Tennis also became the favourite game amongst the bourgeois in the towns,

and tennis-courts were built in all parts, of such spacious proportions

and so well adapted for spectators, that they were often converted into

theatres. Their game of billiards resembled the modern one only in name,

for it was played on a level piece of ground with wooden balls which were

struck with hooked sticks and mallets. It was in great repute in the

fourteenth century, for in 1396 Marshal de Boucicault, who was considered

one of the best players of his time, won at it six hundred francs (or more

than twenty-eight thousand francs of present currency). At the beginning

of the following century the Duke Louis d'Orleans ordered _billes et

billars_ to be bought for the sum of eleven sols six deniers tournois

(about fifteen francs of our money), that he might amuse himself with

them. There were several games of the same sort, which were not less

popular. Skittles; _la Soule_ or _Soulette_, which consisted of a large

ball of hay covered over with leather, the possession of which was

contested for by two opposing sides of players; Football; open Tennis;

Shuttlecock, &c. It was Charles V. who first thought of giving a more

serious and useful character to the games of the people, and who, in a

celebrated edict forbidding games of chance, encouraged the establishment

of companies of archers and bowmen. These companies, to which was

subsequently added that of the arquebusiers, outlived political

revolutions, and are still extant, especially in the northern provinces of

France.

[Illustration: Fig. 178.--The Spring-board.--Fac-simile of a Woodcut in

"Exercises in Leaping and Vaulting," by A. Tuccaro: 4to (Paris, 1599).]

At all times and in all countries the games of chance were the most

popular, although they were forbidden both by ecclesiastical and royal

authority. New laws were continually being enacted against them, and

especially against those in which dice were used, though with little

avail. "Dice shall not be made in the kingdom," says the law of 1256; and

"those who are discovered using them, and frequenting taverns and bad

places, will be looked upon as suspicions characters." A law of 1291

repeats, "That games with dice be forbidden." Nevertheless, though these

prohibitions were frequently renewed, people continued to disregard them

and to lose much money at such games. The law of 1396 is aimed

particularly against loaded dice, which must have been contemporary with

the origin of dice themselves, for no games ever gave rise to a greater

amount of roguery than those of this description. They were, however,

publicly sold in spite of all the laws to the contrary; for, in the "Dit

du Mercier," the dealer offers his merchandise thus:--

"J'ay dez de plus, j'ay dez de moins,

De Paris, de Chartres, de Rains."

("I have heavy dice, I have light dice,

From Paris, from Chartres, and from Rains.")

It has been said that the game of dice was at first called the _game of

God_, because the regulation of lottery was one of God's prerogatives; but

this derivation is purely imaginary. What appears more likely is, that

dice were first forbidden by the Church, and then by the civil

authorities, on account of the fearful oaths which were so apt to be

uttered by those players who had a run of ill luck. Nothing was commoner

than for people to ruin themselves at this game. The poems of troubadours

are full of imprecations against the fatal chance of dice; many

troubadours, such as Guillaume Magret and Gaucelm Faydit, lost their

fortunes at it, and their lives in consequence. Rutebeuf exclaims, in one

of his satires, "Dice rob me of all my clothes, dice kill me, dice watch

me, dice track me, dice attack me, and dice defy me." The blasphemies of

the gamblers did not always remain unpunished. "Philip Augustus," says

Bigord, in his Latin history of this king, "carried his aversion for oaths

to such an extent, that if any one, whether knight or of any other rank,

let one slip from his lips in the presence of the sovereign, even by

mistake, he was ordered to be immediately thrown into the river." Louis

XII., who was somewhat less severe, contented himself with having a hole

bored with a hot iron through the blasphemer's tongue.

[Illustration: Figs. 179 and 180.--French Cards for a Game of Piquet,

early Sixteenth Century.--Collection of the National Library of Paris.]

The work "On the Manner of playing with Dice," has handed down to us the

technical terms used in these games, which varied as much in practice as

in name. They sometimes played with three dice, sometimes with six;

different games were also in fashion, and in some the cast of the dice

alone decided. The games of cards were also most numerous, but it is not

our intention to give the origin of them here. It is sufficient to name a

few of the most popular ones in France, which were, Flux, Prime, Sequence,

Triomphe, Piquet, Trente-et-un, Passe-dix, Condemnade, Lansquenet,

Marriage, Gay, or J'ai, Malcontent, Hère, &c. (Figs. 179 and 180). All

these games, which were as much forbidden as dice, were played in taverns

as well as at court; and, just as there were loaded dice, so were there

also false cards, prepared by rogues for cheating. The greater number of

the games of cards formerly did not require the least skill on the part of

the players, chance alone deciding. The game of _Tables_, however,

required skill and calculation, for under this head were comprised all the

games which were played on a board, and particularly chess, draughts, and

backgammon. The invention of the game of chess has been attributed to the

Assyrians, and there can be no doubt but that it came from the East, and

reached Gaul about the beginning of the ninth century, although it was not

extensively known till about the twelfth. The annals of chivalry

continually speak of the barons playing at these games, and especially at

chess. Historians also mention chess, and show that it was played with

the same zest in the camp of the Saracens as in that of the Crusaders. We

must not be surprised if chess shared the prohibition laid upon dice, for

those who were ignorant of its ingenious combinations ranked it amongst

games of chance. The Council of Paris, in 1212, therefore condemned chess

for the same reasons as dice, and it was specially forbidden to church

people, who had begun to make it their habitual pastime. The royal edict

of 1254 was equally unjust with regard to this game. "We strictly forbid,"

says Louis IX., "any person to play at dice, tables, or chess." This pious

king set himself against these games, which he looked upon as inventions

of the devil. After the fatal day of Mansorah, in 1249, the King, who was

still in Egypt with the remnants of his army, asked what his brother, the

Comte d'Anjou, was doing. "He was told," says Joinville, "that he was

playing at tables with his Royal Highness Gaultier de Nemours. The King

was highly incensed against his brother, and, though most feeble from the

effects of his illness, went to him, and taking the dice and the tables,

had them thrown into the sea." Nevertheless Louis IX. received as a

present from the _Vieux de la Montagne_, chief of the Ismalians, a

chessboard made of gold and rock crystal, the pieces being of precious

metals beautifully worked. It has been asserted, but incorrectly, that

this chessboard was the one preserved in the Musée de Cluny, after having

long formed part of the treasures of the Kings of France.

Amongst the games comprised under the name of _tables_, it is sufficient

to mention that of draughts, which was formerly played with dice and with

the same men as were used for chess; also the game of _honchet_, or

_jonchées_, that is, bones or spillikins, games which required pieces or

men in the same way as chess, but which required more quickness of hand

than of intelligence; and _épingles_, or push-pin, which was played in a

similar manner to the _honchets_, and was the great amusement of the small

pages in the houses of the nobility. When they had not épingles, honchets,

or draughtsmen to play with, they used their fingers instead, and played a

game which is still most popular amongst the Italian people, called the

_morra_, and which was as much in vogue with the ancient Romans as it is

among the modern Italians. It consisted of suddenly raising as many

fingers as had been shown by one's adversary, and gave rise to a great

amount of amusement among the players and lookers-on. The games played by

girls were, of course, different from those in use among boys. The latter

played at marbles, _luettes_, peg or humming tops, quoits, _fouquet,

merelles_, and a number of other games, many of which are now unknown. The

girls, it is almost needless to say, from the earliest times played with

dolls. _Briche_, a game in which a brick and a small stick was used, were

also a favourite. _Martiaus_, or small quoits, wolf or fox, blind man's

buff, hide and seek, quoits, &c., were all girls' games. The greater part

of these amusements were enlivened by a chorus, which all the girls sang

together, or by dialogues sung or chanted in unison.

[Illustration: Fig. 181.--Allegorical Scene of one of the Courts of Love

in Provence--In the First Compartment, the God of Love, Cupid, is sitting

on the Stump of a Laurel-tree, wounding with his Darts those who do him

homage, the Second Compartment represents the Love Vows of Men and

Women.--From the Cover of a Looking-glass, carved in Ivory, of the end of

the Thirteenth Century.]

[Illustration: The Chess-Players.

After a miniature of "_The Three Ages of Man_", a ms. of the fifteenth

century attributed to Estienne Porchier. (Bibl. of M. Ambroise

Firmin-Didot.)

The scene is laid in one of the saloons of the castle of

Plessis-les-Tours, the residence of Louis XI; in the player to the right,

the features of the king are recognisable.]

If children had their games, which for many generations continued

comparatively unchanged, so the dames and the young ladies had theirs,

consisting of gallantry and politeness, which only disappeared with those

harmless assemblies in which the two sexes vied with each other in

urbanity, friendly roguishness, and wit. It would require long antiquarian

researches to discover the origin and mode of playing many of these

pastimes, such as _des oes, des trois ânes, des accords bigarrés, du

jardin madame, de la fricade, du feiseau, de la mick_, and a number of

others which are named but not described in the records of the times. The

game _à l'oreille,_ the invention of which is attributed to the troubadour

Guillaume Adhémar, the _jeu des Valentines,_ or the game of lovers, and

the numerous games of forfeits, which have come down to us from the Courts

of Love of the Middle Ages, we find to be somewhat deprived of their

original simplicity in the way they are now played in country-houses in

the winter and at village festivals in the summer. But the Courts of Love

are no longer in existence gravely to superintend all these diversions

(Fig. 181).

