The Rise of the Balkan Orthodox Merchant Class

Economic History Association
The Conquering Balkan Orthodox Merchant

Author(s): Traian Stoianovich
Source: The Journal of Economic History, Vol. 20, No. 2 (Jun., 1960), pp. 234-313
Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of the Economic History Association
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2114856 .
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The Conquering
BalkanOrthodoxMerchant*
HE origins
ofa BalkanOrthodox
merchant
classorclassesmaybe
traced
backtothefourteenth
andfifteenth
centuries.
Notuntilthe
diditbecomesufficiently
eighteenth
century,
however,
strong
inwealth
and numberto capturethetradeof Hungary,
SouthRussia,and the
eastern
Mediterranean.
The eighteenth
century
wasa timeofexpansion
and Russiantradein theBalkans.It was
ofFrench,
German,
English,
ofthetradeofMoslemAlbanianandBosnianmeralsoa timeofgrowth
to thecultural,
chants.But,in termsof itssignificance
political,
and
general
historical
evolution
oftheBalkanpeoples,
mostimportant
ofall
theGreektrader
oftheBalkanOrthodox
wastheexpansion
merchant:
the Greekand Orthodox
of Constantinople,
Salonika,and Smyrna,
Albanianmerchant,
sailor,and shipper
ofthesmallerAegeanislands,
muleteer
theGreek,Vlach,and Macedo-Slav
and forwarding
agent
of Epirus,Thessaly,and Macedonia,the Serbianpig-merchant
of
the"Illyrian"
andforwarding
Sumadija,
muleteer
agentofHerzegovina
in Ragusa(Dubrovnik)orTrieste,
andDalmatia,whosetup business
the"Rascian"ofPannonia,
and theGreekor Bulgarian
oftheeastern
wereOttoman,
Rhodope.The BalkanOrthodox
merchants
Habsburg,
but
their
business
and Russiansubjects,
principal
was to bringgoods
intoor outof theOttomanEmpire.The areaof theirprimary
businorthand westof thepoliticallimitsof
nessconcentration
stretched
theOttoman
EmpiretoNezhinin SouthRussia,Leipzigin Germany,
Viennain Austria,and Livornoand Naples in Italy.In western
an areaof secondary
in creating
commercial
Europe,theysucceeded
penetration.
The decadenceof Ottomanpoliticaland social institutions,
the
The researchand publicationof this studywere made possibleby generousgrantsfrom
the RutgersResearchCouncil,the Calm Foundationof RutgersUniversity,
the FrenchCentre
de RecherchesHistoriques,and by a Fulbrightgrant for researchin Salonika, Greece, on
problemsof Serbianand Macedoniansocial and economichistory.Exploratory
paperson some
aspectsof the presentstudy were read at the annual meetingof the AmericanHistorical
Associationin December I956 and at a meetingof the Societyof MacedonianStudies of
Salonika in Decemberi958. I am indebtedto ProfessorDavid S. Landes for valuable comof thisworkand to Professor
FernandBraudelforintroducmentson a preliminary
manuscript
ing me to the historicalscience of the Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes and to his own
revolutionary
conceptionsof history,withoutwhich the presentstudy would be almost inconceivabhe.
234

ConqueringBalkan OrthodoxMerchant 235

politicalriseofAustriaand Russia,and thespirited
reand repeated
bellionofChristian
peasant,
priest,
poet,andbandit,
led to thedecline
and dismemberment
of theOttomanstate.The outstanding
positive
factor,
however,
in thespiritual
and politicalawakening
and cultural
redirection
oftheBalkanpeopleswasthegrowth
ofa nativemerchant
ormiddleclass,whichdrewto theBalkansstrayraysofthe"sieclede
lumieres"
and accepted,
at first,
however
hesitatingly
theoneroustask
ofcreating
newnationstates.
The obstacles
toan adequateappraisal
of
theroleoftheBalkanmerchant
as a bearerof non-material
or ideal
cultureare stillveryforbidding.
We can, however,
now showthe
and mannerof development
of thenew Balkan
chronology,
ecology,
merchant
classor classes,and suggestthepregnant
of
consequences
theirappearance
on thesceneofhumanhistory.
The import
ofanygroupor classperforming
or aspiring
topolitical
or economicfunction
notonly,norevenmainly,
is measured
by its
numerical
but equallyby its organization,
strength,
ideology,
tools,
leadership,
alliances,
discipline,
devotion,
wisdom,
energy,
genius,and
theeducation
of bothitsown members
and themembers
of other,
friendly
andhostile,
The middleclassesoftheDutch,English,
groups.
and Frenchrevolutions
werenumerically
American,
small,in every
instance
lessthanio percent
ofthetotalpopulation.
On the
numbering
eve of thewarsof Serbianand Greeknationalliberation,
thenative
or middleclasseswereconsiderably
Balkanmerchant
smaller.Their
weaknessnotwithstanding,
numerical
theywerethe humancatalyst
whichjoinedtheBalkanpeoplesto Europe,bothby theircommerce
and ideas.
The beginnings
ofthenon-Greek
andtherevivaland strengthening
merchant
classes
Balkan
of the Greek
go back to the fourteenth
ofOttoman
The consolidation
andarenotinitially
century
inspiration.
therecruitment
of fresheleof Ottomanpower,however,
permitted
class.Fromthestart
mentsintothestillverysmallnativecommercial
tothecloseofthesixteenth
and culmination
ofthefourteenth
century
classesoftheBalkansexpanded
themerchant
ofOttoman
ascendance,
theencouragement
stimuli:
oftradewith
inresponse
tothreeprincipal
theexclusion
theWestandextension
ofcommercial
ofnonfreedoms,
ofnewandrevival
Ottoman
shipsfromtheBlackSea,andthebuilding
Balkantowns.
ofdeclining

236
Trajan Stoianovich
Severalearlyfourteenth
centurySerbianchrysobulls,
ordinances,
and theLaw Code of StefanDusan authorized
commercial
treaties,
Greek,"Latin"or Italian,Ragusan,Bulgarian,
Serbian,Vlach,and
Albanianmerchants
to markettheirgoodswithout
hindrance
in the
fairsofSerbiaor carrythemfreely
in transit,
provided
theyotherwise
conformed
tothelawandabstained
frombringing
armstoSerbia's
foes
and neighbors.'
Eager to developits own commerce
and mining
economy,
Bosniagranted
similar,
although
lessextensive,
commercial
to themerchants
privileges
of Spalato(Split),Zara (Zadar),Ragusa,
Sebenico(Sibenik),and Traui(Trogir).'
Dusan'sLaw Code and Serbiantreaties
for
withRagusaprovided
theimposition
ofheavymonetary
on anyindividual,
penalties
regardor
lessof rankor office,
who attempted
to restrain
eithermerchant
peasantfrombuyingor sellinggoods,includinggrains,and freely
hiswarestomarket.
Oneoftheaimsofthisarticle
oftheLaw
bringing
landlords
and officials
fromforcing
Code was to prevent
peasantsto
selltheirproduct
belowthemarket
price.The Law Codealsofixedthe
natureandamountofcorveeservices
in order
andmadethemuniform
to facilitate
theexecution
the
of theformer
provision.
Significantly,
himself
was expressly
Emperor
subjectto thelaw.3
and Ragusa,
SlavsfromCattaro(Kotor),Zara,Zagreb,Medrus'a,
beganto settlein Anconaas merchants
duringthesecondhalfofthe
fourteenth
century.
Fear of Turkishoverlordship
soon drovemany
moreSlavsto Ancona,wheretheywerein sufficient
numberaround
themiddleof thefollowing
century
to formtheirown commune
or
1 Teodor Taranovski,Istorijasrpskogprava u Nemanjhckoj
drzavi [Historyof Serbianlaw
I, 111-12,
in the stateof the Nemanja dynasty](Belgrade:Geca Kon, 193I-35),
II5;
Stojan
Novakovic,ed., Zakonskispomenicisrpskihdriava srednjegaveka [Legal monumentsof the
pp. I67-70;
Serbian statesof the Middle Ages] (Belgrade: Serbian Royal Academy,I9I2),
p.
Nikola RadojZic,DusianovZakonik [Dusan's law code] (Novi Sad: Matica Srpska,I950),
62.
2 BogumilHrabak, "Uticaj primorskih

centarana drustveno-ekonomsku
historiju
privrednih
Bosne i Hercegovineu srednjemveku" [The influenceof maritimeeconomiccenterson the
socio-economic
historyof Bosnia and Herzegovinain the Middle Ages], Pregled; casopis za
drustvena pitanja,No. 5 (Sarajevo, 1953),
p. 384.
3 Taranovski,Istorija srpskog prava, I, 69-70, II5-I6.
For more informationon the
medievaloriginsof a Serbian and Bosnian middle or merchantclass, see: Todor Krusevac,
in the developu razvitkubosanskoggradjanstva"[Certaincharacteristics
"Neke karakteristike
pp. 43-49; Ivan Bozic, "Srpskogradmentof a Bosnianmiddleclass], Pregled,No. I(1953),
janstvou srednjemveku" [The serbianmiddle class in the Middle Ages], Nastava historije
u srednjojskoli, Nos. 2-3 (I95I),
pp. Io6-I7; National Committeefor HistoricalStudies,
Ten Years of Yugoslav Historiography,
1945-1955, ed. JorjoTadic (Belgrade: Publicityand
PublishingEnterprise"Jugoslavija,"1955), pp. 173-75,
I78; Stojan Novakovic,"Selo" [The
village],Glas SrpskeKralievskeAkademije(I89I), p. 47.

Conquering Balkan OrthodoxMerchant 237

UniversitasSlavorum.The relentlesscompetitionof the immigrant
Slavs,now tradingwiththemainlandwhencetheyhad come,hurtor
ruinedmanyItalianmerchants,
but themunicipality
of Anconafailed
in itsattemptto expelthemfromtheprovincein I487.
In i514 Ancona was forcedto grantspecialprivilegesto Ottoman
merchants,includingGreeks from Arta, Janina,and Avlona. The
"palatiodellafarina"ofthecitywas turnedintoa fondacoor storehouse
and place of residencefor numerous "mercantiTurchi et altri
Maumetani,"who were engaged in supplyingItaly with grainsand
othergoods.4Towardsthe middleof the century,
about two hundred
Greektradinghouseswereestablishedin cosmopolitanAncona.5
The medieval constitutionalism
of Serbia and the commercial
"liberalism"of Bosniaallowed boththe Slavic and non-SlavicpopulationsofthewesternBalkanareasto developan embryonic
middleclass
with new commercialaspirations.To continuetheirtrade without
embarrassment
afterthe Ottomanconquest,part of the new petty
merchantclassof Serbiaand BosniaacceptedIslam; theremainderfled
to Ragusa,Dalmatia, Italy,and Hungary.'AfterI520 or I530, however,Ottomanpoliciesfavoredthe revivalof a rudimentary
Slavic
Christianpettymiddle class.
Schemingto usurptheroleof Beirut(in realityDamascus), Tripoli
of Syria,Alexandria(in realityCairo), and Venice,and make Constantinoplethe chief emporiumfor the spices,silks, and sugar of
Africa,Syria,and theIndies,theOttomanGovernment
authorizedand
encouragedBalkan and Levantinemerchants-evenbeforeisoo-to
dispatchthepreciousgoods of the Near and Middle East to Italyand
centralEurope by way of the Adriaticand, later,the Danube and
From the Adriaticportsnot underVenetian
Balkan overlandroutes.7
dominationsuchwareswere re-exported
to the centralItalianfairsof
Lanzan and Recanati,whereGreek,Turkish,and Azemini (Persian)
merchantsthreatenedthe economicwell-beingof Venice duringthe
4 VicentiusMakuscev, ed., MonumentahistoricaSlavorum meridionaliumvicinorumque
(Warsaw,I874), I, No.
I, pp. 73-82, I78-80, i88.

5 Kosta N. Kostic,"Gradja za istorijusrpsketrgovine"[Materialsfor a historyof Serbian
trade], SpomenikSrpskeAkademijeNauka, LXVI, 2d class, Book 52 (1926), p. 174; C. M.
Woodhouse,The Greek War of Independence(London, New York, Melbourne,Sydney,and
Capetown:Hutchinson'sUniversity
Library,I952), p. 30.
6 BogumilHrabak, "Domaci trgovciu Novom Pazaru u XVI veku" [Native merchantsin
Novi Pazar in the sixteenthcentury],IstoriskiGlasnik,Nos. 3-4 (195i), pp. 100-2.
7Pierre Sardella,Nouvelleset speNculations
a Veniseau debut du XVIe siecle (Cahiers des
Annales,No. i) (Paris,n. d.), p. 30; Ivan Sakazov, BulgarischeWirtschaftsgeschichte
(Berlin
and Leipzig: Walterde Gruyter& Co., 1929), p. 252.

238
Trajan Stoianovich
earlypartof thesixteenth
thesouthern
century.8
By bringing
trade
routesunderOttomancontrol,
SuleimantheMagnificent
continued
theattempt
ofhispredecessors
to center
thespicetradeoftheworldat
Constantinople.
The conquest
ofBagdadandtheunsuccessful
Ottoman
navalactionsagainstthePortugese
of Diu' reflect
thesameeconomic
policy.9
Moslemsand Christian
Greeksand Slavs-oftenin Moslemdress,
whichafforded
themtheprestige
of thenew"Byzan.
and protection
tium"-brought
theircommerce
to Austriaand evento Lyons,center
of Frenchfinance.'0
Amongthechiefbeneficiaries
of thePax Ottomanicawere,ofcourse,
theshipsandmerchants
ofSlavicand Catholic
Ragusa.But OrthodoxSerbsand Greeksalso profited.
In fact,the
OttomanGovernment
intervened
severaltimesduringthe sixteenth
century
to protect
Serbian,
or Rascian,merchants
in Austria."Greek
carriedtheirtradeevento Antwerp.
merchants
In I582, in anycase,
theDuke ofBrabant
four"mercatores
authorized
Graeciex provinciae
[Galatiae]"to bringOttomanwaresto Antwerp,
"tamperPoloniam
aut Moscoviam
fretiHercules,"disposeof
quam maria
per angustias
themwithout
obstacle,
and providethemselves
withgoodsforexport
to Turkey.'2
The tradeofBalkanmerchants
withtheWest,although
preciseand accurate
dataarelacking,appearsto havereachedat this
momenta heightthatwas notsurpassed
untila century
and a half
later.
in thewestern
One groupofBalkanmerchants,
Ottoman
especially
to
to theeffort maketheOttoman
provinces,
thusarosein response
commerce.Anothergroup,
Empirethe centerof Mediterranean
especially
in thecentral
wasbornofthe
andeastern
Balkanprovinces,
needto assuretheprovisioning
of theOttomancapital.The Empire
openedits doorsto Europeanimports.
At the same time,it gave
themwiththeduty,of
domestic
merchants
theright,and burdened
81 diarii di Marino Sanuto, XXXVI (Venice, I893), 406-7; VitorinoMagalhies-Godinho,
in Evantailde l'histoirevivante:
et egyptienet la routedu Cap, I496-I553,"
"Le repliv~enitien
linguistes,
geographes,economistes,
Hommage a Lucien Febvreofferspar l'amitied'historiens,
sociologues,ethnologues(Paris: ArmandColin, 1953), II, 291-92.
9 A. H. Libyer,"The OttomanTurks and the Routesof OrientalTrade," EnglishHistorical
XXX (I9I5),
Review,
586.
1h0On"Turkish" merchantsin Lyons, see JacquesPannier,"Calvin et les Turcs," Revue

CLXXX (i937), 282-83.
historique,
11 Mita Kostik,Dosite; Obradovil u istoriskojperspektiviXVIII i XIX veka [Dositej
and nineteenth
centuries](Belgrade:
of the eighteenth
Obradovicin the historicalperspective
SerbianAcademyof Sciences,1952), pp. 38, I99.
12J. A. Goris, "TurkscheKoopliedente Antwerpenin de XVI eeuw," Bijdragentot de
XIV (Oct. I5, 1922), 30-38.
Geschiedenis,


theproduce
oftheprovinces
tothecapitalandchiefOttoman
bringing
cities.
intoa worldemporium
If theattempt
to transform
Constantinople
forsugar,spices,and silksmetwithonlypartialsuccess,
thepolicyof
Thisonceteeming
repeopling
itwasspectacularly
successful.
metropolis
encompassed
at no timein thehalfcentury
before
itsfullto theTurks
morethanioo,ooo inhabitants.
to thenewcapital
Intensively
applying
theOttoman
at leastsomeofthemanydepleted
policyofrepopulating
townsand citiesoftheirnewrealms,
MehmedtheConqueror
andhis
successors
welcomed,
urged,coaxed,and bodilytransplanted
Turks,
deVillalon,
andJews
oftheBosporus.
Cristobal
totheshores
Christians,
prisoner
oftheTurkswhobecamethefamily
physician
ofSinanPasha
Conin thetimeofhislatercaptivity,
after1552 relates
that,probably
stantinople
(Istanbul)contained
40,000Christian,
io,oooJewish,
and
morethan6o,oooMoslemcasas; thesuburbs
ofGalata,Pera,andEyub
"casas."Aftera century
of Ottomanrule
comprised
io,oooadditional
thecapitaleasilycounted
several
hundred
thousand
souls.'3
The establishment
ofempireandresurgence
ofConstantinople
as an
Ottomanofficials
imperial
metropolis
confronted
withtheproblem
of
a dependable
securing
market
forthepressing
needsof thestateand
peopleand of findingreliabletradersand contractors.
The Empire
couldnotriskallowingtheprovisioning
of thecapitaland supplying
inthehandsofforeign
ofthearmyandnavytoremain
merchants
with
13Alfons Maria Schneider, "Die Bev6lkerungKonstantinopelsim XV. Jahrhundert,"
Ki., No. 9
in Gdttingen,philologisch-hist.
Nachrichtender Akademie der Wissenschaften
y memories,
Cristobalde Villalon, "Viaje de Turquia," Autobiografias
(1949), pp. 233-42;
ed. Manuel Serranoy Sanz (vol. II of Nueva Bibliotecade autoresespafioles)(Madrid: Casa
),
p. I46. In i590 the cizye,or poll tax, leviedon the
[I902]
EditorialBailly-Baillere,
Pera, and Scutariamountedto 38,ooo sequins. The
Christianpopulationof Constantinople,
averagelevy upon male Christiansfourteenyearsof age or over being one sequin, one may
assumethepresenceof somewhatmorethan40,000 Christianfamiliesin thecapitaland suburbs.
It would thusappearthatthe Christianpopulationdid not growmuchbetween1560 and i590.
On the poll tax levy of 1590, see JohannWilhelm Zinkeisen,Geschichtedes osmanischen
Reichesin Europa, III. Das innereLeben und angehenderVerfalldes Reichesbis zum Jahre
1623 (Gotha, i855), p. 36i. Accordingto Hans Dernschwam,commercialagentof the House
at the
of Fugger,the Ottomantax registersaccountedfor the presencein Constantinople,
or cizye.
of whom6,785 paid theharaczsch
therein I553, of I5,035 Jews,
timeofhissojourn
On the basis of the estimateof Stephan Gerlach,the Jewishpopulationof Constantinople
numbered
30,000
in
I574,
havingalmostdoubledin a periodof two decades.Cf. Franz
und Kleinasien
Babinger,ed., Hans Dernschwam'sTagebucheinerReise nach Konstantinopel
& Humblot,
pp. 107 and I07, n.
I923),
(MunichandLeipzig:VerlagvonDuncker
(1553-55)
2:5 in
318. If the ratiobetweenthe poll tax levy and totalJewishpopulationis approximately
and we extendthisratioto the Christianpopulation,the totalnon-Moslemelementof the
1553
For manyreasons,
citycould not have numberedmore than I50,000 in the period I570-I590.
to estimatethe totalMoslempopulation,but it is unlikelyto have been much
it is moredifficult
householdof the Sultan.We may, in any case, set
in excessof 250,000, even withthe official
ca. I570 at a minimumfigureof 400,000.
thepopulationof Constantinople

240
Traian Stoianovich
whosegovernments
it mightone dayfinditselfat war.Slowly,and
undercircumstances
thusfar onlyvaguelyelucidated,
the rightto
navigatein the watersof the Black Sea, increasingly
considered
a
preserve
forthewantsof the stateand capital,was deniedto ever
largergroupsof foreign
shipsand merchants.
TheVeneto-Ottoman
of1454,1479,1482,and1513 specifically
treaties
allowedtheVenetians
to navigatein theBlackSea,butsucha provisionwas lackingin thetreaty
of I540.'4 Ragusanshipsareknownto
havesailedtoVarna,wheretheytookon suppliesofwooland leather
(montonini,
vacchini,
and bufalini)at leastuntilI59o.'5 In 1592,
"mercanti
Candiotti
de' viniinPolonia"appealedtoVenicetoopenthe
Friulianland routeto theircommerce,
forthe "moltetiranniede
Turchi"nowprevented
theirsevenoreightgalleonsfromtransporting
theircargoesof wineto Polandbywayof theBlackSea."6Between
I592 and 1783thecommerce
of theBlackSea appearsto havebeen
completely
offlimitsfortheshipsofwestern
Europe.The BlackSea
becamea mareclausum.'7
The victory
of theOttomanEmpiresymbolized,
in thesphereof
a victory
economics,
ofGreeks,
Turks,renegade
Christians,
Armenians,
Ragusans,and Jewsoverthetwo-century-old
commercial
hegemony
of Veniceand Genoa.Greek,Armenian,
Ragusan,and Jewishmerchantsrapidly
becamethechieftaxfarmers,
andbusinessmen
bankers,
ofthenewEmpire.Members
ofGreeknoblefamilies-the
Batazidai,
Chrysoloroi,
Azanaioi,and Chalkokondyles
amongthem-captured
partofthetradeoftheEuxineandeventhefurtradeofRussia."8
The
taxfarmer,
wealthiest
and leaseholder
of imperial
merchant,
revenues
-until his hangingin 1576-wasthe popularly
hated"Son of the
Devil" MichaelCantacuzenus,
who used to build fifteen
or more
fortheOttoman
galleys
fleet
every
yearandcould,inpractice,
nominate
GreekOrthodox
andtheprinces
bishops
ofMoldaviaandWallachia."9
14 George Young, Corps de droit ottoman(Oxford: ClarendonPress, Igo5-6), III, 66n.;
Libyer,"The OttomanTurks,"EnglishHistoricalReview,XXX (I9I5), 582.
15FernandBraudel,La Mditerraneeet le monde mediterraneen
a l'epopue de Philippe11
(Paris: ArmandColin, I949), pp. 8i, 246.
16Eugenio Alberi, ed., Relazioni degli ambasciatorivenetial Senato, serie IIIa, vol. II
(Florence,I844), 412.
17 Young,Corpsde droitottoman,
III, 65-68.
18 N. Iorga, "Les grandesfamiliesbyzantineset l'id6e byzantineen Roumanie,"Bulletin
de la Sectionhisborique
de l'AcademieRoumaine[hereafter
citedas Bulletin,Acad. Roumaine],
XVIII (I93I),
Daniell, ed., The Life and
3-5; CharlesThorntonForsterand F. H. Blackburne
Lettersof Ogier Ghiselinde Busbecq (London, i88.i), I, I8.
19Iorga,"Les grades families,"
Gottwald,"Phanariotische
Studien,"Leipziger Vierteliahrsschrift
fur Suidosteuropa[hereafter
citedas LVjsfSOE], V. (I94I),
43; Samuel Gerlach,ed., StephanGerlachdess AelternTageBuch. . . (Frankfurt
amMain,I674), p. 6o.


