæstus peribant. Non solum totius Europæ mercatores, verum etiam ipsi Turcæ aliæque sepositæ nationes ob bellum istud Flandriæ magno afficiebantur dolore. Erat nempe Flandria totius prope orbis stabile mercatoribus emporium. Septemdecim regnorum negotiatores tum Brugis sua certa habuere domicilia ac sedes, præter complures incognitas pæne gentes quæ undique confluebant. Meyer, fol. 205, ad ann. 1385.[e]Meyer; Froissart; Comines.[f]It contained, according to Ludovico Guicciardini, 35,000 houses, and the circuit of its walls was 45,640 Roman feet. Description des Pais Bas, p. 350, &c. (edit. 1609). Part of this enclosure was not built upon. The population of Ghent is reckoned by Guicciardini at 70,000, but in his time it had greatly declined. It is certainly, however, much exaggerated by earlier historians. And I entertain some doubts as to Guicciardini's estimate of the number of houses. If at least he was accurate, more than half of the city must since have been demolished or become uninhabited, which its present appearance does not indicate; for Ghent, though not very flourishing, by no means presents the decay and dilapidation of several Italian towns.[g]Guicciardini, p. 362; Mém. de Comines, 1. v. c. 17; Meyer, fol. 354; Macpherson's Annals of Commerce, vol. i. p. 647, 651.[h]Blomefield, the historian of Norfolk, thinks that a colony of Flemings settled as early as this reign at Worsted, a village in that county, and immortalized its name by their manufacture. It soon reached Norwich, though not conspicuous till the reign of Edward I. Hist. of Norfolk, vol. ii. Macpherson speaks of it for the first time in 1327. There were several guilds of weavers in the time of Henry II. Lyttelton, vol. ii. p. 174.[i]Macpherson's Annals of Commerce, vol. i. p. 412, from Walter Hemingford. I am considerably indebted to this laborious and useful publication, which has superseded that of Anderson.[k]Rymer, t. ii. p. 32, 50, 737, 949, 965; t. iii. p. 533, 1106, et alibi.[m]Rymer, t. iii. p. 759. A Flemish factory was established at Berwick about 1286. Macpherson.[n]In 1295 Edward I. made masters of neutral ships in English ports find security not to trade with France. Rymer, t. ii. p. 679.[o]Rymer, t. iv. p. 491, &c. Fuller draws a notable picture of the inducements held out to the Flemings. "Here they should feed on fat beef and mutton, till nothing but their fulness should stint their stomachs; their beds should be good, and their bedfellows better, seeing the richest yeomen in England would not disdain to marry their daughters unto them, and such the English beauties that the most envious foreigners could not but commend them." Fuller's Church History, quoted in Blomefield's Hist. of Norfolk.[p]Rymer, t. v. p. 137, 430, 540.[q]In 1409 woollen cloths formed great part of our exports, and were extensively used over Spain and Italy. And in 1449, English cloths having been prohibited by the duke of Burgundy, it was enacted that, until he should repeal this ordinance, no merchandise of his dominions should be admitted into England. 27 H. VI. c. 1. The system of prohibiting the import of foreign wrought goods was acted upon very extensively in Edward IV.'s reign.[r]Stat. 11 E. III. c. 1. Blackstone says that transporting wool out of the kingdom, to the detriment of our staple manufacture, was forbidden at common law (vol. iv. c. 19), not recollecting that we had no staple manufactures in the ages when the common law was formed, and that the export of wool was almost the only means by which this country procured silver, or any other article of which it stood in need, from the continent. In fact, the landholders were so far from neglecting this source of their wealth, that a minimum was fixed upon it, by a statute of 1343 (repealed indeed the next year, 18 E. III. c. 3), below which price it was not to be sold; from a laudable apprehension, as it seems, that foreigners were getting it too cheap. And this was revived in the 32nd of H. VI., though the act is not printed among the statutes. Rot. Parl. t. v. p. 275. The exportation of sheep was prohibited in 1338—Rymer, t. v. p. 36; and by act of Parliament in 1425—3 H. VI. c. 2. But this did not prevent our importing the wool of a foreign country, to our own loss. It is worthy of notice that English wool was superior to any other for fineness during these ages. Henry II., in his patent to the Weavers' Company, directs that, if any weaver mingled Spanish wool with English, it should be burned by the lord mayor. Macpherson, p. 382. An English flock transported into Spain about 1348 is said to have been the source of the fine Spanish wool. Ibid. p. 539. But the superiority of English wool, even as late as 1438, is proved by the laws of Barcelona forbidding its adulteration. p. 654. Another exportation of English sheep to Spain took place about 1465, in consequence of a commercial treaty. Rymer, t. xi. p. 534 et alibi. In return, Spain supplied England with horses, her breed of which was reckoned the best in Europe; so that the exchange was tolerably fair. Macpherson, p. 596. The best horses had been very dear in England, being imported from Spain and Italy. Ibid.[s]Schmidt, t. iv. p. 18.[t]Considerable woollen manufactures appear to have existed in Picardy about 1315. Macpherson ad annum. Capmany, t. iii. part 2, p. 151.[u]The sheriffs of Wiltshire and Sussex are directed in 1253 to purchase for the king 1000 ells of fine linen, lineæ telæ pulchræ et delicate. This Macpherson supposes to be of domestic manufacture, which, however, is not demonstrable. Linen was made at that time in Flanders; and as late as 1417 the fine linen used in England was imported from France and the Low Countries. Macpherson, from Rymer, t. ix. p. 334. Velly's history is defective in giving no account of the French commerce and manufactures, or at least none that is at all satisfactory.[x]Adam Bremensis, de Situ Daniæ, p. 13. (Elzevir edit.)[y]Schmidt, t. iv. p. 8. Macpherson, p. 392. The latter writer thinks they were not known by the name of Hanse so early.[z]Pfeffel, t. i. p. 443; Schmidt, t. iv. p. 18; t. v. p. 512; Macpherson's Annals, vol. i. p. 693.[a]Macpherson, vol. i. passim.[b]Rymer, t. viii. p. 360.[c]Macpherson (who quotes Stow), p. 415.[d]Walsingham, p. 211.[e]Rymer, t. vii. p. 210, 341; t. viii. p. 9.[f]Rymer, t. x. p. 461.[g]Rymer, t. viii. p. 488.[h]Macpherson, p. 667.[i]Richard III., in 1485, appointed a Florentine merchant to be English consul at Pisa, on the ground that some of his subjects intended to trade to Italy. Macpherson, p. 705, from Rymer. Perhaps we cannot positively prove the existence of a Mediterranean trade at an earlier time; and even this instrument is not conclusive. But a considerable presumption arises from two documents in Rymer, of the year 1412, which inform us of a great shipment of wool and other goods made by some merchants of London for the Mediterranean, under supercargoes, whom, it being a new undertaking, the king expressly recommended to the Genoese republic. But that people, impelled probably by commercial jealousy, seized the vessels and their cargoes; which induced the king to grant the owners letters of reprisal against all Genoese property. Rymer, t. viii. p. 717, 773. Though it is not perhaps evident that the vessels were English, the circumstances render it highly probable. The bad success, however, of this attempt, might prevent its imitation. A Greek author about the beginning of the fifteenth century reckons theΙγγληνοιamong the nations who traded to a port in the Archipelago. Gibbon, vol. xii. p. 52. But these enumerations are generally swelled by vanity or the love of exaggeration; and a few English sailors on board a foreign vessel would justify the assertion. Benjamin of Tudela, a Jewish traveller, pretends that the port of Alexandria, about 1160, contained vessels not only from England, but from Russia, and evenCracow. Harris's Voyages, vol. i. p. 554.[k]The Amalfitans are thus described by William of Apulia, apud Muratori, Dissert. 30.Urbs hæc dives opum, populoque referta videtur,Nulla magis locuples argento, vestibus, auro.Partibus innumeris ac plurimus urbe moraturNauta, maris cœlique vias aperire peritus.Huc et Alexandri diversa feruntur ab urbe,Regis et Antiochi. Hæc [etiam?] freta plurima transit.Hic Arabes, Indi, Siculi noscuntur, et Afri.Hæc gens est totum prope nobilitata per orbem,Et mercanda ferens et amans mercata referre.