Amongst the amusements which time has not obliterated, but which, on the

contrary, seem destined to be of longer duration than monuments of stone

and brass, we must name dancing, which was certainly one of the principal

amusements of society, and which has come down to us through all

religions, all customs, all people, and all ages, preserving at the same

time much of its original character. Dancing appears, at each period of

the world's history, to have been alternately religions and profane,

lively and solemn, frivolous and severe. Though dancing was as common an

amusement formerly as it is now, there was this essential difference

between the two periods, namely, that certain people, such as the Romans,

were very fond of seeing dancing, but did not join in it themselves.

Tiberius drove the dancers out of Rome, and Domitian dismissed certain

senators from their seats in the senate who had degraded themselves by

dancing; and there seems to be no doubt that the Romans, from the conquest

of Julius Caesar, did not themselves patronise the art. There were a

number of professional dancers in Gaul, as well as in the other provinces

of the Roman Empire, who were hired to dance at feasts, and who

endeavoured to do their best to make their art as popular as possible. The

lightheartedness of the Gauls, their natural gaiety, their love for

violent exercise and for pleasures of all sorts, made them delight in

dancing, and indulge in it with great energy; and thus, notwithstanding

the repugnance of the Roman aristocracy and the prohibitions and anathemas

of councils and synods, dancing has always been one of the favourite

pastimes of the Gauls and the French.

[Illustration: Fig. 182.--Dancers on Christmas Night punished for their

Impiety, and condemned to dance for a whole Year (Legend of the Fifteenth

Century).--Fac-simile of a Woodcut by P. Wohlgemuth, in the "Liber

Chronicorum Mundi:" folio (Nuremberg, 1493).]

Leuce Carin, a writer of doubtful authority, states that in the early

history of Christianity the faithful danced, or rather stamped, in

measured time during religions ceremonials, gesticulating and distorting

themselves. This is, however, a mistake. The only thing approaching to it

was the slight trace of the ancient Pagan dances which remained in the

feast of the first Sunday in Lent, and which probably belonged to the

religious ceremonies of the Druids. At nightfall fires were lighted in

public places, and numbers of people danced madly round them. Rioting and

disorderly conduct often resulted from this popular feast, and the

magistrates were obliged to interfere in order to suppress it. The church,

too, did not close her eyes to the abuses which this feast engendered,

although episcopal admonitions were not always listened to (Fig. 182). We

see, in the records of one of the most recent Councils of Narbonne, that

the custom of dancing in the churches and in the cemeteries on certain

feasts had not been abolished in some parts of the Languedoc at the end of

the sixteenth century.

Dancing was at all times forbidden by the Catholic Church on account of

its tendency to corrupt the morals, and for centuries ecclesiastical

authority was strenuously opposed to it; but, on the other hand, it could

not complain of want of encouragement from the civil power. When King

Childebert, in 554, forbade all dances in his domains, he was only induced

to do so by the influence of the bishops. We have but little information

respecting the dances of this period, and it would be impossible

accurately to determine as to the justice of their being forbidden. They

were certainly no longer those war-dances which the Franks had brought

with them, and which antiquarians have mentioned under the name of

_Pyrrhichienne_ dances. In any case, war-dances reappeared at the

commencement of chivalry; for, when a new knight was elected, all the

knights in full armour performed evolutions, either on foot or on

horseback, to the sound of military music, and the populace danced round

them. It has been said that this was the origin of court ballets, and La

Colombière, in his "Théâtre d'Honneur et de Chevalerie," relates that this

ancient dance of the knights was kept up by the Spaniards, who called it

the _Moresque_.

The Middle Ages was the great epoch for dancing, especially in France.

There were an endless number of dancing festivals, and, from reading the

old poets and romancers, one might imagine that the French had never

anything better to do than to dance, and that at all hours of the day and

night. A curious argument in favour of the practical utility of dancing is

suggested by Jean Tabourot in his "Orchésographie," published at Langres

in 1588, under the name of Thoinot Arbeau. He says, "Dancing is practised

in order to see whether lovers are healthy and suitable for one another:

at the end of a dance the gentlemen are permitted to kiss their

mistresses, in order that they may ascertain if they have an agreeable

breath. In this matter, besides many other good results which follow from

dancing, it becomes necessary for the good governing of society." Such was

the doctrine of the Courts of Love, which stoutly took up the defence of

dancing against the clergy. In those days, as soon as the two sexes were

assembled in sufficient numbers, before or after the feasts, the balls

began, and men and women took each other by the hand and commenced the

performance in regular steps (Fig. 183). The author of the poem of

Provence, called "Flamença," thus allegorically describes these

amusements: "Youth and Gaiety opened the ball, accompanied by their sister

Bravery; Cowardice, confused, went of her own accord and hid herself." The

troubadours mention a great number of dances, without describing them; no

doubt they were so familiar that they thought a description of them

needless. They often speak of the _danse au virlet_, a kind of round

dance, during the performance of which each person in turn sang a verse,

the chorus being repeated by all. In the code of the Courts of Love,

entitled "Arresta Amorum," that is, the decrees of love, the _pas de

Brabant_ is mentioned, in which each gentleman bent his knee before his

lady; and also the _danse au chapelet_, at the end of which each dancer

kissed his lady. Romances of chivalry frequently mention that knights used

to dance with the dames and young ladies without taking off their helmets

and coats of mail. Although this costume was hardly fitted for the

purpose, we find, in the romance of "Perceforet," that, after a repast,

whilst the tables were being removed, everything was prepared for a ball,

and that although the knights made no change in their accoutrements, yet

the ladies went and made fresh toilettes. "Then," says the old novelist,

"the young knights and the young ladies began to play their instruments

and to have the dance." From this custom may be traced the origin of the

ancient Gallic proverb, "_Après la panse vient la danse_" ("After the

feast comes the dance"). Sometimes a minstrel sang songs to the

accompaniment of the harp, and the young ladies danced in couples and

repeated at intervals the minstrel's songs. Sometimes the torch-dance was

performed; in this each performer bore in his hand a long lighted taper,

and endeavoured to prevent his neighbours from blowing it out, which each

one tried to do if possible (Fig. 184). This dance, which was in use up to

the end of the sixteenth century at court, was generally reserved for

weddings.

[Illustration: Fig. 183.--Peasant Dances at the May Feasts.--Fac-simile

of a Miniature in a Prayer-book of the Fifteenth Century, in the National

Library of Paris.]

[Illustration: Fig. 184.--Dance by Torchlight, a Scene at the Court of

Burgundy.--From a Painting on Wood of 1463, belonging to M. H. Casterman,

of Tournai (Belgium).]

Dancing lost much of its simplicity and harmlessness when masquerades were

introduced, these being the first examples of the ballet. These

masquerades, which soon after their introduction became passionately

indulged in at court under Charles VI., were, at first, only allowed

during Carnival, and on particular occasions called _Charivaris_, and they

were usually made the pretext for the practice of the most licentious

follies. These masquerades had a most unfortunate inauguration by the

catastrophe which rendered the madness of Charles VI. incurable, and which

is described in history under the name of the _Burning Ballet_. It was on

the 29th of January, 1393, that this ballet made famous the festival held

in the Royal Palace of St. Paul in Paris, on the occasion of the marriage

of one of the maids of honour of Queen Isabel of Bavaria with a gentleman

of Vermandois. The bride was a widow, and the second nuptials were deemed

a fitting occasion for the Charivaris.

[Illustration: Fig. 185.--The Burning Ballet.--Fac-simile of a Miniature

in the Manuscript of the "Chroniques" of Froissart (Fifteenth Century), in

the National Library of Paris.]

A gentleman from Normandy, named Hugonin de Grensay, thought he could

create a sensation by having a dance of wild men to please the ladies. "He

admitted to his plot," says Froissart, "the king and four of the principal

nobles of the court. These all had themselves sewn up in close-fitting

linen garments covered with resin on which a quantity of tow was glued,

and in this guise they appeared in the middle of the ball. The king was

alone, but the other four were chained together. They jumped about like

madmen, uttered wild cries, and made all sorts of eccentric gestures. No

one knew who these hideous objects were, but the Duke of Orleans

determined to find out, so he took a candle and imprudently approached too

near one of the men. The tow caught fire, and the flames enveloped him

and the other three who were chained to him in a moment." "They were

burning for nearly an hour like torches," says a chronicler. "The king had

the good fortune to escape the peril, because the Duchesse de Berry, his

aunt, recognised him, and had the presence of mind to envelop him in her

train" (Fig. 185). Such a calamity, one would have thought, might have

been sufficient to disgust people with masquerades, but they were none the

less in favour at court for many years afterwards; and, two centuries

later, the author of the "Orchésographie" thus writes on the subject:

"Kings and princes give dances and masquerades for amusement and in order

to afford a joyful welcome to foreign nobles; we also practise the same

amusements on the celebration of marriages." In no country in the world

was dancing practised with more grace and elegance than in France. Foreign

dances of every kind were introduced, and, after being remodelled and

brought to as great perfection as possible, they were often returned to

the countries from which they had been imported under almost a new

character.

[Illustration: Fig. 186.--Musicians accompanying the Dancing.--Fac-simile

of a Wood Engraving in the "Orchésographie" of Thoinot Arbeau (Jehan

Tabourot): 4to (Langres, 1588).]