The capacitiesof the formerByzantinearistocracy
to providea
sufficient
recruits
failedto satisfy
numberof merchant
the requireThe Empiretherefore
ofthe
mentsofthecapital.
openedthecommerce
theGenoese,
BlackSeatothecommon
orabsorbing
people.20
Displacing
and nativeRumanianmerchant
Armenian,
classes,Greekmerchants
in cattleand grain-rich
Wallachiaand
settledin increasing
numbers
Moldavia,uponwhichtheOttoman
capitaldependedso muchforits
werein
dailybreadand saltand mutton.2"
By i6ooGreekmerchants
ofthecommerce
oftheeastern
halfof
control
ofa significant
portion
theBalkanpeninsula.
forprovisioning
thecapitalweremoreor less
Ottomantechniques
perfected
bythemiddleofthesixteenth
century.
The provisioners
were
eitherprivatetradersand tradeassociations,
to
speciallyauthorized
or
other
or
purchase
foods
the
commodities,official
government
buyers,
latterchiefly
concerned
withthepurchaseof grains.The BlackSea
coastof Bulgaria,the Rumanianprincipalities,
Thrace,Macedonia,
districts
ofAsiaMinorwererapidly
Thessaly,
Morea,andseveral
forced
a largepartof theirsurplusproduction
to reserve
in grains,sheep,
cattle,
horses,
butter,
tallow,honey,wax,and timber
forexportto the
Ottoman
capital.
The statepolicyofcaringfortheneedsof Constantinople,
ofother
cities,
andofthearmyandnavyledtotheconcentration
oftradein the
handsofmonopolists
and possessors
of specialprivileges.
Fur traders,
ofbeefand mutton,
saltfarmers,
and buyers
purveyors
and exporters
of silk,wool,cotton,
coffee,
rice,oil, grains,wax,copper,lead,and
topurchase
wereall required
saltpeter
government
patents
authorizing
themto engagein thecommerce
oftheirchoice.
Merchants
charged
withsatisfying
theneedsofthecapitaland state
at firstmadetheirpurchases
in theporttowns.Soon,however,
they
intotheinterior,
extended
theiroperations
forcing
peasants
tosellthem
theirgoodsat pricesevenlowerthanthosefixedbythestate,buying
fortheir
merchandise
as wellas fortherequirements
enrichment
private
of stateand capital,and effectively
the market.Between
cornering
peasantandmerchant
monopolist,
however
humblethelatter's
origins,
the gulfwas deep beforethe end of the sixteenth
In the
century.
eighteenth
century,
Macedonian
peasants
evenpreferred
tomakegrain
to theportof Salonikaat theirown expenseratherthan
deliveries
20 Gottwald,"Phanariotische
Studien,"LVjsfSOE,V (I94),
4-6.
21 I. Nistor,Handel und Wandel in der Moldau bis zum Ende des -6. Jahrhunderts
(Czernowitz:H. Pardini, I9I2), pp. 9-IO, 55-56, 6i; N. lorga, A Historyof Roumania;
trans.fromthe2d enlargeded. byJosephMcCabe (London: T. Fisher

Land, People,Civilisation,
Unwin Ltd., ig25),
p. i28.

242
Traian Stoianovich
receivethedreadedvisitof rapaciousgovernment
buyersand monopolists.'
The thirdstimulus
to theriseof a Balkanmerchant
classwas the
urbanization
policyof the Ottomanstate.Appliedenergetically
to
Constantinople,
thispolicywas extended
simultaneously
totheBalkan
interior.
New townswerefounded:Babadaghin Dobrudja,Osman
Pazar in thedistrict
of Sumen,Orhanijein theStaraPlanina,Tatar
Pazardzik,Novi Pazar,Tirana,Elbasan,Sarajevo,Travnik,Kbprulli
ofOttoman
(Veles),andPirot.The first
twocenturies
unoccupation,
favorable
tothedevelopment
ofNovoBrdo,Ochrida(Ohrid),Trnovo,
and Anchialus,inspiredtheexpansionofPhilipSrebrenica,
Mesembria,
popolis (Plovdiv), Adrianople,Janina,Salonika,Larissa (Yenizehir),
Tripolitsa(Tripolis), Pljevlje,Prokupije,Uskiib (Skoplje), Monastir
(Bitolj), Sofia, Belgrade, Valjevo, Uzice, Kladovo (Fethislam),
Hercegnovi(Castelnuovo),Mostar,Foca, Banja Luka, Zvornik,Jajce,
and Livno.23
The formationof empirerequiredthe ameliorationof the arteries
22Walter Hahn, Die Verpflegung

nach
Konstantinopels
durch staatlicheZwangswirtschaft
fur Sozial- und
(Beiheftezur Vierteljahrschrift
Urkundenaus dem I6. Jahrhundert
tuirkischen
No. 8) (Stuttgart:Verlag von W. Kohlhammer,1926), pp. 7-62; G. I.
Wirtschaftsgeschichte,
et le monopoledu ble a l'epoque
de Constantinople
Bratianu,"Etudes sur l'approvisionnement
byzantineet ottomane,"Etudes byzantinesd'histoiree'conomiqueet sociale (Paris: Librairie
Paul Geuthner,1938), pp. I69-77; LiutfiGiicer,"Le problem de l'approvisionneOrientaliste
mentd'Istanbulen cerealesversle milieudu XVIIIe siecle,"Revue de la Facultedes Sciences
LiutfiGiucer,"Le commerce
153-62;
economiquesde l'Universited'lstanbul,XI (1950),
int6rieurdes cerealesdans l'Empireottomanpendantla seconde moitiedu XVIeme siecle,"
ibid., pp. I63-88; Arnold J. Toynbee, A Study of History,VIII (London, New York,
pp.
Press,1954), I78; Sakazov, BulgarischeWirtschaftsgeschichte,
Toronto:OxfordUniversity
258-59; (Franqois de Tott), Me'moiresdu Baron de Tott, sur les Turcs et les Tartares
1785),
(Amsterdam,
I,
32-33;
G(uillaume) A(ntoine) Oliver, Voyagedans l'Empire
pendantles six premieres

othoman,I'Egypteet la Perse,fait par ordre du Gouvernement,
(Louis-Auguste)Feix-Beaujour,Tableau
anne'esde la Republique,I (Paris, an IX), 360-6I;
du commercede la Grece d'apres une annee moyennedepuis 1787 jusqu'a 1797 (Paris, an
N. G. Svoronos,Le commercede Salonique au XVIIIe siecle (Paris: Presses
VIII), I, 115-22;
de France, I956), pp. 48-56, 6o, 113, 398-99; Ignace MouradgeaD'Ohsson,
Universitaires
IV, premierepartie,pp. 222-25, 257;
Tableau generalde l'Empireothoman(Paris, I787-I820),
(J. Raicevich), Osservazionistorichenaturali,e politicheintorno;la Valachia, e Moldavia
Herbert Wilhelmy,Hochbulgarien,II. Sofia:
280;
(Napoli, 1788), pp. 25-26, 120-21,
des
zwischenOrientund Okzident(Band V, Heft 3, of Schriften
WandlungeneinerGrossstadt
Institutsder UniversitatKiel) (Kiel, 1936), pp. 85-86; ArchivesNationales
Geographischen
consulaire,letterfrom
(Paris) (hereaftercited as A.N.), Aff.Etr. B1 473, Correspondance
Taitbout,Frenchconsularagentin Coron,July9, 1790; A.N., Aff.Etr. B1 904, despatchfrom
Bauchier,Frenchconsularagentin Naples de Romanie(Nauplion), December31, 1764.
23 FehimBajraktarevic,
"Uskiib," Encyclopidiede l'Islam,IV (1934), IIIO; TihomirR.
Djordjevi6,Srbija pre sto,godina [Serbiaa hundredyearsago] (Belgrade:Prosveta,1946), pp.
i68; V. Radovanovic,"Prizren,"Narodna enciklopedijasrpsko-hrvatsko-slovenacka
153-57,
2I,
698; Lujo
National Encyclopedia], ed. St. Stanojevic, III (I928),
[Serb-Croat-Slovene
Vojnovic,Dubrovniki osmanskocarstvo[Dubrovnikand the OttomanEmpire] (Belgrade,
I898), I, 89; A. Sopov, "Evlija ,elebi," Periodiceskospisanie of B'lgarskotoknizovno
v Sofija,yearXIII,vol.LXII (1901),
druzestvo
I73-76,
I85-87,
I92;
PeterCharanis,
"A Note


of imperialintercourse:
the war routeslinkingLarissa,Varna,Vidin,
Sofia,Salonika, SkopIje, Belgrade,Novi Pazar, and Sarajevo to the
capital,to each other,to theDanube, and to the Adriaticcoastalcities
of Ragusa and Spalato.The joiningof the principalcitiesof the seacoastto thefrontiers
ofthenorththroughtheforgingofpoliticalunity
quickenedthe buildingof caravanstationsor hans, which provided
merchantsand travelers
withtemporary
quartersand a place to keep
theirgoods. Palankas,or crudelyconstructedfortshousing a conarose
tingentof soldiers,severalofficials,
and a numberof craftsmen,
aroundmanyof the caravanstations.A few such stationsbecameimor exchange:Tatar Pazardzik,
portantcentersofhandicraft
production
Harmanli,and Caribrodon the routebetweenAdrianopleand NiA;
Dupnica and Petric betweenSofia and the valley of the Vardar;
Ru'scuk (Ruse), Svistov,and Lomi along the Danube; Balcik and
Karoana along theBlack Sea.24
The TurkishhistorianOmerLuitfiBarkanestimates
thatthepopulationof Adrianople,Athens,Sarajevo,Monastir,Skoplje,Sofia,Larissa,
and Trikkalaincreasedby68 percentbetween1525 and 1575. Whatever
the exact percentageof urban growth,the urban populationof the
Balkans,much depletedduringthe previouscenturyof war and civil
disorder,
unquestionably
expandedduringthesixteenth
century.
Moreover,theBalkanurbanincreasewas no lessremarkablethantheurban
increasein thewesternMediterranean.25
on the Populationand Cities of the ByzantineEmpire in the ThirteenthCentury,"in The
No. 5) (New York: ConJoshuaStarrMemorialVolume (JewishSocial StudiesPublications,
ference
on Jewish
Relations,
1953), pp. 141-44;
Wilhelmy,
Hochbulgarien,
II, 60-62; Franz
Babinger,"Tirana," Encyclopetdie
de l'lslam,IV (1934), 825; [Lorenzo Bernardo],Viaggioa
Constantinopoli
di sierLorenzoBernardoper l'arrestodel bailo sier GirolamoLippomanoCav.,
1591 aprile,ed. R. DeputazioneVeneta sopra gli studi di stona patria (Venice, I886), pp.
28-29; Edward Brown, A Brief Account of Some Travels in Hungaria, Servia, Bulgaria,
Macedonia,Thessaly,Austria,Styria,Carinthia,Carniola,and Friuli (London, i673), pp. 39,
45-47; MiroslavPremrou,"Jermenska
kolonija u Beogradu; istoriskaskica s dokumentima"
[The Armeniancolonyin Belgrade;documentedhistoricalsketch],Spomenik,LXVI, 2d cl.,
Book 52 (I926), p. 2I3n.;
Glisa Elezovic, "Iz putopisa Evlije Celebije; njegov put iz
Beogradau Hercegovinu;opis Uzica I664 godine" [The travelaccountof Evlija Celebija; his
of Uzice in I664], Istoriskicasopis, year
journeyfromBelgradeto Herzegovina;a description
I, Nos. i-2 (1948), p. 13. Milan v. gufflay,
"Stidte und BurgenAlbaniens,hauptsachlich
of the Akademie der Wissenschaften
wsihrenddes Mittelalters,"Denkschriften
in Wien,
philosoph.-hist.
Kl.,LXIII,No. I (ViennaandLeipzig,1924), pp. 27-29, 35.
24 Sakazov, BulgarischeWirtschaftsgeschichte,
pp. 220-23; Wilhelmy,Hochbulgarien,
II, 46i
C. J. Jirecek,Die Heerstrassevon Belgrad nach Constantinopel
(Prague, I877), passim.
25Omer LutfiBarkan,"Quelques observations
sur l'organisationeconomiqueet sociale des
villesottomanes
des XVIe et XVIIe siecles,"Recueilsde la Socitetlean Bodin,VII. La uille, 2e
partie,Institutions
e'conomiqueset society(Brussels,I955), pp. 292-93; Omer Lutfi Barkan,
"La 'Mediterranee'de Fernand Braudel vue d'Istamboul," Annales (Economies, Societes,
Omer Liitfi Barkan, "Vers un renouveau de l'historie
Civilisations),IX (I954), 19I-93;
fromConferences
d'Athenes("Fakiulteler
ottomane,"offprint
Matbaasi,"[1952], p. 84.

244
Traian Stoianovich
The growthof Balkantownspromoted

the spreadof trade.The
principal
initialbeneficiaries
ofBalkanurbanexpansion
in thewestern
and even centralBalkan provinces,
however,were not Orthodox
merchants
butMoslems,
RomanCatholicSlavsfromRagusa,Italians,
western
andJews.
Europeans,
Notuntiltheendofthesixteenth
century,
afterthe slowing-down
of Jewishimmigration
and the declineof
Ragusa,didtheOrthodox
urbanelement
begintoexpandsignificantly
intheareawestofthelineVidin-Sofia-Salonika.
II
The centerof worldcommerce

shifted
in theseventeenth
century
totheAtlantic.
HollandandEngland,eagertoexpandtheirtradeand
ofCatholic
challenge
thepolitical
andcommercial
supremacy
Spain,beIn theeighteenth
merchants.
cameplacesofrefuge
forJewish
century,
of Europegrewboth
Europeanindustry
bloomedand thepopulation
in wealthand in number.
In thefootsteps
ofeconomic
folexpansion
tolerance
Intellectual
of the Jews
lowedintellectual
enlightenment.
becamewidespread,
evenin the Germanies,
wherethe rulingand
to seetheJewin theimage
"thinking"
classesbeganto seeor pretend
ofLessing's
NathantheWise.
and economicopportunity,
Temptedby the promiseof tolerance
West.The Jewishpopulation
manyJewsflockedto the prosperous
timeswerereversed,
of medievaland Renaissance
movements
and
fromPoland,Russia,and Turkeyforwestern,
Jewsdeparted
central,
numbered
and DanubianEurope.In i650 Holland'sJewish
population
In i735
ofDutchJewsexceeded
50,ooo.26
3,ooo;in i790 thenumber
andmostofthemwererecent
thanI2,oooJewslivedinHungary,
fewer
The number
ofHungarianJewsthengrewto 75,000 in
immigrants.27
1785, 128,000 in i8o5, and 225,000 in
i825.28
Veryfew Jewsinhabited
MoldaviaandWallachiabefore
themiddleoftheseventeenth
century,
counted
butin i825 MoldaviaandWallachia
8o,oooJews.'Sephardic,
26 Salo Wittmayer
Baron,A Social and ReligiousHistoryof the Jews(New York: Columbia
Press,I937), II, I72.
University
Hungary(London: ErnestBenn Ltd., 1934), p. 2Io.
27C. A. Macartney,
28 Martinvon Schwartner,
Statistikdes KdnigreichsUngern (2d aug. and rev. ed.; Ofen,
I809-II),
I,
I44.
29 N. Iorga,"Histoiredes Juifsen Roumanie,"Bulletin,Acad. Roumaine,II, No. i (Jan. i,

pp. 33-8i; Uriah Zevi Engelman,"Sources of JewishStatistics,"The Jews: Their
1914),
History,Culture,and Religion,ed. Louis Finkelstein(New York: Harper & BrothersPublishers,c. 1949), II, II85.


halfthetotalJewishpopulation
Italian,and OrientalJewries
constituted
oftheworldin i650 butonly20 percenttwocenturies
later.30
The Jewsgoing westcame mostlyfromRussia and Poland, where
acuteanti-Semitism
eruptedin theseventeenth
century.
Manyof them,
ofthe
however,also camefromtheOttomanEmpire,whereintolerance
Jewsincreasedwhile in theWest it diminished.In the secondhalf of
thesixteenth
century,
forexample,OttomanJewsweremade subjectto
sumptuary
laws regulatingdress.3'SpanishMoors,who settledin Conin largenumbersat theend ofthecentury,
stantinople
broughtvirulent
anti-Jewish
feelingswiththem,whichtheycommunicated
to otherresiThe soldieryof the capital,moreover,
dents.32
was proneto set fireto
Jewishquartersin orderto plunderJewishproperties
duringthe confusion.33
By i8oo Jewshardlydared enter,much less live in, thosetownsof
the Bosporuswhichhad a heavyGreek Orthodoxpopulation,where
theywereoftenobjectsoftotess sortesd'avanies,qui, dans la croyance
du people,passaientpour meritoires."
Jewishfishmongers
passingon
the quays,forexample,were sometimesassaulted-maliciously
rather
thanjestingly-withflyingsnowballsor lessinnocuousmissiles.Prince
Nikolaos Soutsos,an enlightenedGreek who was criticalof such
hooliganism,relatesin his memoirsthatno Jewdared appear in the
streetsof such townsduringHoly Week. Streeturchinsgreasedhis
beardwithtar and setfireto it if he did. On Good Friday,theyeven
filedin processionwiththe mannequinof a wretchedJew,chanting
"une kyrielled'inviectives
les plus grossierescontrele people dIsrael"
"du
and burningtheJewin effigy
in thenightto avengeChristendom
34 Greekintolerance
oftheJews,
pecheoriginalde la nationhebraique."
however,did not initiallyprovokebut rathersprangfromthe decline
of the role of the Jewsin the Empire.
The Jewishelementin Balkan townshad risenrapidlybetweenthe
30 Baron,A Social and ReligiousHistory,II, I66.
31I. S. Emmanuel,Histoiredes lsra'litesde Salonique (Paris: LibrairieLipschutz,1936),
turcsconcernantles Juifsde Turquie (Istanbul:
officiels
1, 244; AbrahamGalantc,Docuoments
Haim, Rozio & Co., 193I), p. II4; Dusanka Dopova,ed., Makedonija vo XVI i XVII vek;
[Macedonia in the sixteenthand seventeenth
arhivi (1557-I645)
dokumentiod carigradskite
centuries;documentsfromthe archivesof Istanbul,I557-I6451 (Skopje, I955), pp. 49-50.
objective-to prevent
Laws regulatingdress appear to have had initiallyan anti-inflationary
the priceriseof clothand colorsdesiredby the dominantreligiousgroup.
32 F. W. Hasluck, Christianity
and Islam under the Sultans, ed. MargaretM. Hasluck
(Oxford:
Clarendon
Press,I929), II, 723-24.
33Isaac Broyde,"Constantinople,"
JewishEncyclopedia,IV, 238.
34 PrinceNikolaosSoutsos,Memoiresdu PrinceNicolasSoutzo,Grand-Logothete
de Moldavie,
ed. PanaiotiRizos (Vienne: Gerold& Cie, I899), p. io.
I798-I87I,

246
Trajan Stoianovich
century.
Sofia,
and middleof the seventeenth
closeof thefifteenth
withouta Jewin I520, contained52 Jewishfamiliesin I546, 300 Jews
in I578, and 2,000 Jewsin i664. Monastir counted 34 Jewishfamiliesc.