[There must be, I suspect, some exaggeration about the commerce and opulence of Amalfi, in the only age when she possessed any at all. The city could never have been considerable, as we may judge from its position immediately under a steep mountain; and what is still more material, has a very small port. According to our notions of trade, she could never have enjoyed much; the lines quoted from William of Apulia are to be taken as a poet's panegyric. It is of course a question of degree; Amalfi was no doubt a commercial republic to the extent of her capacity; but those who have ever been on the coast must be aware how limited that was. At present she has, I believe, no foreign trade at all. 1848.][m]The inhabitants of Acre were noted, in an age not very pure, for the excess of their vices. In 1291 they plundered some of the subjects of a neighbouring Mohammedan prince, and, refusing reparation, the city was besieged and taken by storm. Muratori, ad ann. Gibbon, c. 59.[n]Villani, 1. vii. c. 144.[o]Macpherson, p. 490.[p]Capmany, Memorias Historicas, t. iii. preface, p. 11; and part 2, p. 131. His authority is Balducci Pegalotti, a Florentine writer upon commerce about 1340, whose work I have never seen. It appears from Balducci that the route to China was from Asoph to Astrakan, and thence, by a variety of places which cannot be found in modern maps, to Cambalu, probably Pekin, the capital city of China, which he describes as being one hundred miles in circumference. The journey was of rather more than eight months, going and returning; and he assures us it was perfectly secure, not only for caravans, but for a single traveller with a couple of interpreters and a servant. The Venetians had also a settlement in the Crimea, and appear, by a passage in Petrarch's letters, to have possessed some of the trade through Tartary. In a letter written from Venice, after extolling in too rhetorical a manner the commerce of that republic, he mentions a particular ship that had just sailed for the Black Sea. Et ipsa quidem Tanaim it visura, nostri enim maris navigatio non ultra tenditur; eorum vero aliqui, quos hæc fert, illic iter [instituent] eam egressuri, nec antea substituri, quàm Gange et Caucaso superato, ad Indos atque extremos Seres et Orientalem perveniatur Oceanum. En quo ardens et inexplebilis habendi sitis hominum mentes rapit! Petrarcæ Opera, Senil. 1. ii. ep. 3, p. 760 edit. 1581.[q]Hist. de Languedoc, t. iii. p. 531; t. iv. p. 517. Mém. de l'Acad. des Inscriptions, t. xxxvii.[r]Capmany, Memorias Historicas de Barcelona, t. i. part 2. See particularly p. 36.[s]Muratori, Dissert. 30. Denina, Rivoluzione d'Italia, 1. xiv. c. 11. The latter writer is of opinion that mulberries were not cultivated as an important object till after 1300, nor even to any great extent till after 1500; the Italian manufacturers buying most of their silk from Spain or the Levant.[t]The history of Italian states, and especially Florence, will speak for the first country; Capmany attests the woollen manufacture of the second—Mem. Hist. de Barcel. t. i. part 3, p. 7, &c.; and Vaissette that of Carcassonne and its vicinity—Hist. de Lang. t. iv. p. 517.[u]None were admitted to the rank of burgesses in the town of Aragon who used any manual trade, with the exception of dealers in fine cloths. The woollen manufacture of Spain did not at any time become a considerable article of export, nor even supply the internal consumption, as Capmany has well shown. Memorias Historicas, t. iii. p. 325 et seqq., and Edinburgh Review, vol. x.[x]Boucher, the French translator of Il Consolato del Mare, says that Edrissi, a Saracen geographer who lived about 1100, gives an account, though in a confused manner, of the polarity of the magnet. t. ii. p. 280. However, the lines of Guiot de Provins are decisive. These are quoted in Hist. Littéraire de la France, t. ix. p. 199; Mém. de l'Acad. des Inscript. t. xxi. p. 192; and several other works. Guinizzelli has the following passage, in a canzone quoted by Ginguené, Hist. Littéraire de l'Italie, t. i. p. 413:—In quelle parti sotto tramontana,Sono li monti della calamita,Che dan virtute all'aereDi trarre il ferro; ma perchè lontana,Vole di simil pietra aver aita,A far la adoperare,E dirizzar lo ago in ver la stella.We cannot be diverted, by the nonsensical theory these lines contain, from perceiving the positive testimony of the last verse to the poet's knowledge of the polarity of the magnet. But if any doubt could remain, Tiraboschi (t. iv. p. 171) has fully established, from a series of passages, that this phenomenon was well known in the thirteenth century; and puts an end altogether to the pretensions of Flavio Gioja, if such a person, ever existed. See also Macpherson's Annals, p. 364 and 418. It is provoking to find an historian like Robertson asserting, without hesitation, that this citizen of Amalfi was the inventor of the compass, and thus accrediting an error which had already been detected.It is a singular circumstance, and only to be explained by the obstinacy with which men are apt to reject improvement, that the magnetic needle was not generally adopted in navigation till very long after the discovery of its properties, and even after their peculiar importance had been perceived. The writers of the thirteenth century, who mention the polarity of the needle, mention also its use in navigation; yet Capmany has found no distinct proof of its employment till 1403, and does not believe that it was frequently on board Mediterranean ships at the latter part of the preceding age. Memorias Historicas, t. iii. p. 70. Perhaps however he has inferred too much from his negative proof; and this subject seems open to further inquiry.[y]Boucher supposes it to have been compiled at Barcelona about 900; but his reasonings are inconclusive, t. i. p. 72; and indeed Barcelona at that time was little, if at all, better than a fishing-town. Some arguments might be drawn in favour of Pisa from the expressions of Henry IV.'s charter granted to that city in 1081. Consuetudines, quas habent de mari, sic iis observabimus sicut illorum est consuetudo. Muratori Dissert. 45. Giannone seems to think the collection was compiled about the reign of Louis IX. 1. xi. c. 6. Capmany, the last Spanish editor, whose authority ought perhaps to outweigh every other, asserts and seems to prove them to have been enacted by the mercantile magistrates of Barcelona, under the reign of James the Conqueror which is much the same period. Codigo de las Costumbres Maritimas de Barcelona, Madrid, 1791. But, by whatever nation they were reduced into their present form, these laws were certainly the ancient and established usages of the Mediterranean states: and Pisa may very probably have taken a great share in first practising what a century or two afterwards was rendered more precise at Barcelona.[z]Macpherson, p. 358. Boucher supposes them to be registers of actual decisions.[a]I have only the authority of Boucher for referring the Ordinances of Wisbuy to the year 1400. Beckman imagines them to be older than those of Oleron. But Wisbuy was not enclosed by a wall till 1288, a proof that it could not have been previously a town of much importance. It flourished chiefly in the first part of the fourteenth century, and was at that time an independent republic, but fell under the yoke of Denmark before the end of the same age.[b]Hugh Despenser seized a Genoese vessel valued at 14,300 marks, for which no restitution was ever made. Rym. t. iv. p. 701. Macpherson,A.D.1336.[c]The Cinque Ports and other trading towns of England were in a constant state of hostility with their opposite neighbours during the reigns of Edward I. and II. One might quote almost half the instruments in Rymer in proof of these conflicts, and of those with the mariners of Norway and Denmark. Sometimes mutual envy produced frays between different English towns. Thus, in 1254 the Winchelsea mariners attacked a Yarmouth galley, and killed some of her men. Matt. Paris, apud Macpherson.[d]Muratori, Dissert. 53.[e]Du Cange, voc. Laudum.[f]Rymer, t. iv. p. 576. Videtur sapientibus et peritis, quod causa, de jure, non subfuit marcham seu reprisaliam in nostris, seu subditorum nostrorum, bonis concedendi. See too a case of neutral goods on board an enemy's vessel claimed by the owners, and a legal distinction taken in favour of the captors. t. vi. p. 14.[g]27 E. III. stat. ii. c. 17, 2 Inst. p. 205.[h]Rymer, t. i. p. 839.[i]Idem, t. iii. p. 458, 647, 678, et infra. See too the ordinances of the staple, in 27 Edw. III., which confirm this among other privileges, and contain manifold evidence of the regard paid to commerce in that reign.[k]Rymer, t. ii. p. 891. Madox, Hist. Exchequer, c. xxii. s. 7.[m]In the remarkable speech of the Doge Mocenigo, quoted in another place, vol. i. p. 465, the annual profit made by Venice on her mercantile capital is reckoned at forty per cent.[n]Muratori, Dissert. 16.[o]Bizarri, Hist. Genuens. p. 797. The rate of discount on bills, which may not have exactly corresponded to the average annual interest of money, was ten per cent. at Barcelona in 1435. Capmany t. i. p. 209.[p]Du Cange, v. Usura.[q]Muratori, Diss. 16.[r]Greg. Turon. I. iv.