Ep. 193 - The Trade and Tribulations of the Free Imperial Cities
History of the Germans
Dirk Hoffmann-Becking
4.9 • 550 Ratings
🗓️ 8 May 2025
⏱️ 38 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Ravensburg, and you are very much forgiven if you cannot place it on the map, is today a town of 50,000 in the far south eastern corner of Baden-Württemberg between Friedrichshafen, home of the Zeppelins, and the city of Ulm and its majestic church tower.
If you have heard of it, it may be because of Ravensburger, the publisher of puzzles and boardgames, but you would not have associated it with any great mercantile or commercial activity.
Nevertheless, in the 15th century it housed the headquarters of a company that held a near monopoly in the trade between Spain and the empire and in certain wares, namely linen and a special cloth variously called barchent, bombast or fustian.
Before we get into Ravensburger and the Grosse Handelsgesellschaft, we need to put the whole region into the context of the free imperial cities of the 15th century.
Trading routes of the HABW_11_03_Ravensburger_Handelsgesellschaft.jpg (4957×3535)
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello and welcome to the history of the Germans. |
| 0:07.0 | Episode 193, the trade and tribulations of the free imperial cities, which is also episode |
| 0:13.5 | 9 of season 10, the empire in the 15th century. |
| 0:19.7 | Amongst the few perks the head of the general state archives of Barden enjoyed were the occasional |
| 0:25.9 | inspections of libraries across the country. |
| 0:28.4 | It allows for journeys away from the office and occasionally came with the invitation to dinner |
| 0:33.0 | at a splendid castle or monastery. |
| 0:36.6 | And in 1911, few invitations could rival with the honor of going to Schloss Salem, the home of Prince Max von Baden, |
| 0:45.3 | the heir to the Grand Duchy. |
| 0:47.3 | It is likely that Dr. Karl Obzer, he is the one who held that post as head of the archives in that year, enjoyed his time in the stunning Baroque Abbot's palace, not far from Lake Constance. |
| 1:00.0 | But he was there not just for pleasure, but also for work. |
| 1:05.0 | Though Salem had once been one of southern Germany's greatest Cistercian monasteries, |
| 1:10.0 | and had hence held a vast |
| 1:12.2 | library and archives dating back to the 12th century, most of that material had long been shipped |
| 1:17.8 | up to Karlsruhe. Therefore expectations to find something exciting were more than modest. |
| 1:25.1 | But Dr. Opser was clearly a thorough archivist and left no shelf untouched or bookcase unopened. |
| 1:32.4 | In an attic room with a broken window he came across a drawer, and it must have been left open |
| 1:36.6 | a long time ago, as it had become home to a family, most likely to generations of families |
| 1:42.7 | of sparrows. |
| 1:50.7 | Still, Dr. Opser saw a few sheets of paper peeking up underneath the nest and investigated. |
| 1:59.9 | What he discovered were 1,825 pages of paper holding the accounts of the great Ravensburg Trading Company, covering the years from 1450 to 1526. |
| 2:05.6 | He had stumbled upon the most significant documentation of late medieval trading in the Free Imperial Cities ever found. |
... |
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