The history of western civilization is so closely connected with the development of the great routes of travel and the growth of commerce that one cannot possibly separate them. Commerce cannot exist without the intercourse of peoples, and peoples cannot be in mutual communication unless each learns from the other.

Feudalism.—When the Roman Empire fell civilization in western Europe was not on a high plane; indeed, the feudalism that followed was not much above barbarism. The people were living in a manner that was not very much unlike the communal system under which the serfs of Russia lived only a few years ago. Each centre of population was a sort of military camp governed by a feudal lord. The followers and retainers were scarcely better off than slaves; indeed, many of them were slaves. There was no ownership of the land except by the feudal lords, and the latter were responsible for their acts to the king only.

But very few people cared to be absolutely free, because they had but little chance to protect themselves; so it was the common custom to attach one's self to a feudal lord in order to have his protection; even a sort of peonage or slavery under him was better than no protection at all. A few of the people were engaged in trade and manufacture of some kind or other, and they were the only ones through whom the feudal lord could supply himself with the commodities needed for his retainers and the luxuries necessary to himself.

Each feudal estate, therefore, became a sort of industrial centre by itself, producing its own food-stuffs and much of the coarser manufactures. It was not a very high condition of enlightenment, but it was much better than the one which preceded it, for at least it offered protection. It encouraged a certain amount of trade and commerce, because the feudal lord had many wants, and he was usually willing to protect the merchant who supplied them.

The Crusades and Commerce.—The Crusades, or wars by which the Christians sought to recover the Holy Land from the Turk, resulted in a trade between Europe and India that grew to wonderful proportions. Silk fabrics, cotton cloth, precious stones, ostrich plumes, ivory, spices, and drugs—all of which were practically unknown in Europe—were eagerly sought by the nobility and their dependencies. In return, linen and woollen fabrics, leather goods, glassware, blacklead, and steel implements were carried to the far East.

Milan, Florence, Venice and Genoa, Constantinople and a number of less important towns along the Mediterranean basin became important trade centres, but Venice and Genoa grew to be world powers in commerce. Not only were they great receiving and distributing depots of trade, but they were great manufacturing centres as well.

The routes over which this enormous commerce was carried were few in number. For the greater part, the Venetian trade went to Alexandria, and thence by the Red Sea to India. Genoese merchants sent their goods to Constantinople and Trebizond, thence down the Tigris River to the Persian Gulf and to India. There was also another route that had been used by the Phoenicians. It extended from Tyre through Damascus and Palmyra[2] to the head of the Persian Gulf; this gradually fell into disuse after the founding of Alexandria.

The general effects of this trade were very far-reaching. To the greater number of the people of Europe, the countries of India, China, and Japan were mythical. According to tradition they were infested with dragons and gryphons, and peopled by dog-headed folk or by one-eyed Arimaspians. About the first real information of them to be spread over Europe was brought by Marco Polo, whose father and uncle had travelled all through these countries during the latter part of the thirteenth century.[3] Marco Polo's writings were very widely read, and influenced a great many people who could not be reached through the ordinary channels of commerce. So between the wars of the Crusades on the one hand, and the growth of commerce on the other, a new and a better civilization began to spread over Europe.

The Turkish Invasions.—But the magnificent trade that had thus grown up was checked for a time by an unforeseen factor. The half-savage Turkomans living southeast of Russia had become converted to the religion of Islam, and in their zeal for the new belief, determined to destroy the commerce which seemed to be connected with Christianity. So they moved in upon the borderland between Europe and Asia, and one after another the trade routes were tightly closed. Then they captured Constantinople, and the routes between Genoa and the Orient were hermetically sealed. Moslem power also spread over Syria and Egypt, and so, little by little, the trade of Venice was throttled.

Now a commerce that involved not only many millions of dollars, but the employment of thousands of people as well, is not likely to be given up without a struggle. So the energy that had been devoted to this great trade was turned in a new direction, and there began a search for a new route to India—one that the Turks could not blockade.

The Search for an All-Water Route to India.—Overland routes were out of the question; there were none that could be made available, and so the search was made for a sea-route. Rather singularly the Venetians and Genoese, who had hitherto controlled this trade, took no part in the search; it was conducted by the Spanish and the Portuguese.