[s]Hist. de Languedoc, t. ii. p. 517; t. iii. p. 531.[t]Id. t. iii. p. 121.[u]Id. p. 163.[x]Marina, Ensayo Historico-Critico, p. 143.[y]Martenne Thesaurus Anecdotorum, t. i. p. 984.[z]Velly, t. iv. p. 136.[a]The city of Cahors, in Quercy, the modern department of the Lot, produced a tribe of money-dealers. The Caursini are almost as often noticed as the Lombards. See the article in Du Cange. In Lombardy, Asti, a city of no great note in other respects, was famous for the same department of commerce.[b]There were three species of paper credit in the dealings of merchants: 1. General letters of credit, not directed to any one, which are not uncommon in the Levant: 2. Orders to pay money to a particular person: 3. Bills of exchange regularly negotiable. Boucher, t. ii. p. 621. Instances of the first are mentioned by Macpherson about 1200, p. 367. The second species was introduced by the Jews, about 1183 (Capmany, t. i. p. 297); but it may be doubtful whether the last stage of the progress was reached nearly so soon. An instrument in Rymer, however, of the year 1364 (t. vi. p. 495), mentions literæ cambitoriæ, which seem to have been negotiable bills; and by 1400 they were drawn in sets, and worded exactly as at present. Macpherson, p. 614, and Beckman, History of Inventions, vol. iii. p. 430, give from Capmany an actual precedent of a bill dated in 1404.[c]Usury was looked upon with horror by our English divines long after the Reformation. Fleury, in his Institutions au Droit Ecclésiastique, t. ii. p. 129, has shown the subterfuges to which men had recourse in order to evade this prohibition. It is an unhappy truth, that great part of the attention devoted to the best of sciences, ethics and jurisprudence, has been employed to weaken principles that ought never to have been acknowledged.One species of usury, and that of the highest importance to commerce, was always permitted, on account of the risk that attended it This was marine insurance, which could not have existed, until money was considered, in itself, as a source of profit. The earliest regulations on the subject of insurance are those of Barcelona in 1433; but the practice was, of course, earlier than these, though not of great antiquity. It is not mentioned in the Consolato del Mare, nor in any of the Hanseatic laws of the fourteenth century. Beckman, vol. i. p. 388. This author, not being aware of the Barcelonese laws on this subject published by Capmany, supposes, the first provisions regulating marine assurance to have been made at Florence in 1523.[d]Macpherson, p. 487, et alibi. They had probably excellent bargains; in 1329 the Bardi farmed all the customs in England for 20l.a day. But in 1282 the customs had produced 8411l., and half a century of great improvement had elapsed.[e]Villani, 1. xii. c. 55, 87. He calls these two banking-houses the pillars which sustained great part of the commerce of Christendom.[f]Capmany, t. i. p. 213.[g]Macpherson, p. 341, from Sanuto. The bank of Venice is referred to 1171.[h]G. Villani, 1. xi. c. 49.[i]Matt. Villani, p. 227 (in Muratori, Script. Rer. Ital. t. xiv.).[k]Bizarri, Hist. Genuens. p. 797 (Antwerp, 1579); Machiavelli, Storia Fiorentina, 1. viii.[m]Ricobaldus Ferrarensis, apud Murat. Dissert. 23; Francisc. Pippinus, ibidem. Muratori endeavours to extenuate the authority of this passage, on account of some more ancient writers who complain of the luxury of their times, and of some particular instances of magnificence and expense. But Ricobaldi alludes, as Muratori himself admits, to the mode of living in the middle ranks, and not to that of courts, which in all ages might occasionally display considerable splendour. I see nothing to weaken so explicit a testimony of a contemporary, which in fact is confirmed by many writers of the next age, who, according to the practice of Italian chroniclers, have copied it as their own.[n]Murat. Dissert. 23.[o]Bellincion Berti vid' io andar cintoDi cuojo e d'osso, e venir dallo specchioLa donna sua senza 'l viso dipinto,E vidi quel di Nerli, e quel del VecchioEsser contenti alla pelle scoverta,E sue donne al fuso ed al pennechio.Paradis. canto xv.See too the rest of this canto. But this is put in the mouth of Cacciaguida, the poet's ancestor, who lived in the former half of the twelfth century. The change, however, was probably subsequent to 1250, when the times of wealth and turbulence began at Florence.[p]Velly, t. xiii. p. 352. The second continuator of Nangis vehemently inveighs against the long beards and short breeches of his age; after the introduction of which novelties, he judiciously observes, the French were much more disposed to run away from their enemies than before. Spicilegium, t. iii. p. 105.[q]37 E. III. Rep. 38 E. III. Several other statutes of a similar nature were passed in this and the ensuing reign. In France, there were sumptuary laws as old as Charlemagne, prohibiting or taxing the use of furs; but the first extensive regulation was under Philip the Fair. Velly, t. vii. p. 64; t. xi. p. 190. These attempts to restrain what cannot be restrained continued even down to 1700. De la Mare, Traité de la Police, t. i. 1. iii.[r]Muratori, Antichità Italiane, Dissert. 23, t. i. p. 325.[s]"These English," said the Spaniards who came over with Philip II., "have their houses made of sticks and dirt, but they fare commonly so well as the king." Harrison's Description of Britain, prefixed to Holingshed, vol. i. p. 315 (edit. 1807).[t]Pfeffel, t. i. p. 293.[u]Æneas Sylvius, de Moribus Germanorum. This treatise is an amplified panegyric upon Germany, and contains several curious passages: they must be taken perhaps with some allowance; for the drift of the whole is to persuade the Germans, that so rich and noble a country could afford a little money for the poor pope. Civitates quas vocant liberas, cum Imperatori solùm subjiciuntur, cujus jugum est instar libertatis; nec profectò usquam gentium tanta libertas est, quantâ fruuntur hujuscemodi civitates. Nam populi quos Itali vocant liberos, hi potissimùm serviunt, sive Venetias inspectes, sive Florentiam aut Cænas, in quibus cives, præter paucos qui reliquos ducunt, loco mancipiorum habentur. Cum nec rebus suis uti, ut libet, vel fari quæ velint, et gravissimis opprimuntur pecuniarum exactionibus. Apud Germanos omnia læta sunt, omnia jucunda; nemo suis privatur bonis. Salvo cuique sua hæreditas est, nulli nisi nocenti magistratus nocent. Nec apud eos factiones sicut apud Italas urbes grassantur. Sunt autem supra centum civitates hâc libertate fruentes. p. 1058.In another part of his work (p. 719) he gives a specious account of Vienna. The houses, he says, had glass windows and iron doors. Fenestræ undique vitreæ perlucent, et ostia plerumque ferrea. In domibus multa et munda supellex. Altæ domus magnificæque visuntur. Unum id dedecori est, quod tecta plerumque tigno contegunt, pauca latere. Cætera ædificia muro lapideo consistunt. Pictæ domus et exterius et interius splendent. Civitatis populus 50,000communicantiumcreditur. I suppose this gives at least double for the total population. He proceeds to represent the manners of the city in a less favourable point of view, charging the citizens with gluttony and libertinism, the nobility with oppression, the judges with corruption, &c. Vienna probably had the vices of a flourishing city; but the love of amplification in so rhetorical a writer as Æneas Sylvius weakens the value of his testimony, on whichever side it is given.[x]Vols. iv. and vi.[y]Mr. Lysons refers Castleton to the age of William the Conqueror, but without giving any reasons. Lysons's Derbyshire, p. ccxxxvi. Mr. King had satisfied himself that it was built during the Heptarchy, and even before the conversion of the Saxons to Christianity; but in this he gave the reins, as usual, to his imagination, which as much exceeded his learning, as the latter did his judgment. Conisborough should seem, by the name, to have been a royal residence, which it certainly never was after the Conquest. But if the engravings of the decorative parts in the Archæologia, vol. vi. p. 244, are not remarkably inaccurate, the architecture is too elegant for the Danes, much more for the unconverted Saxons. Both these castles are enclosed by a court or ballium, with a fortified entrance, like those erected by the Normans.[No doubt is now entertained but that Conisborough was built late in the Norman period. Mr. King's authority, which I followed for want of a better, is by no means to be depended upon. 1848.][z]Whitaker's Hist. of Whalley; Lysons's Cumberland, p. ccvi.[a]The ruins of Herstmonceux are, I believe, tolerably authentic remains of Henry VI.'s age, but only a part of Haddon Hall is of the fifteenth century.[b]Archæologia, vol. vi.[c]Blomefield's Norfolk, vol. iii. p. 242.[d]Whitaker's Hist. of Whalley.

