‘Eating the bread out of their mouth’:Antwerp's export trade and generalized institutions, 1544–5

Abstract

This article studies the distribution of exports from mid‐sixteenth‐century Antwerp at the individual and group level (grouped by merchant origin). Recently, scholars have argued that sixteenth‐century Antwerp, and in its wake a series of other cities, hosted an open‐access market as a result of an evolution towards open‐access institutions. However, the direct effect of this institutional change on merchant enterprise is hard to measure. Relying on detailed tax records, preferences at the individual merchant level for particular destinations and commodities are documented, to evaluate whether exporters had equal chances in Antwerp's export market. A few exporters had large export shares next to a multitude of smaller merchants. The exports of these smaller merchants to distant destinations and their participation in the export of important products demonstrate a fairly level commercial playing field with regard to their larger‐scale colleagues. Foreign traders had access to trade in Low Countries products, while local merchants were active in the export of major transit products. The activities of the latter group are particularly important; contrary to previous literature, Low Countries traders did not differ in their preference for home‐grown products.

Women, town councils, and the organisation of work in Bilbao and Antwerp: a north-south comparison (1400–1560)

“…The main focus of Antwerp's economy was international commerce, organised by the town's merchant guilds. 25 In addition, Antwerp's most productive and small-scale trade occupations were traditionally organised by craft guilds. Only citizens of Antwerp could become members of these privileged guilds, which held considerable power in the government of the town.…”

Marketing and Pricing Risk in Marine Insurance in Sixteenth-Century Antwerp

“…19, 163-64;Piccinno 2015, p. 39). 6 On the history of commerce in sixteenth-century Antwerp: Gelderblom (2013), Limberger (2001), Puttevils (2015b), Van der Wee (1963, 1994 Henriquez's account books cover a period between a failed attempt to set up a government-sanctioned monopoly in brokering and registering marine insurance policies in the late 1550s and the Dutch Revolt from 1566, which would ultimately end Antwerp's commercial hegemony. 14 The two ledgers cover the period from 1 August 1562 to 26 September 1563 and are written in Spanish (see Image 1).…”

“…Adrian Leonard (2015) shows how the arrival of newcomers in insurance frequently induced legal changes and the formalization of informal rules to accommodate the relatively unexperienced newcomers. Indeed, Antwerp's commercial success has recently been explained by the city's open-access institutions open to all economic agents (Gelderblom 2013;North, Wallis, and Weingast 2009;Ogilvie 2011;Ogilvie and Carus 2014;Puttevils 2015aPuttevils , 2015b). …”

A Trail of Trials. A 'Flemish' Merchant Community in Sixteenth-century Valladolid and Medina del Campo

“…The evidence reveals that large quantities of Baltic wax and German copper were also shipped from the Low Countries to Spain and Portugal. 54 Jorge Tulaime, for example, also traded in copper next to other commodities such as textiles. 55 Some Flemish merchants also sold luxury goods such as Flemish devotional paintings or amber.…”