wax, timber, pitch, tar, iron, and all the other products
of the northern world. Organized into hansas, or mer-
chant leagues, they prospered greatly throughout the
High Middle Ages.
Ghent, Bruges, Ypres, and the other Flemish cities
concentrated primarily on the manufacture of cloth.
Their position near the mouths of the Meuse and
Rhine made them natural ports that connected the Eu-
ropean interior with England, Scandinavia, and north-
ern Spain. Some of them also rivaled the Hanse in the
salt trade, which was vital because salt was the primary
means of preserving food. By the end of the thirteenth
century, the Low Countries had become a highly ur-
banized center of wealth that rivaled Italy in commer-
cial importance. Other, smaller, centers of trade and
manufacturing developed along the main trade routes
or wherever a local product achieved some level of
renown.
Manufacturing in the Middle Ages did not nor-
mally employ elaborate machinery or the techniques of
mass production and cannot, therefore, be described as
truly industrial, though some of the larger wool shops
in Italy or Flanders employed as many as 150 workers.
Goods were produced by artisans who, after the tenth
century, were typically organized into guilds or associa-
tions that attempted to regulate price and quality in a
particular trade. Because they included not only jour-
neymen but also the masters who owned the shops and
the apprentices who would one day be admitted to full
membership, guilds combined a variety of functions.184 Chapter 10
AAAASS SS
SSSSSSConstantinopleLisbon
CórdobaToledo
ValenciaBarcelonaBordeaux
GenoaLyons Milan
FlorenceVeniceRome
NaplesParisBruges
GhentHamburgLübeckLeipzig
Frankfurt
Nuremberg
AugsburgDanzigCracow
ViennaNovgorodKievAstrakhanTrebizond
Tabriz
MosulBaghdad
Damascus
AlexandriaTripoliTunisEdinburghWinchester LondonDublinStockholmBergenBudapestBelgradeDnie
perR.Balearic
IslandsSardiniaSicilyCrete CyprusAtlantic
OceanNorth
SeaBlack SeaRed
SeaPe
rsi
an
Gu
lfMediterranean SeaCa
sp
ia
n
Se
aNi
le
R.Vistu
la
R.CorsicaDanu
be
R.BalticSeaVolga
R.0 300 600 Miles0 300 600 900 KilometersArea of cloth production
Area of linen production
Area of silk production
Trade routes
S
ASalt
Alum
WineGold
Silver
Other metalsMAP 10.1
Medieval Trade Routes