In 1548, the dances of the Béarnais, which were much admired at the court

of the Comtes de Foix, especially those called the _danse mauresque_ and

the _danse des sauvages_, were introduced at the court of France, and

excited great merriment. So popular did they become, that with a little

modification they soon were considered essentially French. The German

dances, which were distinguished by the rapidity of their movements, were

also thoroughly established at the court of France. Italian, Milanese,

Spanish, and Piedmontese dances were in fashion in France before the

expedition of Charles VIII. into Italy: and when this king, followed by

his youthful nobility, passed over the mountains to march to the conquest

of Naples, he found everywhere in the towns that welcomed him, and in

which balls and masquerades were given in honour of his visit, the dance

_à la mode de France_, which consisted of a sort of medley of the dances

of all countries. Some hundreds of these dances have been enumerated in

the fifth book of the "Pantagruel" of Rabelais, and in various humorous

works of those who succeeded him. They owed their success to the singing

with which they were generally accompanied, or to the postures,

pantomimes, or drolleries with which they were supplemented for the

amusement of the spectators. A few, and amongst others that of the _five

steps_ and that of the _three faces_, are mentioned in the "History of the

Queen of Navarre."

[Illustration: Fig. 187.--The Dance called "La Gaillarde."--Fac-simile of

Wood Engravings from the "Orchésographie" of Thoinot Arbeau (Jehan

Tabourot): 4to (Langres, 1588).]

Dances were divided into two distinct classes--_danses basses_, or common

and regular dances, which did not admit of jumping, violent movements, or

extraordinary contortions--and the _danses par haut_, which were

irregular, and comprised all sorts of antics and buffoonery. The regular

French dance was a _basse_ dance, called the _gaillarde_; it was

accompanied by the sound of the hautbois and tambourine, and originally it

was danced with great form and state. This is the dance which Jean

Tabouret has described; it began with the two performers standing opposite

to each other, advancing, bowing, and retiring. "These advancings and

retirings were done in steps to the time of the music, and continued until

the instrumental accompaniment stopped; then the gentleman made his bow

to the lady, took her by the hand, thanked her, and led her to her seat."

The _tourdion_ was similar to the _gaillarde_, only faster, and was

accompanied with more action. Each province of France had its national

dance, such as the _bourrée_ of Auvergne, the _trioris_ of Brittany, the

_branles_ of Poitou, and the _valses_ of Lorraine, which constituted a

very agreeable pastime, and one in which the French excelled all other

nations. This art, "so ancient, so honourable, and so profitable," to use

the words of Jean Tabourot, was long in esteem in the highest social

circles, and the old men liked to display their agility, and the dames and

young ladies to find a temperate exercise calculated to contribute to

their health as well as to their amusement.

The sixteenth century was the great era of dancing in all the courts of

Europe; but under the Valois, the art had more charm and prestige at the

court of France than anywhere else. The Queen-mother, Catherine,

surrounded by a crowd of pretty young ladies, who composed what she called

her _flying squadron_, presided at these exciting dances. A certain

Balthazar de Beaujoyeux was master of her ballets, and they danced at the

Castle of Blois the night before the Duc de Guise was assassinated under

the eyes of Henry III., just as they had danced at the Château of the

Tuileries the day after St. Bartholomew's Day.

[Illustration: Fig. 188.--The Game of Bob Apple, or Swinging

Apple.--Manuscript of the Fourteenth Century, in the British Museum.]

Commerce.

State of Commerce after the Fall of the Roman. Empire.--Its Revival

under the Frankish Kings.--Its Prosperity under Charlemagne.--Its

Decline down to the Time of the Crusaders.--The Levant Trade of the

East.--Flourishing State of the Towns of Provence and

Languedoc.--Establishment of Fairs.--Fairs of Landit, Champagne,

Beaucaire, and Lyons.--Weights and Measures.--Commercial Flanders. Laws

of Maritime Commerce.--Consular Laws.--Banks and Bills of

Exchange.--French. Settlements on the Coast of Africa.--Consequences of

the Discovery of America.

"Commerce in the Middle Ages," says M. Charles Grandmaison, "differed but

little from that of a more remote period. It was essentially a local and

limited traffic, rather inland than maritime, for long and perilous sea

voyages only commenced towards the end of the fifteenth century, or about

the time when Columbus discovered America."

On the fall of the Roman Empire, commerce was rendered insecure, and,

indeed, it was almost completely put a stop to by the barbarian invasions,

and all facility of communication between different nations, and even

between towns of the same country, was interrupted. In those times of

social confusion, there were periods of such poverty and distress, that

for want of money commerce was reduced to the simple exchange of the

positive necessaries of life. When order was a little restored, and

society and the minds of people became more composed, we see commerce

recovering its position; and France was, perhaps, the first country in

Europe in which this happy change took place. Those famous cities of Gaul,

which ancient authors describe to us as so rich and so industrious,

quickly recovered their former prosperity, and the friendly relations

which were established between the kings of the Franks and the Eastern

Empire encouraged the Gallic cities in cultivating a commerce, which was

at that time the most important and most extensive in the world.

Marseilles, the ancient Phoenician colony, once the rival and then the

successor to Carthage, was undoubtedly at the head of the commercial

cities of France. Next to her came Arles, which supplied ship-builders and

seamen to the fleet of Provence; and Narbonne, which admitted into its

harbour ships from Spain, Sicily, and Africa, until, in consequence of the

Aude having changed its course, it was obliged to relinquish the greater

part of its maritime commerce in favour of Montpellier.

[Illustration: Fig. 189.--View of Alexandria in Egypt, in the Sixteenth

Century.--Fac-simile of a Woodcut in the Travels of P. Belon,

"Observations de Plusieurs Singularitez," &c.: 4to (Paris, 1588).]

Commerce maintained frequent communications with the East; it sought its

supplies on the coast of Syria, and especially at Alexandria, in Egypt,

which was a kind of depôt for goods obtained from the rich countries lying

beyond the Red Sea (Figs. 189 and 190). The Frank navigators imported from

these countries, groceries, linen, Egyptian paper, pearls, perfumes, and a

thousand other rare and choice articles. In exchange they offered chiefly

the precious metals in bars rather than coined, and it is probable that at

this period they also exported iron, wines, oil, and wax. The agricultural

produce and manufactures of Gaul had not sufficiently developed to

provide anything more than what was required for the producers themselves.

Industry was as yet, if not purely domestic, confined to monasteries and

to the houses of the nobility; and even the kings employed women or serf

workmen to manufacture the coarse stuffs with which they clothed

themselves and their households. We may add, that the bad state of the

roads, the little security they offered to travellers, the extortions of

all kinds to which foreign merchants were subjected, and above all the

iniquitous System of fines and tolls which each landowner thought right to

exact, before letting merchandise pass through his domains, all created

insuperable obstacles to the development of commerce.

[Illustration: Fig. 190.--Transport of Merchandise on the Backs of

Camels.--Fac-simile of a Woodcut in the "Cosmographie Universelle," of

Thevet: folio, 1575.]

The Frank kings on several occasions evinced a desire that communications

favourable to trade should be re-established in their dominions. We find,

for instance, Chilpéric making treaties with Eastern emperors in favour

of the merchants of Agde and Marseilles, Queen Brunehaut making viaducts

worthy of the Romans, and which still bear her name, and Dagobert opening

at St. Denis free fairs--that is to say, free, or nearly so, from all

tolls and taxes--to which goods, both agricultural and manufactured, were

sent from every corner of Europe and the known world, to be afterwards

distributed through the towns and provinces by the enterprise of internal

commerce.

After the reign of Dagobert, commerce again declined without positively

ceasing, for the revolution, which transferred the power of the kings to

the mayors of the palace was not of a nature to exhaust the resources of

public prosperity; and a charter of 710 proves that the merchants of

Saxony, England, Normandy, and even Hungary, still flocked to the fairs of

St. Denis.

Under the powerful and administrative hand of Charlemagne, the roads being

better kept up, and the rivers being made more navigable, commerce became

safe and more general; the coasts were protected from piratical

incursions; lighthouses were erected at dangerous points, to prevent

shipwrecks; and treaties of commerce with foreign nations, including even

the most distant, guaranteed the liberty and security of French traders

abroad.

Under the weak successors of this monarch, notwithstanding their many

efforts, commerce was again subjected to all sorts of injustice and

extortions, and all its safeguards were rapidly destroyed. The Moors in

the south, and the Normans in the north, appeared to desire to destroy

everything which came in their way, and already Marseilles, in 838, was

taken and pillaged by the Greeks. The constant altercations between the

sons of Louis le Débonnaire and their unfortunate father, their jealousies

amongst themselves, and their fratricidal wars, increased the measure of

public calamity, so that soon, overrun by foreign enemies and destroyed by

her own sons, France became a vast field of disorder and desolation.

The Church, which alone possessed some social influence, never ceased to

use its authority in endeavouring to remedy this miserable state of

things; but episcopal edicts, papal anathemas, and decrees of councils,

had only a partial effect at this unhappy period. At any moment

agricultural and commercial operations were liable to be interrupted, if

not completely ruined, by the violence of a wild and rapacious soldiery;

at every step the roads, often impassable, were intercepted by toll-bars

for some due of a vexatious nature, besides being continually infested by

bands of brigands, who carried off the merchandise and murdered those few

merchants who were so bold as to attempt to continue their business. It

was the Church, occupied as she was with the interests of civilisation,

who again assisted commerce to emerge from the state of annihilation into

which it had fallen; and the "Peace or Truce of God," established in 1041,

endeavoured to stop at least the internal wars of feudalism, and it

succeeded, at any rate for a time, in arresting these disorders. This was

all that could be done at that period, and the Church accomplished it, by

taking the high hand; and with as much unselfishness as energy and

courage, she regulated society, which had been abandoned by the civil

power from sheer impotence and want of administrative capability.

