On this page
The origins of the Hanseatic League are obscure, but the roots of the League can be traced to the commercial expansion of the northern German towns in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. The term Hanse originally referred to a band or company of merchants who traded together for mutual protection and support, and the Hanseatic associations of London, Bergen, and Novgorod were originally groups of German merchants in distant cities. The Hanse of London was established in the twelfth century, the Hanse of Bergen in the thirteenth century, and the Hanse of Novgorod in the thirteenth century. The gradual evolution of these regional Hanses into a single confederation of northern German towns was a complex process that unfolded over several centuries.
The standard English-language treatment is Philippe Dollinger, “The German Hansa” (1970). The Hanseatisches Urkundenbuch (ed. K. Höhlbaum and others, 1876–) is the primary source. The first mention of a civitas maritima (maritime town) acting jointly is in the 1241 charter of Hamburg and Lübeck.
The German Merchants Abroad
The German merchants of Cologne had established a trading post in London by the eleventh century, and they received charters from the English kings in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. The Cologne Hanse was joined by merchants from other German towns, and the Hanse of London gradually expanded to include merchants from Lübeck, Hamburg, Bremen, Dortmund, and other cities. The Hanse of London was a major commercial force in medieval England, and it played a major role in the export of English wool and the import of German cloth and metalwork.
The German merchants of Lübeck played a major role in the development of the Hanse in the Baltic. Lübeck was founded in 1143 on the site of an earlier Slavic settlement, and it rapidly developed into the leading commercial center of the Baltic. The merchants of Lübeck established trading posts in Visby on the Swedish island of Gotland, in Bergen in Norway, in Novgorod in Russia, and in Bruges in Flanders. The Hanseatic trading posts — known as kontors — became the centers of Hanseatic trade in the Baltic and North Sea, and they developed sophisticated administrative apparatuses to manage the trade of the Hanse.
The Wendish Towns and the Baltic Trade
The Wendish towns — Lübeck, Hamburg, Bremen, Wismar, Stralsund, Rostock, and Lüneburg — were the nucleus of the Hanseatic League in the Baltic. These towns were founded or expanded in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries as part of the German colonization of the territory east of the Elbe, and they quickly developed into major commercial centers. The towns were governed by city councils of merchants and craftsmen, and they maintained their own laws, courts, and militias. The towns cooperated with each other in defense, trade, and diplomacy, and they formed a regional confederation that was the basis of the Hanseatic League.
The Wendish towns dominated the trade of the Baltic in the thirteenth century, and they played a major role in the expansion of German commerce across northern Europe. The Wendish towns exported grain, timber, fur, honey, wax, amber, and other products of the Baltic region to Western Europe, and they imported cloth, wine, salt, metalwork, and other manufactured goods from Western Europe. The trade was organized through a network of kontors and commanderies that linked the Wendish towns with the other Hanseatic towns across Europe.
The Alliance of Cologne and Lübeck
The alliance of Cologne and Lübeck in 1241 was a major step in the evolution of the Hanseatic League. The alliance brought together the two leading commercial centers of northern Germany — Cologne in the west and Lübeck in the east — and it provided a framework for cooperation between the two regional Hanseatic associations. The alliance was originally a commercial agreement that allowed the merchants of Cologne to trade freely in Lübeck and vice versa, but it gradually expanded to include a wider range of cooperative activities — defense, diplomacy, and the management of the Hanseatic kontors.
The alliance of Cologne and Lübeck was the basis of the later Hanseatic League, and the League developed around the two centers of the alliance. The League gradually expanded to include other Hanseatic towns — Hamburg, Bremen, Dortmund, Goslar, Hildesheim, Brunswick, Magdeburg, Erfurt, Mühlhausen, Naumburg, and many others — and it developed a complex organizational structure to manage the affairs of the expanding confederation.
The Hanseatic Diets
The Hanseatic Diets (Hansetage) were the diplomatic assemblies of the Hanseatic League, and they played a major role in the development of the League’s policies and institutions. The first recorded Hanseatic Diet was held in 1256, and the Diets became increasingly frequent in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. The Diets were typically held in Lübeck, the leading town of the League, but they were also held in other towns on special occasions. The Diets brought together the representatives of the Hanseatic towns, and they made decisions about trade policy, defense, relations with foreign powers, and the management of the Hanseatic kontors.
The Diets provided a forum for the discussion and resolution of disputes between the Hanseatic towns, and they helped to maintain the cohesion of the League in the face of external pressures and internal rivalries. The Diets also provided a forum for the coordination of the League’s defense and diplomacy, and they helped to mobilize the resources of the League in times of crisis. The Diets were an important institution of the Hanseatic League, and they contributed to the success of the League as a commercial and political confederation.
The Treaty of Stralsund
The Treaty of Stralsund in 1370 was a major step in the development of the Hanseatic League, and it is often considered the formal founding of the League as a major political force in Europe. The Treaty was concluded between the Hanseatic League and the Kingdom of Denmark, and it ended a long conflict between the Hanse and the Danish kings over control of the Baltic trade. The Treaty recognized the Hanseatic privileges in Scandinavia, granted the Hanse control of the fortresses of the Sound, and established the League as a major political force in the Baltic region.
The Treaty of Stralsund was a major triumph for the Hanseatic League, and it marked the beginning of the League’s golden age in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. The League expanded rapidly in the following decades, and it came to dominate the trade of the Baltic and the North Sea. The League established a sophisticated system of commercial and diplomatic relations with the kingdoms of Scandinavia, England, France, and the Low Countries, and it became one of the most powerful commercial and political forces in medieval Europe.
The Significance of the Origins
The origins of the Hanseatic League are significant for understanding the history of medieval Europe and the development of the European economy. The League was a major commercial and political force in medieval Europe, and it played a central role in the development of the European economy and the integration of northern Europe into the wider European economy. The League was also a major patron of the arts and learning, and it contributed to the development of the literary and architectural culture of northern Europe.
The origins of the League also illustrate the complex and multifaceted nature of medieval commerce. The League was not a single organization with a single leader or capital, but a confederation of towns that cooperated for mutual benefit. The League was held together by a combination of mutual interest and shared institutions, and it developed sophisticated mechanisms for the management of trade, defense, and diplomacy. The League is a major subject of modern historical study, and it is a subject of ongoing debate in the modern era.
Sources
Principal sources used in this article:
- Philippe Dollinger, The German Hansa (Stanford, 1970).
Further reading:
- James Westfall Thompson, The Medieval German Guilds (Oxford, 1919; repr. 1966).
For a recent single-volume synthesis with full scholarly apparatus, see the relevant chapter of Barbara H. Rosenwein, A Short History of the Middle Ages (University of Toronto Press, 2014).