Trade, Commodities and Shipping in the Medieval Mediterranean

Book excerpt: The studies in this volume focus on various aspects of western economic expansion within the Eastern Mediterranean from the 11th-15th-century. Attention is devoted to the relations of the Italian maritime powers with Byzantium, the crusader states and the Levant and Egypt, the presence of the powers and their subjects in these regions, and industrial competition between Venice and the cities of the Italian mainland. In addition, this text covers the mobility of merchants and craftsmen, trade in raw materials and finished products, banking investments, manufacturing processes and technological transfers, and the impact of trade, shipping and Italian commercial outposts and communities on the evolution of urban centres of the regions concerned.