[Illustration: Fig. 191.--Trade on the Seaports of the Levant.--After a

Miniature in a Manuscript of the Travels of Marco Polo (Fifteenth

Century), Library of the Arsenal of Paris.]

At all events, thanks to ecclesiastical foresight, which increased the

number of fairs and markets at the gates of abbeys and convents, the first

step was made towards the general resuscitation of commerce. Indeed, the

Church may be said to have largely contributed to develop the spirit of

progress and liberty, whence were to spring societies and nationalities,

and, in a word, modern organization.

The Eastern commerce furnished the first elements of that trading activity

which showed itself on the borders of the Mediterranean, and we find the

ancient towns of Provence and Languedoc springing up again by the aide of

the republics of Amalfi, Venice, Genoa, and Pisa, which had become the

rich depôts of all maritime trade.

At first, as we have already stated, the wares of India came to Europe

through the Greek port of Alexandria, or through Constantinople. The

Crusades, which had facilitated the relations with Eastern countries,

developed a taste in the West for their indigenous productions, gave a

fresh vigour to this foreign commerce, and rendered it more productive by

removing the stumbling blocks which had arrested its progress (Fig. 191).

The conquest of Palestine by the Crusaders had first opened all the towns

and harbours of this wealthy region to Western traders, and many of them

were able permanently to establish themselves there, with all sorts of

privileges and exemptions from taxes, which were gladly offered to them by

the nobles who had transferred feudal power to Mussulman territories.

Ocean commerce assumed from this moment proportions hitherto unknown.

Notwithstanding the papal bulls and decrees, which forbade Christians from

having any connection with infidels, the voice of interest was more

listened to than that of the Church (Fig. 192), and traders did not fear

to disobey the political and religions orders which forbade them to carry

arms and slaves to the enemies of the faith.

It was easy to foretell, from the very first, that the military occupation

of the Holy Land would not be permanent. In consequence of this,

therefore, the nearer the loss of this fine conquest seemed to be, the

greater were the efforts made by the maritime towns of the West to

re-establish, on a more solid and lasting basis, a commercial alliance

with Egypt, the country which they selected to replace Palestine, in a

mercantile point of view. Marseilles was the greatest supporter of this

intercourse with Egypt; and in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries she

reached a very high position, which she owed to her shipowners and

traders. In the fourteenth century, however, the princes of the house of

Anjou ruined her like the rest of Provence, in the great and fruitless

efforts which they made to recover the kingdom of Naples; and it was not

until the reign of Louis XI. that the old Phoenician city recovered its

maritime and commercial prosperity (Fig. 193).

[Illustration: Fig. 192.--Merchant Vessel in a Storm.--Fac-simile of a

Woodcut in the "Grand Kalendrier et Compost des Bergers," in folio:

printed at Troyes, about 1490, by Nicolas de Rouge.[*]

[Footnote *: "Mortal man, living in the world, is compared to a vessel

on perilous seas, bearing rich merchandise, by which, if it can come to

harbour, the merchant will be rendered rich and happy. The ship from the

commencement to the end of its voyage is in great peril of being lost or

taken by an enemy, for the seas are always beset with perils. So is the

body of man during its sojourn in the world. The merchandise he bears is

his soul, his virtues, and his good deeds. The harbour is paradise, and

he who reaches that haven is made supremely rich. The sea is the world,

full of vices and sins, and in which all, during their passage through

life, are in peril and danger of losing body and soul and of being

drowned in the infernal sea, from which God in His grace keep us!

Amen."]

]

[Illustration: Fig. 193.--View and Plan of Marseilles and its Harbour, in

the Sixteenth Century.--From a Copper-plate in the Collection of G. Bruin,

in folio: "Théâtre des Citez du Monde."]

Languedoc, depressed, and for a time nearly ruined in the thirteenth

century by the effect of the wars of the Albigenses, was enabled,

subsequently, to recover itself. Béziers, Agde, Narbonne, and especially

Montpellier, so quickly established important trading connections with all

the ports of the Mediterranean, that at the end of the fourteenth century

consuls were appointed at each of these towns, in order to protect and

direct their transmarine commerce. A traveller of the twelfth century,

Benjamin de Tudèle, relates that in these ports, which were afterwards

called the stepping stones to the Levant, every language in the world

might be heard.

Toulouse was soon on a par with the towns of Lower Languedoc, and the

Garonne poured into the markets, not only the produce of Guienne, and of

the western parts of France, but also those of Flanders, Normandy, and

England. We may observe, however, that Bordeaux, although placed in a most

advantageous position, at the mouth of the river, only possessed, when

under the English dominion, a very limited commerce, principally confined

to the export of wines to Great Britain in exchange for corn, oil, &c.

La Rochelle, on the same coast, was much more flourishing at this period,

owing to the numerous coasters which carried the wines of Aunis and

Saintonge, and the salt of Brouage to Flanders, the Netherlands, and the

north of Germany. Vitré already had its silk manufactories in the

fifteenth century, and Nantes gave promise of her future greatness as a

depôt of maritime commerce. It was about this time also that the fisheries

became a new industry, in which Bayonne and a few villages on the

sea-coast took the lead, some being especially engaged in whaling, and

others in the cod and herring fisheries (Fig. 194).

Long before this, Normandy had depended on other branches of trade for its

commercial prosperity. Its fabrics of woollen stuffs, its arms and

cutlery, besides the agricultural productions of its fertile and

well-cultivated soil, each furnished material for export on a large scale.

The towns of Rouen and Caen were especially manufacturing cities, and were

very rich. This was the case with Rouen particularly, which was situated

on the Seine, and was at that time an extensive depôt for provisions and

other merchandise which was sent down the river for export, or was

imported for future internal consumption. Already Paris, the abode of

kings, and the metropolis of government, began to foreshadow the immense

development which it was destined to undergo, by becoming the centre of

commercial affairs, and by daily adding to its labouring and mercantile

population (Figs. 195 and 196).

It was, however, outside the walls of Paris that commerce, which needed

liberty as well as protection, at first progressed most rapidly. The

northern provinces had early united manufacturing industry with traffic,

and this double source of local prosperity was the origin of their

enormous wealth. Ghent and Bruges in the Low Countries, and Beauvais and

Arras, were celebrated for their manufacture of cloths, carpets, and

serge, and Cambrai for its fine cloths. The artizans and merchants of

these industrious cities then established their powerful corporations,

whose unwearied energy gave rise to that commercial freedom so favourable

to trade.

[Illustration: Fig. 194. Whale-Fishing. Fac-simile of a Woodcut in the

"Cosmographie Universelle" of Thevet, in folio: Paris, 1574.]

More important than the woollen manufactures--for the greater part of the

wool used was brought from England--was the manufacture of flax, inasmuch

as it encouraged agriculture, the raw material being produced in France.

This first flourished in the north-east of France, and spread slowly to

Picardy, to Beauvois, and Brittany. The central countries, with the

exception of Bruges, whose cloth manufactories were already celebrated in

the fifteenth century, remained essentially agricultural; and their

principal towns were merely depôts for imported goods. The institution of

fairs, however, rendered, it is true, this commerce of some of the towns

as wide-spread as it was productive. In the Middle Ages religious feasts

and ceremonials almost always gave rise to fairs, which commerce was not

slow in multiplying as much as possible. The merchants naturally came to

exhibit their goods where the largest concourse of people afforded the

greatest promise of their readily disposing of them. As early as the first

dynasty of Merovingian kings, temporary and periodical markets of this

kind existed; but, except at St. Denis, articles of local consumption only

were brought to them. The reasons for this were, the heavy taxes which

were levied by the feudal lords on all merchandise exhibited for sale, and

the danger which foreign merchants ran of being plundered on their way, or

even at the fair itself. These causes for a long time delayed the progress

of an institution which was afterwards destined to become so useful and

beneficial to all classes of the community.

We have several times mentioned the famous fair of Landit, which is

supposed to have been established by Charlemagne, but which no doubt was a

sort of revival of the fairs of St. Denis, founded by Dagobert, and which

for a time had fallen into disuse in the midst of the general ruin which

preceded that emperor's reign. This fair of Landit was renowned over the

whole of Europe, and attracted merchants from all countries. It was held

in the month of June, and only lasted fifteen days. Goods of all sorts,

both of home and foreign manufacture, were sold, but the sale of parchment

was the principal object of the fair, to purchase a supply of which the

University of Paris regularly went in procession. On account of its

special character, this fair was of less general importance than the six

others, which from the twelfth century were held at Troyes, Provins,

Lagny-sur-Marne, Rheims, and Bar-sur-Aube. These infused so much

commercial vitality into the province of Champagne, that the nobles for

the most part shook off the prejudice which forbad their entering into any

sort of trading association.

Fairs multiplied in the centre and in the south of France simultaneously.