The Spanish monarchs, Ferdinand and Isabella of Castile, fitted out an expedition under Christopher Columbus, a master-mariner and cartographer, the funds being provided by Isabella, who pledged her private property as security for the cost of the expedition. This expedition resulted in the discovery, October 10–21, 1492, of the West India Islands. In a subsequent voyage, Columbus discovered the mainland of South America.

Even before the voyage of Columbus, the Portuguese had been trying to find a way around Africa to India, and Pope Eugenius IV. had conferred on Portugal "all heathen lands from Cape Bojador eastward even to the Indies." Little by little, therefore, Portuguese navigators were pushing southward until, in 1487, Bartholomew Dias sighted the Cape of Good Hope, and got about as far as Algoa Bay. Then he unwillingly turned back because of the threats of his crew. It was a most remarkable voyage, and one of the shipmates of Dias was Bartholomew Columbus, a brother of the discoverer of the New World.

Ten years later, or five years after the voyage of Columbus, Vasco da Gama sailed from Lisbon for the Cape of Good Hope. As he passed the Cape he was terribly storm-tossed, but the storms carried him in a fortunate direction. And when at last he got his reckonings, he was off the coast of India; he therefore kept along the coast until in sight of a port. The port was the well-known city of Calicut. Two years later he returned to Europe by the same route, his ships laden with spices, precious stones, beautiful tapestries and brocades, ivory and bronzes. The long-sought sea-route to India had been discovered.

Commerce in Western Europe.—After the discovery of the new route, Venice and Genoa were scarcely heard of in relation to commerce; they lost everything and gained nothing. The great commerce with the Orient was to have a new western terminus, and the latter was to be on the shores of the North and Baltic Seas.

The commerce between Europe and India stimulated trade in western Europe as well. As early as the twelfth century the manufacture of linen and woollen cloth had grown to be a very important industry that had resulted in the rapid growth of population. The older cities grew rapidly, and new ones sprang up wherever the commodities of trade were gathered, manufactured, or distributed.

These centres of trade had two hostile elements against them. The feudal lords used to pillage them legally by extorting heavy taxes and forced loans whenever their treasuries were empty. The portionless brothers and relatives of the feudal lords, to whom no employments save war, adventure, and piracy were open, pillaged them illegally. Along the coasts especially, piracy was considered not only a legitimate, but a genteel, profession. So in order to protect themselves, the cities began to join themselves into leagues.

The Hanse League.—About the beginning of the thirteenth century[4] Hamburg and LÜbeck formed an alliance afterward called a hansa; at the beginning of the fourteenth century it embraced seventy cities, having the capital at LÜbeck. At the time of its greatest power the League embraced all the principal cities of western Europe nearly as far south as the Danube. Large agencies, called "factories," were established in London, Bruges, Novgorod, Bergen, and Wisby. The influence of the League practically controlled western Europe.

The Hanse League performed a wonderful work. It stopped piracy on the seas and robbery on the land. Industrially, it encouraged self-government and obedience to constitutional authority. Shipbuilding and navigation so greatly improved that the ocean traffic resulting from the discovery of the cape route to India quickly fell into the hands of Hanse sailors and master-mariners. The League not only encouraged and protected all sorts of manufactures, but its schools trained thousands of operatives. The mines were worked and the idle land cultivated. It was the greatest industrial movement that ever occurred.

Socially, the Hanse League brought the wealth that gave those comforts and conveniences before unknown. The standards of social life, education, art, and science were raised from a condition scarcely better than barbarism to a high plane of civilization. Indeed, the civilization of western Europe was the most important result of it.

It forced the rights of individual freedom, as well as municipal independence, from more than one monarch, and punished severely the kings who sought to betray it. It crushed the power of those who opposed it,[5] and rewarded those who were faithful to it. Its most important mission, however, was the overthrow of feudalism and the gradual substitution of popular government in its place.

Having accomplished the regeneration of Europe, the Hanse League died partly by its own hand, because of its arrogance, but mainly from the fact that, having educated western Europe to self-government and commercial independence, there was no longer need for its existence. Independent cities grew rapidly into importance, and these got along very well without the protection of the League. The great industrial progress was at times temporarily checked by wars, but it never took a backward step. Indeed the progress of commerce has always been a contest between brains and brute force, and in such a struggle there is never any doubt about the final outcome.

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

COLLATERAL READING[6]