[a]Macpherson's Annals of Commerce, vol. i. p. 270. Meyer ascribes the origin of Flemish trade to Baldwin count of Flanders in 958, who established markets at Bruges and other cities. Exchanges were in that age, he says, chiefly effected by barter, little money circulating in Flanders. Annales Flandrici, fol. 18 (edit. 1561).

[b]Matthew Westmonast, apud Macpherson's Annals of Commerce, vol. i. p. 415.

[c]Such regulations scared away those Flemish weavers who brought their art into England under Edward III. Macpherson, p. 467, 494, 546. Several years later the magistrates of Ghent are said by Meyer (Annales Flandrici, fol. 156) to have imposed a tax on every loom. Though the seditious spirit of the Weavers' Company had perhaps justly provoked them, such a tax on their staple manufacture was a piece of madness, when English goods were just coming into competition.

[d]Terrâ marique mercatura, rerumque commercia et quæstus peribant. Non solum totius Europæ mercatores, verum etiam ipsi Turcæ aliæque sepositæ nationes ob bellum istud Flandriæ magno afficiebantur dolore. Erat nempe Flandria totius prope orbis stabile mercatoribus emporium. Septemdecim regnorum negotiatores tum Brugis sua certa habuere domicilia ac sedes, præter complures incognitas pæne gentes quæ undique confluebant. Meyer, fol. 205, ad ann. 1385.

[e]Meyer; Froissart; Comines.

[f]It contained, according to Ludovico Guicciardini, 35,000 houses, and the circuit of its walls was 45,640 Roman feet. Description des Pais Bas, p. 350, &c. (edit. 1609). Part of this enclosure was not built upon. The population of Ghent is reckoned by Guicciardini at 70,000, but in his time it had greatly declined. It is certainly, however, much exaggerated by earlier historians. And I entertain some doubts as to Guicciardini's estimate of the number of houses. If at least he was accurate, more than half of the city must since have been demolished or become uninhabited, which its present appearance does not indicate; for Ghent, though not very flourishing, by no means presents the decay and dilapidation of several Italian towns.

[g]Guicciardini, p. 362; Mém. de Comines, 1. v. c. 17; Meyer, fol. 354; Macpherson's Annals of Commerce, vol. i. p. 647, 651.

[h]Blomefield, the historian of Norfolk, thinks that a colony of Flemings settled as early as this reign at Worsted, a village in that county, and immortalized its name by their manufacture. It soon reached Norwich, though not conspicuous till the reign of Edward I. Hist. of Norfolk, vol. ii. Macpherson speaks of it for the first time in 1327. There were several guilds of weavers in the time of Henry II. Lyttelton, vol. ii. p. 174.

[i]Macpherson's Annals of Commerce, vol. i. p. 412, from Walter Hemingford. I am considerably indebted to this laborious and useful publication, which has superseded that of Anderson.