Those of Puy-en-Velay, now the capital of the Haute-Loire, are looked upon

as the most ancient, and they preserved their old reputation and attracted

a considerable concourse of people, which was also increased by the

pilgrimages then made to Notre-Dame du Puy. These fairs, which were more

of a religious than of a commercial character, were then of less

importance as regards trade than those held at Beaucaire. This town rose

to great repute in the thirteenth century, and, with the Lyons market,

became at that time the largest centre of commerce in the southern

provinces. Placed at the junction of the Saóne and the Rhône, Lyons owed

its commercial development to the proximity of Marseilles and the towns of

Italy. Its four annual fairs were always much frequented, and when the

kings of France transferred to it the privileges of the fairs of

Champagne, and transplanted to within its walls the silk manufactories

formerly established at Tours, Lyons really became the second city of

France.

[Illustration: Fig. 195.--Measurers of Corn in Paris.

Fig. 196.--Hay Carriers.

Fac-simile of Woodcuts from the "Royal Orders concerning the Jurisdiction

of the Company of Merchants and Shrievalty in the City of Paris," in small

folio goth.: Jacques Nyverd, 1528.]

It may be asserted as an established fact that the gradual extension of

the power of the king, produced by the fall of feudalism, was favourable

to the extension of commerce. As early as the reign of Louis IX. many laws

and regulations prove that the kings were alive to the importance of

trade. Among the chief enactments was one which led to the formation of

the harbour of Aigues-Mortes on the Mediterranean; another to the

publication of the book of "Weights and Measures," by Etienne Boileau, a

work in which the ancient statutes of the various trades were arranged and

codified; and a third to the enactment made in the very year of this

king's death, to guarantee the security of vendors, and, at the same time,

to ensure purchasers against fraud. All these bear undoubted witness that

an enlightened policy in favour of commerce had already sprung up.

Philippe le Bel issued several prohibitory enactments also in the interest

of home commerce and local industry, which Louis X. confirmed. Philippe le

Long attempted even to outdo the judicious efforts of Louis XI., and

tried, though unsuccessfully, to establish a uniformity in the weights and

measures throughout the kingdom; a reform, however, which was never

accomplished until the revolution of 1789. It is difficult to credit how

many different weights and measures were in use at that time, each one

varying according to local custom or the choice of the lord of the soil,

who probably in some way profited by the confusion which this uncertain

state of things must have produced. The fraud and errors to which this led

may easily be imagined, particularly in the intercourse between one part

of the country and another. The feudal stamp is here thoroughly exhibited;

as M. Charles de Grandmaison remarks, "Nothing is fixed, nothing is

uniform, everything is special and arbitrary, settled by the lord of the

soil by virtue of his right of _justesse_, by which he undertook the

regulation and superintendence of the weights and measures in use in his

lordship."

Measures of length and contents often differed much from one another,

although they might be similarly named, and it would require very

complicated comparative tables approximately to fix their value. The _pied

de roi_ was from ten to twelve inches, and was the least varying measure.

The fathom differed much in different parts, and in the attempt to

determine the relations between the innumerable measures of contents which

we find recorded--a knowledge of which must have been necessary for the

commerce of the period--we are stopped by a labyrinth of incomprehensible

calculations, which it is impossible to determine with any degree of

certainty.

The weights were more uniform and less uncertain. The pound was everywhere

in use, but it was not everywhere of the same standard (Fig. 201). For

instance, at Paris it weighed sixteen ounces, whereas at Lyons it only

weighed fourteen; and in weighing silk fifteen ounces to the pound was

the rule. At Toulouse and in Upper Languedoc the pound was only thirteen

and a half ounces; at Marseilles, thirteen ounces; and at other places it

even fell to twelve ounces. There was in Paris a public scale called

_poids du roi_; but this scale, though a most important means of revenue,

was a great hindrance to retail trade.

In spite of these petty and irritating impediments, the commerce of France

extended throughout the whole world.

[Illustration: Fig. 197.--View of Lubeck and its Harbour (Sixteenth

Century).--From a Copper-plate in the Work of P. Bertius, "Commentaria

Rerum Germanicarum," in 4to: Amsterdam, 1616.]

The compass--known in Italy as early as the twelfth century, but little

used until the fourteenth--enabled the mercantile navy to discover new

routes, and it was thus that true maritime commerce may be said regularly

to have begun. The sailors of the Mediterranean, with the help of this

little instrument, dared to pass the Straits of Gibraltar, and to venture

on the ocean. From that moment commercial intercourse, which had

previously only existed by land, and that with great difficulty, was

permanently established between the northern and southern harbours of

Europe.

Flanders was the central port for merchant vessels, which arrived in great

numbers from the Mediterranean, and Bruges became the principal depôt.

The Teutonic league, the origin of which dates from the thirteenth

century, and which formed the most powerful confederacy recorded in

history, also sent innumerable vessels from its harbours of Lubeck (Fig.

197) and Hamburg. These carried the merchandise of the northern countries

into Flanders, and this rich province, which excelled in every branch of

industry, and especially in those relating to metals and weaving, became

the great market of Europe (Fig. 198).

The commercial movement, formerly limited to the shores of the

Mediterranean, extended to all parts, and gradually became universal. The

northern states shared in it, and England, which for a long time kept

aloof from a stage on which it was destined to play the first part, began

to give indications of its future commercial greatness. The number of

transactions increased as the facility for carrying them on became

greater. Consumption being extended, production progressively followed,

and so commerce went on gaining strength as it widened its sphere.

Everything, in fact, seemed to contribute to its expansion. The downfall

of the feudal system and the establishment in each country of a central

power, more or less strong and respected, enabled it to extend its

operations by land with a degree of security hitherto unknown; and, at the

same time, international legislation came in to protect maritime trade,

which was still exposed to great dangers. The sea, which was open freely

to the whole human race, gave robbers comparatively easy means of

following their nefarious practices, and with less fear of punishment than

they could obtain on the shore of civilised countries. For this reason

piracy continued its depredations long after the enactment of severe laws

for its suppression.

This maritime legislation did not wait for the sixteenth century to come

into existence. Maritime law was promulgated more or less in the twelfth

century, but the troubles and agitations which weakened and disorganized

empires during that period of the Middle Ages, deprived it of its power

and efficiency. The _Code des Rhodiens_ dates as far back as 1167; the

_Code de la Mer_, which became a sort of recognised text-book, dates from

the same period; the _Lois d'Oléron_ is anterior to the twelfth century,

and ruled the western coasts of France, being also adopted in Flanders and

in England; Venice dated her most ancient law on maritime rights from

1255, and the Statutes of Marseilles date from 1254.

[Illustration: Fig. 198.--Execution of the celebrated pirate Stoertebeck

and his seventy accomplices, in 1402, at Hamburg.--From a popular Picture

of the end of the Sixteenth Century (Hamburg Library).]

The period of the establishment of commercial law and justice

corresponds with that of the introduction of national and universal codes

of law and consular jurisdiction. These may be said to have originated in

the sixth century in the laws of the Visigoths, which empowered foreign

traders to be judged by delegates from their own countries. The Venetians

had consuls in the Greek empire as early as the tenth century, and we may

fairly presume that the French had consuls in Palestine during the reign

of Charlemagne. In the thirteenth century the towns of Italy had consular

agents in France; and Marseilles had them in Savoy, in Arles, and in

Genoa. Thus traders of each country were always sure of finding justice,

assistance, and protection in all the centres of European commerce.

Numerous facilities for barter were added to these advantages. Merchants,

who at first travelled with their merchandise, and who afterwards merely

sent a factor as their representative, finally consigned it to foreign

agents. Communication by correspondence in this way became more general,

and paper replaced parchment as being less rare and less expensive. The

introduction of Arabic figures, which were more convenient than the Roman

numerals for making calculations, the establishment of banks, of which the

most ancient was in operation in Venice as early as the twelfth century,

the invention of bills of exchange, attributed to the Jews, and generally

in use in the thirteenth century, the establishment of insurance against

the risks and perils of sea and land, and lastly, the formation of trading

companies, or what are now called partnerships, all tended to give

expansion and activity to commerce, whereby public and private wealth was

increased in spite of obstacles which routine, envy, and ill-will

persistently raised against great commercial enterprises.

For a long time the French, through indolence or antipathy--for it was

more to their liking to be occupied with arms and chivalry than with

matters of interest and profit--took but a feeble part in the trade which

was carried on so successfully on their own territory. The nobles were

ashamed to mix in commerce, considering it unworthy of them, and the

bourgeois, for want of liberal feeling and expansiveness in their ideas,

were satisfied with appropriating merely local trade. Foreign commerce,

even of the most lucrative description, was handed over to foreigners, and

especially to Jews, who were often banished from the kingdom and as

frequently ransomed, though universally despised and hated.

Notwithstanding this, they succeeded in rising to wealth under the stigma

of shame and infamy, and the immense gains which they realised by means of

usury reconciled them to, and consoled them for, the ill-treatment to

which they were subjected.

[Illustration: Fig. 199.--Discovery of America, 12th of May,

1492.--Columbus erects the Cross and baptizes the Isle of Guanahani (now

Cat Island, one of the Bahamas) by the Christian Name of St.

Salvador.--From a Stamp engraved on Copper by Th. de Bry, in the

Collection of "Grands Voyages," in folio, 1590.]

At a very early period, and especially when the Jews had been absolutely

expelled, the advantage of exclusively trading with and securing the rich

profits from France had attracted the Italians, who were frequently only

Jews in disguise, concealing themselves as to their character under the

generic name of Lombards. It was under this name that the French kings

gave them on different occasions various privileges, when they frequented

the fairs of Champagne and came to establish themselves in the inland and

seaport towns. These Italians constituted the great corporation of

money-changers in Paris, and hoarded in their coffers all the coin of the

kingdom, and in this way caused a perpetual variation in the value of

money, by which they themselves benefited.

