The trading post is an old and influential institution. Established in
the midst of an undeveloped society by a more advanced people, it is a
center not only of new economic influences, but also of all the
transforming forces that accompany the intercourse of a higher with a
lower civilization. The Phoenicians developed the institution into a
great historic agency. Closely associated with piracy at first, their
commerce gradually freed itself from this and spread throughout the
Mediterranean lands. A passage in the Odyssey (Book XV.) enables us to
trace the genesis of the Phoenician trading post:
"Thither came the Phoenicians, mariners renowned, greedy merchant-men
with countless trinkets in a black ship.... They abode among us a whole
year, and got together much wealth in their hollow ship. And when their
hollow ship was now laden to depart, they sent a messenger.... There
came a man versed in craft to my father's house with a golden chain
strung here and there with amber beads. Now, the maidens in the hall and
my lady mother were handling the chain and gazing on it and offering him
their price."
It would appear that the traders at first sailed from port to port,
bartering as they went. After a time they stayed at certain profitable
places a twelvemonth, still trading from their ships. Then came the
fixed factory, and about it grew the trading colony.[2] The Phoenician
trading post wove together the fabric of oriental civilization, brought
arts and the alphabet to Greece, brought the elements of civilization to
northern Africa, and disseminated eastern culture through the
Mediterranean system of lands. It blended races and customs, developed
commercial confidence, fostered the custom of depending on outside
nations for certain supplies, and afforded a means of peaceful
intercourse between societies naturally hostile.
Carthaginian, Greek, Etruscan and Roman trading posts continued the
process. By traffic in amber, tin, furs, etc., with the tribes of the
north of Europe, a continental commerce was developed. The routes of
this trade have been ascertained.[3] For over a thousand years before
the migration of the peoples Mediterranean commerce had flowed along the
interlacing river valleys of Europe, and trading posts had been
established. Museums show how important an effect was produced upon the
economic life of northern Europe by this intercourse. It is a
significant fact that the routes of the migration of the peoples were to
a considerable extent the routes of Roman trade, and it is well worth
inquiry whether this commerce did not leave more traces upon Teutonic
society than we have heretofore considered, and whether one cause of the
migrations of the peoples has not been neglected.[4]
That stage in the development of society when a primitive people comes
into contact with a more advanced people deserves more study than has
been given to it. As a factor in breaking the "cake of custom" the
meeting of two such societies is of great importance; and if, with
Starcke,[5] we trace the origin of the family to economic
considerations, and, with Schrader,[6] the institution of guest
friendship to the same source, we may certainly expect to find important
influences upon primitive society arising from commerce with a higher
people. The extent to which such commerce has affected all peoples is
remarkable. One may study the process from the days of Phoenicia to
the days of England in Africa,[7] but nowhere is the material more
abundant than in the history of the relations of the Europeans and the
American Indians. The Phoenician factory, it is true, fostered the
development of the Mediterranean civilization, while in America the
trading post exploited the natives. The explanation of this difference
is to be sought partly in race differences, partly in the greater gulf
that separated the civilization of the European from the civilization of
the American Indian as compared with that which parted the early Greeks
and the Phoenicians. But the study of the destructive effect of the
trading post is valuable as well as the study of its elevating
influences; in both cases the effects are important and worth
investigation and comparison.