1525 and 200 families in i59i. Skoplje numbered 12 Jewishfamilies c.
I525, 32 familiesin I546, and 3,000 Jewsin i688. Adrianople contained
20i Jewishfamiliesc. I525, i,ooo familiesin I555, and i6,ooo Jewsin
1664. Salonika contained 2,465 Jewishfamilies c. I525, 2,807 families
in 1568, and perhaps 40,000 Jews in i664. Constantinople numbered
i,500 Jewishfamilies in 1477, i,647 families c. I525, over I5,000 Jews
in I553, and 30,000 in I574.3
Probablylevelingoffin Constantinoplebeforei600,36the Jewish

populationdeclinedin most Balkan towns betweeni66o and i8oo.
ManyJewsfromSalonikaand Morea emigratedto Smyrna,whichbetrade,partlyin consecame the centerof the easternMediterranean
quence of the War of Candy (i645-i669), duringwhich the commercialintercourse
of SalonikawiththeWestwas muchcurtailed.The
near
Jewsof Spalato,Ragusa,and the Ionian Islands-geographically
ifnotpolitically
partoftheOttomanpolity-alsodiminishedin number
as thecommerceof theseplacesstagnatedor felloff.An undetermined
numberof Jewsleftthe OttomanEmpire in the eighteenthcentury
London,and Hamburg,all
forVienna,Trieste,Livorno,Amsterdam,
centersof expandingeconomies.37
Certainestimates,reliablein their
35 Wilhelmy,
pp. 28-29;
Bernardo,Viaggioa Constantinopoli,
II, 89, 99-I00;
Hochbulgarien,
K. N. Kostic,"Gradja za istorijusrpsketrgovine,"Spomenik,LXVI, 2d cl., Book 52 (I926),
pp. I84-90; Babinger,Hans Dernschwam'sTagebuch, p. 107, n. 3I8; Barkan, "Quelques
295-96;
pp. 292,
observations,"Recuedisde la Societe lean Bodin, VII, No. 2 (I955),
p. 84;
Barkan, "Vers un renouveaude l'histoireottomane,"Contrrencesd'Athenes (1952),
zur Tuirkenzeit,"
Arno Mehlan, "Mittel- und Westeuropa und die Balkanjahresmarkte
III (Leipzig, 1938), 82. The anonymousauthorof a description
Forschungen,
Sfidostdeutsche
against the Turks describesSkopije as a "vast
of the Austriancampaign of I689-I690
markettownnot much smallerthan Prague,or perhapsjust as large,"with a totalpopulation
of perhaps6o,ooo, of which3,000 were Jews.Cf. Kriegsarchiv(Vienna), Feldakten,Tuirkensee note I3.
fols.33-34. On theJewsof Constantinople,
kriegI689, fasc.I67 (I3/I),
Jews paid the poll tax
36 In 1553, accordingto Dernschwam,6,785 Constantinopolitan
only 5,I50 Jews paid the cizye. Cf. Babinger,Hans Dernschwam's
or cizye. In I69I/92
Tagebuch, p. 107; Uriel Heyd, "The JewishCommunitiesof Istanbul in the Seventeenth
p. 309.
Century,"Oriens,VI, No. 2 (Dec. 3I, I953),
37 Emmanuel,Histoire des Israelitesde Salonique, pp. I4, 26I; Young, Corps de droit
ottoman,II, 142-43; AbrahamGalante,Histoiredes Juilsd'Anatolie(Istanbul:Babok,I937-39),
a l'histoiredes Juifsespagnolsa Vienne," Revue
I, 136, I6i; N. M. Gelber,"Contribution
des Etudes juices, XCVII 0934), II4, I21; M. Franco,Essai sur l'histoiredes Israelitesde
l'Empire ottomandepuis les originesjusqu'ai nos jours (Paris: LibrairieDurlacher,I897),
p. iI9; Cecil Roth,Venice ["JewishCommunitiesSeries"] (Philadelphia:The JewishPublication Societyof America,1930), pp. 306-9, 331, 333. On Jewsin Ragusa in the sixteenthand
workof JorjoTadic, Jevreiiu Dubrovnikudo polovine
see the important
centuries,
seventeenth
century](Sarajevo: "La
XVII stoljeia [Jewsin Dobrovnikuntilthe middleof the seventeenth
Benevolencia,"1937).


suggestiveness
ifnotintheirarithmetic
exactitude,
purport
toshowthat
theJewish
population
of Salonikadeclinedfroma possible40,000in
the i66o's to 30,000 in M715,20,000 in I734, i8,ooo in I783, and I2,000 C.
I792.38 The Jewish
population
ofZemun(Semlin)declined
fromi,ooo
in i68o to less thanone-tenth

thisnumberin I750.39 The Jewsof
Belgrade
andSkoplje,andperhaps
ofSarajevoandVidin,alsodeclined
in numberat theendof theseventeenth
century,
although
in several
of theseplacestheyrecovered
and
partof theirformer
demographic
economic
strength
duringthesecondhalfoftheeighteenth
century.40
The messianism
of Shabbethai
Zebi (Zevi) inspired
OttomanJews
to neglecttheirwordlyaffairs,
alreadysuffering
froma slowdownin
business
on by a severeinternal
brought
socialcrisisthroughout
the
Empireandbytheseemingly
warswithPersia,Austria,
and
unending
Venice.SirPaul Rycaut,
observant
Englishconsulin Smyrna,
reports
the spreadof an apocalyptic
and chiliastmovement
fromConto Buda. Everywhere
he "perceived
a strangetransport
stantinople
in theJews,
noneofthemattending
to anybusiness,
unlesstowindup
former
themselves
andfamilies
fora journey
negotiations,
andprepare
. ." In SalonikatheJewsengagedin abnormal
to Jerusalem.
fasting
or "buriedthemselves
in theirgardens,
covering
theirnakedbodies
withearth,theirheadsonlyexcepted,
in thosebeds
[and] remained
of dirt,untiltheirbodieswere stiffened
withcold and moisture:
others
wouldendureto havemeltedwax droptupontheirshoulders:
to roul[sic] themselves
others
in snow,and throwtheirbodiesin the
38 HubertPernot,ed., Voyageen Turquie et en Grecedu R. P. Robertde Dreux, aumonier

p. Io3; (Paul
de l'ambassadeurde France (1665-1669) (Paris: "Les Belles Lettres,"I925),
Lucas), Voyagedu sieurPaul Lucas, faiten MDCCXIV, &c. par ordrede Louis XIV dans la
I, 37;
Turquie, l'Asie, Sourie; Palestine,Haute et Basse Egypte,&c. (Amsterdam,I720),
Bulgariens(Sofia: "Knipegraph,"1943),
Nicolas V. Michoff,Beitrdgezur Handelsgeschichte
opisi Srbijepred Kotinu Krajinuod I783 i I784 god."
I, i; Dusan Pantelic,"Vojno-geografski
of Serbia in I783 and I784], Spomenik,LXXXII, 2d cl.,
descriptions
[Military-geographic
Book 64 (1936), p. 7; Felix-Beaujour,Tableau du commerce,I, 5I-53. Arasy,Frenchconsul
in Salonika,places the Jewishpopulationof the cityin I777 at 25,000, whichis probablytoo
high. Cf. Michel Lascaris,"Salonique a la fin du XVIIIe siecle d'apres le consul de France
J.V. Arasy,"Les Balkans,X, No. 4 (Athens,I938), pp. 375-76.
39 D. J.Popovic,0 Cincarima;prilozipitanjupostankanaleg gradjanskogdrus'tva[On the
of our middleclass] (2d ed.;
to the problemof the formation
Tsintsars[Vlachs]; contributions
Belgrade:Drag. Gregoric,I937), p. I28, n. I02.
40 On Jewsin Belgrade,see: K. N. Kostic,"Gradja za istorijusrpsketrgovine,"Spomenik,
p. i9o; Drag. M. Pavlovic,"Finansije i privredaza vreme
LXVI, 2d cl., Book 52 (I926),
austriskevladavineu Srbiji (I7I8-I739)
po gradji iz beckih arhiva" [Financesand economy
in Serbia under Austrianrule, I7I8-I739, on the basis of Viennesearchivematerials],Glas,
u Srbiji za
LXIV, 2d cl., Book 40 (I9OI), pp. I8-20; Vuk Vinaver,"Tursko stanovnistvo
vremePrvog srpskogustanka" [resumein German: "Die tirkischeBevolkerungSerbiensim
Zeitalterder serbischen
Revolution"],IstoriskiGlasnik,No. 2 (I955), pp. 43-44.

248
Traian Stoianovich
Butthemost
intothesea,orfrozenwaters.
seasonofthewinter
coldest
backsandsides
topricktheir
wasfirst
ofmortification
manner
common
ninelashes."In i666,
and thento givethemselves
thirty
withthorns,
Islam,andpartofthe
unexpectedly
embraced
Shabbethai
underduress,
ofthe
The coming
hisexample.
ofSalonikafollowed
community
Jewish
wasthuspostponed.4'
"FifthMonarchy"
Jewswho remainedin theOttomanEmpireafteri666,although
apostasy,were psychologically
somewhatsoberedby Shabbethai's
andtendedto
fromtheclimateofmoderncapitalism
further
removed
less
able
thanthose
less
and
generally
less
enterprising,
be
wealthy,
itseems,had "truly
fallen."
Jews,
whodeparted.
By i750 theOttoman
forgiftsand bribesto theTurks
enormous
expenses
Mutualrivalries,
and a predilection
of ancientprivileges,
forconfortheconservation
or tnecertaine
outreed'Espagnol,"
magnificence
consumption,
spicuous
of the numerically
prehad causedthe dwindlingof the fortunes
Only the so-called
OttomanJewsof Hispanicorigin.42
ponderant
and "Livornese"(or "Italian")Jews,morerecentar"Portuguese"
toperpetuate
ofFrance,continued
rivalswhowereundertheprotection
wealthand enterprise.43
ofJewish
theearliertraditions
III
BalkantownsbecamelessJewish,
Slowlyandalmostimperceptibly,
evenless Turkish,and moreGreek,
less Armenianand sometimes
from
moreSlavic,andmoreAlbanian.In Old Serbiaand Macedonia,
offamilies
fledto Hungaryin i69o, thetrend
whichmanythousands
was complicated
bythefactthattownsoftenbecamemoreGreekor
untilthattimemainlyby Slavs.This
Albanianin regionsinhabited
in spiteof seemingcontradictions,
was the
urbanrenationalization,
41 Sir Paul Rycaut (late consul of Smyrna& fellow of the Royall Societie), The History
of the TurkishEmpire,fromthe Year 1623, to the Year z677, Containingthe Reignsof the
Three Last Emperors. . . (London, i687), pp. I74-8i. On the movementof Shabbethai
Zebi, see also H. Graetz, Historyof the Jews (Philadelphia:JewishPublicationSocietyof
America,c. i895), V, ii8-66; Abram Leon Schahar,A Historyof the Jews (New York:
AlfredA. Knopf,I937), pp. 242-44; SolomonGrayzel,A Historyof the Jews(Philadelphia:
ofAmerica,
1947), pp. 512-15.
Publication
Society
Jewish
42A. N., Aff.Etr. B"'. 239, memoiron the commerceof the Black Sea, Doc. No. I,
The anonymousauthorof the memoiractuallyobservesthat the Jews
I75I.
Constantinople,
have "trulyfallen. . . in companywith the Armenians."See also the
of Constantinople
memoiron "the characterof the people of the country,theircommerce,"ibid., Doc. No. i8,
1751-53.
43 A. N., Aff.Etr. B"'. 234, memoiron the Portugueseand Italian Jews,I693; A. N., Aff.
Etr. B"' 237, memoiron the commerceof Salonika,AugustI736.


steptowardtherealizationoftheyetdistant
first,
howeverunconscious,
goal of the uninationaltownand uninationalstate.
war of i683-i690, theGermanic-Imperial
DuringtheAustro-Turkish
large
occupiedor besiegedand burnedor destroyed
armiestemporarily
partsof Belgrade,Sarajevo,Vidin, Skoplje,Stip,Veles, and Tetovo."
Before the war Skoplje had attained a population of 40-60,ooo and
Belgrademore than 50,000. The inhabitantsof these towns-Turks,

as well as someSlavs and Greeks-fledwiththe
Jews,and Armenians,
Turks,joined the Germans (Austrians),or died of disease and the
wounds of war. The Serbs and ChristianAlbaniansof Prizrenand
Pristina,along with many thousandsof rebellioustownsmenfrom
otherpartsof Old Serbia and Macedonia,fled northwardwith the
armies. The repopulationmeasures of Austria
Germanic-Imperial
and Turkey
(which occupiedBelgradefor two decades,I718-i738)
were only partiallysuccessful.On the eve of the Napoleonic wars
Skoplje still numberedonly 6,ooo and Belgrade only 25,000 inhabitants.45
The long and deleteriouswars thatTurkeywaged againstPersia,
Russia, Poland, Venice, and the Germanic-RomanEmpire of the
Hapsburgsbetween1592 and I7P8 are oftencitedin explanationof the
inabilityof the Turks to reproducethemselvesand replenishtheir
emptiedtownswith theirown kind. Afterthe close of the sixteenth
century,the employmentof Christianauxiliariesin the Ottoman
Turkishwar lossesin manpower,losses
armiesbecamelesscustomary.
becameheavier.Ottomantownsin
of
the
towns,consequently
largely
the centraland westernBalkan areas,where the urban declinewas
from
mostpronounced,
couldnotdrawupon adequateTurkishreserves
ruralareasbecausethepeasantsof theseregionswere
the surrounding
by and large ChristianSlavs or Moslem Slavs and Albanians,rarely
Turks.
Bulgariens,"Siidostdeutsche
44 Arno Mehlan,"GrundlinieneinerAussenhandlungsgeschichte
III (i939), 73I; Ljuben Lape, "Prilogkon izucavanjetona drustveno-ekonomskite
Forschungen,
to the studyof socio-economic
i politickiprilikina Makedonijavo XVIII vek" [Contribution
century](resumein French), Glasnik
and politicalconditionsin Macedoniain the eighteenth
za nacionalnaistorija,II, No. I (Skopje, I958), p. io2.
na Institutot
45 V. Radovanovic,"Skoplije,"Narodna enciklopedija,
IV (ig29), I28-29; V. Radovanovic,
"Pristina"and "Prizren"ibid.,III (ig28), 695, 698; Stojan Novakovic,"S Moravena Vardar,
26-2g oktobraI886, putne beleske" (Travel Notes: From the Morava to the Vardar, Oct.
26-29, i886), GodilnjicaNikole eupica, XIII (Belgrade,I893), 38; Djordjevic',Srbija pre sto
godina, p. I53; Tihomir R. Djordjevic, Makedonija (2d ed.; Belgrade: Udruzenje Juzno"Uskiib," Encyclopsdiede l'slam, IV, 1I1O;
Srbijanaca, Ig2g), pp. 82-83; Bajraktarevic',
Premrou, "Jermenskakolonija," Spomenik, LXVI, 2d cl., Book 52 (i926), p. 2I3n.;
I689, fasc.i67.
(Vienna), Feldakten,Tiirkenkrieg
Kriegsarchiv

250
Traian Stojanovich
the plaguespreadeasilythroughthe largetownsand

Moreover,
wheretheTurks
agglomerated
villagesofthecoastsandrivervalleys,
and hencetheprincipal
wereoftenthechiefinhabitants
victims.
The
isolators,
dissipated
its
whilenotwhollyeffective
forest
andmountains,
to thepastoraland semiagricultural
forceand hindered
itsextension
The comcommunities
of theSlavs,Vlachs,Greeks,and Albanians.
fromeach
monpractice
at somedistance
of locatingtheirdwellings
otherafforded
protection
againsttheplagueto theinhabitants
further
Only
and highlandcommunities.
of manySlav and Albanianforest
and Albanianswerethusable
theSlavs,Greeks(and Greco-Vlachs),
bywar
to furnish
fortheunfortunate
townsdecimated
newcolonists
or epidemic.
The sexualattitudes
and practices
of the Turksalso accountfor
in Balkantowns.Pouqueville,
thedeclineof theTurkishpopulation
ofGreekand
thewell-known
Frenchtraveler,
consul,and chronicler
Balkanhistory,
writesoftheMoreotewomenofMoslemfaithand of
Moslemsexualhabitsin general:
Quoique souvent elles [Moreote Moslem women] soient grecques elles-memes,
rarementont-elles,comme ces dernieres,un grand nombred'enfants;ce qu'il faut
des avortemens
attribuer,
d'une part,a la polygamie,et de l'autre,a l'arteffroyable
qui leur est familier:nulle part ses effetsne furentaussi funestes,ni si solennellement consacres.Avoues publiquementdans la familledu sultan,qui condamne
a la steriliteses soeurs et ses nieces,ces moyensaffreuxde depopulationpassent
dans les diff6rentes
classes de la society.Si un Turc soupconne la fidelityde ses
femmes,elles ne balancentpas a commettrele crime; elles s'y livrentmeme, et
sans remords,dans la seule vue de conserverleurs attraits,et de manager cette
beauty qui leur donne 1'empiresur des rivales avec lesquelles elles ne cessent
d'etreen guerre.
The practiceof polygamy

and abortionand the spreadof venereal
diseasereducedthereproductive
powersoftheTurks.4"
was acof Balkantownsin the sixteenth
century
The recovery
or varosi.47 With
and followedby thegrowthof suburbs
companied
en Albanie, et dans
46 F. C. H. L. Pouqueville, Voyage en Moree, a' Constantinople,
plusieursautrespartiesde l'Empireottoman,pendantles anne'es1798, 1799, I8oo et i8oI
(Paris, i805), I, 265.
47Eberhard Wolfgramm,"Die osmanische Reichskriseim Spiegel der bulgarischen
36. Busbecq,ImperialAmbassadorto the Porte,
LVjsfSOE, VI (1942),
Haidukendichtung,"
made the followingobservationin 1555 regardingBelgrade: "In frontof the city are very
large suburbs,built withoutany regardto order.These are inhabitedby people of different
nations-Turks, Greeks, Jews, Hungarians,Dalmatians, and many more." And he concluded: "Indeed, throughoutthe Turkish Empire, the suburbs,as a rule, are larger than
place." Cf. Forster
give theidea of a veryconsiderable
thetowns,and suburbsand towntogether
and Daniell,Life and Lettersof OgierGhiselinde Busbecq,p. 93. On the growthof suburbsin
Kl.,
philosoph.-hist.
Albania around i6oo and later,see Sufflay,
"Stiidte,. . ." Denkschriften,
pp. 27-29,, 33, 35.
LXIII/i (0924),

ConqueringBalkan OrthodoxMerchant 25I

thedeclineoftheurbannucleiduringtheWar ofCandyand AustroTurkishwars,thevarosaniorsuburban
Christian
inhabitants
obtained
accessto theurbancenters.
In i669, forexample,
MehmedIV issued
a firman
authorizing
Bulgarians
to settlein theTurkishquarters
of
Sofia,wherethepopulation
haddiminished,
whileexpressly
forbidding
Turksand Jewsto livein theBulgarianquarter.48
The modification
of theprinciple
or practice
of restricting
eachquarterto one or two
speciallydesignated
religiousconfessions
probablyalso occurredin
othertowns,as Christian
recruits
weresoughtto perform
economic
tasksformerly
belonging
to Turks,BosnianMoslems,
Jews,Ragusans,
or Armenians.
Sarajevo,it appears,lackedevena singleChristian
familyin 1520.
In i655, i percentofitspopulation
wasChristian.
In i807, onefourth
of its inhabitants
were Christian,virtuallyall OrthodoxSerbs.
Christians
of Banja Luka in
comprised
6 percentof thepopulation
i655 and8opercentin i807, halfRomanCatholics
andhalfOrthodox
Serbs.The totalpopulation
ofbothtownswas considerably
smallerat
the closeof the eighteenth
century
thanit had been in i655. The
Moslemelementdeclinedbothabsolutely
and relatively,
whilethe
Christianelementincreased.49
In 1578,Philippopolis
contained250
in i68o,io,oooof thetown'sinhabitants
Christians;
wereOrthodox
Greeksand Bulgarians.50
Between1734 and 1792 thetotalpopulation
of Salonika,whichhad declinedduringthe previoushalf-century,
grewby 50 percent.The Greekelementin thetownmayhaveincreasedfrom20 to 25 per cent of the total population,the Jewish
elementfellperhapsfrom50 to 20 per centof thetotal,whilethe

Moslemelement,made up of Janissary
familiesof diverseethnic
origins,
increased
from30 to 55 percentof thetotal.The Greekelementexpanded
further
afteri790 through
theimmigration
ofEpirote
and Macedonian
thepersecution
Greeksor HellenizedVlachsfleeing
ofAli Pashaand ofotherwarlords
Albanianbands.5
and wandering
In thoseSerbian
andMacedonian
townswheretheMoslempopulation
or relatively
the
greweitherabsolutely
duringtheeighteenth
century,
I, 64-66.
Wilhelmy,Hochbulgarien,
Recuejisde la Socilt6 lean Bodin, VII, No. 2, p. 295;
Barkan,"Quelques observations,"
AleksandarSoloviev,"Nestanakbogomilstvai islamizacijaBosne" ("La fin du bogomilismeet
l'islamisationde la Bosnie"), Godiinjak IstoriskogDrultva Bosne I Hercegovine(Sarajevo,
p. 65, n. 7; AmledeeChaumettedes Fosses, Voyageen Bosnie dans les annees 1807 et
I949),
48
49
I8o8 (Paris, I822), pp. 33, 4I.

