The ‘Golden Age’ of the Hanseatic League 89
Anglo-Hanseatic relations, and when Denmark regained Gotland from the
Teutonic Knights in 1408, another possible cause for conflict had been removed.
Nevertheless, basic problems remained unsolved, like the status of the English
merchants in Prussia, and the kings and princes tried to strengthen and inten-
sify their rule by controlling their countries’ trade and by also reducing the
privileges of foreign merchants or favouring their rivals. In consequence,
conflicts intensified, and the influence of the Hanseatic towns suffered many
drawbacks.
These events also concerned the southwest of Europe. In the fifteenth cen-
tury, ships from the Hanseatic towns reached the Atlantic and the Western
Mediterranean.86 In 1419, there was a Prussian ship in Sevilla loading oil and
wine. When John ii of Castile decided to attack the Flemish-Hanseatic salt
fleet near La Rochelle in the same year, accusing the Hanseatic merchants
of supporting the English in Southern France, this led to a seemingly endless
commercial conflict. When the Flemish concluded a peace ten years later,
the Castilian-Hanseatic conflict remained unsolved; and in 1433, the towns
decided to prohibit the import of Spanish wool. This finally led to a truce under
Flemish mediation in 1443 which was prolonged later. The German merchants
were allowed to move freely and securely in Castile but promised to prefer
Castilian ships for the transport of their goods, if possible, and not to rival the
Castilians in the Bay of Biscay.87
This was far from being a success, but the events in the Baltic proved to be
more important for the future of the Hanseatic League. Margaret of Denmark
had already started efforts to regain the Duchy of Schleswig after the death
of Duke Gerhard vi in 1404. In 1411, in the five years’ truce of Kolding, she
secured the Northern part of the duchy. When she died in 1412, her heir Eric of
Pomerania continued her policies with even greater force. He aimed at restor-
ing the Baltic empire of the earlier Danish kings, which meant that he wanted
to eliminate the towns’ privileges. The Schauenburg counts of Holstein claimed
the Duchy of Schleswig based on the grant by Margaret in 1386, but in 1413 Eric
accused them of treason and reclaimed the duchy. He used the constitutional
86 Examples in Werner Paravicini, “Jenseits von Brügge. Norddeutsche Schiffer und
Kaufleute an der Atlantikküste und im Mittelmeer in Mittelalter und Früher Neuzeit,”
in Konzeptionelle Ansätze der Hanse-Historiographie, ed. Eckhard Müller-Mertens,
Heidelore Böcker, Hansische Studien, vol. 14 (Trier: Porta Alba, 2003), 69–114; Simone
Abraham-Tisse, “Les relations hispano-hanséates au bas Moyen Âge,” En la España medi-
eval 14 (1991) 131–61, and 15 (1992), 249–95.
87 Dollinger, Hanse, 337–38; Theodor Hirsch, Danzigs Handels- und Gewerbsgeschichte
(Danzig, 1858, repr. Schaan, Liechtenstein: Sändig, 1968), 272–74.