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Chapter 1 - The London guildhall and Cologne's rise to dominance in the eleventh and twelfth centuries

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 November 2009

Joseph P. Huffman
Affiliation:
Messiah College, Pennsylvania
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Summary

The most enduring dynamic uniting Germany with England during the Central Middle Ages was commerce along the Rhine—Thames corridor. Hence we must first consider the emergence and evolution of this economic nexus in order to set the context for our subsequent researches into emigrant populations at both ends of the corridor.

Commercial contacts existed between England and the eastern Frankish realm at least as far back as the era of Charlemagne, yet not until around the year 1000 do we find a specific reference to such activity. King Aethelred II's “Institutes of London” mention the presence of “homines imperatoris qui veniebant in navibus suis” among the foreign merchants in the city. There has been much speculation about the identity of these “men of the emperor.” Koppmann supposed that Cologne merchants were the principal figures along with others from the Westphalian cities of Dortmund, Soest, and Münster, while Kellenbenz expected merchants from Cologne, Tiel, Deventer, and Utrecht and Dollinger believed they were merchants from Cologne, Tiel, and Bremen. The full passage in Aethelred's statutes reads: “Et homines imperatoris, qui veniebant in navibus suis, bonarum legum digni tenebantur, sicut et nos,” which indicates that the German merchants enjoyed legal rights comparable to those of the English. This was a privileged status for foreign traders. The Leges Edwardi Confessoris also allude to traditionally good trading relations between Germany and England during the Anglo-Saxon era.

Type
Chapter
Information
Family, Commerce, and Religion in London and Cologne
Anglo-German Emigrants, c.1000–c.1300
, pp. 9 - 22
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 1998

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