50 Jirecek,Die Heerstrasse,p. I3I; K. N. Kostic, "Gradja za istorijusrpske trgovine,"
LXVI, 2d cl., Book 52 (i926), p. 175n.
Spomenik,
51 Referencesare given in note 38. For a somewhatdifferent

view on the populationof
de Salonique,pp. 7-IO.
Salonika,see Svoronos,Le commerce

252
Traian Stojanovich
to the adventof Albanian or Bosnian

increaseis mainlyattributable
Moslems.Afterthe northwardtrekof Serbs,Macedo-Slavs,Christian
Albanians,and even Greeksin the companyof the armiesof Austria,
AlbanianMoslemsmovedintoKosovo and Macedoniaand thennorthwardto Karanovac(the futureKraljevo), Trstenik,Cuprija,Nis, and
Vidin. OtherAlbaniansmoved into Bulgariaand duringthe RussoTurkishwar of i768-i774 spreadsouthwardinto Morea. Afteri750
BosnianMoslemsmovedintowesternSerbiaand settledin Belgrade.
Some MoslemAlbaniansand Bosnianscame as merchantsand peaceful settlers,
but the bulk appeared as conqueringirregularsor mercenaries,part-time
bandits,and primitiveherdsmen.52
Macedo-Vlach commercialtowns reached the height of their
prosperity
aroundand shortlyafteri750. Among the mostflourishing
of the Epirote,Macedonian,and Thessaliancommunities
engaged in
the carrying
tradewas theVlach townof Moschopolis,whichin i750
may have attaineda populationof 40,000. Hidden in a mountain
fastnessand thuslong securefromthe envyof outlawsand Ottoman
the citizensof Moschopolisgrew rich throughthe sale of
officials,
theproductsof theirflocks-wool,hides,and cheese-to Jewishbuyers
of Salonikaand to Italian merchants.
Afterthe treatyof Passarowitz
extended
trade
to
In the war yearsof
their
they
Hungary.
(07i8)
i769 and I788, however,rudeAlbanianbanditraiders(an exampleof
or "violence-using"
FredericC. Lane's "protection-producing"
enterprises)5 fell upon and devastatedMoschopolis.At the head of the
band in I788 was thefatherof Ali Pasha; Ali Pasha himselflatercomand soonthetownwas reducedto twohundred
pletedthedestruction,
shepherdhuts.54
52 Vuk Vinaver,"TrgovinaBara, Bijelog Polja i Podgoricesa Dubrovnikom(1720-I760)"
[The trade of Bar (Antivari), Bijelo Poije, and Podgorica with Dubrovnik, I720-I760],
IstoriskiZapisi,Year VI, Vol. IX, No. 2 (Cetinje,I953), p. 467; V. Radovanovic,"Kumanovo,"
Narodna enciklopedija,
II, 573-74; Pantelic,"Vojno-geografski
opisi," Spomenik,LXXXII, 2d
cl., Book 64, pp. 29-9o; Vinaver,"Tursko stanovnistvo"
IstoriskiGlasnik,No. 2 (i955), pp.
45-48; Traian Stoianovich,"L'economiebalkaniqueaux XVIIe et XVIIIe siecles,"unpublished
doctoraldissertation,
University
of Paris, 1952, pp. 30-32, 37-38.
53For the use of the termsand a discussionof the conceptsof "protection-producing"
and
"violence-using"enterprises,
see FredericC. Lane, "Economic Consequencesof Organized
Violence,"Journalof EconomicHistory,XVIII (i958), 40I-17.
54Th. Capidan, Les Macedo-Roumains;esquisse historiqueet descriptivedes populations
roumainesde la Peninsulebalcanique (Bucarest:AcademieRoumaine,1937), pp. 17, 6o-6I;
Leonhard Schultze-Jena,
Kulturbilder(Jena: Gustav Fischer,
Makedonien; Landschafts-und
1927), p. 55; E. M. Cousinery,Voyage dans la Mace'doine,contenantdes recherchessur
de ce pays,2 tomesin one vol. (Paris, i831), I,17;
I'histoire,la geographicet les antiquities
Felix-Beaujour,
Tableau du commerce,I, 328; ApostolosE. Vakalopoulos,Oi dytikomakedones
in Turkishtimes] (Salonika:
apodemoiepi tourkokratias
[The west Macedonianemigrations
Societyof MacedonianStudies,1958.), pp. 24-26.


In I770, Vlach refugeesfrom Moschopolis founded the new
Macedonian town of Krusevo. Afterthe second razzia against the
Moschopolitans,
thegreatlocal lord Ismail Bey of Sereswelcomedthe
fleeingVlach refugeesto his bailiwick,wheretheyfoundemployment
as drovers,carters,and cottoncommissionagents.Other Vlachs,not
of Moschopolis,settledin otherparts
victimsof thedisasters
necessarily
of Macedonia,in Hungaryand the Banat,and in Morea.55
The banditryand disordersof the half-century
afteri769 brought
of Morea and to many small
ruin to almostthe entirecountryside
markettowns,namelyGrevenain southwestern
Macedonia and the
and Greco-Bulgarian
townsof Arbanasi
Albanian,Vlacho-Bulgarian,
(near Trnovo), Stanimaka, Rahovo, Panagjuriste,Kalofer, and
in Bulgaria.5"
The Countof Ferrieres-Sauveboeuf
notedin
Koprivstica,
I788, while the Turks were waging war againstAustriaand Russia,
thatthe outragesof the Turkishtroopshad "frightened
nearlyall the
inhabitantsof Bulgaria" into taking flightto "the mountainsof
like the
Macedonia."57 Some groupsof ruraland semiurbanrefugees,
Greek-speaking
Sarakatsanoi,revertedto a pastoraland seminomadic
life; others-Greeks,Vlachs, Macedo-Slavs,and Bulgarians-founded
or fledto commercialcenterswitholdertraditions.58
new communities
In Serbia,as in Macedonia,Albania, and Bulgaria,bandit chiefs
seizedthereinsof government,
of the Sultan,
challengedtheauthority
and attemptedto expropriateSerbian peasants of their properties,
extendcorveelabor and otherfeaturesof serfdom(the Jiftlik
system
and increasethe fiscalburdensof the rural
of propertyrelations),59
merchantclass. The Serbs rose in rebellion,organized their own
and in tenyearsofwarexterminated,
"protection-producing"
enterprise,
converted,or expelled almostthe entireMoslem elementfrom the
Pashalikof Belgrade.The townsof Serbiawere depopulated,reduced
to simple villages.Except in the so-calledfortresstowns,such as
Belgradeand Uzice, Serbia found itselfwithoutTurks and without
55 Cousinery,Voyagedans la Maccdoine,I, I7-I8; RichardBusch-Zantner,
Agrarverfassung,
Gesellschaft
und Siedlungin SildosteuropaunterbesondererBeriicksichtigung
der Tiirkenzeit
(Leipzig: OttoHarrassowitz,
1938), p. 98.
56 Ibid., p. 68; Stoianovich,"L'economie balkanique," pp. 48-50; Vakalopoulos, 0O
apodemoi,p. i2; Sakazov, BulgarischeWirtschaftsgeschichte,
p. 224.
dytikomakedones
57 Le Comte (Louis-Franqois)de Ferrieres-Sauveboeuf,
Mcmoireshistoriques,politiqueset
geographiques
des voyagesfaitsen Turquie (Paris,1790), I, I28-30.
58 Wolfgramm,"Die osmanischeReichskrise,"
LVjsfSOE, VI (1942), 37; Rev. R. Walsh,
Narrativeof a journeyfromConstantinople
to England (Philadelphia,I828), p. 82.
59 On the liftliksystem,see Traian Stoianovich,"Land Tenure and RelatedSectorsof the
Balkan Economy,i6oo-i8oo," journal of EconomicHistory,XIII (I953), 398-4II.

254
Traian Stojanovich
The
enterprises.
Moslems,thatis, withoutthe old violence-using
and Serbiaalmostachieved
townswerelaterreurbanized,
deurbanized
townand uninational
idealof theuninational
thenineteenth-century
state.
different
althoughsubstantially
The GreekWar of Independence,
gave the
in originfromthe Serbianwars of nationalliberation,
to
Greeksin revoltand thenew Greekstatea similaropportunity
theexpulsion
through
realizeruraland urbannationalhomogeneity
(the
of theTurkishand MoslemAlbanianminority
or annihilation
agencies)and the Hellenizationof Orthodox
old violence-using
Kosovo,Metohija,
Albaniansand Vlachs.In Bosnia,Herzegovina,
came
Epirus,Thessaly,and Bulgaria,nationalliberation
Macedonia,
were absentin the
tendencies
later,not becauserenationalization
of the
but becauseof the extremecomplexity
century,
eighteenth
oftheseterritories,
whichdelayedthe
composition
ethnicandreligious
authority.
ofa strong,
single,popularprotection-producing
emergence
IV
policiesoftheOttomanEmpire
The protectionist
and urbanization
of
thedevelopment
stimulated
in theera of itspoliticalascendance
in thechiefcities,
in Balkantownsandtheemergence,
industries
craft
the woolenmanufacture
including
textileindustry,
of an important
or
DerivedfromByzantium
of Salonika.60
of theJewish
community
fromSpainthrough
theagencyof theIberianJews,Ottomanmanuafter
intactforalmosta century
traditions
weremaintained
facturing
No new technicaladvances
thereignof Suleimanthe Magnificent.
and theprotection
of
weremadein theseventeenth
however,
century,
once
The
Turkish,
laterceased.
Greek,
flourishing
Ottomanindustry
and
of Salonika,Brusa,Adrianople,
and Jewish
textilemanufactures
declinedor disappeared.'
Constantinople
and protectionist
of mercantilist
policieswas
The abandonment
Ottoman
the
of
the
decline
of
and consequence
itselfa reflection
in
whichstemmed
enterprise,
as a protection-producing
government
in thegenoftheOttoman
Empiretoparticipate
partfromthefailure
century.
eral Europeandemographic
expansionof the eighteenth
60 I. (saac) S. (amuel) Emmanuel,Historiede l'industrie
des tissusdes Israelitesde Salonique
p. 254; Svoronos,
Wirtschftsgeschichte,
(Paris: Lipschutz,I935), p. 23; SakAzov, Bulgarische
de Salonique,p. i87.
Le commerce
61Ibid., p. 397; Emmanuel,Histoirede l'industie des tissue,pp. 53-63.

Merchant255
BalkanOrthodox
Conquering
Several European states,namelyRussia and Hungary,opened their
to settlement
by otherEuropeans.Ottomanpolicy,on the
frontiers
Ottomansubjectsto fleeand discouraged
encouraged
many
otherhand,
in thedominionsof theSultan.The population
fromsettling
foreigners
of European Turkey,threeor fourtimesthat of Hungaryin I700,
failedto keep pace withthatof its neighbor,whichincreased-as we
shall see in detaillater-by400 per centbetweenI700 and i8oo. Thus,
in i8oo, the population of Hungary probably exceeded that of
EuropeanTurkey.
The decline or stagnationof population,unless compensatedby
or territorial
proexpansionor innovation,
commercial,
technological,
vokes a declineor stagnationof total and, under certainconditions,
even per capita purchasingpower.Ottomandemographicstagnation
was accompanied,as we have seen,by an urbandemographiccontracresultedin the narrowtion.Rural stagnationand urbancontraction
ing of the domesticmarket.Confrontedwith an inadequateurban
domesticmarketfor their farm surpluses,the landowningclasses
soughtto place theirgoods in foreignmarkets.
The expansionof towns,population,and industryin westernand
centurycreateda risingdemand
centralEuropeduringtheeighteenth
fortheruralproductionof the Balkans:grains,hides,cattle,meat,oil,
wax, silk,wool, cotton,tobacco,and timber.The increaseddemand
produceda rapid rise in the price of rural commodities.The landhowowningclasseswerethusable torealizetheiraims.Theirsuccesses,
and urbanor semiurban
ever,arousedthejealousyof Ottomanofficials
who hired and armed each his own band of destitute
proprietors,
In
men in orderto forcethe Balkan peasantryto accept"protection."
many areas,especiallynear the coastsor in the lowlands and river
valleys,the peasantsoon foundhimselfwith two landlords,one to
whom he paid a legal rentand anotherto whom he gave "protection
money"in the formof a portionof his produce.62
62 For a more completediscussionof demographicand economicchange in the Balkans
and the profoundrelationshipbetweenthe two, see sectionVI of the presentstudy and
Stoianovich,"L'economie balkanique," passim; Stoianovich,"Land Tenure," Journal of
EconomicHistory,XIII (I953), 398-4II;
Svoronos,Le commercede Salonique, pp. 8.i-82,
of artisansand the extraeconomic
measurestheypursued
362-66. On the economicdifficulties
to amelioratetheircondition,see Sabri F. tlgener, "La morale des metiersdepuis le XIVe
siecleet les critiquesqui leur ont ft6adress'es,"Revue de la FaculM des SciencesEconomiques
de l'Universited'lstanbul,XI, Nos. I-4 (Oct. I949-July I950), pp. 62-66. Felix-Beaujour,
Tableau du4commerce,I, o30-32, draws a dark pictureof general povertyand distressin
spite,or ratherbecause,of the exportationof a verylarge part of the rural productionof
Macedonia:

256
Traian Stoianovich
interest
The urbanproperty-owning
classesthusacquireda primary
ofwealththrough
theexpropriation
intheaccumulation
ofthepeasant
and exportation
of expropriated
ruralcommodities.
They ceasedto
have a profound
or primary
interest
in the protection
of industry,
whilethelandowning
classeswerefundamentally
opposedto theprotection
ofcommodities
whichweremoreexpensive
thantheirEuropean
counterparts
and of poorerquality.Europeanstatesand merchants,
of Ottoman
furthermore,
obstructed
the revivaland improvement
manufactures.
In a fewscattered
placesoftheBalkansandAegean,namelyamong
the Greeks,industry
grew,it is true,even duringthe eighteenth
century.
The townandportofChios,forexample,
continued
topossess
a prosperous
textileindustry,
thanksto theebullience
and entrepreneurialambition
or "desird'entreprendre"
of its increasingly
Greek
Orthodoxinhabitants.
The commercial
and industrial
prosperity
of
Chiosalso stemmed
fromitsenjoyment,
sincethetimeof Suleiman,
of judicialand administrative
autonomy.63
Naxos,however,
which
evenmoreextensive
enjoyed
autonomies,
thrived
on commerce
neither
nor industry.
For the numerous
impoverished
"nobility"
of Naxos,
theirancestry
to thepre-Ottoman
Italianaristocracy
or to the
tracing
Paleologues
andComnenes,
haughtily
disdained
manuallabor.64
Local
autonomies
promoted
thegrowth
ofcommerce
and industry,
butonly
"Quand on consider la Macedoinesous le pointde vue de ses avantagesnaturels,on trouve
qu'il n'est aucun pays de l'Europe ou les individusaient requ plus d'aptitudeau bonheur:
mais quand on l'envisagesous l'aspectde ses formespolitiques,on trouveque tous les fleaux
d'une administration
barbaresemblents'etredonned'
la main pour desolerune des plus belles
contreesde la terrepar la richesseet la varietyde ses produits.
"La moitiede la Mac6doineest inculte:le systbmeabsurdedes jacheresest cause que le
troisiemequart ne produitrien ou produitpeu; et telle est la langueurdes culturesgrecques,
que le quatriemequartqui estmis en rapport,ne donnepas le tiersde ses produitspossibles."
On the basis of Macedonianexports,"on seraittent de juger favorablement
de l'tat des
cultivateurs;
mais on se tromperait.
Cette surabondancede productionsne prouve rien pour
leur bonheur,parce qu'elle n'est point l'excedentdu necessaire.Dans les ctats oui les paysans
jouissentde la plenitudede leursdroitscivils,commedans la plus grandepartiede l'Europe,
rienne se vend qu'on n'ait pourvudu moinsau necessaire;c'est alorsle vrai superflu
que l'on
exporte.Mais dans les pays qui se rapprochent
de l'etat de ces contreesou une multitudede
Negresest mise en actionpar le fouetde quelques Blancs,l'exportation
n'estjamais en proportionexacteavec. l'abondance"aU, des milliersd'individustravaillent
a produirepour un tries
petitnombre.La, de petitstyransreunissentla masse de travailde tout un canton,pour la
devorerseuls. . . . En Macedoinecomme en Pologne, les paysansmeurentde faim, et les
seigneursregorgent
d'or."
Beaujour is manifestly
describingthe Jifliksystemof land tenurein Macedonia.See also
Michoff,
Beitrige,II. Osterreichische
Konsularbertichie,
I, 5.
63Olivier,
Voyage,II, Io8-9, 114-24, 138-40.
64Ibid., pp. i63-64; J. L. S. Bartholdy,Voyage en Grece fait dans les annees 1803 et
I804 (Paris, I807), II, 49.


if thepossessors
of suchliberties
also possessed
drive
entrepreneurial
andinitiative.
Industry
alsothrived
in theeighteenth
century
in a fewgeographicallyisolatedBalkancommunities,
of whichtheclassicexamplewas
the diminutive
Thessaliantownof Ambelakia."A weak and insignificant
hamlet,"
without
"a singlefieldin itsvicinity,"
a
without
navigable
riverorharbor,
inaccessible
exceptby"a goat'spathamong
65 situated
precipices,"
in fact"in themostsecludedspotofthewhole
empire,and whereno one wouldlook forthehauntsof activeindustry,"
6 Ambelakia
acquiredtheprosperous
air of "a boroughof
"
Holland." In 1778 itsinhabitants
organizedthemselves
as a jointstockcompanyforthepurposeof exporting
cottonyarn,spunand
dyedin thecommunity,
to Buda,Vienna,Leipzig,Berlin,Hamburg,
Dresden,Ansbach,and Bayreuth.
In 1783 Ambelakiastillcontained
less than i,500 inhabitants.
In I798, however,it numbered4,000
and,in i803, 6,ooo,and exported
everyyear2,500balesofcottonyarn
to theabove-mentioned
places,whereit possessedagentsor branch
establishments.68
For twentyyearsAmbelakiawas "leftalone,"69 and it prospered

because it was leftalone-by banditsand governmentboth. But it
failedtoo becauseit was leftalone,becausethe government
failedto
encourageits industry.Ambelakiotescomplained in i8oi to the
Britishtraveler,
Edward Daniel Clarke,thattheyhad begun to "feel
the effectof the preferencegiven to English cottonthreadin the
German markets."Clarke himselfobservesthat this was surelythe
outcomeof "the improvement
adoptedin Great Britainof spinning
cottonthreadin mills,by meansof enginesthatare workedby steam,
which has caused such a considerablereductionin its price;-all the
threadmadeat Ambelakiabeingspunbymanuallabour."70
With the extensionof "capitulatory"
rights,thatis, specialpolitical
and economicprivileges,to an ever-larger
numberof European nations,all of themproducersand exportersof textiles,the interestof
65 David Urquhart,Turkeyand Its Resources:Its MunicipalOrganizationand Free Trade
(London, i833), p. 53.
66Edward Daniel Clarke,Travelsin VariousCountriesof Europe,Asia and Africa(London,

i8io-i6), Part II, Section3, Vol. IV, 28i.
67F6lix-Beaujour,Tableau du commerce,I, 272-75.
68Clarke, Travels,Part II, Section3, Vol. IV, 285; Urquhart,Turkeyand Its Resources,
pp. 47-54; Toynbee,A Study of History,VIII, i8i-82;
Bartholdy,Voyageen Grece,I, 98,
103-6.
69 Urquhart,Turkeyand Its Resources,
p. 54.
70 Clarke,Travels,Part II, Section3, Vol. IV, 286-87.

