Genoese Merchant Networks from the Black Sea to West Africa and the Americas (15th−16th Centuries)

Fifth European Congress on World and Global History Ruptures, Empires, Revolutions ▹ Budapest, 31 August—3 September 2017 PROGRAMME PROGRAMME ▹ ENIUGHENIUGH EUROPEAN NETWORK IN UNIVERSAL AND GLOBAL HISTORY 48 PROGRAMME Thursday Friday Saturday Sunday ▹ ▹Atlantic Italies: Economic, cultural, and political entanglements (late 15th–early 19th centuries) (Part 1) Venue: Corvinus University, Fővám tér 8, E309 Part 2 see page 76 Fernand Braudel’s seminal thesis on the Mediterranean world in the age of Philip II vividly depicted the ‘Northern invasion’ of the Mediterranean at the end of the 16th century. Following Europe’s ‘discovery’ and colonization of the Americas, and Portuguese and Dutch penetration of Asian markets, this “invasion” confirmed, in Braudel’s eyes, the shift of Europe’s political and economic core from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic. Despite current reassessment of Braudel’s thesis, the predominant grand narrative about early modern Europe’s ‘expansion’ and economic development still considers that – after having been a propulsive center in the Middle Ages – the Italian peninsula underwent a process of steady decline and marginalization in the age of Atlantic trade. This interpretative framework resulted into different historical foci. While the history of Europe’s Atlantic engagement was concerned mostly with the ‘triumphant’ cases of Portugal, Spain, the Dutch Republic, France and England, scholars of Mediterranean history mainly dealt with intra-Mediterranean relations. Although research in both Mediterranean and in Atlantic history have fuelled vivid debates about cross-cultural contacts in the pre-industrial world, they tend in general to develop as separate fields. This panel will tackle the pertinence of these traditions. By highlighting the porous borders of early modern empires and reconstructing trans-imperial connections between and beyond them, it will examine the multifold entanglements between the Mediterranean space and the Atlantic world from the late 15th to the early 19th century. The session focuses on the “Italies” – that is the plural and internally fragmented Italian-speaking areas – which connections with the Atlantic world prior to the (well-studied) late 19th century mass migrations to the Americas have up to now remained underexplored. How did Mediterranean / Italian commodities enter Atlantic markets, what role did they play in shaping processes of cultural change, and what kind of meanings did consumers in the Americas and Africa assign to them? How did Atlantic commodities arrive in Italian societies and how did they transform the patterns of consumption and the material culture of both popular and elite households? What strategies did actors from an allegedly IN DETAIL 49 Thursday Friday Saturday Sunday ▹ Ruptures, Empires and Revolutions Fifth European Congress on World and Global History peripheralized region develop to connect themselves to the thriving oceanic trade routes, what interstices did they occupy, and what kind of patronage relations did they profit from? What kind of mobility patterns and what channels of knowledge circulation emerged between the Mediterranean and the Atlantic? How did Atlantic powers and interests shape political and economic decisions in Italian peninsular states before Italian independence? And what kind of efforts – both diplomatic and informal – were undertaken by the governments of Italian states to defend their interests in the Atlantic space? By tackling these (and other) questions, we aim at shedding new light on inter-continental entanglements in the early modern age and at contributing to a renewal of both Atlantic and Italian history. Convenors / Chairs: Silvia Marzagalli (Nice / Paris), Roberto Zaugg (Lausanne) Papers: Carlo Taviani (Rome), Steven Teasdale (Toronto): Genoese merchant networks from the Black Sea to West Africa and the Americas (15th−16th centuries) Cecilia Tarruell (Oxford): Between the Mediterranean and the Atlantic: The network of the Gasparo Corso Brothers in the late 16th century Alida Clemente (Foggia): Atlantic Naples: Merchant networks and new consumptions in the 18th century Luca Codignola-Bo (Notre Dame / Halifax / Montréal): Antonia Filicchi, Vito Viti, and other Atlantic entrepreneurs: From the Grand Duchy of Tuscany to the United States, 1815−1847 Roberto Zaugg (Lausanne): From the Mediterranean Sea to the Royal Court of Benin: Trade networks and cultural meanings of Red Coral (15th−18th centuries) Alejandro García Montón (Seville): Mediterranean institutions and the transatlantic slave trade: Creation, diffusion, and re-appropriation (17th and 18th centuries) Anne Ruderman (Cambridge, MA): Venetian beads for the Atlantic slave trade Alessandro Tuccillo (Naples / Lyon), Giulia Bonazza (Florence): Italian states and Atlantic slave trade: Imperial diplomacy and debates on slavery during the first half of the 19th century 1 2 Braudel, Cipolla and Lopez and the Genoese notarial archives From R.S. Lopez’s archives, New Haven (Yale) HISTORIOGRAPHY ON EARLY ATLANTIC SLAVERY (CA. 1450-1530) The traditional view of early Atlantic slavery for the majority of the 20th century was either one of general incommensurability or one of general equivalence. •Early Atlantic slavery as a novel artefact of “modernity” with only superficial resemblances to earlier