In the sixteenth century the wars of Italy rather changed matters, and we

find royal and important concessions increasing in favour of Castilians

and other Spaniards, whom the people maliciously called _negroes_, and who

had emigrated in order to engage in commerce and manufactures in

Saintonge, Normandy, Burgundy, Agenois, and Languedoc.

About the time of Louis XI., the French, becoming more alive to their true

interests, began to manage their own affairs, following the suggestions

and advice of the King, whose democratic instincts prompted him to

encourage and favour the bourgeois. This result was also attributable to

the state of peace and security which then began to exist in the kingdom,

impoverished and distracted as it had been by a hundred years of domestic

and foreign warfare.

From 1365 to 1382 factories and warehouses were founded by Norman

navigators on the western coast of Africa, in Senegal and Guinea. Numerous

fleets of merchantmen, of great size for those days, were employed in

transporting cloth, grain of all kinds, knives, brandy, salt, and other

merchandise, which were bartered for leather, ivory, gum, amber, and gold

dust. Considerable profits were realised by the shipowners and merchants,

who, like Jacques Coeur, employed ships for the purpose of carrying on

these large and lucrative commercial operations. These facts sufficiently

testify the condition of France at this period, and prove that this, like

other branches of human industry, was arrested in its expansion by the

political troubles which followed in the fourteenth and fifteenth

centuries.

Fortunately these social troubles were not universal, and it was just at

the period when France was struggling and had become exhausted and

impoverished that the Portuguese extended their discoveries on the same

coast of Africa, and soon after succeeded in rounding the Cape of Good

Hope, and opening a new maritime road to India, a country which was always

attractive from the commercial advantages which it offered.

Some years after, Christopher Columbus, the Genoese, more daring and more

fortunate still, guided by the compass and impelled by his own genius,

discovered a new continent, the fourth continent of the world (Fig. 199).

This unexpected event, the greatest and most remarkable of the age,

necessarily enlarged the field for produce as well as for consumption to

an enormous extent, and naturally added, not only to the variety and

quantity of exchangeable wares, but also to the production of the precious

metals, and brought about a complete revolution in the laws of the whole

civilised world.

Maritime commerce immediately acquired an extraordinary development, and

merchants, forsaking the harbours of the Mediterranean, and even those of

the Levant, which then seemed to them scarcely worthy of notice, sent

their vessels by thousands upon the ocean in pursuit of the wonderful

riches of the New World. The day of caravans and coasting had passed;

Venice had lost its splendour; the sway of the Mediterranean was over; the

commerce of the world was suddenly transferred from the active and

industrious towns of that sea, which had so long monopolized it, to the

Western nations, to the Portuguese and Spaniards first, and then to the

Dutch and English.

France, absorbed in, and almost ruined by civil war, and above all by

religious dissensions, only played a subordinate part in this commercial

and pacific revolution, although it has been said that the sailors of

Dieppe and Honfleur really discovered America before Columbus.

Nevertheless the kings of France, Louis XII., Francis I., and Henry II.,

tried to establish and encourage transatlantic voyages, and to create, in

the interest of French commerce, colonies on the coasts of the New World,

from Florida and Virginia to Canada.

But these colonies had but a precarious and transitory existence;

fisheries alone succeeded, and French commerce continued insignificant,

circumscribed, and domestic, notwithstanding the increasing requirements

of luxury at court. This luxury contented itself with the use of the

merchandise which arrived from the Low Countries, Spain, and Italy.

National industry did all in its power to surmount this ignominious

condition; she specially turned her attention to the manufacture of silks

and of stuffs tissued with gold and silver. The only practical attempt of

the government in the sixteenth century to protect commerce and

manufactures was to forbid the import of foreign merchandise, and to

endeavour to oppose the progress of luxury by rigid enactments.

Certainly the government of that time little understood the advantages

which a country derived from commerce when it forbade the higher classes

from engaging in mercantile pursuits under penalty of having their

privileges of nobility withdrawn from them. In the face of the examples of

Italy, Genoa, Venice, and especially of Florence, where the nobles were

all traders or sons of traders, the kings of the line of Valois thought

proper to make this enactment. The desire seemed to be to make the

merchant class a separate class, stationary, and consisting exclusively of

bourgeois, shut up in their counting-houses, and prevented in every way

from participating in public life. The merchants became indignant at this

banishment, and, in order to employ their leisure, they plunged with all

their energy into the sanguinary struggles of Reform and of the League.

[Illustration: Fig. 200.--Medal to commemorate the Association of the

Merchants of the City of Rouen.]

It was not until the reign of Henry IV. that they again confined

themselves to their occupations as merchants, when Sully published the

political suggestions of his master for renewing commercial prosperity.

From this time a new era commenced in the commercial destiny of France.

Commerce, fostered and protected by statesmen, sought to extend its

operations with greater freedom and power. Companies were formed at Paris,

Marseilles, Lyons, and Rouen to carry French merchandise all over the

world, and the rules of the mercantile associations, in spite of the

routine and jealousies which guided the trade corporations, became the

code which afterwards regulated commerce (Fig. 200).

[Illustration: Fig. 201.--Standard Weight in Brass of the Fish-market at

Mans: Sign of the Syren (End of the Sixteenth Century).]

Guilds and Trade Corporations.

Uncertain Origin of Corporations.--Ancient Industrial Associations.--The

Germanic Guild.--Colleges.--Teutonic Associations.--The Paris Company

for the Transit of Merchandise by Water.--Corporations properly so

called.--Etienne Boileau's "Book of Trades," or the First Code of

Regulations.--The Laws governing Trades.--Public and Private

Organization of Trade Corporations and other Communities.--Energy of the

Corporations.--Masters, Journeymen, Supernumeraries, and

Apprentices.--Religious Festivals and Trade Societies.--Trade Unions.

Learned authorities have frequently discussed, without agreeing, on the

question of the origin of the Corporations of the Middle Ages. It may be

admitted, we think _à priori_, that associations of artisans were as

ancient as the trades themselves. It may readily be imagined that the

numerous members of the industrial classes, having to maintain and defend

their common rights and common interests, would have sought to establish

mutual fraternal associations among themselves. The deeper we dive into

ancient history the clearer we perceive traces, more or less distinct, of

these kinds of associations. To cite only two examples, which may serve to

some extent as an historical parallel to the analogous institutions of the

present day, we may mention the Roman _Colleges_, which were really

leagues of artisans following the same calling; and the Scandinavian

guilds, whose object was to assimilate the different branches of industry

and trade, either of a city or of some particular district.

Indeed, brotherhoods amongst the labouring classes always existed under

the German conquerors from the moment when Europe, so long divided into

Roman provinces, shook off the yoke of subjection to Rome, although she

still adhered to the laws and customs of the nation which had held her in

subjection for so many generations. We can, however, only regard the few

traces which remain of these brotherhoods as evidence of their having

once existed, and not as indicative of their having been in a flourishing

state. In the fifth century, the Hermit Ampelius, in his "Legends of the

Saints," mentions _Consuls_ or Chiefs of Locksmiths. The Corporation of

Goldsmiths is spoken of as existing in the first dynasty of the French

kings. Bakers are named collectively in 630 in the laws of Dagobert, which

seems to show that they formed a sort of trade union at that remote

period. We also see Charlemagne, in several of his statutes, taking steps

in order that the number of persons engaged in providing food of different

kinds should everywhere be adequate to provide for the necessities of

consumption, which would tend to show a general organization of that most

important branch of industry. In Lombardy colleges of artisans were

established at an early period, and were, no doubt, on the model of the

Roman ones. Ravenna, in 943, possessed a College of Fishermen; and ten

years later the records of that town mention a _Chief of the Corporation

of Traders_, and, in 1001, a _Chief of the Corporation of Butchers_.

France at the same time kept up a remembrance of the institutions of Roman

Gaul, and the ancient colleges of trades still formed associations and

companies in Paris and in the larger towns. In 1061 King Philip I. granted

certain privileges to Master Chandlers and Oilmen. The ancient customs of

the butchers are mentioned as early as the time of Louis VII., 1162. The

same king granted to the wife of Ives Laccobre and her heirs the

collectorship of the dues which were payable by tanners, purse-makers,

curriers, and shoemakers. Under Philip Augustus similar concessions became

more frequent, and it is evident that at that time trade was beginning to

take root and to require special and particular administration. This led

to regulations being drawn up for each trade, to which Philip Augustus

gave his sanction. In 1182 he confirmed the statutes of the butchers, and

the furriers and drapers also obtained favourable concessions from him.

According to the learned Augustin Thierry, corporations, like civic

communities, were engrafted on previously existing guilds, such as on the

colleges or corporations of workmen, which were of Roman origin. In the

_guild_, which signifies a banquet at common expense, there was a mutual

assurance against misfortunes and injuries of all sorts, such as fire and

shipwreck, and also against all lawsuits incurred for offences and crimes,

even though they were proved against the accused. Each of these

associations was placed under the patronage of a god or of a hero, and

had its compulsory statutes; each had its chief or president chosen from

among the members, and a common treasury supplied by annual contributions.