258
Traian Stoianovich
Ottoman
ofdomestic
textile
manufactures
officialdom
in theprotection
waned.RamiMehmedPasha,GrandVizier,deviseda plan in 1703
forthegeneralimprovement
thefounding
ofnewtextile
ofindustry,
manufactures
in Constantinople,
Adrianople,
and Salonika,and the
encouragement
in BrusaofGreekmanufactures
ofcertain
silkfabrics
hitherto
imported
fromtheeast.To protect
theseindustries
theGrand
Vizier forbadethe exportation
of neededraw materials.
But the
vizierateof Rami Mehmedsoon felland the projects"to establish
clothand silk-fabric
manufactures
in thestatesoftheGrandSeigneur
fellwithhim,"according
to theFrenchAmbassador,
who possessed
definite
of new and rival
instructions
to baror hamperthecreation
manufactures
in Turkey.'Dilatoryattempts
to promote
did
industry
notceasealtogether,
butthepoorqualityandhighinitialpricesofnew
textilemanufactures
and thestate'sfailureto subsidizedomestic
industries
and excludeforeignmanufactures
by protective
tariffs,
preventedthesuccessofOttoman
mercantilist
experiments.
SarandoPapadopoulo,
Greekmerchant
and holderof a patentor
beratplacinghim undertheprotection
of France,triedduringthe
1760's to foundsoap "factories"
in Coronand Navarino.His plans,
to preventthe
however,
miscarried,
forFrenchconsulsintervened
creationof manufactures
of
with the soap industry
competitive
Marseilles
and Provence.72
Upon returning
froma specialinspection
tourof theFrenchconsulates
of theLevantin 1779, Baronde Tott
advisedhis Government
to continue
theobstruction
of all efforts
to
startnewindustry
in theOttomanEmpire.73
SeveralyearsearliertheFrenchmerchant
ClaudeFlachat(c. I7I0to FrancewithGreekweaversand spinners
I775) had returned
from
masters
of techniques
If industry
unknownin theWest.74
Smyrna,
thrived
amongtheGreeksin a fewplacesonly,it was notforlack
of talentor enterprise
butforlack of systematic
protection.
Rarely
finding
incentive
to investin vulnerable
fixedindustrial
capital,the
commercial
classesputbacktheirprofits
intocommerce.
When,at the
71 Stoianovich,
"L'economiebalkanique,"pp. 344-45; A. N., Archievsde la Marine (hereaftercitedas A. M.), B7 7I, fol. I54, instructions
to A. M. de Ferriol,FrenchAmbassadorto
to Lebret,
Nov. 7, 1703;
thePorte,October
17, I703; A. N., A. M., B' 7I, fol.i68, despatch
A. N., A. M., B775, p. 463, instructions
to Ferriol,July6, I708; A.N., Aff.Etr. B1 384, despatch
fromFerriol,Aug. I6, I703; Svoronos,Le commercede Salonique,p. 397.
72 Stoianovich,
"L'economiebalkanique,"pp. 343-44.
73 A. N., Aff.Etr. BIII 233, Tott memoirdated July8, I779.
74 Sandor Baumgarten,
sur le commerceet sur les arts; notes de voyagede
"Observations
Revue d'histoirecompare, new ser., Vol.
Jean-ClaudeFlachatsur la Hongrie (1740-174I),"
V, No. 3 (I947), p. 86.


closeof the eighteenth
a numberof Greeksopenedsoap,
century,
macaroni,
or other"factories,"
theyfoundedthenew ventures
more
in theportsand townsoftheUkraineorSouthRussiathan
frequently
in theirnativetowns.75
The Ottoman
capitalitselfwas no longera greatcenterofindustry
bytheendoftheeighteenth
If we canbelieveEdwardDaniel
century.
Clarke,who spentsometimetherein i8oo, Constantinople
could
offerfewof the goodsand luxuriesavailablein London,Paris,or
Vienna.In itsstallsonefoundonly"theworstmanufactured
waresof
theworld,. . . unfit
foranyothermarket,
. . . andyetofthehighest
price.""Still,"Clarkeobserved,
"youaresaidtobe in thecenterofthe
commerce
oftheworld:and thismaybe trueenoughwithreference
tothefreight
ofvessels
passingtheStraits
whichis neverlanded.View
theexteriour
of Constantinople,
and it seemsthemostopulentand
flourishing
cityin Europe;examineitsinteriour,
and itsmiseries
and
deficiencies
areso striking,
thatitmustbe considered
themeanest
and
poorest
metropolis
oftheworld."76
V
The absenceof industrial

protectionism
in the OttomanEmpire
duringtheeighteenth
century,
combined
withtheindustrial
boomin
theWest,forcedtheOttomanprovinces
to becomesuppliers
of raw
materials
forEuropeandbuyers
ofEuropeanmanufactured,
processed
"colonial,"and luxurygoods,principally
sugar,coffee,
textiles,
expensiveRussianfurs,and centralEuropeanhardwareand glassware.
The sixteenth-century
balancebetweencommerce
and industry
was
in favorof commerce,
nowweighted
and Balkanmerchants
profited
fromthechangeevenmorethanEuropeanmerchants.
In a century
of
peasantimpoverishment,
theBalkanOrthodox
merchant-like
western
Europeanmerchants
and like the Ottomanofficial
and landowning
classes-wasto enjoyan unprecedented
prosperity.
At leastuntili770, Ottomanlandowners
imposedonlyrelatively
minordeterrents
on thetradeofmerchants
sellingthegrains,
cotton,
and otherfarmsurplusesof theirrivalsor competitors.
Properly
bribedcustoms
officials,
moreover,
evenencouraged
or shuttheireves
75 P. S. Pallas, Travelsthroughthe SouthernProvincesof the RussianEmpirein the Years
and 1794, trans.fromthe German2d ed. (London, i8i2), II, 480, 484-85.
76 Clarke, Travels, Part I, Section I, pp. 450-5i.
For confirmation
of this view, see:
(AmbroiseFirminDidot), Notes d'un voyagefait dans le Levant en i8i6 et s817 (Paris,
1793
[1826]),
p. 63.

Traian Stoianovich
260
to thelegallyforbidden
butwidelyprevalent
exportofgrainsbeyond
theconfines
of theEmpire.77
Macedoniaand Thessalythusexported
duringthesecondhalfof thecentury
40 percentof theirgrainand
overhalftheircotton
andtobaccoproduction.78
The new textilefactories
of Austria,
Saxony,Prussia,and Switzerlandrequiredthewool and cottonof Macedoniaand Thessaly,
and
risingFrench,German,and Italiandemandscausedthe cottonproductionof Macedoniato treblebetweeni720 and i8oo."9Austrian
raw cottonimports
fromMacedoniaand Thessalyrosefroma mere
triflein the I720'S
to an estimatedI,360,000 florinsin I752.80 In I766,
Austrian
cottonimports
fromthe Balkans,by theland routealone,
amounted
to i,900,000 florins.
In 177i, Austrian
woolandcotton
im-
portsfromtheBalkans,
bythelandroutealone,amounted
to fivemillionflorins.8
Balkanwool and cottonwereexportedoverlandto Austriaand
Germanyalmostexclusively
by Balkanmerchants,
mainlyMacedoand hardThessalianand EpiroteGreeksand Vlachs.Sugar,coffee,
to theBalkanson European
ware,on theotherhand,werebrought
in Aegeanand Adriaticports.
shipsforEuropeanmerchants
resident
The western
withthewaysof
merchants,
however,
wereunfamiliar
theBalkanpeoplesand withtheGreek,Turkish,
and Slavictongues,
and weretherefore
forcedto dependon Jewish
brokers
and Greek,
to disposeoftheirmerchandise
in theBalkan
Vlach,and Slavcarters
interior.
FromAegean,Ionian,Adriatic,
orBlackSea ports,
Balkanmuleteers
77 Stoianovich,"L'economiebalkanique,"pp. I30-3I
and passim.
78 Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchiv(Vienna) (hereaftercited as H.H.S.A.), St A. Tirkei
V/25, undated anonymousmemoiron the commerceof Macedonia, probablywrittenca.
de Salonique,pp. 364-66.
1775 (in Italian); Svoronos,Le commerce
79Ibid., p. 245; H.H.S.A., St A. Tiirkei V/25, undated anonymousmemoir in Italian
on thecommerceof Macedonia,ca. I775; H.H.S.A., St A. Tirkei 1/230, undatedand unsigned
memoirin Italianon the importand exportcommerceof AustriawithTurkeyand the Levant,
"L'economiebalkanique,"pp. 86, 275
ca. i8oo-6; Stoianovich,
80 H.H.S.A., St A. TiirkeiV/26, "Votum des Freyherrn
von Borie uiberden Commercien
dd' JanuarI0, 1I766, in Betreffder Schadlichkeitdes TiirkischenHandels."
Raths-Vortrag
source
Borie was a memberof the AustrianStaatsrat,at least in I767. Anothercontemporary
lower importfigure,but Borie's estimateis probablycloserto the truth.
gives a considerably
under Maria Theresiain der
bsterreichs
Cf. Mariannev. Herzfeld,"Zur Orienthandelspolitik
Geschichte(hereaftercited as AfnG),
Archiv far dsterreichische
Zeit von I740-I77I,"
HandelspolitikunderMaria Theresia
AdolfBeer,"Die 5sterreichische
289;
274,
CVIII (1920),
und JosefII," AfoG,LXXXVI (I899), 123, I86. The figuresI have myselfcitedshouldperhaps
be raisedto accountforsmuggling.
oneAfog,CVIII (I920), 277-78. Approximately
"ZurOrienthandelspolitik,"
81 Herzfeld,
to Germany
fourthof the Austriancottonimportsfromthe OttomanEmpirewere re-exported
and Switzerlandin the 1760's.

ConqueringBalkan OrthodoxMerchant 26i

or carters
delivered
thewaresof theWestto theclosestfairs.These
fairswere,forthemostpart,already
existent
intheseventeenth
century,
althoughtwo-thefairsof Slivenor Selimnoand Prilep-mayhave
We knowoftwoparallelchains
beeneighteenth-century
innovations.
of fairs,neithermorethan50 to 200 kilometers
froman Aegean,
around
Adriatic,
Ionian,or BlackSea port,whichwerein existence
i750. One chainwas verycloseto the Aegeanand extended
from
Zeytoun
(Lamia) toSeres.The otherwasclosertotheIonian,Adriatic,
or BlackSeas at thetwoends;nearthemiddle,it was situated
along
theroutes
leadingtotheDanubeandconverging
uponBelgrade.
Other
fairs,
aboutwhichlittleis known,existedin thedeeperinterior
ofthe
Balkanpeninsula.
The meagerdata availablesuggestthat thesefairswere more
morecommercially
animated,
important,
in the eighteenth
century
thaneverbefore.In theveryperiodin whichmanyBalkantowns
wereinthethroes
ofprolonged
economic
crisis,
thefairsoftheBalkans
bloomedand prospered.82
forthe
Thisis notin itselfa contradiction,
of thepre-industrial
well-being
fairwas in factgenerally
contingent
upontheinadequate
performance
bytownsof certainmanufacturing
or exchange
functions.
Europeanmanufactures
grewandcompetition
between
producers
of
French,English,Belgian,Italian,and Austrian
goodsstiffened.
The
maritime
powersof Europesoughtto bringtheirgoodsfromthe
BalkancoaststotheDanube,whilequasi-continental
Austriasoughtto
bringits waresfromthe Danube to the Aegean. Lipsicanesor
"Leipzigtraders"-Germans,
Poles, Jews,Greeks,and Vlachs-introduced"Leipzigcloth,"productof the manufactures
of Verviers,
Vervins,
and Aix-la-Chapelle
(Aachen),intotheDanubianprincipalitiesin the I720'S.' Greekand Macedo-Vlach
carters
and merchants,
who wentto theLeipzigfairsin ever-larger
betweeni740
numbers
and i780, introduced
"Leipzigcloth"southoftheDanubeandSavabetweeni76i andi783 and,in theI770's, placedthecotton
andwoolen
clothand otherproductsof the Leipzig fairs,includingthe new
82 On the subjectof Macedo-Thessalian
and Balkan fairsin general,see: Mehlan, "Mittelund Westeuropa,"Siidostdeutsche
Forschungen,
III/I (1938), pp. 69-120, but esp. pp. 99-I00;
Svoronos,Le commercede Salonique, pp. 210-II, 395-96, 401; Felix-Beaujour,Tableau du
commerce,
I, 95; Pouqueville,Voyageen Moree,II, 44.
83 Nicolas lorga, Pointsde vue sur l'histoiredu commercede l'Orienta' I'poque moderne
(Paris, I925), p. II2; A. N., Aff.Etr. B"I' 239, memoiron the commerceof Moldavia,
surle commerce
I751-53;
A. N., Aff.Etr.B"1' 415, "Observations
que la Francepeutouvrir
entreSmyrneet les departmentsde la ci-devantBelgique," withoutsignatureand n.d., but
written
in theNapoleonicera.

262
Traian Stoianovich
market.
on theMacedonian
ofBohemiaandAustria,
textile
production
of theWar of American
Independence,
thetextile
Bytheconclusion
ofBelgium,
and Germany,
carriedsouthofthe
Austria,
manufactures
were offering
Danube and into Macedoniaby Balkanmerchants,
to Frenchclothbroughtintothe Balkansby
merciless
competition
Salonika,and theAdriaticports.84
wayof Constantinople,
landlords,
officials,
powerofOttoman
The increase
inthepurchasing
of "luxury"
allowedan increasein the importation
and merchants
werethefurs
of theseluxuries
products.
Amongthemostimportant
broughtto Conof Russia,whichGreekand Armenianmerchants
andtoMacedonia,
tothegreatautumn
fairofUzundzovo,
stantinople,
andThessaly.
Epirus,
or envoyto the SublimePorte
FearingthattheRussianresident
mightseize the liquid fundstheyobtainedin exchangefor their
drawnon theRussian
letters
ofcredit
costly
fursandgivetheminstead
Russianfurtraders
Russiancurrency,
Courtto be paidin depreciated
darednotbringtheirgoodstotheOttoman
capital.Constantinopolitan
Macedonia,
GreeksandArmenians,
GreeksandVlachsfromThessaly,
and Bulgarians
and Epirus,and a smallernumberof Macedo-Slavs
of Russianfursfor
becamethechiefand onlysuppliers
consequently
theOttomandominions.
Russianmerchants
avoidedcomingto theOttomanEmpire;Ottoof
manmerchants
therefore
wentto Russia.Butsincethemerchants
Moscow and Kiev desiredHungariansequins,Italian silks,and
Leipzigcloth,andsinceViennaandthefairsofLeipzigwerethemost
merchants
oftenwent
convenient
Ottoman
placestofindthesearticles,
to Leipzigor Viennabeforeproceeding
to Russia.A three-cornered
in Contradethusdeveloped,
withone of thepointsof thetriangle
of
community
Uzundzovo,Janina,or the fur-making
stantinople,
thesecondpointin theGermanies,
andthethirdat Nezhin,
Kastoria,
a smalltownnortheast
or evenin
of Kiev and southof Chernigov,
Kievor Moscow.85
84 A. N., Aff.Etr. B"'I I90, "Rapportfaitau Bureaudu commercedu Levant" by Montaran,
esp. pp. 190-93, 313; A. N., A. M., B7 452, memoiron the cloth trade,June 20, 1787;
Svoronos,Le commercede Salonique,p. I82.
85 Stoianovich,"L'6conomie balkanique," pp. I63-65; H. Gandev, "T'rgovskataobmena
na Evropa s b'lgarskitezemi prez XVIII i nac'alotona XIX vek" [European trade with the
Bulgarianlands duringthe eighteenthand beginningof the nineteenthcenturies],Godisnik
na SofliskijaUniversitet,
Istorikofilologileski
Fakultet(Annuairede l'Universitede Sofia), XL
(1943-44), 24; (Antoine-Ignace)Anthoine,Essai historiquesur le commerceet la navigation
de la Mer Noire (2d rev. ed.; Paris, I 820), p. 82; Ibrahim Manzour-Efendi(Samson
d'Ali Pacha (Paris,
Cerfberr),Memoiressur la Grece et l'Albanie pendantle gouvernement


The absenceof positive
protection
formostdomestic
thus
industry
and thetradeofbothforeign
servedas protection
forforeign
industry
and domestic
merchants.
Europeantraders'
ignorance
of marketconditionsin theBalkans,
andpeddlers
moreover,
gaveBalkanmerchants
the opportunity
to obtaincontrolof mostof the overlandcarrying
the entire
trade,partof the maritime
carrying
trade,and virtually
commerce
oftheBalkaninterior.
sector
oftheBalkan
The commercial
economyexpanded,while the over-allBalkan economydeclined.
Balkanmerchants
was subprospered,
whilethe Balkanpeasantry
jectedtonewforms
ofoppression.
VI
The economic
stagnation
ordeclineoftheover-all
Ottoman
economy
wenthandinglovewiththeterritorial
and
contraction
oftheOttoman
expansion
oftheHabsburgEmpire.By theirconquests
in thewar of
won nearlyall the territories
whichthe
I683-I699, the Habsburgs
Turkshad acquiredsinceI526. TurkishHungary,
mostof Slavonia,
thevassalstateofTransylvania,
andmuchofVojvodina(Srem,Backa,
and Baranja) came under the Habsburgcrown.The treatyof
Karlowitz(i699), in effect,
established
thefrontier
between
theHabsburgand Ottomanempiresalong the Tisza Riverin the east and
theSavainthesouth.
The treatyof Passarowitz,
whichbroughtan end to the war of
I7i6-I7i8, gaveAustria
theBanatofTemesvar,
LittleWallachia,the
restof Slavonia,partof gumadijaor the Serb-inhabited
area imsouthofBelgrade,
mediately
and a stripof northern
Bosniasouthof
theSavaRiver.
Following
thewarofI737-I739, Austria
hadtogive
up LittleWallachiaand all territories

southoftheSava and Danube
rivers,
and thepeaceof Belgrade(1739) placedthefrontier
between
theOttoman
andHabsburg
empires
alongtheUna,Sava,andDanube
easttoOrsova.
The Austrian
government
soughttobringthenewlywonterritories
1827), PP. 301-3; A. N., Aff.Etr.,BIII 239, memoiron the commerceof the Russians,n. d.
(ca. 1751-53). Among the foundersand early leaders of the Philike Hetairia were the fur
tradersNicolasSkoufasand AthanasiusTsakalof.On the role of Greekfurmerchants,
especially
thoseof Kastoria,see: AnghelikiHadjimihali,"Aspectsde l'organisation
economiquedes Grecs
de la prise de Constantinople,
dans l'Empireottoman,"Le cinq-centieme
anniversaire
14531953 (L'Hellenisme contemporain, 2e serie,7e ann', fasc.horsserie) (Athens,May 29, 1953),
pp. 272-75.

264
Traian Stoianovich
underthecentralized
control
ofVienna.Hungary,
although
theoreticallya separate
kingdom,
obtainedonlylimitedrightsof autonomy
and was notallowedto makeTransylvania
an integral
partof her
territory.
SlavoniaandVojvodinawereorganized
as a military
frontier
of the ImperialWar Councilin
district
underthe administration
Vienna.Until i779, when it was incorporated
into Hungary,the
Banatwassimilarly
governed
bya special"Administration"
appointed
bythecentralgovernment.
The warsofthesixteenth
had turnedthe
and seventeenth
centuries
Pannonian
basinintoa desolatemarshland
and depopulated
grassland
in whichlurkednumerous
robberbands.Malariakepttheremaining
of theareain ill health,and epidemicdiseasesprevented
inhabitants
themfrommultiplying.
of Hungary-without
In i700 thepopulation
notmuch
Transylvania
butwiththeBanatand Croatia-Slavonia-was
overtwomillions.
The population
ofTransylvania
did notmuchexceed 500,000.To do awaywithbrigandage,
protectits peopleand
economy
fromtherazziasof willfulTurkishor Bosnianbeys,curb
the rebellious
Hungarianand Transylvanian
nobility,
and createa
colonialraw-material
area forthe needsof the
and food-producing
industry
of Bohemiaand Austria,
thegovernment
ofViennadecided
toundertake
thesystematic
repopulation
ofthenewterritories
andthe
therein
ofhealthier
establishment
conditions
oflife.
The recolonization
of Hungaryand Vojvodinabeganin i690 with
the settlement
of tensof thousands
of Serbianrefugees
fromOld
Serbia,
whowereeagertomaketheirhomestherebecausetheEmperor
hadpromised
themreligious
freedom
anda formoflimited
communal
a promiselaterviolated.A systematic
enautonomy,
recolonization,
bothbythestateandgreatlandowners,
couraged
beganafterthepeace
of Passarowitz.
Amongthenew settlers
therewerenot onlySerbs,
Croats,and Magyars,but Greeks,Vlachs,Rumanians,Bulgarians,
Albanians,
Ukrainians,
Czechs,Slovaks,
Swiss,and Italians.Alsatians,
Lorrainers,
andGermans
fromthecongested
ruralareasoftheRhineland and southwestern
Germany,however,were probablymore
numerous
thanany othersingleethnicgroupof new immigrants.
Throughthisgreatcolonization
effort,
moreimportant
eventhanthe
eighteenth-century
settlement
of theEnglishcoloniesor theRussian
of the Ukraineand SouthRussia,the populationof
colonization
Transylvania
grewto a millionin I754, I,400,000 in I787, and I,62I,-
oooin i799. In I785 thepopulation

ofHungary
andCroatia-Slavonia


exceededsevenmillions;two decadeslaterit was nine millions.86
Untillate in theeighteenth
century,
however,
Hungarypossessed
hardly
a single
townwithmorethan20,000 inhabitants.
In 1805,when
its totalpopulation
exceededthatof EuropeanTurkey,it
probably
had onlysixor seventownswithmorethan20,000 inhabitants
each,
andthesetownstogether
didnotcontain
morethanI5ooooinhabitants,
verylargelynon-Magyar.87
BeforetheFrenchRevolution,
Hungary
a nativeMagyarmiddleor merchant
was virtually
without
class.
In viewof therapidgrowthof theruraland slowerexpansion
of
the urbansectorof the Hungarianeconomy,
mercantile
functions
wereappropriated
bytheonlyethnicgroupsgeographically
closeand
psychologically
ableto adjustthemseves
to theconditions
ofbusiness
in an economically
area: Greeks,
expanding
butstillunderdeveloped
Macedo-Vlachs,
Jews,Armenians,
and bothHabsburgand Ottoman
Serbs.Germanimmigrants
fromwesternEurope were generally
peasants
and oftenindigent.
Amongthetemporary
or permanent
imfromtheBalkans,thereweretheold-time
migrants
merchants:
Jews
and Armenians.
Therewerealso thepastoral
folk-Serbsand Vlachs
-with seminomadic
habits,readierto adapt themselves
to the
exigencies
of commerce
thanto thedrudgeries
of thesoil.Manyimmigrants
fromOld Serbiaand Macedonia,moreover,
had beenmer-
chants and artisansand were once well-to-do.88

In view of their
numerouscolonies and their settlementin compactgroups in the
townsof Hungaryand boththe townsand ruralareas of Vojvodina,
theirfamilyand businessconnections
withthe OttomanEmpire,and
theirrepugnanceformanual labor and the tillingof the soil, it was
86Marcel R. Reinhard,Histoirede la populationmondialede I700 k 1948 (Paris: Editions

Domat-Montchrestien,
n.d.), p. 147; JulesSzekfiu,
Etat et nation(Paris: PressesUniversitaires
de
France,1945), pp. 173-75, 179, I83-90; M. Demian,Tableaugeographique
et politiquedes
royaumesde Hongrie,d'Esclavonie,de Croaie et de la grande principautcde Transilvanie,
trans.fromthe German(Paris, I809), II, 19-20, 96-97, 402; Schwartner,
Statistik,I, Io6-i2,
II8, 140-41; Vuk St. Karadzic,Danica; zabavnikza godinu 1827 (MorningStar; Almanacfor
18.27) (Vienna, 1827), p. 77; Kostic,Dositej Obradovic',
p. 215; GeorgStadtmuiller,
Geschichte
Suidosteuropas
(Munich: R. Oldenbourg,1950), p. 320; Henri Brunschwig,
La crisesde l'Etat
prussiena la findu XVIlle sizcleet la genesede la mentality
romantique(Paris: PressesUniversitaires
de France,1947), pp. 121-23; HenryMarczali,Hungaryin the EighteenthCentury
(Cambridge
University
Press,1910), pp. 32-37, 52; Macartney,
pp. 78-86; Karl F.
Hungary,
Helleinerrelatesthatonlyone or twogenerations
folksong
ago Austriansstillsang a melancholy
repletewith memoriesof the eighteenth-century
Germancolonizationof Hungary,popularly
called "Griechenland"because of the overwhelming
presenceof OrthodoxSouth Slavs and
Greekmerchantsin the country.Cf. Karl F. Helleiner,ed., Readingsin European Economic
of TorontoPress,1946), p. 25.
History(Toronto:University
87 Schwartner,
Statistik,
I, I67-68; III, 5I9-22.
88 Kostic,DositejObradovic,
pp. 208-9.

