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Ragusa and the Portuguese Spice Trade

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 June 2017

Nicholas Mirkovich
Nicholas Mirkovich*
Affiliation:
The University of California
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Extract

Note: This article summarizes the result of a part of the author's research in the economic history of the Serbian lands and the Republic of Ragusa (Dubrovnik). The work was begun in Yugoslavia in 1938 and then continued, with interruptions, in England and the United States. It is the special aim of the author to investigate documents and reconstruct the commercial history of Ragusa during the period of the Commercial Revolution, principally the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, in connection with the discoveries and the colonization of America. It is almost unknown that Ragusa was one of the principal commercial and naval powers in the period 1510–1667 and that it played an important role in the history of Brazil, the Caribbean, and the West Indies in general. The same goes for England, the Netherlands, Spain, and other regions. The author will center his work around three regions in which the role of Ragusan commerce and navigation was of extreme importance: (a) Spain and America, (b) England and the Netherlands, and (c) the Levant and the East Indies.

Type
Research Article
Information
Slavonic and East European Review American Series , Volume 2 , March 1943 , pp. 174 - 187
Copyright
Copyright © Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies 1943

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References

1 Mirkovich, N., “Economic Growth of the Pacific Area,” Pacific Affairs, XIII, 4 (December, 1940), 458–460 Google Scholar.

2 Lane, F. C., “The Mediterranean Spice Trade,” American Historical Review, XLV, 3 (April, 1940), 581–590 Google Scholar.

3 Haebler, K., Die überseeischen Unternehmungen der Welser und ihrer Gesellschafter (Leipzig, 1903), pp. 24–25 Google Scholar.

4 de Lannoy, C. and Vander Linden, H., Histoire de l‘expansion coloniale des peuples européens: Portugal et Espagne (Brussels and Paris, 1907), p. 59 Google Scholar.

5 The attempt was of a later date, about 1521 (Report on the Old Records of the India Office [London and Calcutta, 1891], p. 174).

6 “The gunners in the Portuguese service were frequently Flemings and Germans; those that came with the Turkish fleet were usually renegades from Southern Europe” ( Whiteway, R. S., The Rise of Portuguese Power in India, 1497–1550 [Westminster, 1899], p. 40 Google Scholar).

7 Mookerji, R., Indian Shipping: A History of the Sea-Borne Trade and Maritime Activity of the Indians from the Earliest Times (Bombay and Calcutta, 1912), p. 201 Google Scholar.

8 Lane in his article mentions two Venetian fondachi in Alexandria about 1561, “the other ‘nations,’ the Genoese, Ragusans, and French, who were less numerous, each having one” (Alessandro Magno Ms., Lane, op. cit., p. 582).

9 Lane, C. F., “Venetian Shipping During the Commercial Revolution,” American Historical Review, XXXVIII, No. 2 (January, 1933), 219–237 Google Scholar.

10 Ragusa was under Venetian supremacy at that time and stayed so until 1358, when the Venetians were forced by Hungary to abandon Dalmatia.

11 “Praeterea Ragusini de mercibus Romaniae, quas Venetias apportaverint, debunt in Venetis communi Venetianim quinque pro centenario, et de marcibus ultramarinis et terrae Aegypti, Tunixi et Barbariae, solvent quintum …” (Urkunden zur älleren Handels- und Staatsgeschichte der Republik Venedig mit besonderer Beziehung auf Byzanz und die Levante, vom neunlen bis zum Anfang des fünfzehnlen Jahrhunderts, ed. G. L. Fr. Tafel und G. M. Thomas (Vienna, 1856), I (814–1205), Forties rerum Austriacarum, Diplomataria et acta, XII, Doc. cccxxi, 468).

12 It is believed that the agreement concluded between Ragusa and sultan Urchan at Brusa in 1340 was the first agreement to be signed by any Christian nation with the Turks. The authenticity of that agreement is doubted ( Jireček, C., “Die Bedeutung von Ragusa in der Handelsgeschichte des Mittelalters,” Almanach der Kais. Akademie der Wissenschaften, Vienna, XL [1898], 451)Google Scholar.