[k]Rymer, t. ii. p. 32, 50, 737, 949, 965; t. iii. p. 533, 1106, et alibi.

[m]Rymer, t. iii. p. 759. A Flemish factory was established at Berwick about 1286. Macpherson.

[n]In 1295 Edward I. made masters of neutral ships in English ports find security not to trade with France. Rymer, t. ii. p. 679.

[o]Rymer, t. iv. p. 491, &c. Fuller draws a notable picture of the inducements held out to the Flemings. "Here they should feed on fat beef and mutton, till nothing but their fulness should stint their stomachs; their beds should be good, and their bedfellows better, seeing the richest yeomen in England would not disdain to marry their daughters unto them, and such the English beauties that the most envious foreigners could not but commend them." Fuller's Church History, quoted in Blomefield's Hist. of Norfolk.

[p]Rymer, t. v. p. 137, 430, 540.

[q]In 1409 woollen cloths formed great part of our exports, and were extensively used over Spain and Italy. And in 1449, English cloths having been prohibited by the duke of Burgundy, it was enacted that, until he should repeal this ordinance, no merchandise of his dominions should be admitted into England. 27 H. VI. c. 1. The system of prohibiting the import of foreign wrought goods was acted upon very extensively in Edward IV.'s reign.

[r]Stat. 11 E. III. c. 1. Blackstone says that transporting wool out of the kingdom, to the detriment of our staple manufacture, was forbidden at common law (vol. iv. c. 19), not recollecting that we had no staple manufactures in the ages when the common law was formed, and that the export of wool was almost the only means by which this country procured silver, or any other article of which it stood in need, from the continent. In fact, the landholders were so far from neglecting this source of their wealth, that a minimum was fixed upon it, by a statute of 1343 (repealed indeed the next year, 18 E. III. c. 3), below which price it was not to be sold; from a laudable apprehension, as it seems, that foreigners were getting it too cheap. And this was revived in the 32nd of H. VI., though the act is not printed among the statutes. Rot. Parl. t. v. p. 275. The exportation of sheep was prohibited in 1338—Rymer, t. v. p. 36; and by act of Parliament in 1425—3 H. VI. c. 2. But this did not prevent our importing the wool of a foreign country, to our own loss. It is worthy of notice that English wool was superior to any other for fineness during these ages. Henry II., in his patent to the Weavers' Company, directs that, if any weaver mingled Spanish wool with English, it should be burned by the lord mayor. Macpherson, p. 382. An English flock transported into Spain about 1348 is said to have been the source of the fine Spanish wool. Ibid. p. 539. But the superiority of English wool, even as late as 1438, is proved by the laws of Barcelona forbidding its adulteration. p. 654. Another exportation of English sheep to Spain took place about 1465, in consequence of a commercial treaty. Rymer, t. xi. p. 534 et alibi. In return, Spain supplied England with horses, her breed of which was reckoned the best in Europe; so that the exchange was tolerably fair. Macpherson, p. 596. The best horses had been very dear in England, being imported from Spain and Italy. Ibid.

[s]Schmidt, t. iv. p. 18.

[t]Considerable woollen manufactures appear to have existed in Picardy about 1315. Macpherson ad annum. Capmany, t. iii. part 2, p. 151.

[u]The sheriffs of Wiltshire and Sussex are directed in 1253 to purchase for the king 1000 ells of fine linen, lineæ telæ pulchræ et delicate. This Macpherson supposes to be of domestic manufacture, which, however, is not demonstrable. Linen was made at that time in Flanders; and as late as 1417 the fine linen used in England was imported from France and the Low Countries. Macpherson, from Rymer, t. ix. p. 334. Velly's history is defective in giving no account of the French commerce and manufactures, or at least none that is at all satisfactory.

[x]Adam Bremensis, de Situ Daniæ, p. 13. (Elzevir edit.)

[y]Schmidt, t. iv. p. 8. Macpherson, p. 392. The latter writer thinks they were not known by the name of Hanse so early.

[z]Pfeffel, t. i. p. 443; Schmidt, t. iv. p. 18; t. v. p. 512; Macpherson's Annals, vol. i. p. 693.

[a]Macpherson, vol. i. passim.

[b]Rymer, t. viii. p. 360.

[c]Macpherson (who quotes Stow), p. 415.

[d]Walsingham, p. 211.

[e]Rymer, t. vii. p. 210, 341; t. viii. p. 9.

[f]Rymer, t. x. p. 461.

[g]Rymer, t. viii. p. 488.

[h]Macpherson, p. 667.

[i]Richard III., in 1485, appointed a Florentine merchant to be English consul at Pisa, on the ground that some of his subjects intended to trade to Italy. Macpherson, p. 705, from Rymer. Perhaps we cannot positively prove the existence of a Mediterranean trade at an earlier time; and even this instrument is not conclusive. But a considerable presumption arises from two documents in Rymer, of the year 1412, which inform us of a great shipment of wool and other goods made by some merchants of London for the Mediterranean, under supercargoes, whom, it being a new undertaking, the king expressly recommended to the Genoese republic. But that people, impelled probably by commercial jealousy, seized the vessels and their cargoes; which induced the king to grant the owners letters of reprisal against all Genoese property. Rymer, t. viii. p. 717, 773. Though it is not perhaps evident that the vessels were English, the circumstances render it highly probable. The bad success, however, of this attempt, might prevent its imitation. A Greek author about the beginning of the fifteenth century reckons theΙγγληνοιamong the nations who traded to a port in the Archipelago. Gibbon, vol. xii. p. 52. But these enumerations are generally swelled by vanity or the love of exaggeration; and a few English sailors on board a foreign vessel would justify the assertion. Benjamin of Tudela, a Jewish traveller, pretends that the port of Alexandria, about 1160, contained vessels not only from England, but from Russia, and evenCracow. Harris's Voyages, vol. i. p. 554.

[k]The Amalfitans are thus described by William of Apulia, apud Muratori, Dissert. 30.Urbs hæc dives opum, populoque referta videtur,Nulla magis locuples argento, vestibus, auro.Partibus innumeris ac plurimus urbe moraturNauta, maris cœlique vias aperire peritus.Huc et Alexandri diversa feruntur ab urbe,Regis et Antiochi. Hæc [etiam?] freta plurima transit.Hic Arabes, Indi, Siculi noscuntur, et Afri.Hæc gens est totum prope nobilitata per orbem,Et mercanda ferens et amans mercata referre.[There must be, I suspect, some exaggeration about the commerce and opulence of Amalfi, in the only age when she possessed any at all. The city could never have been considerable, as we may judge from its position immediately under a steep mountain; and what is still more material, has a very small port. According to our notions of trade, she could never have enjoyed much; the lines quoted from William of Apulia are to be taken as a poet's panegyric. It is of course a question of degree; Amalfi was no doubt a commercial republic to the extent of her capacity; but those who have ever been on the coast must be aware how limited that was. At present she has, I believe, no foreign trade at all. 1848.]

[k]The Amalfitans are thus described by William of Apulia, apud Muratori, Dissert. 30.