Roman colleges, as we have already stated, were established with a more

special purpose, and were more exclusively confined to the peculiar trade

to which they belonged; but these, equally with the guilds, possessed a

common exchequer, enjoyed equal rights and privileges, elected their own

presidents, and celebrated in common their sacrifices, festivals, and

banquets. We have, therefore, good reason for agreeing in the opinion of

the celebrated historian, who considers that in the establishment of a

corporation "the guild should be to a certain degree the motive power, and

the Roman college, with its organization, the material which should be

used to bring it into existence."

[Illustration: Fig. 202.--Craftsmen in the Fourteenth Century--Fac-simile

of a Miniature of a Manuscript in the Library of Brussels.]

It is certain, however, that during several centuries corporations were

either dissolved or hidden from public notice, for they almost entirely

disappeared from the historic records during the partial return to

barbarism, when the production of objects of daily necessity and the

preparation of food were entrusted to slaves under the eye of their

master. Not till the twelfth century did they again begin to flourish,

and, as might be supposed, it was Italy which gave the signal for the

resuscitation of the institutions whose birthplace had been Rome, and

which barbarism had allowed to fall into decay. Brotherhoods of artisans

were also founded at an early period in the north of Gaul, whence they

rapidly spread beyond the Rhine. Under the Emperor Henry I., that is,

during the tenth century, the ordinary condition of artisans in Germany

was still serfdom; but two centuries later the greater number of trades in

most of the large towns of the empire had congregated together in colleges

or bodies under the name of unions (_Einnungen_ or _Innungen_) (Fig. 202),

as, for example, at Gozlar, at Würzburg, at Brunswick, &c. These colleges,

however, were not established without much difficulty and without the

energetic resistance of the ruling powers, inasmuch as they often raised

their pretensions so high as to wish to substitute their authority for the

senatorial law, and thus to grasp the government of the cities. The

thirteenth century witnessed obstinate and sanguinary feuds between these

two parties, each of which was alternately victorious. Whichever had the

upper hand took advantage of the opportunity to carry out the most cruel

reprisals against its defeated opponents. The Emperors Frederick II. and

Henry VII. tried to put an end to these strifes by abolishing the

corporations of workmen, but these powerful associations fearlessly

opposed the imperial authority. In France the organization of communities

of artisans, an organization which in many ways was connected with the

commercial movement, but which must not be confounded with it, did not

give rise to any political difficulty. It seems not even to have met with

any opposition from the feudal powers, who no doubt found it an easy

pretext for levying additional rates and taxes.

The most ancient of these corporations was the Parisian _Hanse_, or

corporation of the bourgeois for canal navigation, which probably dates

its origin back to the college of Parisian _Nautes_, existing before the

Roman conquest. This mercantile association held its meetings in the

island of Lutetia, on the very spot where the church of Notre-Dame was

afterwards built. From the earliest days of monarchy tradesmen constituted

entirely the bourgeois of the towns (Fig. 203). Above them were the

nobility or clergy, beneath them the artisans. Hence we can understand how

the bourgeois, who during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries were a

distinct section of the community, became at last the important commercial

body itself. The kings invariably treated them with favour. Louis VI.

granted them new rights, Louis VII. confirmed their ancient privileges,

and Philip Augustus increased them. The Parisian Hanse succeeded in

monopolising all the commerce which was carried on by water on the Seine

and the Yonne between Mantes and Auxerre. No merchandise coming up or down

the stream in boats could be disembarked in the interior of Paris without

becoming, as it were, the property of the corporation, which, through its

agents, superintended its measurement and its sale in bulk, and, up to a

certain point, its sale by retail. No foreign merchant was permitted to

send his goods to Paris without first obtaining _lettres de Hanse_,

whereby he had associated with him a bourgeois of the town, who acted as

his guarantee, and who shared in his profits.

[Illustration: Fig. 203.--Merchants or Tradesmen of the Fourteenth

Century.--Fac-simile of a Miniature in a Manuscript of the Library at

Brussels.]

There were associations of the same kind in most of the commercial towns

situated on the banks of rivers and on the sea-coast, as, for example, at

Rouen, Arles, Marseilles, Narbonne, Toulouse, Ratisbon, Augsburg, and

Utrecht. Sometimes neighbouring towns, such as the great manufacturing

cities of Flanders, agreed together and entered into a leagued bond, which

gave them greater power, and constituted an offensive and defensive

compact (Fig. 204). A typical example of this last institution is that of

the commercial association of the _Hanseatic Towns_ of Germany, which were

grouped together to the number of eighty around their four capitals, viz.,

Lubeck, Cologne, Dantzic, and Brunswick.

[Illustration: Fig. 204.--Seal of the United Trades of Ghent (End of the

Fifteenth Century).]

Although, as we have already seen, previous to the thirteenth century many

of the corporations of artisans had been authorised by several of the

kings of France to make special laws whereby they might govern themselves,

it was really only from the reign of St. Louis that the first general

measures of administration and police relating to these communities can be

dated. The King appointed Etienne Boileau, a rich bourgeois, provost of

the capital in 1261, to set to work to establish order, wise

administration, and "good faith" in the commerce of Paris. To this end he

ascertained from the verbal testimony of the senior members of each

corporation the customs and usages of the various crafts, which for the

most part up to that time had not been committed to writing. He arranged

and probably amended them in many ways, and thus composed the famous "Book

of Trades," which, as M. Depping, the able editor of this valuable

compilation, first published in 1837, says, "has the advantage of being to

a great extent the genuine production of the corporations themselves, and

not a list of rules established and framed by the municipal or judicial

authorities." From that time corporations gradually introduced themselves

into the order of society. The royal decrees in their favour were

multiplied, and the regulations with regard to mechanical trades daily

improved, not only in Paris and in the provinces, and also abroad, both in

the south and in the north of Europe, especially in Italy, Germany,

England, and the Low Countries (Figs. 205 to 213).

Etienne Boileau's "Book of Trades" contained the rules of one hundred

different trade associations. It must be observed, however, that several

of the most important trades, such as the butchers, tanners, glaziers,

&c., were omitted, either because they neglected to be registered at the

Châtelet, where the inquiry superintended by Boileau was made, or because

some private interest induced them to keep aloof from this registration,

which probably imposed some sort of fine and a tax upon them. In the

following century the number of trade associations considerably increased,

and wonderfully so during the reigns of the last of the Valois and the

first of the Bourbons.

The historian of the antiquities of Paris, Henry Sauval, enumerated no

fewer than fifteen hundred and fifty-one trade associations in the capital

alone in the middle of the seventeenth century. It must be remarked,

however, that the societies of artisans were much subdivided owing to the

simple fact that each craft could only practise its own special work.

Thus, in Boileau's book, we find four different corporations of

_patenôtriers_, or makers of chaplets, six of hatters, six of weavers, &c.

Besides these societies of artisans, there were in Paris a few privileged

corporations, which occupied a more important position, and were known

under the name of _Corps des Marchands_. Their number at first frequently

varied, but finally it was settled at six, and they were termed _les Six

Corps_. They comprised the drapers, which always took precedence of the

five others, the grocers, the mercers, the furriers, the hatters, and the

goldsmiths. These five for a long time disputed the question of

precedence, and finally they decided the matter by lot, as they were not

able to agree in any other way.

[Illustration: Fig. 205.--Seal of the Corporation of Carpenters of St.

Trond (Belgium)--From an Impression preserved in the Archives of that Town

(1481).]

[Illustration: Fig. 206.--Seal of the Corporation of Shoemakers of St.

Trond, from a Map of 1481, preserved in the Archives of that Town.]

[Illustration: Fig. 207.--Seal of the Corporation of Wool-weavers of

Hasselt (Belgium), from a Parchment Title-deed of June 25, 1574.]

[Illustration: Fig. 208.--Seal of the Corporation of Clothworkers of

Bruges (1356).--From an Impression preserved in the Archives of that

Town.]

[Illustration: Fig. 209.--Seal of the Corporation of Fullers of St. Trond

(about 1350).--From an Impression preserved in the Archives of that Town.]

[Illustration: Fig. 210.--Seal of the Corporation of Joiners of Bruges

(1356).--From an Impression preserved in the Archives of that Town.]

[Illustration: Fig. 211.--Token of the Corporation of Carpenters of

Maestricht.]

[Illustration: Fig. 212.--Token of the Corporation of Carpenters of

Antwerp.]

[Illustration: Fig. 213.--Funeral Token of the Corporation of Carpenters

of Maestricht.]

Trades.

Fac-simile of Engravings on Wood, designed and engraved by J. Amman, in

the Sixteenth Century.

[Illustration: Fig. 214.--Cloth-worker.]

[Illustration: Fig. 215.--Tailor.]

[Illustration: Fig. 216.--Hatter.]

[Illustration: Fig. 217.--Dyer.]

[Illustration: Fig. 218.--Druggist]

[Illustration: Fig. 219.--Barber]

[Illustration: Fig. 220.--Goldsmith]

[Illustration: Fig. 221.--Goldbeater]

[Illustration: Fig. 222.--Pin and Needle Maker.]

[Illustration: Fig. 223.--Clasp-maker.]

[Illustration: Fig. 224.--Wire-worker.]

[Illustration: Fig. 225.--Dice-maker.]

[Illustration: Fig. 226.--Sword-maker.]

[Illustration: Fig. 227.--Armourer.]

[Illustration: Fig. 228.--Spur-maker.]

[Illustration: Fig. 229.--Shoemaker.]