medieval Mediterranean slavery. •Early Atlantic slavery as a transplanted and expanded form of medieval Mediterranean slavery. Recent views have adopted a less structural and more dynamic approach: •An intermediate position which identifies both continuities and divergences between the two systems. •A world-historical approach connecting southern Europe, the Levant, and Africa with the Dinaric highlands, the Caucasus plains, and the Indian Ocean. Our research examines a crucial spatiotemporal node in this dynamic system of enslavement and forced migration: the republic of Genoa and the dispersed Genoese merchant networks of the fifteenth and early sixteenth-century 3 4 DAVID BRION DAVIS While the role of early modern Italians in global exploration and trade has been widely studied, unfortunately “far less attention has been paid to the Italian merchants and bankers who provided the capital, technology, and sailors that enabled the Portuguese… to build the first foundations of the Atlantic slave system.” David Brion Davis receives the National Humanities Medal by President Barack Obama in a White House ceremony, July 28, 2014. THE LOMELLINI MERCHANT NETWORK A significant part of my research focuses on the Lomellini family and the slave trade during the 1400s. Why the Lomellini? •They were active in all aspects of the slave trade: as owners, sellers, financiers, insurers, renters, and transporters of slaves, as well as owners of property in, and administrators of, slaving regions in the Mediterranean and the Atlantic. •They were widely dispersed across the Mediterranean and Atlantic region: from Caffa in the Black Sea, to Chios, Ceuta, Tabarka, Seville, Lisbon, Madeira, and the Canary Islands. •They appear extensively throughout the documentary record, particularly in the Genoese notarial archives (the Notai Antichi fonds of the Archivio di Stato di Genova). As such, keeping in mind the clarion call of David Brion Davis, the Lomellini had the “capital, technology, and sailors” that the Portuguese (and Iberians in general) required in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth-century. 5 6 A FRAMEWORK FOR MERCHANT NETWORK ANALYSIS: AN EXCHANGE OF CAPITAL The emergence of early Atlantic slavery from entangled Genoese and Iberian networks of the fifteenth century can be articulated as an exchange of financial, intellectual, and social capital within a moral economy predicated on the captivity, forced migration, and unpaid labour of sub-Saharan Africans. •Transfer of intellectual capital: a form of tacit-tacit knowledge transfer based on shared communities of experience (Polyani, Roos & Klein) •The Lomellini family (and Genoese traders in general) had developed a surplus of intellectual capital regarding exploration, expansion, and the slave trade. This expertise was in turn exchanged with Iberians (via tacit knowledge transfer) for social capital (influence) and financial capital. •For example, they were able to obtain permission to settle in Iberian lands, trade freely without traditional tariffs, and elevate themselves to important advisory roles that would allow them to serve as financiers to Iberian expansion. The Portuguese relied on Genoese knowledge in their exploratory and proto-colonial activities in Africa and the Atlantic Islands. ACCUMULATING CAPITAL: THE LOMELLINI AND MEDITERRANEAN COMMERCE The activities of the Lomellini family in Mediterranean commerce in activities directly related and adjacent to the slave trade during the fifteenth-century can be seen as a means by which they accumulated intellectual capital. •In commerce: for example, both Pietro and Bonifacio Lomellini arranged to have slaves shipped to Genoa from the Levant in June 1449. •In proto-colonial settlement: for example, in 1455 Leonello Lomellini was attested as operating a trading house (fondaco) in Damascus. •In military expeditions: for example, the campaign of Carlo Lomellini in the Black Sea in 1433-34 to curb Venetian influence and put down unrest. •In administration: for example, Gherardo Lomellini was appointed consul for Caffa in 1463 which gave him authority over laws governing the commerce in slaves. •Related to San Giorgio: for example, in 1455 San Giorgio rewarded Damiano Lomellini with the revenue for various taxes (gabelles) for his service in Cyprus. Furthermore, the Lomellini were routinely appointed as prottetori for the bank during the 1400s, for example, Egidio in 1455, Gregorio in 1460, and Carlo in 1469. 7 8 EXAMPLE: LOMELLINI TRADE NETWORKS IN THE LEVANT Leonardo Lomellini (di Francesco) is attested as having been « in Damascho » where he had made an exchange with a certain Antonio Falamonica. ASG, Notai antichi 587, notaio Antonio Fazio, filza 13, nr. 173, dated 17 June 1448. ACCUMULATING CAPITAL: THE LOMELLINI AND GENOESE SLAVERY The activities of the Lomellini family regarding the social world of fifteenth-century slavery in Genoa can be seen as another means by which they accumulated intellectual capital regarding the exploitation of slave labor. •The extant Cabella sclavorum registers of the Banco di San Giorgio show them as one of the largest slave owning families in Genoa, both in absolute and per capita terms, during the middle of the fifteenth century. •The Lomellini were very active in buying and selling female slaves for the purposes of domestic service—and quite often as wet-nurses. •Active in the practice of leasing slaves: both leasing out their own slaves to others as well as renting slaves of others, again usually for the purpose of wet-nursing. •A certain Baldassare Lomellini was an active insurer of pregnant female slaves against the risk of death by childbirth, with at least 50 extant contracts in the Notai antichi archive in the 1460s and 1470s. •The Lomellini are also attested as frequent manumitters of slaves during the fifteenth-century, often combining leasing with manumission and thus accumulating both spiritual and financial capital through their activity. 