Urbs hæc dives opum, populoque referta videtur,Nulla magis locuples argento, vestibus, auro.Partibus innumeris ac plurimus urbe moraturNauta, maris cœlique vias aperire peritus.Huc et Alexandri diversa feruntur ab urbe,Regis et Antiochi. Hæc [etiam?] freta plurima transit.Hic Arabes, Indi, Siculi noscuntur, et Afri.Hæc gens est totum prope nobilitata per orbem,Et mercanda ferens et amans mercata referre.

[There must be, I suspect, some exaggeration about the commerce and opulence of Amalfi, in the only age when she possessed any at all. The city could never have been considerable, as we may judge from its position immediately under a steep mountain; and what is still more material, has a very small port. According to our notions of trade, she could never have enjoyed much; the lines quoted from William of Apulia are to be taken as a poet's panegyric. It is of course a question of degree; Amalfi was no doubt a commercial republic to the extent of her capacity; but those who have ever been on the coast must be aware how limited that was. At present she has, I believe, no foreign trade at all. 1848.]

[m]The inhabitants of Acre were noted, in an age not very pure, for the excess of their vices. In 1291 they plundered some of the subjects of a neighbouring Mohammedan prince, and, refusing reparation, the city was besieged and taken by storm. Muratori, ad ann. Gibbon, c. 59.

[n]Villani, 1. vii. c. 144.

[o]Macpherson, p. 490.

[p]Capmany, Memorias Historicas, t. iii. preface, p. 11; and part 2, p. 131. His authority is Balducci Pegalotti, a Florentine writer upon commerce about 1340, whose work I have never seen. It appears from Balducci that the route to China was from Asoph to Astrakan, and thence, by a variety of places which cannot be found in modern maps, to Cambalu, probably Pekin, the capital city of China, which he describes as being one hundred miles in circumference. The journey was of rather more than eight months, going and returning; and he assures us it was perfectly secure, not only for caravans, but for a single traveller with a couple of interpreters and a servant. The Venetians had also a settlement in the Crimea, and appear, by a passage in Petrarch's letters, to have possessed some of the trade through Tartary. In a letter written from Venice, after extolling in too rhetorical a manner the commerce of that republic, he mentions a particular ship that had just sailed for the Black Sea. Et ipsa quidem Tanaim it visura, nostri enim maris navigatio non ultra tenditur; eorum vero aliqui, quos hæc fert, illic iter [instituent] eam egressuri, nec antea substituri, quàm Gange et Caucaso superato, ad Indos atque extremos Seres et Orientalem perveniatur Oceanum. En quo ardens et inexplebilis habendi sitis hominum mentes rapit! Petrarcæ Opera, Senil. 1. ii. ep. 3, p. 760 edit. 1581.

[q]Hist. de Languedoc, t. iii. p. 531; t. iv. p. 517. Mém. de l'Acad. des Inscriptions, t. xxxvii.

[r]Capmany, Memorias Historicas de Barcelona, t. i. part 2. See particularly p. 36.

[s]Muratori, Dissert. 30. Denina, Rivoluzione d'Italia, 1. xiv. c. 11. The latter writer is of opinion that mulberries were not cultivated as an important object till after 1300, nor even to any great extent till after 1500; the Italian manufacturers buying most of their silk from Spain or the Levant.

[t]The history of Italian states, and especially Florence, will speak for the first country; Capmany attests the woollen manufacture of the second—Mem. Hist. de Barcel. t. i. part 3, p. 7, &c.; and Vaissette that of Carcassonne and its vicinity—Hist. de Lang. t. iv. p. 517.

[u]None were admitted to the rank of burgesses in the town of Aragon who used any manual trade, with the exception of dealers in fine cloths. The woollen manufacture of Spain did not at any time become a considerable article of export, nor even supply the internal consumption, as Capmany has well shown. Memorias Historicas, t. iii. p. 325 et seqq., and Edinburgh Review, vol. x.

[x]Boucher, the French translator of Il Consolato del Mare, says that Edrissi, a Saracen geographer who lived about 1100, gives an account, though in a confused manner, of the polarity of the magnet. t. ii. p. 280. However, the lines of Guiot de Provins are decisive. These are quoted in Hist. Littéraire de la France, t. ix. p. 199; Mém. de l'Acad. des Inscript. t. xxi. p. 192; and several other works. Guinizzelli has the following passage, in a canzone quoted by Ginguené, Hist. Littéraire de l'Italie, t. i. p. 413:—In quelle parti sotto tramontana,Sono li monti della calamita,Che dan virtute all'aereDi trarre il ferro; ma perchè lontana,Vole di simil pietra aver aita,A far la adoperare,E dirizzar lo ago in ver la stella.We cannot be diverted, by the nonsensical theory these lines contain, from perceiving the positive testimony of the last verse to the poet's knowledge of the polarity of the magnet. But if any doubt could remain, Tiraboschi (t. iv. p. 171) has fully established, from a series of passages, that this phenomenon was well known in the thirteenth century; and puts an end altogether to the pretensions of Flavio Gioja, if such a person, ever existed. See also Macpherson's Annals, p. 364 and 418. It is provoking to find an historian like Robertson asserting, without hesitation, that this citizen of Amalfi was the inventor of the compass, and thus accrediting an error which had already been detected.It is a singular circumstance, and only to be explained by the obstinacy with which men are apt to reject improvement, that the magnetic needle was not generally adopted in navigation till very long after the discovery of its properties, and even after their peculiar importance had been perceived. The writers of the thirteenth century, who mention the polarity of the needle, mention also its use in navigation; yet Capmany has found no distinct proof of its employment till 1403, and does not believe that it was frequently on board Mediterranean ships at the latter part of the preceding age. Memorias Historicas, t. iii. p. 70. Perhaps however he has inferred too much from his negative proof; and this subject seems open to further inquiry.

In quelle parti sotto tramontana,Sono li monti della calamita,Che dan virtute all'aereDi trarre il ferro; ma perchè lontana,Vole di simil pietra aver aita,A far la adoperare,E dirizzar lo ago in ver la stella.

We cannot be diverted, by the nonsensical theory these lines contain, from perceiving the positive testimony of the last verse to the poet's knowledge of the polarity of the magnet. But if any doubt could remain, Tiraboschi (t. iv. p. 171) has fully established, from a series of passages, that this phenomenon was well known in the thirteenth century; and puts an end altogether to the pretensions of Flavio Gioja, if such a person, ever existed. See also Macpherson's Annals, p. 364 and 418. It is provoking to find an historian like Robertson asserting, without hesitation, that this citizen of Amalfi was the inventor of the compass, and thus accrediting an error which had already been detected.

It is a singular circumstance, and only to be explained by the obstinacy with which men are apt to reject improvement, that the magnetic needle was not generally adopted in navigation till very long after the discovery of its properties, and even after their peculiar importance had been perceived. The writers of the thirteenth century, who mention the polarity of the needle, mention also its use in navigation; yet Capmany has found no distinct proof of its employment till 1403, and does not believe that it was frequently on board Mediterranean ships at the latter part of the preceding age. Memorias Historicas, t. iii. p. 70. Perhaps however he has inferred too much from his negative proof; and this subject seems open to further inquiry.