[Illustration: Fig. 230.--Basin-maker.]

[Illustration: Fig. 231.--Tinman.]

[Illustration: Fig. 232.--Coppersmith.]

[Illustration: Fig. 233.--Bell and Cannon Caster.]

Apart from the privilege which these six bodies of merchants exclusively

enjoyed of being called upon to appear, though at their own expense, in

the civic processions and at the public ceremonials, and to carry the

canopy over the heads of kings, queens, or princes on their state entry

into the capital (Fig. 234), it would be difficult to specify the nature

of the privileges which were granted to them, and of which they were so

jealous. It is clear, however, that these six bodies were imbued with a

kind of aristocratic spirit which made them place trading much above

handicraft in their own class, and set a high value on their calling as

merchants. Thus contemporary historians tell us that any merchant who

compromised the dignity of the company "fell into the class of the lower

orders;" that mercers boasted of excluding from their body the

upholsterers, "who were but artisans;" that hatters, who were admitted

into the _Six Corps_ to replace one of the other trades, became in

consequence "merchants instead of artisans, which they had been up to that

time."

Notwithstanding the statutes so carefully compiled and revised by Etienne

Boileau and his successors, and in spite of the numerous arbitrary rules

which the sovereigns, the magistrates, and the corporations themselves

strenuously endeavoured to frame, order and unity were far from governing

the commerce and industry of Paris during the Middle Ages, and what took

place in Paris generally repeated itself elsewhere. Serious disputes

continually arose between the authorities and those amenable to their

jurisdiction, and between the various crafts themselves, notwithstanding

the relation which they bore to each other from the similarity of their

employments.

In fact in this, as in many other matters, social disorder often emanated

from the powers whose duty it was in the first instance to have repressed

it. Thus, at the time when Philip Augustus extended the boundaries of his

capital so as to include the boroughs in it, which until then had been

separated from the city, the lay and clerical lords, under whose feudal

dominion those districts had hitherto been placed, naturally insisted upon

preserving all their rights. So forcibly did they do this that the King

was obliged to recognise their claims; and in several boroughs, including

the Bourg l'Abbé, the Beau Bourg, the Bourg St. Germain, and the Bourg

Auxerrois, &c., there were trade associations completely distinct from and

independent of those of ancient Paris. If we simply limit our examination

to that of the condition of the trade associations which held their

authority immediately from royalty, we still see that the causes of

confusion were by no means trifling; for the majority of the high officers

of the crown, acting as delegates of the royal authority, were always

disputing amongst themselves the right of superintending, protecting,

judging, punishing, and, above all, of exacting tribute from the members

of the various trades. The King granted to various officers the privilege

of arbitrarily disposing of the freedom of each trade for their own

profit, and thereby gave them power over all the merchants and craftsmen

who were officially connected with them, not only in Paris, but also

throughout the whole kingdom. Thus the lord chamberlain had jurisdiction

over the drapers, mercers, furriers, shoemakers, tailors, and other

dealers in articles of wearing apparel; the barbers were governed by the

king's varlet and barber; the head baker was governor over the bakers; and

the head butler over the wine merchants.

[Illustration: Fig. 234.--Group of Goldsmiths preceding the _Chasse de St.

Marcel_ in the Reign of Louis XIII.--From a Copper-plate of the Period

(Cabinet of Stamps in the National Library of Paris).]

These state officers granted freedoms to artisans, or, in other words,

they gave them the right to exercise such and such a craft with assistants

or companions, exacting for the performance of this trifling act a very

considerable tax. And, as they preferred receiving their revenues without

the annoyance of having direct communication with their humble subjects,

they appointed deputies, who were authorised to collect them in their

names.

The most celebrated of these deputies were the _rois des merciers_, who

lived on the fat of the land in complete idleness, and who were surrounded

by a mercantile court, which appeared in all its splendour at the trade

festivals.

[Illustration: Fig. 235.--Banner of the Corporation of the United Boot and

Shoe Makers of Issoudun.]

The great officers of the crown exercised in their own interests, and

without a thought for the public advantage, a complete magisterial

jurisdiction over all crafts; they adjudicated in disputes arising between

masters and men, decided quarrels, visited, either personally or through

their deputies, the houses of the merchants, in order to discover frauds

or infractions in the rules of the trade, and levied fines accordingly. We

must remember that the collectors of court dues had always to contend for

the free exercise of their jurisdiction against the provost of Paris, who

considered their acquisitions of authority as interfering with his

personal prerogatives, and who therefore persistently opposed them on all

occasions. For instance, if the head baker ordered an artisan of the same

trade to be imprisoned in the Châtelet, the high provost, who was governor

of the prison, released him immediately; and, in retaliation, if the high

provost punished a baker, the chief baker warmly espoused his

subordinate's cause. At other times the artisans, if they were

dissatisfied with the deputy appointed by the great officer of the crown,

whose dependents they were, would refuse to recognise his authority. In

this way constant quarrels and interminable lawsuits occurred, and it is

easy to understand the disorder which must have arisen from such a state

of things. By degrees, however, and in consequence of the new tendencies

of royalty, which were simply directed to the diminution of feudal power,

the numerous jurisdictions relating to the various trades gradually

returned to the hand of the municipal provostship; and this concentration

of power had the best results, as well for the public good as for that of

the corporations themselves.

Having examined into corporations collectively and also into their general

administration, we will now turn to consider their internal organization.

It was only after long and difficult struggles that these trade

associations succeeded in taking a definite and established position;

without, however, succeeding at any time in organizing themselves as one

body on the same basis and with the same privileges. Therefore, in

pointing out the influential character of these institutions generally, we

must omit various matters specially connected with individual

associations, which it would be impossible to mention in this brief

sketch.

In the fourteenth century, the period when the communities of crafts were

at the height of their development and power, no association of artisans

could legally exist without a license either from the king, the lord, the

prince, the abbot, the bailiff, or the mayor of the district in which it

proposed to establish itself.

[Illustration: Fig. 236.--Banner of the Tilers of Paris, with the

Armorial Bearings of the Corporation.]

[Illustration: Fig. 237.--Banner of the Nail-makers of Paris, with

Armorial Bearings of the Corporation.]

[Illustration: Fig. 238.--Banner of the Harness-makers of Paris, with the

Armorial Bearings of the Corporation.]

[Illustration: Fig. 239.--Banner of the Wheelwrights of Paris, with the

Armoral Bearings of the Corporation.]

[Illustration: Fig. 240.--Banner of the Tanners of Vie, with the Patron

Saint of the Corporation.]

[Illustration: Fig. 241.--Banner of the Weavers of Poulon, with the Patron

Saint of the Corporation.]

These communities had their statutes and privileges; they were

distinguished at public ceremonials by their _liveries_ or special dress,

as well as by their arms and banners (Figs. 235 to 241). They possessed

the right freely to discuss their general interests, and at meetings

composed of all their members they might modify their statutes, provided

that such changes were confirmed by the King or by the authorities. It was

also necessary that these meetings, at which the royal delegates were

present, should be duly authorised; and, lastly, so as to render the

communication between members more easy, and to facilitate everything

which concerned the interests of the craft, artisans of the same trade

usually resided in the same quarter of the town, and even in the same

street. The names of many streets in Paris and other towns of France

testify to this custom, which still partially exists in the towns of

Germany and Italy.

[Illustration: Fig. 242.--Ceremonial Dress of an Elder and a Juror of the

Corporation of Old Shoemakers of Ghent.]

The communities of artisans had, to a certain extent, the character and

position of private individuals. They had the power in their corporate

capacity of holding and administrating property, of defending or bringing

actions at law, of accepting inheritances, &c.; they disbursed from a

common treasury, which was supplied by legacies, donations, fines, and

periodical subscriptions.

These communities exercised in addition, through their jurors, a

magisterial authority, and even, under some circumstances, a criminal

jurisdiction over their members. For a long time they strove to extend

this last power or to keep it independent of municipal control and the

supreme courts, by which it was curtailed to that of exercising a simple

police authority strictly confined to persons or things relating to the

craft. They carefully watched for any infractions of the rules of the

trade. They acted as arbitrators between master and man, particularly in

quarrels when the parties had had recourse to violence. The functions of

this kind of domestic magistracy were exercised by officers known under

various names, such as _kings, masters, elders, guards, syndics_, and

_jurors_, who were besides charged to visit the workshops at any hour they

pleased in order to see that the laws concerning the articles of

workmanship were observed. They also received the taxes for the benefit of

the association; and, lastly, they examined the apprentices and installed

masters into their office (Fig. 242).

The jurors, or syndics, as they were more usually called, and whose number

varied according to the importance of numerical force of the corporation,

were generally elected by the majority of votes of their fellow-workmen,

though sometimes the choice of these was entirely in the hands of the

great officers of state. It was not unfrequent to find women amongst the

dignitaries of the arts and crafts; and the professional tribunals, which

decided every question relative to the community and its members, were

often held by an equal number of masters and associate craftsmen. The

jealous, exclusive, and inflexible spirit of caste, which in the Middle

Ages is to be seen almost everywhere, formed one of the principal features

of industrial associations. The admission of new members was surrounded

with conditions calculated to restrict the number of associates and to

discourage candidates. The sons of masters alone enjoyed hereditary

privileges, in consequence of which they were always allowed to be

admitted without being subjected to the tyrannical yoke of the

association.

[Illustration: Martyrdom of SS. Crispin and Crépinien.