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History, Philosophically Issustrated, From the Fall of the Roman Empire to the French Revolution (v. 2)
History Philosophically Issustrated From the Fall of the Roman Empire to the French Revolution - v. 2 Author:George Miller Volume: v. 2 General Books publication date: 2009 Original publication date: 1832 Notes: This is a black and white OCR reprint of the original. It has no illustrations and there may be typos or missing text. When you buy the General Books edition of this book you get free trial access to Million-Books.com where you can select from more than ... more »a million books for free. Excerpt: 78 CHAPTER XXII. Of the history of Commerce, from the suppression of the western empire in the year 476, to the commencement of the fourteenth century. Commerce revived in the year 800. Venice the only city of Italy enjoying an extensive traffic to the end of the ninth century. The trade of Avnulfi flourished in the tenth. Pisa and Genoa flourished in the eleventh. Woollen mannfacture of the Netherlands flourishing during three centuries, from the year 960. Silver mines of Germany discovered about the year 968. Funding system commenced by Venice about the year 1175. Hanseatic league formed in the year 1241. Bills of exchange introduced by the Roman pontifij in the year 1255. The ascendency of the military power of Rome had crushed the commerce of the ancient world1, especially by the destruction of Carthage. Augustus Caesar2, indeed, made some exertions for its re-establishment, and, in the prosecution of a trade with India, was followed by the succeeding emperors, even until the overthrow of the western empire ; but the spirit of the Roman government was military, not commercial, and the balance of wealth was supported in Italy by the pillage of conquered nations, or by the taxes levied in the provinces, rather than by the interchange of commodities and industry. The suppression of the western empire ruined the renewed commerce of the west, which was almost totally interrupted from the time of that revolution, until the genius of Charlemagne, more than three centuries afterwards, laboured for its restoration. Trade was, however, still cherished in the capital of the eastern empire, w...« less