[y]Boucher supposes it to have been compiled at Barcelona about 900; but his reasonings are inconclusive, t. i. p. 72; and indeed Barcelona at that time was little, if at all, better than a fishing-town. Some arguments might be drawn in favour of Pisa from the expressions of Henry IV.'s charter granted to that city in 1081. Consuetudines, quas habent de mari, sic iis observabimus sicut illorum est consuetudo. Muratori Dissert. 45. Giannone seems to think the collection was compiled about the reign of Louis IX. 1. xi. c. 6. Capmany, the last Spanish editor, whose authority ought perhaps to outweigh every other, asserts and seems to prove them to have been enacted by the mercantile magistrates of Barcelona, under the reign of James the Conqueror which is much the same period. Codigo de las Costumbres Maritimas de Barcelona, Madrid, 1791. But, by whatever nation they were reduced into their present form, these laws were certainly the ancient and established usages of the Mediterranean states: and Pisa may very probably have taken a great share in first practising what a century or two afterwards was rendered more precise at Barcelona.

[z]Macpherson, p. 358. Boucher supposes them to be registers of actual decisions.

[a]I have only the authority of Boucher for referring the Ordinances of Wisbuy to the year 1400. Beckman imagines them to be older than those of Oleron. But Wisbuy was not enclosed by a wall till 1288, a proof that it could not have been previously a town of much importance. It flourished chiefly in the first part of the fourteenth century, and was at that time an independent republic, but fell under the yoke of Denmark before the end of the same age.

[b]Hugh Despenser seized a Genoese vessel valued at 14,300 marks, for which no restitution was ever made. Rym. t. iv. p. 701. Macpherson,A.D.1336.

[c]The Cinque Ports and other trading towns of England were in a constant state of hostility with their opposite neighbours during the reigns of Edward I. and II. One might quote almost half the instruments in Rymer in proof of these conflicts, and of those with the mariners of Norway and Denmark. Sometimes mutual envy produced frays between different English towns. Thus, in 1254 the Winchelsea mariners attacked a Yarmouth galley, and killed some of her men. Matt. Paris, apud Macpherson.

[d]Muratori, Dissert. 53.

[e]Du Cange, voc. Laudum.

[f]Rymer, t. iv. p. 576. Videtur sapientibus et peritis, quod causa, de jure, non subfuit marcham seu reprisaliam in nostris, seu subditorum nostrorum, bonis concedendi. See too a case of neutral goods on board an enemy's vessel claimed by the owners, and a legal distinction taken in favour of the captors. t. vi. p. 14.

[g]27 E. III. stat. ii. c. 17, 2 Inst. p. 205.

[h]Rymer, t. i. p. 839.

[i]Idem, t. iii. p. 458, 647, 678, et infra. See too the ordinances of the staple, in 27 Edw. III., which confirm this among other privileges, and contain manifold evidence of the regard paid to commerce in that reign.

[k]Rymer, t. ii. p. 891. Madox, Hist. Exchequer, c. xxii. s. 7.

[m]In the remarkable speech of the Doge Mocenigo, quoted in another place, vol. i. p. 465, the annual profit made by Venice on her mercantile capital is reckoned at forty per cent.

[n]Muratori, Dissert. 16.

[o]Bizarri, Hist. Genuens. p. 797. The rate of discount on bills, which may not have exactly corresponded to the average annual interest of money, was ten per cent. at Barcelona in 1435. Capmany t. i. p. 209.

[p]Du Cange, v. Usura.

[q]Muratori, Diss. 16.

[r]Greg. Turon. I. iv.

[s]Hist. de Languedoc, t. ii. p. 517; t. iii. p. 531.

[t]Id. t. iii. p. 121.

[u]Id. p. 163.

[x]Marina, Ensayo Historico-Critico, p. 143.

[y]Martenne Thesaurus Anecdotorum, t. i. p. 984.

[z]Velly, t. iv. p. 136.

[a]The city of Cahors, in Quercy, the modern department of the Lot, produced a tribe of money-dealers. The Caursini are almost as often noticed as the Lombards. See the article in Du Cange. In Lombardy, Asti, a city of no great note in other respects, was famous for the same department of commerce.

[b]There were three species of paper credit in the dealings of merchants: 1. General letters of credit, not directed to any one, which are not uncommon in the Levant: 2. Orders to pay money to a particular person: 3. Bills of exchange regularly negotiable. Boucher, t. ii. p. 621. Instances of the first are mentioned by Macpherson about 1200, p. 367. The second species was introduced by the Jews, about 1183 (Capmany, t. i. p. 297); but it may be doubtful whether the last stage of the progress was reached nearly so soon. An instrument in Rymer, however, of the year 1364 (t. vi. p. 495), mentions literæ cambitoriæ, which seem to have been negotiable bills; and by 1400 they were drawn in sets, and worded exactly as at present. Macpherson, p. 614, and Beckman, History of Inventions, vol. iii. p. 430, give from Capmany an actual precedent of a bill dated in 1404.

[c]Usury was looked upon with horror by our English divines long after the Reformation. Fleury, in his Institutions au Droit Ecclésiastique, t. ii. p. 129, has shown the subterfuges to which men had recourse in order to evade this prohibition. It is an unhappy truth, that great part of the attention devoted to the best of sciences, ethics and jurisprudence, has been employed to weaken principles that ought never to have been acknowledged.One species of usury, and that of the highest importance to commerce, was always permitted, on account of the risk that attended it This was marine insurance, which could not have existed, until money was considered, in itself, as a source of profit. The earliest regulations on the subject of insurance are those of Barcelona in 1433; but the practice was, of course, earlier than these, though not of great antiquity. It is not mentioned in the Consolato del Mare, nor in any of the Hanseatic laws of the fourteenth century. Beckman, vol. i. p. 388. This author, not being aware of the Barcelonese laws on this subject published by Capmany, supposes, the first provisions regulating marine assurance to have been made at Florence in 1523.

One species of usury, and that of the highest importance to commerce, was always permitted, on account of the risk that attended it This was marine insurance, which could not have existed, until money was considered, in itself, as a source of profit. The earliest regulations on the subject of insurance are those of Barcelona in 1433; but the practice was, of course, earlier than these, though not of great antiquity. It is not mentioned in the Consolato del Mare, nor in any of the Hanseatic laws of the fourteenth century. Beckman, vol. i. p. 388. This author, not being aware of the Barcelonese laws on this subject published by Capmany, supposes, the first provisions regulating marine assurance to have been made at Florence in 1523.

[d]Macpherson, p. 487, et alibi. They had probably excellent bargains; in 1329 the Bardi farmed all the customs in England for 20l.a day. But in 1282 the customs had produced 8411l., and half a century of great improvement had elapsed.

[e]Villani, 1. xii. c. 55, 87. He calls these two banking-houses the pillars which sustained great part of the commerce of Christendom.

[f]Capmany, t. i. p. 213.

[g]Macpherson, p. 341, from Sanuto. The bank of Venice is referred to 1171.

[h]G. Villani, 1. xi. c. 49.

[i]Matt. Villani, p. 227 (in Muratori, Script. Rer. Ital. t. xiv.).