266
Trajan Stoianovich
onlylogicalthattheSerbsofHungary-native
or long-term
residents,
newimmigrants,
and Ottomansubjects-should
capturemuchofthe
Hungarian
retailtradeandan important
oftheforeign
segment
trade
of Austriaand HungarywiththeOttomanEmpire.The recolonizationpoliciesofViennaand thesuccesses
ofHabsburgSerbmerchants
and artisans
soonattracted
to Austriaand
Greeksand Macedo-Vlachs
andtheGreekandVlachmerchants
even
Hungary,
provedthemselves
moreenterprising,
commercially
better-informed,
and favoredwith
better
business
connections
thantheSerbs.
The Austrian
and Hungarianauthorities,
whileneedingand welcomingthe commerce
of bothOttomanand HabsburgSerbsand
Greeks,tookoccasionalpunitiveor restrictive
measuresagainstthe
commerce
of Ottomansubjects.
Successive
edictsand decrees,
aiming
to setboundsto thepropensity
to engagein
of Ottomanmerchants
"alla minuta
Handel,"restricted
theretailtradeto taxpaying
residents
andHabsburg
subjects
andprohibited
Balkanmerchants
fromretailing
theirgoodsexceptat thenumerous
and flourishing
Hungarian
fairs.89
In i74i theBanatAdministration
limited
thetradeofOttoman
Greek
to the threecommunities
merchants
of Temesvar(Timi~oara),
Pancevo,and Mehadia,wheretheywereallowedto sell theirgoods
toretailers,
butnottoretailthemthemselves.90
Theserestrictions,
howandwerenotstrictly
enforced.
ever,werefrequently
violated
Greek,Macedo-Vlach,
and Serbianmerchants,
together
withJews
andArmenians,
cameto control
ofWallachia
notonlythecommerce
andMoldavia,butofHungary,
Vojvodina,
Croatia-Slavonia,
and part
ofTransylvania
and Moravia.We findsuchmerchants
in theeighteenthcentury
in Nis',Vidin,Belgrade,Zemun,SremskiKarlovci,
Petrovaradin,
Novi Sad, Subotica,Slankamen,
Titel,Osijek,Ruma,
Zagreb,Karlovac,Sisak,Petrinja,
Fiinfkirchen
(Pecs or Pecuj), Baja,
Futog,Siklos,Gy6r (Raab), Veszprem,Stuhlweissenburg
(Szekesor Stoni Beograd),Heves, Borsod,Jaszbereny,
fehervar
Komorn,
Tokaj, Sopron,Szeged,Szentes(foundedc. i750), Balassagyarmat,
Ebes-Falva(Epersdorf),Szamos-Ujvar,
Pressburg(Pozsony,today
HerCronstadt
Bratislava),
(Brasovor, in Greek,Stephanoupolis),
mannstadt
(Sibiu),andClausenburg
(Cluj)." In I754, 403 Ottoman
89 H.H.S.A., St A. TuirkeiV/26, "Votumdes Freyherrn
von Borie." See also Herzfeld,"Zur
HandelsOrienthandelspolitik,"
AfoG, CVIII (I920), 254-55, 302; Beer, "Die 6sterreichische
politik,"AfnG,LXXXVI (1899), 33.
90Popovic,0 Cincarima,p. 105.
91 Ibid., pp. II8-21; Kostic,Dositej Obradovic,p. 217; Marczali,Hungaryin the Eighteenth
Century,
p. 73; Demian,Tableau geographique,
I, 207-8; H.H.S.A., St A. TuirkeiV/26, "Votum
Handel in den Erblanden;"
des Freyherrn
von Borie,"Jan.ia, I766; ibid.,memoir:"Tiirkischer


merchantswere presentin the towns of Waitzen (Vac), Miskolc,
Gydngyds(foundedc. i750), Eger (Erlau), Kecskemet,and Joka.2
The commerceof Buda, Pest, Eger, Szentendre (Sent Andreja),
Keresztes,Kecskemet,K6vesd,Grosswardein(Nagyvarad or Oradea
Mare), Arad, Debrecen,and Temesvarwas in preponderantly
Greek
and Serbianhands,93
and Serbiansor "OrthodoxGreeks"had captured
"virtuallythe entireclothtradeof Miskolc,"whereall shopsbut one
The AustrianCouncil of Commerceestimatedin
belongedto them.94
the I760's that therewere 2,000 Ottomanmerchantson the landed
estatesof Hungaryand,in all of Hungary,a totalof i7-i8,ooo resident
Ottoman"families."In fact,hardlya middlesizedvillageexistedthat
did nothave itsown Greekor JewishKrimer.95
It mightappearfromthe foregoingthat Greek and Serbianmerchants were found almost everywherein Hungary, Croatia, and
Transylvania,especiallysince theywere so numerouson the landed
estates.The big merchants,
however,were found for the most part
on or neartheprincipalriverroutes:on or along theDanube between
Vidin and Vienna,on or along the Tisza betweenTitel and Tokaj,
along the MuresbetweenTurda and Szeged,and along the Sava and
Kupa.
VII
Amongthe conditionsnormallyprerequisite
to the developmentof
a carryingtradeare the existenceof surplusesin one or more areas,
the existenceof a demandforthesesurplusesin some otherarea,and
H.H.S.A., St A. Serbien I, "Vorschlag in Beziehung auf die Pass-Ertheilungen
bey den
Slavonisch-Siirmischen
Commando," Peterwardein,Aug. 25, i8iI;
Rudolf Bicanic, Doba
[The manufacturing
epoch in Croatia and
manufactureu Hrvatskoii Slavoniji (1750-1860)
Slavonia, I750-I8 6o] (Zagreb: Jugoslavenska
Akademija znanosti i umjetnosti,195I), pp.
I89, I99; Nicolaus B. Tomadakis,"Les communaut&helleniquesen Autriche,"Mitteilungen
des osterreichischen
Staatsarchivs,
ErganzungsbandIII, Festschrift
zur Feier des ZweihunBestandesdes Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchivs,
ed. Leo Santifaller(Vienna, 1951),
dertidhrigen
Vol. II, 456-57; AugustFournier,"Handel und Verkehrin Ungarnund Polen um die Mitte
des A8. Jahrhunderts;
ein Beitrag zur Geschichteder 6sterreichischen
Commerzialpolitik,"
AfoG, LXIX, erste Halfte (I887), pp. 404-I6;
Kosta Petrovic',"Karlovci i karlovacko
u prvoj poloviniI8 veka" ("Srem. Karlovci [Karlovitz] und seine Bev6lkerung
stanovnistvo
in der erstenHalftedes I8. Jahrhunderts"),
Istoriskieasopis,V, 1954-55 (Belgrade,I955), pp.
296-302.
92H.H.S.A., St A. TuirkeiV/26, memoir:"Tiurkischer

Handel in den Erblanden."
93Ibid.,"Votumdes Freyherrn
vonBoris."
94 Kostic,DositejObradoviW,
pp. 2I6-17.
95 Herzfeld,"Zur Orienthandelspolitik,"
Statistik,I, 403.
Af&G,CVIII, 293; Schwartner,

268
Trajan Stoianovich
13
I.I
I
A
0~~~~~~~~~~~~~ '
??~~ iv
ok
cr
<
pq
ED'
,'
~ ~ ~ ~~~~-
7'
2
0
At~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
0~~~~~~~~~~~
o0
C~~~~
*0~~~~
ORTHODOX MERCHANT COLONIES

IN EIGHTEENTH CENTURY HUNGARY
Danubian Colonies
Colonies
-----Sava-Kupa
..... ...MurelColonies
-x-x-x-x-x-x
Tisza Colonies


thepresence
ofpeoplereadyto carrythegoodsfromoneplaceto the
other.
Carriers
areespecially
likelytoarisein ornearan areapossessing
bothsignificant
surpluses
and a classofinhabitants
thatdoesnotseek
orcannotfindemployment
inagriculture
orindustry.
The carrier-producing
areasof the Balkanswereall situated
near
thesea or at thejunctionof land,maritime,
and riverroutes.Their
inhabitants
wererelatively
freeand sometimes
armedpastoralfolk
without
sedentary
habits,
whodweltin theseclusion
offorest
clearings
or mountainpastures,
possessedself-movable
goods such as sheep
and pigsor docilebeastsofburden,
and weredetermined
to prevent
thespreadof serfdom
to thewoodlandsand uplands.Islandersand
dwellersof thelittoral
to buildseaworthy
wereencouraged
shipsby
thepresence
innear-by
areasofgrain,oliveoil,wine,wool,cotton,
silk,
and
tobacco, fruitsurpluses.
Suitableeconomic
and geographic
conditions,
werenotin
however,
themselves
sufficient
topromote
theriseoftheBalkanOrthodox
merchant.Alsopresent
andnecessary
wasthesupport
ofsomeprotectionproducing
The chiefprotectors
enterprise.
ofthetradeofBalkanmerchantsand peddlerswere the Ottoman,Habsburg,and Russian
empires,
severalotherEuropeanstates,
and certainethnic-professional
groupswhichformed
minorprotection-producing
enterprises
of their
ownandthuscoulddefend
themselves
againsttheviolence-using
enterprisesofothers.
Amongthemostimportant
oftheseethnic-professional
groupswere:i) thePhanariotes
of Constantinople
and theGreeksof
theDanubianprincipalities
and theLevant;2) theOrthodox
GrecoAlbanianmerchant-adventurers
of the smallerAegean islands;3)
theGreco-Vlach
andMacedo-Slav
muleteers
ofMacedonia,
Epirus,and
Thessaly;4) theGreekand Bulgarian
oftheRhodopeandthe
carters
Bulgarian
oftheBalkan(StaraPlanina);5) theSerbiancattlecarters
traders
of Sumadijaand Pannonia;and 6) the"Illyrian"muleteers,
andmerchant-adventurers
seamen,
ofHerzegovina
andtheAdriatic.
Phanariote
and LevantineGreeks
In diplomacy,religion,and commerce,
the positionof Constantinopolitan,
insular,and maritime
Greeksbecamestronger
after
i650 thaneverbefore
and moresecurethanthatof anyof theother
subjectraces.Influential
Greeksobtaineda virtualmonopoly
of the
newpostsof dragoman
of thePorte,or undersecretary
of thegrand

270
Trajan Stoianovich
oftheFleet,or undersecretary
oftheNavyand
vizier,anddragoman
chargeof Aegean affairs.
For a centuryafterI716 the officeof
hospodar
ofMoldaviaandWallachia,whichhad at itsdisposalmany
lucrative
appointments,
and other
monopolies,
government
contracts,
privileges,
becamethe closelyguardedproperty
of the Phanariotes,
Greekpatriciate
or "noblessede robe" of Constantinople.
Under
Phanariote
theOttomanGovernment
abolishedtheSerbian
pressure,
patriarchate
in I766 andthearchbishopric
ofOchrida(Ohrid)in i767
and placedtheirdiocesesunderthedirectcontrolof thepatriarchate
of Constantinople.
Executive
powerremained
in Moslemhands,but
the patriciate
of Constantinople
and otherprivileged
Greekswere
turned
intoa loosely
organized
orderoftechnical
andpolitical
advisers,
whosemembers
dreamed
oftherestoration
ofByzantium
andplanned
theestablishment
of Greekpoliticaland economichegemony
in the
Balkans.96
to commonbelief,
Contrary
veryfewPhanariotes
weredescendants
of theold Byzantine
aristocracy.
Mostof themweremenof wealth
whohad wontheirrichesas traders
in theAegean,the
and peddlers
Ottomancapital,theDanubianprincipalities,
Russia,and the Black
Sea. A fewacquiredtheirinitialwealthin Constantinople,
butmany
madetheirfortunes
firstin Smyrna,
Chios,Janina,
or Kastoriaand
thensettled
in thecapitalwiththeobjectofestablishing
politicalcontactsandfriendships
in orderto makesuretheywouldbe ableto pass
on theirrichestotheirdescendants.
To winwealthwas easierthanto
or transfer
keep,consolidate,
it to futuregenerations.
Manywealthy
merchants
therefore
sought
tobecomeprovisioners
ofthecapital,
credi96Woodhouse,The Greek War of Independence,p. 27; Nicolas Svoronos,Histoirede la
Grece moderne("Que sais-je?" No. 578) (Paris: PressesUniversitaires
de France, I953), p.
28; Ladislas Hadrovics,Le people serbe et son Eglise sous la dominationtorque (Paris:
PressesUniversitaires
de France,I947), pp. I52-53; Harold W. Temperley,Historyof Serbia
(London: G. Bell and Sons Ltd., I9I7), pp. i62-67; CharlesJelavich,
"Some Aspectsof Serbian
ReligiousDevelopmentin the EighteenthCentury,"Church History,XXIII (I954), I48;
G. GeorgiadesArnakis,"The Greek Church of Constantinople
and the OttomanEmpire,"
Journalof Modern History,XXIV (I952),
247; Theodore H. Papadopoulos,Studies and
DocumentsRelatingto theHistoryof the GreekChurchand People underTurkishDomination
(Bibliothecagraeca aevi posterioris,
I) (Brussels:printedby De Meester,Wetteren,I952), pp.
44, 49-60, I39-49; Leopold Ranke, The Historyof Servia,and the ServianRevolution,with
in Bosnia (to which is added, The Slave Provincesof Turkey,
a Sketchof the Insurrection
chieflyfromthe Frenchof CyprienRobert),trans.Mrs. AlexanderKerr (London: Henry G.
Bohn, i853), pp. 30-31; Gottwald,"Phanariotische
Studien,"LVjsfSOE, V, 9-I;
Karadzic',
Danica. . . 1827, pp. II4-I6. For a briefhistory
of Greeksin theservice
of thePorte,see:
"Les Grecsau servicede 1'Empireottoman,"Le cinq-centiame
anniversaire
P. A. Argyropoulo,
de la prisede Constantinople
2e ser.,7e annee,fasc.h. s.) (Athens,
(L'Hellenismecontemporain,
1953), pp 151-77.


torsof high officials,
and advisersto all the politicallypowerfulwho
would listen. Their ultimategoal was to transcendtheir purely
mercantilefunctionsand becomea politicalbourgeoisiein possession
of the functionsof banking,governingthe Danubian principalities,
administering
theciviland fiscalaffairs
oftheGreekOrthodoxChurch,
and counselingthe authoritiesat the imperial,provincial,and even
municipallevels.
Chiote,Smyrniote,
and Constantinopolitan
Greeks were the chief
initial beneficiaries
of the new Greek politicalmonopoly.By i700
Chioteswere among the richestof Greek merchantsand so rafflnes
thatJewswere beggarsby comparison.With the shiftof tradefrom
Salonikato Smyrnaafterthe War of Candy,Chiotemerchantswent
to Smyrnain droves.As citrusplantationproprietors
and ownersofthe
bestmanufactures
in the Empire,theypossessedample quantitiesof
goods easilymarketablein Smyrnaand Constantinople.
Many Chiotes
importedsilk fromRumelia,Brusa,and Morea forthe manufactures
of theirisland community;otherssettledin the Ottomancapitalas
clothmerchants.
By the end of thecentury,
Greeks-manyof themof
Chiote origin-owned fivehunderdbusinesshouses in Smyrna,the
largestand wealthiest
ofwhichmaintainedcorrespondents
or branches
in Vienna,Trieste,Livorno,Genoa, Amsterdam,and Paris,in Russia
and in theportsof theBlack Sea, and perhapsin London,Manchester,
and Liverpool.97
Indirectly,if not directly,the new political monopoly allowed
wealthyGreekmerchantsto extendtheirtradefromSmyrna,Chios,
and Constantinopleto Vidin, Belgrade,Sarajevo, Bucharest,Jassy,
Galati,Moscow,and Astrakhan.Even morethanthis,it allowedthem
tobringtheirtradeat thefirst
favorableopportunity
to westernEurope.
The propitious
momentarrivedin 1730, whentheNetherlandsgranted
Greek, Jewish,and Armenian merchantsthe commercialrights
possessedby its own subjects.Greek merchantshad opened business
in Amsterdameven beforeI730, but the new rightsof commercial
equalitysoon attractedmany more Levantinetraders.Greeks,Jews,
and Armeniansdisplaced Dutch tradersin the commerceof the
97 A. N., Aff.Etr. B"' 239, memoirson the commerceof the Black Sea and the character
of the peopleof the OttomanEmpire;A. N., Aff.Etr. B"'. 242, memoiron the commerceof
Smyrna,signedFourcade,n. d. but ca. i8io; A. N., Aff.Etr. B"'. 236, memoiron the prices
of importsand exportsbetweenChios (Scio) and France,Jan. I720; Toynbee,A Study of
History,VIII, I74-76; Dositej Obradovi6,Dela [Works] (n. p., n. d.), p. 13I, letterwrittenin
Wittemberg,
Oct. 8, I788, withilluminating
information
on the cityand merchants
of Chios.

272
Traian Stoianovich
becamethechiefgathering
Levant,andAmsterdam
placeofLevantine
inall ofwestern
merchants
Europe.98
It is difficult
to gaugetheexactimportance
ofthedevelopment
ofa
Greekpatriciate
upon the expansionof Greekmercantile
activities,
forotherfactors
alsofavored
theexpansion
of Greekcommerce.
But
thepartlyunconscious
decisionof theOttomangovernment
to promote the creationof a Greek "noblessede robe" and financial
bourgeoisie
no doubtaidedthewidening
and deepening
ofthetrade
ofGreekmerchants.
EveninItaly,whereGreekshad carried
on a brisk
tradesincethebeginning
of thesixteenth
century,
Greekcommerce
expanded.
Greektraders
swarmed
in theeighteenth
century
notonly
toVenice,Ancona,andLivorno,
but
wheretheyhadbeenlongpresent,
to thefairof Senigallia,
thefair"la plusmarchande"
in all of Italy
aroundI75o,99 and to the kingdomof Naples,especially
to Lecce,
Barletta,
Naples,and Bari."' To attribute
thisexpansion
to theriseof
the Phanariotes
alone is to be blindaltogether
to otherimportant
factors,
but to overlookthe contributions
of the rise of a Greek
patriciate
to thegrowthofGreektradeis alsoblindness.
The growthof Greekeconomicpowerfacilitated
the growthof
Greekbargaining
powerin politics
andfinance,
justas theacquisition
of advisory
politicalauthority
had allowedthemto obtainnew economicadvantages.
Hardpressed
bythedemandsofhisrebellious
and
undisciplined
Janissary
troopsanddiscontented
urbanpopulaceandin
needof somepublicsupport,
desperate
SelimIII had to yieldto the
of Demetrios
suggestions
Mouroutsis
to allowtheGreeksto forma
tradingcompanyor guild of "Europeanmerchants"
possessing
virtuallyall the privilegesof westernEuropeantradersin the
Whilethepolitical
Empire.'0'
andeconomic
ofthePhanariote
successes
98 Stoianovich,"L'conomie balkanique,"pp. I70-7I. On AdamantiosKorais as an agent
in Amsterdam,
see StephenGeorgeChaconas,AdamantiosKorais; a Studyin GreekNationalism
(New York: ColumbiaUniversity
Press,I942), pp. 17-20; on JohnPriggos,a wealthyGreek
merchantin Amsterdam,
see L. S. Stavrianos,Balkan Federation:a Historyof the Movement
towardBalkan Unityin ModernTimes (Smith College Studiesin History,vol. XXVII, Nos.
1-4, Oct. 1941-JUly 1942, Northampton,
Mass.) (Menasha, Wisc.: printedby George Banta
PublishingCo., 1944), p. 8, n. I3.
99 On the activityof Greek,Bosnian,and Dalmatianmerchants
at the fairof Senigallia,see:
A. N., Aff.Etr. B1 948, fol. 99, despatchfromLe Maire,Nov. 30, 1762; A. N., Aff.Etr. B"'.
242,
memoirin Italian on Albania by Citizen BartolettiZulattifils,joined to the letterof
GeneralDu Bayet,FrenchAmbassadorto the Porte,dated Sebenico,i Fructidor,year IV;
A. N., Aff.Etr. B' ioi5, lettersof July20, 1722, and Aug. 26, I723, fromCount Beliardy.
100RuggieroRomano,Le commercedu Royaumede Naples avec la France et les pays de
l'Adriatiqueau XVIIIe si'cle (Paris: ArmandColin, i95i), pp. 65, 79, 89.
101G. G. Gervinus,Insurrection
et regeneration
de la Grece, trans.J. F. Minssen and
LeonidasSgouta(Paris: A. Durand,i863), p. 99.


and thecompatriciate
furthered
primarily
theirown classinterests
of Constantinople,
merceof the wealthymerchants
Smyrna,
Chios,
lessfavored
Greeksto extend
and Janina,
theyincidentally
permitted
theircommerce
andaugment
theirwealth.
Merchant
Marine
Greco-Albanian
commerce
Evenwithout
thePhanariotes,
however,
Greekmaritime
Undercertainconditions
the poor
was almostdestinedto prosper.
the
becomepoorerand the rich richer.Under otherconditions,
becomewealthy-iftheyare industrious,
wretched
thrifty,
upright
and lucky,thatis,ifthey
and dishonest
as theoccasionmaywarrant,
ofwealth.Many
finda propitious
environment
fortheaccumulation
of
Greekspossessedsuch qualities,and the commercial
prosperity
Europealso auguredwellforthem.
The population
ofsomeofthelargerAegeanislands,suchas Crete
also
and Cyprus,
declinedaftertheOttomanconquest;theireconomy
The population
worsened.102
of thesmallerislands,in spiteof their
Temmeageragricultural
resources,
appearsto havebeenaugmented.
and Epirus,provided
a
porary
emigration,
as in Thessaly,
Macedonia,
solutionto theproblemof largepopulation
and limitednaturalresources.
someofthebestsailors
The islandofMykonos
thusproduced
and Melosand Kimolossomeofthebestpilotsof theAegean,while
servants
forConstantinople,
domestic
andTinosforthe
Syrosprovided
of Smyrna."03La necessity
i f2industriosi.
inhabitants
Whiletheinhabitants
Melos,Kimolos,Syros,
andTinos
ofMykonos,
managedto live by theirlabor,theyrarelymanagedto thrive.A
to the rapidaccumulation
of wealthor capital
generalprerequisite
is theinitialreadiness
to use noneconomic
formation
meansand the
to use all economicmeansto achievethesame
readiness
subsequent
of the Greco-Albanian
desiredend. The methodof formation
and
merchant
marinesin theeighteenth
century
suggests
the
Dulcignote
ofthisargument.
plausibility
The razziasofMoslemAlbanians
forced
manyGreeksandOrthodox
Albanians
fromtheGreekmainlandand Moreato theislandsof the
century,
fugitive
Aegeanand Ionianseas. Earlyin the eighteenth
virtually
unOrthodox
Albanianssettledon thebarrenand hitherto
islandsof Hydraand Spetsai,whileGreekssettledon the
inhabited
102
G. F. Hertzberg,GeschichteGriechenlands
(Gotha, 1876-79),
II, 326-27; Stoianovich,

"L'&conomie
balkanique,"
pp.50-52.
103
III,
Ibid.,p. io6; Bartholdy,

Voyageen Grkce,
I, 352.