9 10 EXAMPLE: PURCHASE OF A SLAVE FOR THE PURPOSE OF WET-NURSING Vincenzo Lomellini (di Gregorio) purchases a Tartaran slave by the name of Agnese for 120 lire. This is for « suo lacte », that is, for the purpose of being a wet-nurse. ASG, Notai antichi 482, notaio Giuliano Canella, register 5, 14151417, fol. 185r, dated 4 August 1416. TRANSFERRING CAPITAL: THE LOMELLINI IN THE IBERIAN PENINSULA Moving westward, the activities of the Lomellini family in the Iberian zone—again, often in activities directly related and adjacent to the slave trade—can be seen as a means of exchanging their intellectual capital and financial capital for social capital. •In commerce: for example, in 1450 Cosmo Lomellini arranges the shipment of goods into Portugal from Catalonia by leasing a galley a Malaga. •As lenders to Portuguese merchants in Genoa: for example, in 1462 a certain Portuguese merchant by the name of Vasco Martino borrows 14 ducats from Bartolomeo Lomellini while passing through Genoa. •Selling slaves to Catalonia: for example, in 1445 Pietro Lomellini sells a group of 18 slaves to a syndicate of Catalonian merchants at Chios. •In administration and expertise: for example, Antonio Lomellini is appointed consul in Genoa of Castile and had significant influence on Castilian policy towards the Genoese the 1430s and 1440s. •Providing sailors: for example, in 1452 Marco Lomellini is charged with transporting Eleanora of Portugal, the future empress, to Porto Pisano. He sources a vessel owned by Niccolò Doria and arranges the payment of 7500 lire. 11 12 The Commercial Hub GIS MAP Genoa Tunis Tlemcen Oran Malaga Seville Source: Archivio di Stato di Genova 25 26 Institution rules, norms, contracts, form of organizations, formal and informal agreements, and more generically all the social tools that can have an impact on economics. Institutions as a vehicle that fosters economy. The field of studies on institutional innovations is growing and is becoming a subfield of economic history. Douglas North, Daron Acemoğlu, Avner Greif 27 28 Institutional Transplantation Adopting, copying, replicating, transplanting an institution How did it happen? Vague approaches, no definition or model Institutional transplantation muḍāraba Waqf /Merton College Commenda/accomandita (Oxford) everywhere Maona/maunaat? wazir al-mushrif Almoxarife Portugal and colonies Muhtasib/Mustasaf Spain 29 30 The Genoese Mahona An organization composed by creditors of the commune of Genoa (the state). Usually it had military or administrative tasks. 1235 Ceuta 1347 Chios 1378 Corsica from the Abbasid epoch onwards ma’una seems an institution. Iraq, Syria and Egypt. ‘amil or sahib al-ma’una 31 32 “ We fought the Azd in Iraq and the renegade tribe of Rabi‘a and the commander Ibn Shuīl, the hypocrite, without ma'unat and without the revenue […]” (Translation: Marco di Branco) Diwan Tamim ibn al-MuHzz li-Din Allah al-Fat (10th century) “ We fought the Azd in Iraq and the renegade tribe of Rabi‘a and the commander Ibn Shuīl, the hypocrite, without ma'unat and without the revenue […]” (Translation: Marco di Branco) Diwan Tamim ibn al-MuHzz li-Din Allah al-Fat (10th century) 33 34 Muḍāraba commenda a contract stipulated in the presence of a notary and setting the terms of the investment in and division of the profits of a (generally maritime) venture. Muḍāraba commenda a contract stipulated in the presence of a notary and setting the terms of the investment in and division of the profits of a (generally maritime) venture. an investor (commendator) made an agreement with an individual who started a journey to buy and sell goods. the investing partner (LP) participated in the venture by supplying the money 35 36 Muḍāraba commenda a contract stipulated in the presence of a notary and setting the terms of the investment in and division of the profits of a (generally maritime) venture. an investor (commendator) made an agreement with an individual who started a journey to buy and sell goods. the investing partner (LP) participated in the venture by supplying the money while the traveling partner (GP) conducted the business (a unilateral commenda) the traveling might invest some money (a bilateral commenda) The contract was valid for a single journey, at the end of which it was terminated According to Ron Harris the commenda: “[It] could be found anywhere from North Western Europe to India, Indonesia and China. It was in use in maritime trade all across the Indian Ocean from the Arabian Sea to the South China Sea.” 37 38 Was the Plantation an Institution? Sugar mill (ingenio) Transplantation of sugar mills from Madeira, the Canary Islands, Cabo Verde (?) to the New World The SOURCES 39 40 Braudel, Cipolla and Lopez and the Genoese notarial archives From R.S. Lopez’s archives, New Haven (Yale) Inventory of the Genoese notarial archives 27 volumes For the 15th-16th centuries around 10 volumes Private Collection 41 42 22 43