[k]Bizarri, Hist. Genuens. p. 797 (Antwerp, 1579); Machiavelli, Storia Fiorentina, 1. viii.

[m]Ricobaldus Ferrarensis, apud Murat. Dissert. 23; Francisc. Pippinus, ibidem. Muratori endeavours to extenuate the authority of this passage, on account of some more ancient writers who complain of the luxury of their times, and of some particular instances of magnificence and expense. But Ricobaldi alludes, as Muratori himself admits, to the mode of living in the middle ranks, and not to that of courts, which in all ages might occasionally display considerable splendour. I see nothing to weaken so explicit a testimony of a contemporary, which in fact is confirmed by many writers of the next age, who, according to the practice of Italian chroniclers, have copied it as their own.

[n]Murat. Dissert. 23.

[o]Bellincion Berti vid' io andar cintoDi cuojo e d'osso, e venir dallo specchioLa donna sua senza 'l viso dipinto,E vidi quel di Nerli, e quel del VecchioEsser contenti alla pelle scoverta,E sue donne al fuso ed al pennechio.Paradis. canto xv.See too the rest of this canto. But this is put in the mouth of Cacciaguida, the poet's ancestor, who lived in the former half of the twelfth century. The change, however, was probably subsequent to 1250, when the times of wealth and turbulence began at Florence.

[o]

Bellincion Berti vid' io andar cintoDi cuojo e d'osso, e venir dallo specchioLa donna sua senza 'l viso dipinto,E vidi quel di Nerli, e quel del VecchioEsser contenti alla pelle scoverta,E sue donne al fuso ed al pennechio.Paradis. canto xv.

See too the rest of this canto. But this is put in the mouth of Cacciaguida, the poet's ancestor, who lived in the former half of the twelfth century. The change, however, was probably subsequent to 1250, when the times of wealth and turbulence began at Florence.

[p]Velly, t. xiii. p. 352. The second continuator of Nangis vehemently inveighs against the long beards and short breeches of his age; after the introduction of which novelties, he judiciously observes, the French were much more disposed to run away from their enemies than before. Spicilegium, t. iii. p. 105.

[q]37 E. III. Rep. 38 E. III. Several other statutes of a similar nature were passed in this and the ensuing reign. In France, there were sumptuary laws as old as Charlemagne, prohibiting or taxing the use of furs; but the first extensive regulation was under Philip the Fair. Velly, t. vii. p. 64; t. xi. p. 190. These attempts to restrain what cannot be restrained continued even down to 1700. De la Mare, Traité de la Police, t. i. 1. iii.

[r]Muratori, Antichità Italiane, Dissert. 23, t. i. p. 325.

[s]"These English," said the Spaniards who came over with Philip II., "have their houses made of sticks and dirt, but they fare commonly so well as the king." Harrison's Description of Britain, prefixed to Holingshed, vol. i. p. 315 (edit. 1807).

[t]Pfeffel, t. i. p. 293.

[u]Æneas Sylvius, de Moribus Germanorum. This treatise is an amplified panegyric upon Germany, and contains several curious passages: they must be taken perhaps with some allowance; for the drift of the whole is to persuade the Germans, that so rich and noble a country could afford a little money for the poor pope. Civitates quas vocant liberas, cum Imperatori solùm subjiciuntur, cujus jugum est instar libertatis; nec profectò usquam gentium tanta libertas est, quantâ fruuntur hujuscemodi civitates. Nam populi quos Itali vocant liberos, hi potissimùm serviunt, sive Venetias inspectes, sive Florentiam aut Cænas, in quibus cives, præter paucos qui reliquos ducunt, loco mancipiorum habentur. Cum nec rebus suis uti, ut libet, vel fari quæ velint, et gravissimis opprimuntur pecuniarum exactionibus. Apud Germanos omnia læta sunt, omnia jucunda; nemo suis privatur bonis. Salvo cuique sua hæreditas est, nulli nisi nocenti magistratus nocent. Nec apud eos factiones sicut apud Italas urbes grassantur. Sunt autem supra centum civitates hâc libertate fruentes. p. 1058.In another part of his work (p. 719) he gives a specious account of Vienna. The houses, he says, had glass windows and iron doors. Fenestræ undique vitreæ perlucent, et ostia plerumque ferrea. In domibus multa et munda supellex. Altæ domus magnificæque visuntur. Unum id dedecori est, quod tecta plerumque tigno contegunt, pauca latere. Cætera ædificia muro lapideo consistunt. Pictæ domus et exterius et interius splendent. Civitatis populus 50,000communicantiumcreditur. I suppose this gives at least double for the total population. He proceeds to represent the manners of the city in a less favourable point of view, charging the citizens with gluttony and libertinism, the nobility with oppression, the judges with corruption, &c. Vienna probably had the vices of a flourishing city; but the love of amplification in so rhetorical a writer as Æneas Sylvius weakens the value of his testimony, on whichever side it is given.

In another part of his work (p. 719) he gives a specious account of Vienna. The houses, he says, had glass windows and iron doors. Fenestræ undique vitreæ perlucent, et ostia plerumque ferrea. In domibus multa et munda supellex. Altæ domus magnificæque visuntur. Unum id dedecori est, quod tecta plerumque tigno contegunt, pauca latere. Cætera ædificia muro lapideo consistunt. Pictæ domus et exterius et interius splendent. Civitatis populus 50,000communicantiumcreditur. I suppose this gives at least double for the total population. He proceeds to represent the manners of the city in a less favourable point of view, charging the citizens with gluttony and libertinism, the nobility with oppression, the judges with corruption, &c. Vienna probably had the vices of a flourishing city; but the love of amplification in so rhetorical a writer as Æneas Sylvius weakens the value of his testimony, on whichever side it is given.

[x]Vols. iv. and vi.

[y]Mr. Lysons refers Castleton to the age of William the Conqueror, but without giving any reasons. Lysons's Derbyshire, p. ccxxxvi. Mr. King had satisfied himself that it was built during the Heptarchy, and even before the conversion of the Saxons to Christianity; but in this he gave the reins, as usual, to his imagination, which as much exceeded his learning, as the latter did his judgment. Conisborough should seem, by the name, to have been a royal residence, which it certainly never was after the Conquest. But if the engravings of the decorative parts in the Archæologia, vol. vi. p. 244, are not remarkably inaccurate, the architecture is too elegant for the Danes, much more for the unconverted Saxons. Both these castles are enclosed by a court or ballium, with a fortified entrance, like those erected by the Normans.[No doubt is now entertained but that Conisborough was built late in the Norman period. Mr. King's authority, which I followed for want of a better, is by no means to be depended upon. 1848.]

[No doubt is now entertained but that Conisborough was built late in the Norman period. Mr. King's authority, which I followed for want of a better, is by no means to be depended upon. 1848.]

[z]Whitaker's Hist. of Whalley; Lysons's Cumberland, p. ccvi.

[a]The ruins of Herstmonceux are, I believe, tolerably authentic remains of Henry VI.'s age, but only a part of Haddon Hall is of the fifteenth century.

[b]Archæologia, vol. vi.

[c]Blomefield's Norfolk, vol. iii. p. 242.

[d]Whitaker's Hist. of Whalley.

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