52;
Olivier,Voyage,
274
Traian Stoianovich
The newcolonists
islandofPsara.'04
lackedtheinclination
toworkor
becomedevotedcultivators
ofthesoil,andtherockysoildidnotoffer
newtemptations.
To earna living,Hydriotes,
andPsariotes
Spetsiotes,
embarked
uponthesometimes
fruitful
buttechnically
or
noneconomic,
ormaritime
andcoastalbrigandage."05
venture
ofpiracy,
extraeconomic,
Economicattractions,
however,
wereoverwhelming.
The piratesbecamemerchants,
takingsometimes,
it is true,whattheycouldnot
purchase,but increasingly
carrying,
buying,and selling.A noneconomic
venture
becameeconomic.
The overpowering
economic
attraction
fromthepossibility
stemmed
of makinga quickfortune
by transporting
winesurpluses
fromthe
Aegeanto Russiaand grainsurpluses
fromtheBalkanor Anatolian
mainlands,
andlaterfromtheDanubianprincipalities
andtheUkraine,
to thegrain-deficient
islandsoftheAegeanand to Naples,Marseilles,
and otherportsof the grain-hungry
Mediterranean.
Balkan and
Anatolian
surpluses
weregreater
in theeighteenth
century
becauseof
thedeliberate
effort
on thepartof Ottomanlandlords
to reducethe
percapitaconsumption
oftheirtenants.
Theywerealsogreater,
however,becauseoftheintroduction
ofa newgraincrop,maizeor Indian
corn.
Maize cultivation
beganin theBalkansin theseventeenth
century
andspreadrapidly
throughout
thepeninsula.
Little,
however,
is known
of thecircumstances
of itsdiffusion
untilafteri700. The cultivation
of the new crop may have begunin the Danubianprincipalities
shortly
afteri650, but it acquiredimportance
thereonlya century
later.ByI7i6 maizewasa noteworthy
exportcommodity
ofDurazzo
and themaingraincropofSerbia.It appearsto havebeencultivated
inHerzegovina
before
I740 andwasthechief
graincropofMontenegro
beforeI780. Aroundthemiddleofthecentury,
it was introduced
into
MoreafromDulcigno(Ulcinj). By I774, it was an important
export
articleofEpirus,whichshippedbothwheatand maizefromArtato
Livorno.'06
104 Hertzberg,
Geschichte
Griechenlands,
III,
Toynbee,A StudyofHistory,VIII, 174-75.
210;
Urquhart,Turteyand Its Resources,p. 57;
105 Stoianovich, "L'economie balkanique," pp. 122-23.
106Ibid., pp. I09, 20I-6; Stoianovich,"Land Tenure," Journalof EconomicHistory,XIII

(1953), 404-6; N. Iorga, "Anciennetede la culturedu mais en Roumanie,"Bulletinde la
Section historique de l'Acadimie Roumaine, IX (ig2i),
I85-91;
Raicevich, Osservazioni, p.
56; Gottwald,"Phanariotische
Studien," LVjsfSOE, V (I94I),
30; Dusan Pantelic',"Popis
pogranicnihnahija Srbijeposle Pozarevac'kogmira" [Census of the frontier
districts
of Serbia
afterthe peace of Passarowitz],Spomenik,XCVI, 2d cl., Book 75 (Belgrade,I948), p. 31;
P. D. gerovic,"0 rasprostranjenosti
licnog imena Njegos" [The spatial expansionof the
personalname Njegos], IstoriskiZapisi, I. Nos. 5-6 (Cetinje,May-June1948), p. 370.


EmbryonicDulcignoteor Moslem Albanian and Greek or GrecoAlbanian merchantmarineswere formedbeforei750. Withoutthe
coastaltradebetweenMorea and Triesteand withoutthe transport
of
thegrainsof Albania,Epirus,Morea,Thessaly,Odessa,and Hungary,
to all Mediterraneanports,thesemarineswould doubtlesshave remained the crude enterprisesof piratesand freebooters
that they
originallywere. In hard times,indeed,Greeksand Dulcignotesdid
revertto piracywithoutqualm.107
While going to Triesteand to Italian ports,108
Moslem Albanians
refrained
fromgoingto enlightened
Franceor holyOrthodoxRussia.
Becausetheywerealso lessreadythanGreeksand OrthodoxAlbanians
to transform
half-economic
venturesinto purelyeconomicenterprise,
theDulcignotemerchantmarinefailedto maintainthepace of growth
oftheGreekorOrthodoxAlbanianmerchant
marine.
By removingFrenchcommercefromtheeasternMediterranean,
the
Seven Years' War allowed Greek and insularOrthodoxAlbaniansto
widentheirsphereofmaritimeactivity,
increasetheirshipsin number,
and augmentthem in size.109The War of AmericanIndependence
and the wars of the FrenchRevolution,whichagain expelledFrench
commercefromtheMediterranean,
enabledtheGreeksand Orthodox
Albaniansof thesmallerAegean islandsto securetheirmaritimeposition and affirm
theirstatusas economicentrepreneurs.
By bringing
grainsto Marseillesduringthe FrenchRevolution,Greek merchants
and shippers-muleteers
of the sea-amassed much wealthand some
became"millionaires."
110
Around i8oo, more than two thirdsof the tonnageand half the
ships of the growingGreco-Albanianmerchantmarinebelongedto
theislandersof Hydra,Spetsai,and Psara,to parvenusof the Aegean.
The new merchantsand shipownerswere financedin part,it is true,
by Chioteand Smyrniote
capitalists,
and theywere also aided in their
economicgrowthby Phanariotecontrolof Aegean affairs."'Like
107 Stoianovich,
"L'economiebalkanique,"pp. T05-30.
108 Manzour-Efendi
(Cerfberr),
Memoires,
p. xvi.
109Stoianovich,
"L'&conomie
balkanique,"
pp.i i o-I 2.
110Pouqueville,Voyageen Moree,I, 518, 520; II, 265-66.
i11 Ibid.; Bernard Vonderlage,Die Handelspolitischen
BeziehungenHamburgs und Griechenlandsvon 5832 his i867 (Hamburg: Cram, De Gruyter& Co., 1954), p. 2i; Thomas
Gordon,Historyof the Greek Revolution(2d ed.; Edinburgh,i844), I. 35; Toynbee,A
StudyofHistory,VIII, I76n. For estimates
of thesize of the Greekor Greco-Albanian
merchant
marinein the Napoleonicand pre-independence
era, see also Stavrianos,Balkan Federation,
p. 3I; A. A. Pepelasis,"The Legal Systemand EconomicDevelopmentof Greece," journal
ofEconomicHistory,
XIX ( 959), 176,n. i I.

276
Traian Stoianovich
thenew maritime
communities
grewbecause
moreover,
Ambelakia,
in "spotsoutofthewayofmanand comtheywerewell concealed,
oftradeand tourist
merce"112 notoutofthewayofmodernchannels
century.
travel,
butoutofthewayofthetraderoutesoftheeighteenth
Macedo-Thessalian
and EpiroteForwarders
ofThessaly,
Epirus,and
inhabitants
The GreekandVlachhighland
who
another
exampleofthe"free"but"wretched"
Macedoniapresent
makefortunes.
The pastoral
obtaineda livelifolkofthesehighlands
hoodfrom
brigands,
themenwereherdsmen,
occupations:
fiveprincipal
soldiers,
and
muleteers,
and
mercenary
workers
seasonalmigratory
ofthePindusoften
The pastors
whilethewomenwereskilledweavers.
the year.Seekinggreen
did not dwellin a fixedplace throughout
intothe
anddescended
insummer
themountain
pastures,
theyclimbed
ofinSincesmallnumbers
lowlandsandapproached
theseain winter.
cansupervise
largeherds,mentendedtobecomesuperfluous.
dividuals
of economicfunctheexercise
Men unableto earna livingthrough
At thetimeof theirconquest
tionsconsequently
turnedto banditry.
and tax
localautonomies
oftheBalkanpeninsula,
theTurksgranted
communities,
whichtheymaderesponsipastoral
exemptions
tocertain
bleforkeepingmountain
passesfreeofbanditsand opento travelers.
tookadvantage
oftheir
The guardsofthepasses,however,
sometimes
The expansion
to engagein brigandage
themselves.
specialprivileges
openedotheroccupasubsequently
century
of townsin thesixteenth
tionsto thepastoralruralfolk.Youngersonsand menwho lacked
fromtheirhomesfora
robbery
departed
herdsortheurgetohighway
and unskilled
seasonor a yearto workas pecalbarior semiskilled
in distant
towns,evenin theOttomancapital.The womenlaborers
and
of theircommunities,
spinning,
dyeing,
folkbecametheartisans
the
blankets
and
for
the
cold
of
the
into
herds
carpets
weaving wool
valley.
andbitter
ofthehighmountain
andwindswept
winters
nights
of raw-material
The availability
cheese,and skinssurpluses-wool,
themigratory
andcraft
habitsofthemenandtheirintimate
products,
of
the
difficult
which
routes,theirspecialprivileges,
knowledge
to allowthespreadto
allowedthemtobeararms,andtheirreluctance
of theseignorial
themountain
whichenveloped
ever-larger
reaction,
areasof thecoasts,plains,and valleysafteri6oo,finally
a
persuaded
112Urquhart,Turkeyand Its Resources,
p. 54.


portion
ofthepastoral
folktobecomecarriers
ofgoods.113
and traders
the herdsmen
In the sixteenth
of Thessaly,Epirus,and
century,
Macedoniasoldtheirwool,skins,carpets,
andblankets
onlyto visiting
Jewish
orItalianmerchants,
whiletheirurbanneighbors
ventured
even
to Italyand Austriawiththeproducts
oftheBalkans.The ruralfolk
theirperiodic
limited
to shortdistances,
commercial
odysseys
generally
withinthe confines
of the OttomanEmpire,untilthe end of the
seventeenth
Afteri700, however,
century.
aftertheera
and especially
of relativepeaceinaugurated
of Passarowitz,
by thetreaty
itselfthe
product
ofPhanariote
negotiations
withEuropeandiplomats,
MacedoThessalianand Epirotemuleteers
theirgoodsto
beganto accompany
Austria,
Hungary,
andRussia.
An anonymous
informant
relatesaroundi8oo thattheBalkanmerchantswho wentto Hungarywereoften"fromthemostwretched
114 The most
villagesof Macedoniaand otherpartsof Turkey."
"wretched"
villagesin thelateeighteenth
century,
however,
wereno
longerthehighlandcommunities
butrather
theservile
villagesofthe
lowlands,
wherepeasants
wereboundto thesoilor to theirlandlords.
The Balkanmerchants
of Hungarydid notcomefromthesevillages,
forthetillersof thesoil becameserfsratherthanmerchants.
They
cameinstead
fromthefreeorprivileged
mountain
communities,
which
tendedin theeighteenth
to becometownsor acquirecertain
century
attributes
of towns.The bulkof themerchants
camenot"fromthe
mostwretched
villages,"or villagesof the seignorial
economy,
but
fromtheuplandcommunities
of Blatse,Kozane,Kleisoura,Melnik,
Mehomija,Razlog, Tepelene,Selenicd,Argyrokastro,
Kerasovon,
Metsovon,
Mavrovo(Mavrochori),
Sipiska,
Samarina,
Grevena,
Tyrnavos,Bogatsko,
Niaousta(Naoussa),Servia,Selitsa,Ostrovo,
Tsaritsane,
Siatista,
and Katranitsa,
all situated
withinthezone of therelatively
flourishing
urban communities
of Janina,Kastoria,Moschopolis,
Larissa,Ambelakia,
andSeres.'15
Monastir,
Edessa,Verroia,
113BranislavDjurdjev,"O vojnucimasa osvrtomna razvoj turskogfeudalizmai na pitanje
bosanskogagaluka" [The Vojnuks,the developmentof Turkishfeudalism,and the question
of the Bosnian seignorialeconomy],GlasnikZemaliskogMuzeja u Sarajevu,new ser., social
sciences,II (I947), 75-I08; BranislavDjurdjev, "Nesto o vlaskimstarjesinamapod turskom
upravom" [The "Vlach" elders under the Turkish administration],Glasnik Zemaliskog
Muzeja, yearLII (1940), pp. 49-52; Glisa Elezovi6,Turskispomenici[Turkishmonuments]
(Srpska KraljevskaAkademija,Zbornikza istoc'njalkuistoriskui kniizevnugradju [Collection of Orientalhistoricaland literarymaterials],Ist ser., Vol. I) (Belgrade: "Zora," I940),
I, No. I, pp. 337-47; Vakalopoulos,Oi dytikomakedones
apodemoi,pp. 4-6, I7.
114H.H.S.A., St A. TiirkeiI/230, undatedand unsignedmemoirin Italian on the import
and exportcommerceof AustriawithTurkeyand the Levant,ca. i8oo-6.
Vakalopoulos,Oi dytikomakedones
apodemoi,pp.
115Popovi6,0 Cincarima,pp. 3I4-480;
I1-22.

278
Trajan Stoianovich
resident
inViennain i766,
merchants
OftheGreekandGreco-Vlach
and
(Woscopoli)116and Siatista,
one thirdcamefromMoschopolis
almostone half fromKastoria,Melnik,Tyrnavos,Argyrokastro,
of the
Of the58 members
Janina,
Razlog,Larissa,and Monastir."7
ofTokaj,onehalfwere
orguildofGreekmerchants
Tokaj Company,
fromKozaneand Kastoriain I762. Of the76 Greekor Greco-Vlach
families
in Croatiain I774 and the8i Greekor Greco-Vlach
resident
resident
in thetown
families
resident
in Sremandthegoorso families
almostonefourth
ofZemunc. I770, onethirdcamefromMoschopolis,
fromthevillages
and almostone fifth
fromthevillageofKatranitsa,
tableshowsin detailtheplace
The following
ofBlatseand Kleisoura.
of theTokaj Companyand of the
oforiginoftheGreekmerchants
of
in Croatia,
in theprovince
GreekandGreco-Vlach
families
resident
Srem,andinthetownsofZemunandVienna,c. I770:
PLACE OF
ORIGIN 18
NUMBER OF GREEK AND GRECO-VLACH MERCHANTS IN

THE DESIGNATED PROVINCE, TOWN, OR COMPANY
Croatia
Moschopolis
Katranitsa
Kozane
Blatse
Siatista
Kleisoura
Kastoria
Melnik
Verroia
Tyrnavos
Argyrokastro
28
i8
3
II
Srem
Zemun
29
29
20
I6
Vienna Tokal Co.
98
I2
54
I
I-2
22
II
Total
3I-32
27
I8-I9
I-2
I-2
I-2
I7-I8
I6-I7
I-2
I 2-I3
I2
4
4
II
9
4
116 Eighteenthcenturydocumentsin the archivesof Vienna generallyreferto Woscopoli

ratherthan Moschopolis.Accordingto Dugan J. Popovic,Woscopoli (Voskopolje) was a place
in the immediatevicinityof Moschopolis.Cf. Popovic,0 Cincarima,p. 35n. For our purposes,
since thereis
Moschopolisand Woscopolimay be consideredone and the same, particularly
some evidenceto suggestthatthe Vlach name forMoschopoliswas Woscopoli.
und Kaufleutein Wien
117PolychronisK. Enepekides,GriechischeHandelsgesellschaften
(Thessalonike:HetaireiaMakedonikonSpoudon,
aus dem Jahre1766 (ein Konskriptionsbuch)
withoutcomments,of the portionof the documententitled
This is a transcription,
i959).
"Conscriptionderen allhier in Wien sich befindendenTiirken und tiirkischenUnterthanen,"whichpertainsto Greek,Macedo-Slav,Serbian,and Bulgarianmerchantsin Vienna.
residingin and doing commercein
The Austrian"census" of Ottomansubjectstemporarily
Vienna showsthe presenceof 82 membersof the EasternOrthodoxfaith.Of the 82, five are
not merchants.Of the remaining77, two are OrthodoxSerbs from Sarajevo and Trebinje
(Bosnia-Herzegovina).Of the remaining75, five are almost certainlyMacedo-Slavs.Of the
remaining70, sixteenare of doubtfulnationality(Greeks,Vlachs,and Macedo-Slavs)and two
of
with certainty
the Greeknationality
are Greeksor Slavs fromSofiaand Nis. We can affirm
and eventheseGreeksare forthemostpartof Vlach origin.Cf. H. H. S. A.,
only52 merchants,
St. A. TilrkeiV/27.
118Popovic,0 Cincarima,pp. 49-50.


PLACE OF
ORIGIN 118
NUMBER OF GREEK AND GRECO-VLACH MERCHANTS IN

THE DESIGNATED PROVINCE, TOWN, OR COMPANY
Croatia
Janina
Monastir
Larissa
Razlog
Niaousta
Srem
Zemun
Vienna Tokaj Co.

4
I-2
I-3
2
2-5
I
3
2
2
I
Servia
Other or unnamedcommunities in "Bulgaria"

Otheror unnamedcommunitiesin "Greece"
Otheror unnamedcommunities in Thessaly,
Epirus, or Macedonia
x6
19
10
IO
Unknown
Total
Total
7
I66
76
8i
82-88
65-67
58
I6
362-370
all thetownsand othercommunities

enumerated
above
Virtually
Vlachand culturally
The pastoralvillages
wereethnically
Greek.119
includedin thegrouponcemayhavebeenmore"wretched"
thanthe
of
the
of
tillers thesoil;somemaynothavebeenvillagesat all
villages
inthesenseofbeingpermanently
fixedcommunities.
In theeighteenth
of the pastoral,
century,
however,
manyof thecommunities
manuandmerchant
folkgrewrich,replaced
thehutsand tentsof
facturing,
theirformer
frugalexistence
withstonehousesor dwellings
partlyof
woodandpartly
ofstone,
in theTurkishmanner
usuallyfurnished
but
sometimes
decoratedin the styleof Vienna,and built attractive
churches
withpopularly
inspired
frescoes
and richwoodcarvings,
or
evenfounded
elementary
andsecondary
schools.'20
Zone of Commerce
Bulgarian
The Thessalo-Macedo-Epirote
regionproducedmorecartersand
merchants
in theeighteenth
thananyotherBalkanarea of
century
comparable
size. Cartersand merchants
raisedin thiszone were
primarily
GreeksandVlachs,although
a fewMacedonian
Slavs(and
perhapsOrthodoxAlbanians)were also foundamong them.As
Macedonianoverlandexportsincreased,
the geographic
area from
whichthemuleteers,
and merchants
weredrawnbroadened
carters,
119 Ibid., p. 55.
120
Vakalopoulos,Oi dytikomakedones
apodemoi,pp.
13-14.