13 For the relations between the Mameluke empire and the Medieval trade cf. G. S. Rentz, The Mameluke Empire at the Close of the Fourteenth Century, Ms. (University of California, Berkeley, 1938).

14 Kirchmayer, F., La cadutta della repubblica aristocralica di Ragusa dopo quasi tredici secoli di esistenza e la lotta dei soldati di Napoleone I colla flotta russa i Montenegrini e Crivosciani pel possesso delle Bncche di Cattaro (Zara, 1900), p. 46 Google Scholar.

15 Hallberg, C. W., The Suez Canal (New York, 1931), p. 33 Google Scholar.

16 Heyd, W., Geschichte des Lewantenhandels im Mittelalter, II (Stuttgart, 1879), 540 Google Scholar.

17 Lybyer, A. H., “The Influence of the Rise of the Ottoman Turks upon the Routes of Oriental Trade,” Annual Report of the American Historical Association, 1914, I (Washington, 1916), 127–133 Google Scholar.

18 F. M. Appendini, Nolizie istorico-critiche sille antichilà, storia e hlteralura de'Ragusei. I (Ragusa, 1802), 236.

19 Ragusa was represented in Constantinople by two ambassadors, who were changed quite frequently.

20 Srpska kraljevska akademija, Fontes Rerum Slavorum Meridionalium, Series prima (Acta Diplomatica Ragusina), II, fasc. 1, collected and edited by J. Radonić (Belgrade, 1935), Doc. xc (November 1, 1520), 205.

21 In Luccari's annals we read that this Ragusan merchant was “the Viceroy of Delo” and “ambassador of the king of Cambaya” ( Luccari, G. P., Copioso ristretto de gli annali di Ragusa [Venice, 1605], p. 140 Google Scholar.

22 Danvers, F. C., The Portuguese in India: Being a History of the Rise and Decline of their Eastern Empire, I (London, 1894) 425–430 Google Scholar.

23 G. P. Luccari, op. cit., p. 141.

24 Ibid., pp. 141–142.

25 Tripolis in Syria (Tarabulus ash-Sham), as distinguished from Tripolis in Lybia (Tarabulus al-Gharb).

26 The First Englishmen in India, ed. Locke, J. Courtenay (London, 1930), pp. 79–80 Google Scholar.

27 St Blaise (São Braz, San Biagio, Sv. Vlaho) is the patron saint of the Republic of Ragusa, which was also frequently called the Republic of St Blaise (Repubblica di San Biagio, Republika Svetoga Vlaha).

28 F. Diniz d'Ayalla, Goa antigua e moderna (Lisbon, 1888), pp. 144–145

29 de Fonseca, J Nicolau, An Historical and Archaeological Sketch of the City of Goa (Bombay, 1878), p. 255 Google Scholar.

30 de Klougen, D. L. Cottineau, An Historical Sketch of Goa (Madras, 1831), p. 82 Google Scholar.

31 G. P. Luccari, op. cit., p. 141.

32 Historia general de los viages, desde el principle del sigh XV, Libro IV (Historia general de los viages, o nueva coleccion de todas las relaciones de los que se han hecho por Mar, y Tierra, y se han publicado hasta ahora en diferentes lenguas de todas las naciones conocidas, Tomo XII), Madrid, 1772, p. 386.

33 Academia Real das Sciencias de Lisboa, Corpo Diplomatico Portuguez, Relaçōes com a Curia Romana (Reinado de el-Rei D. Sebastiāo), ed. J. da Silva Mendes Leal, IX (Lisbon, 1886).

34 The reader will also find detailed reference in Lane's article, pp. 581–590.

35 It must be added here that a great amount of the trade of Messina, then under Spanish rule, was in the hands of the Ragusan merchants, who had their establishments in that city. The station at Messina enabled them to distribute the goods brought from the East without having to call at Ragusa first. This station supplied Southern Italy and the islands, including Malta, and was an important base for Ragusan fleets serving the England route.

36 Mediterranean Spice Trade, p. 587.

37 Corpo Diplomalico Portuguez, pp. 111, 112.

38 The First Englishmen in India, p. 90.

39 The Travels of Pedro Teixeira, Hakluyt Society, Series II, Vol. IX (London, 1902), especially ch. X, pp. 102 ff.