What was founded in the twelfth century and had become known by the thirteenth as the Hanseatic League was essentially an alliance of mercantile guilds in maritime cities bordering the North Sea and Baltic, extending from Edinburgh in Scotland in the west to Novgorod in Russia in the east.
In London, its headquarters was the so-called “Steelyard”, which for much of its existence was essentially an enclave of Germany. Here, the relationship between local and German merchants was sometimes strained (*). The following writ was issued in Westminster on this day in 1388:
“Whereas the merchants of the cities of London and Norwich and the boroughs of [King’s] Lynn, Great Yarmouth, St Botolph [Boston] and [Kingston on] Hull had complained that the men of Lubeck, Rostock, Wismar, Stralsund and Hamburg in Germany had arrested their servants and goods in … Stralsund, … whereof the said merchants were innocent, the King commanded the mayor and sheriffs of London to arrest all the men, goods and merchandise of the towns of … Germany being in the ports of London or elsewhere … , and to detain them until they … answer to such charges as may be made against them on behalf of the King … ”.
(*) Indeed, London merchants forced the – albeit only temporary – expulsion of German ones in the early post-Medieval period.
I am not surprised to read this. During my family research on Burrell/Burel I have come to a conclusion that the Hanse was invited to occupy the ‘Sreelyard’ ( from 1250) to help crush the dominance of the Burel family over the cloth industry ( mainly burel in Candlewick). After much friction, they were finally expelled. Conversations are welcome at martin.burrell@bigpond.com
Most interesting – thank-you!
Thank you for this post!