Genoese Atlantic Trade and Exploration

Genoese Atlantic Trade and Exploration

Introduction

Genoa is “the most winding, incoherent of cities, the most entangled topographical ravel in the world”. In the increasing interchange of commodities throughout the Mediterranean that assisted so much in this transformation if the Middle Ages, Florence, Venice and Genoa played the dominant role. The first two, as centers of medieval civilization and trade, have justifiably received the greatest attention; with the Genoa failed to compete in any but the commercial field. The Genoese have not thought deeply nor built grandly. They never achieved the political coherence of Venice or the solid native industrial foundation of Florentine life. Trade in Western Europe, with its American colonies and the fact that theoretically closed systems, Colonial treaties, "exclusive" in nature. Colonies are not allowed to turn in the raw material they collect, transform, should be held in the capital.

History 500-1500

The middle Ages generally classified as the time in Europe between 500 and 1500 AD. It was a time of great social and economic change. Much, in fact the vast majority of this transformation was brought about by food.

After the fall of the Roman Empire in 476 AD, so-called barbarian tribes overran Europe. Goths, Vandals, Gepids, Alemanni, and Franks were all independent forces that controlled large sections of Europe. The trade of food and goods was quite small among and within these sections. The meals of the barbarians consisted primarily of milk, cheese, and a lot of meat. For them, sustained agriculture was hardly available.

A great transformation occurred around 1000 AD, when commoners began to move out of small city clusters and into the countryside. The exodus from the cities meant that within decades, 90 percent of medieval public worked in agriculture.

In Western Europe, the disappearance of serfdom and the commercialization of agriculture, led to a reduction of common rights. In the late seventeenth, the population growth and the land would not increase, caused the saturation of the field. The surplus from the countryside had to leave the city, to wander through the countryside or to commit crimes.

An important aspect of economic history was dispensed from the cash economy. The money was used to pay increasingly more diverse. Drafts, letters of credit and bills of exchange were increasingly used and largely accepted by merchants that increase the volume of trade credit.

With the growth of trade in Western Europe, became more necessary to the proper functioning of the market against the fairs. Wholesale trade, step made in the open to be held in closed markets. To advance the growth period the wholesale trade, this became more complex, so it appeared the representatives and greater specialization.

The increased range of products, development of wholesale trade, led to develop the store. It also increased the importance of hawking, especially the sale of textiles, clocks, glass, etc. These vendors helped increase the demand for new products on the most remote parts of Europe.

Economic importance

The economic importance of the medieval Italian cities have received less attention of historians than ...