Trajan Stoianovich
280
THE TWO CHAINS OF FAIRS IN THESSALY, EPIRUS, MACEDONIA, AND EASTERN

OF THE EIGHTEENTHRUMELIA, AND THE CHIEF TOWNS AND VILLAGES
EMIGRATION
TO SERBIA, CROATIA, HUNGARY, AND
CENTURY COMMERCIAL
THE BANAT
Io
WO~
N
)\
c~~0
~~~0 ~ ~
0~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~000,
0~~~~~~~~~~~C
0~~~~~~~~
.0
~ ~
Ci
Chainof Fairs
EasternRhodopeand Balkan
Zone of CarryingVillages


Towns and Villages
i.
Blatse
2. Kleisoura
3. Kozane
4. Selitsa
5. Siatista
6. Grevena
7. Bogatsko
8. Niaousta
9. Katranitsa
Verroia
Metsovon
i2.
Kerasovon
I3. Larissa
Ambelakia
I4.
I5. Tyrnavos
i6. Argyrokastro
i0.
i i.
I7.
Tepelene
i9.
Moschopolis
i8. Selenice
20.
2i.
22.
23.
24.
8ipiska
Edessa
Kastoria
Monastir
Seres
25.
Stanimaka
27.
Razlog
26. Melnik
28. Panagjuriste
29. Koprivtidca
30.
3I.
32.
Karlovo
Kalofer
Gabrovo
intothezone in whichMacedo-Slavs,
northward
and eastwardinto
thezone in whichBulgarians,
werethepredominant
ethnicgroup.
Four principal
of
obstructed
factors
thedevelopment a Bulgarian
merchant
class:i) The population
oftheBlackSea andAegeancoasts
wasmainly
andArmenian;
Greek,Turkish,
Tatar,Jewish,
2) Bulgaria
was the hinterland
of fourmajorOttomancities(Constantinople,
Adrianople,
Philippopolis,
and Sofia),eachofwhichneededtheproductionof the Bulgarianpeasantand consequently
set limitsupon
theexportation
of his goodsbeyondtheconfines
of theEmpire;3)
and Armenian
merchants
virtualmonopoly
Greek,Jewish,
possessed
tothetradeofConstantinople
rights
withtheeastern
Balkans;and4)
littleof the produceof Bulgariacould be marketed
in Wallachia,
Serbia,or Bosnia,becauseofthebasically
similaragricultural
productionof thefourareas.
Bulgarian
merchants
withGreeknamesand of Greekculturemay
haveengagedsporadically
in international
tradebeforetheeighteenth
The roleof Bulgarian
century.
traders,
however,
was negligible
until
aboutI750, whenthe Greeksand Bulgariansof the Rhodopeand
StaraPlanina(Balkan Mountainsas theyare identified
in central
Bulgaria) villages of Stanimaka,Melnik, Razlog, Panagjuri'ste,
Koprivs'tica,
Karlovo,Kalofer,
andGabrovobegantomakelongcommercialodysseys
to Russiaand Hungary.BytheI780's Bulgarian-as
well as Greek,Jewish,
and Armenian-merchants
werein business
evenin Adrianople
and Philippopolis.
Bulgariantradersand carters
remained
nonethelessuntilthepeasantsand
relatively
unimportant
folkoftheRhodopeand Balkanmountain
pastoral
systems
descended
en massefromtheirheightsto thefoothills,
valleys,
and coastlands,
whichwere depopulatedby the kirialiwars or wave of TurcoAlbanianbrigandage
of the lastdecadeof the eighteenth
and first
quarterof thenineteenth
century.
The beginnings
of the Bulgarian
merchant
classaretraceable
to theeighteenth
century.
The commerce
of theRhodope,however,
remainedalmostwhollyin Greekhands
untilI750, and Bulgarianmerchants
beganto contestGreekcom-

282
Trajan Stoianovich
mercial
in theeastern
superiority
BalkansonlyaftertheRusso-Turkish
of Adrianople
treaty
of Adrianople(i829). The treaty
deprived
the
Turks (and consequently
also PhanarioteGreeks, Jews,and
of the productsof the
Armenians)of the rightof pre-emption
Danubianprincipalities
and fullyopenedthe regionnorthof the
Danube,not onlyto Europeancommerce,
but to the tradeof the
Bulgarians."2'
SerbianPig Trade
DuringtheAustrian
occupation
of 1718-i739, Serbia'smostim-
portant
exportproduct,
afterwax and honey,was cattle.Serbiawas
notthenan exporter
ofswineand evenimported
pigsfromSremand
theBanat.'22
In i76i, thechiefexports
of theBanatwerestillcattle,
pigs,andcopperore.'23
Afterthisdate,however,
Hungary,
theBanat,
and Slavoniabecameincreasingly
producers
and exporters
of grains
anddeclined
as exporters
ofpigs.'24
To supplement
thecerealeconomy
oftheBanatand thecentral
Hungarianplainand to satisfy
Austrian
whichtheBanatand Hungaryno longermetadequately,
demands,
theSerbsofgumadijabegantoraisepigsforexport,
whichtheyfedon
theacornsoftheirimmense
forests
of oak. Greekand Macedo-Vlach
merchants
and muleteers
wentto Austriawiththeirwooland cotton;
Serbianruralmerchants
wenttherewiththeirpigs.
At the end of the century,
nearlyeverySerbianhouseholdof
Sumadija possessed20 to 200 pigs. Karadjordje,leader of the First
SerbianRevolt,at one timeowned300 pigs,3,000 sheep,70 head of
cattle,and i6 horses.'25
Betweeni777 and i786 Hungaryimportedan
averageof i,300,000 francs'(over500,000florins')
worthof pigsfrom
121 On the beginnings
of a Bulgarianmerchantclass, see: Gandev, "T'rgovskataobmena,"
XL (i943-44), 23-24;
Sakazov, BulgarischeWirtschaftsgeGodifnikna SofliskijaUniversitet,
schichte,pp. 246, 250-52;
Ferrieres-Sauveboeuf, Memoires historiques,II, 249-50; Stella
Hadschi-Petrowa,
"Die geistigeFormungdes bulgarischenBurgertums,"
Sudost-Forschungen,
VII, Heft 3/4 (Dec. I942),
de Conpp. 654-6i; Bratianu,"Etudes sur l'approvisionnement
stantinople,"
Etudes byzantines,
p. 174; Mehlan, "Grundlinien,"Sudostdeutsche
Forschungen,
III (i939), 736; Mehlan,"Mittel-und Westeuropa,"Sudostdeutsche
Forschungen,
III (1938),
95.
122 Pavlovic',
"Finansijei privreda,"Glas,LXIV, 2d cl.,Book 40, p. 23.
123 Kosti, Dositej Obradovic, pp. 13-14.
124 Bicanic',Doba manufacture,
pp. 242, 328-29; Demian, Tableau geographique,I, 50. In
20 percentof the value of all HungarianexportsCf. Robert
1783, grainsand flourrepresented
Townson,Travelsin Hungarywith a Short Accountof Vienna in the Year 1793 (London,
1797),
p. i98.
125JoelMartinHalpern,A Serbian Village (New York: ColumbiaUniversity

Press,I958),
pp. 24-25; JoelMartinHalpern,Social and CulturalChange in a Serbian Village (Pre-PubliColumbia University)(New
cation MonographHRAF-25 Halpern-i, doctoral dissertation,
Haven, Conn.: printedby Human RelationsArea Files, Inc., c. i956), pp. 79-8I, 86.


theOttoman
fromSerbia.'26
Empire,
mostly
The Austro-Turkish
commercialagreement
of 1784, whichliberalized
traderelations
between
thetwoempires,
and theAustro-Turkish
of i79i, which
peacetreaty
grantedto Serbsof thePashalikof Belgradetherightto sell whatever goods theypossessedto whomevertheydesired,stimulated
Serbiantrade.The chiefbeneficiaries
ofthegrowth
in Austro-Turkish
tradewere probablythe Greek and Macedo-Vlachmerchants
of
Belgrade,Zemun,and Pancevo,and the Ottomanbureaucracy
in
Belgrade.'"ButmanySerbianpeasanttraders
of Sumadijaand Serbs
of Belgradeand Vojvodinaalso acquiredrelatively
substantial
wealth
bythesaleofSerbiansheep,cattle,
andpigsto Hungary,
Austria,
and
theAustrian
armies
during
thewarsoftheFrenchRevolution.
Byi8oo,
Serbiawas exporting
annually
threemillionfrancs'
worthofpigsand
cattletoAustria-equivalent
to a thirdoftheaverageannualvalueof
AustriancottonimportsfromMacedoniaand Thessaly-andfairly
largenumbers
ofsheep,cattle,
andpigsto Dalmatia."28
Adriatic
and IllyrianTrade
On June2,
I717,
CharlesVI of AustriadeclaredtheAdriaticopen
to thenavigationofall shipsand on March i8, 719, issuedan imperial

patentestablishing
freeportsin Triesteand Fiume (Rijeka). In I722
Austriabegan to clear the Sava betweenLjubljana and Sisak. The
Caroline route,joining Fiume to Karlovac on the riverKupa, was
completedin i726. In I735 workersbeganto straighten
the channelof
the Sava, and in i756 the Sava-Kupa routeto Karlovac was opened
to navigation.In I776 thenewlybuiltJosephine
routelinkedKarlovac
to Senj on theAdriatic.'29
The improvements
createdfarfromideal conditionsof rivertraffic.
"Morlakken,"or Serbian bandits,with whom the local population
oftensympathized,
lurkedbetweenNovigradand Karlovac,and the
beds of the Sava and Danube continuedto be full of sunken tree
trunks.The Danube below Pressburgand the Sava everywhere
were
dottedwith flourmills,which boats avoidedrunninginto only with
Numerousshoals obstructedtraffic
on the Tisza between
difficulty.
126 Demian, Tableau geographique,
I, 142.
127 Ruzica Guzina, Knezina i postanaksrpskeburzoaskedrzave [The "Knezina" and the
creationof theSerbianbourgeoisstate] (Belgrade:Kultura,1955), pp. 64, 68-69.

128 Dragoslav Jankovic,0 politlicim strankamau Srbiji XIX veka [Political parties in
nineteenth
century
Serbia] (Belgrade:Prosveta,1951), pp. 32-33.
129 Bicanic',Doba manufacture,
pp. 14-I5,
138,
140;
Romano,Le commercedu Royaume
de Naples,pp. 65-66; Beer, "Die 6sterreichische
Handelspolitik,"
AfriG,LXXXVI (1899), 17.

284
Traian Stoianovich
Titeland Szeged;and largeor heavilyladenboatsand raftscould

navigate
on theKupa onlyin floodtime,
and theprojectto makethe
Kupa navigable
between
Karlovacand Brodhad to be abandoned.
Whileofa limited
oftheAustrian
nature,
theachievements
Governmentpermitted
bothnativeAustrianand Ottomanmerchants
to
theirtrade.DuringtheSevenYears'War,boatsand skiffs
intensify
begana regulartraffic
downtheDanubeand up theSava and Kupa
to Karlovac.By thisnew riverrouteto Karlovacand thenoverland
to Fiume,thegrainsof Hungaryobtainedaccessto the Adriaticalthoughat firstonlyoccasionalaccess,sincetheexpenseof carting
grainfromKarlovacto Fiumeexceededthetotalripariantransport
costs.130
The AustrianGovernment
initiallyreserved
the rightto export
thegrainsandotheragricultural
oftheBanatand Hungary
surpluses
a privileged
through
company.
Greekand Serbianmerchants
thereforerestricted
theircommercefor severaldecadeschieflyto the
intoTurkeyof gunsfromStyriaand Carinthia
smuggling
and the
toFiume,bywayoftheSava-Kupa-Caroline
export
ofSlavonian
route,
cattle.131
Afterthefailureand dissolution
of theprivileged
company
in I773, Balkanmerchants
beganto bringthegrainsoftheBanatand
andsucceeded
HungarytotheAdriatic
wheretheprivileged
company
had failed.Greekand Slav maritime
traders
of theeasternAdriatic
transported
theHungarian
grainsfromFiume,Carlobago(Karlopag),
andTrieste
toVenice,Ancona,andNaples,whencetheyreturned
with
French,Italian,and Englishgoodsdestinedforthe Austrianand
markets.
Hungarian
Bytheturnofthecentury,
thiscommerce
assumeddefinite
patterns.
Certain
Illyrische
Handelsleute
openedbusiness
in Karlovac,
Sisak,and
andthenceconveyed
Petrinja
thegrainsoftheBanatto Carinthia,
the
CroatianMilitary
and theAdriatic
Frontier,
portsof Carlobago,
Senj,
Fiume,and Trieste.A secondgroupof Orthodoxmerchants,
establishedin Zagreb,distributed
thegoodsof theBanatto CivilCroatia
and "Illyria."A thirdgroupdelivered
oats,barley,flour,wine,and
vinegarto Bosniaand returned
to the AdriaticwithSerbianand
Bosniancattle,pigs,lumber,
firewood,
staves,
wax,honey,hides,and
furs.OtherOrthodoxmerchants,
and boatmensuppliedthe
carters,
130 ibid.,p. 136, n. 47; Marczali,Hungary,pp. 82-84; Schwartner,
Statistik,
I, 432.
131 Bicanic,Doba manufacture,
pp. 240-42, 260, n. i9; Popovic,0 Cincarima,pp. ii6-17;
Beer,"Die 6sterreichische
Handelspolitik,"
AfoG,LXXXVI (i899),
17-19.


interiorprovinceswith olive oil, salt, and sugar fromthe sugar refineryof Fiume.'32
By I750 or i760, the South Slav Senjani,fiercefighters
and pirates
of old, were carryingthe olive oil of Maina, Morea, and Naples to
Trieste.The numberof Neapolitan ships laden with olive oil for
Triestediminishedconstantly,
as the Senjani and Greekmerchantsin
Triestecapturedtheircarrying
trade.133
Both Greek and Orthodox"Illyrian"(westernSerbian) merchants
began to settlepermanentlyin Triestearound i748. The Triestine
colonyof mercantiilliricidi rito greco numberedsixty-five
persons
in I766 and ninety-one,
includingboth male and femalemembersof
fifteen
different
commercialfamilies,in Februaryi767. OrthodoximmigrantsfromBosnia,Herzegovina,and Boka (Bocche di Cattaro)
were the dominantelementsof the Serbiancommunityof Triestein
bothwealthand in number.Because of theirgeographicoriginsand
mercantileoperationsalong the Adriaticlittoraland in the territories
of the ancientIllyricum,
theyare usuallyidentified
in Austriandocuments as "Illyrians,"in contrastto the continental"Rascians" of
Serbiaand Hungary.Amongthesemerchants,
in i792, was thewealthy
Kurtovicfamilyof Herzegovina,which also maintainedcommercial
representatives
in Smyrnaand Belgrade,and possiblyVienna and
Ragusa. Draga Todorovic of Trieste,illiterateHerzegovinian-born
patronof Serbianliterature,
ownedfourteengalleysin theNapoleonic
era,someof whichsailed even to Americaand the East Indies.'34
Sixty-oneGreek merchantswere presentin Triestein I76i, and
132 H.H.S.A., St A. SerbienI, "Vorschlagin Beziehungauf die Pass-Ertheilungen
bey den
Slavonisch-Siirmischen
General-Commando,"
Peterwardein,
Aug. 25, i8ii.
133 Romano,Le commerce
du Royaumede Naples,pp. 75, 77; Pouqueville,Voyageen More'e,
II, p. iii.
134 Mita Kostic, "Srpsko trgovackonaseije u Trstu XVIII veka" [The Serbian merchant
colonyin Triesteduringtheeighteenth
century],IstoriskiCasopis,V, I954-55 (Belgrade,1955),
PP. 175-85; K. N. Kostic',"Gradja za istorijusrpsketrgovine,"Spomenik,LXVI, 2d cl.,
Book 52, pp, i6i-67. Herbert,the AustrianAmbassadorto the OttomanPorte,writesin a
letterdated Pera, May 2, I780, that a certainCurtovich,Triestinemerchantestablishedin
the exSmyrna,offeredhim moneyto inducehim to solicita firmanfromthePortepermitting
peditionof a shiploadof olive oil fromSmyrnato Trieste.Herbertexplainsto Cobenzl thathe
of servicesin the interestof the developmentof
will not accept moneyfor the performance
Austriantrade. Cf., H.H.S.A., St A. TfirkeiV/i8. Maksim Kurtovic'was establishedin
with his brotherChristoph
Smyrnaat least as early as 1766. He was then in partnership
(born ca. I739), who was carryingon the familybusinessin Vienna. Cf. Enepekides,
pp. 25-26. The populationof Trieste grew from a little
GriechischeHandelsgesellschaften,
over 7,000 in 1735 to 20,000 in 1786, 28,ooo in I790, and 33,000 in i8o8. Cf. M. Kostic,
"Srpskotragovackonaselje,"Istoriskiuasopis,V (I955), i68.

286
Trajan Stoianovich
residents
of the
twenty
Greekcommercial
familieswerepermanent
townin I767.3'5Afterthe Russo-Turkish
war of I768-I774, many
thousands
of Greeksemigrated
to Russia,Austria,Hungary,and
Corsica.Amongthemwerea number
ofmerchants
whoopenedbusinessin Aquileia,PortoRe (Kraljevica),Gorizia,Gradisca,Fiume,
andZara.'36
The Greekcolonists
ofTrieste,
liketheGreeksofVenice
andotherAdriatic
portsbutunlikethoseofHungary,
wereprincipally
merchant
immigrants
fromoil-producting
Crete,fromMorea,and
fromthe Ionian Islands."37
of
The Greekand Serbianmerchants
Hungarywereessentially
continental
tradersor carters
transplanted
to thePannonianbasinfromThessaly,
Epirus,Macedonia,and Old
Serbia.The Greekand Serbianmerchants
of the northern
Adriatic
wereemigrants
fromtheislandsandhinterlands
oftheAegean,Ionian,
andAdriatic
seas.
The OrthodoxSerbsof Herzegovina
di terre,o
were"coltivatori
vitturini,"
according
to a Ragusancommunique
The inof I788.138
habitants
ofPopovoPoljeandotherOrthodox
Herzegovinians
had,in
fact,servedRagusanmerchants
as assistants
andapprentices
eversince
thesixteenth
century.'39
One couldevenarguethattheRepublicof
St.Blaisemightnothaveattained
hersixteenth-century
maritime
preeminencewithoutthe colonizationof Christianrefugeesfrom
and Bosniaat theendofthefifteenth
Herzegovina
century.'40
Be this
135 Ibid., pp. 175-178; Tomadakis,"'Les communaut6s
d. dsterr.
helleniques,"Mitteilungen
ed. Santifaller(Vienna, I95i), Vol. II, 459.
Staatsarchivs,
Erganzungsband
III, Festschrift,
136 Stoianovich,
"L'economie balkanique,"p. 46; K. N. Kostic',"Gradja za istorijusrpske
trgovine,"
Spomenik,
LXVI, 2d cl., Book 52, pp. I75-77.
137 Tomadakis,"Les communautes
helleniques,"pp. 452, 456.
138 2arko Mulja&ic,"Dubrovac'kiizvestajo prilikamau Hercegovini
u proljeceI788 godine"
[Ragusan reporton conditionsin Herzegovinain the springof 1788], Godiinjak Istoriskog
DrultvaBosnei Hercegouine, IV (Sarajevo,1952), 284.
139 JorjoTadic', "Dubrovcanipo juznoj Srbiji u XVI stoljecu" [Ragusansin South Serbia
in thesixteenth
century],GlasnikSkopskogNauc'nogDrultva (Bulletinde la SocieteScientifique
de Skoplie), t. VII-VIII, Sectiondes Sciencessociales,nos. 3-4 (Skoplje, I930), p. 200; Jorjo
(Belgrade,
Tadic, ed., Acta archiviragusinihistoriamBelgradiillustratia,vol. I, I521-157I
La Mediterranle,
p. 274; Josef2ontar,
1950), pp. X-xi, 12, 20, 70-7I, 82, II3, 146; Braudel,
der V6lker Jugoslawiens,"
"Zur Problematikder ilteren Sozial-und Wirtschaftsgeschichte
LX (1I952), 376.
des Institutsfuir8sterreichische
Geschichtsforschung,
Mitteilungen
140If any single occurrencecan explain the remarkablegrowthof the Ragusan merchant
marineafter I450, it may be the massive flightto Ragusa of refugeesfrom Bosnia and
Herzegovina.Lopud (Isola di Mezzo), sparselyinhabitedbeforeI450, was soon settledby
many Bosniansand Herzegovinians,who, withinhalf a century,made the island into an
captainsof the island belongedto
important
shipbuilding
center.AroundI550, ten of the fifty
the familyof Sagri (Sagroevic), which was of Bosnianorigin,and a fourthof the Ragusan
merchantfleetwas operated by the inhabitantsof Lopud. After obtainingrecruitsfrom
Herzegovina,the port of Slano similarlybecame a centerof Ragusan shipbuilding.Ragusa's
fromBosnia and
grandeurwas thus not all her own but also that of the new immigrants
Herzegovina,who became,in theirnew homes,the buildersof ships and carriersof goods.


as it may,we know thatOrthodoxBosnianand Herzegovinianmuleteerswidenedtheboundariesof theircarrying
tradein the eighteenth
century
and beganto fendforthemselves
as independent
entrepreneurs.
The French consul to Ragusa advised his governmentc. I760 that
Bosniansand Herzegovinians,
whom he identified
as "Turks,"began
to carrythe wares of the Balkans to Ragusa "twentyor thirtyyears
ago." They quickly securedinformation
on pricesand price movementsin foreignmarkets,and when it did not suit themto sell in
Ragusa,theywenton to Venice and Ancona,disposedof theirgoods,
and returnedwith wares for which a demand existedamong their
compatriots."4'
By the end of the century,
the new "Illyrian"traders
and Moslem and OrthodoxSerbian"Turks" maintainedcommercial
relationsnot onlywithRagusa,Venice,Ancona,Trieste,Smyrna,and
Belgrade,butwithMarseilles,
Alexandria,theBalkanfairsofPirotand
Uzundzovo,the fairof Senigallia,and the portsof the Black Sea and
lowerDanube.'42
While the Balkan tradewiththe AdriaticslippedfromRagusa into
the hands of "Illyrians"and "Turks,"thatis, Moslem and Orthodox
ChristianSlavsor Serbians,theonce world-famous
Ragusan merchant
marinewas revivedaftera lapse of morethana century.
From a mere
8-io seaworthy
in
it
ships i740,
expandedto a minimumof 8o ships
in i757, ii0-i50
shipsin i764, and considerably

morethan200 before
theend of thecentury.143
By reducingor eliminatingthe competitionof French shippers,
theWar oftheAustrianSuccessionand theSevenYears'War furthered
theresurgence
of Ragusanshipping.The revivalof the Ragusanmerchant marine,however,began severalyearsbeforei740 and would
likelyhave continueduntil the end of the century,althoughnot so
rapidlyor spectacularly,
withoutthese wars and even those of the
American and French revolutions.The essentialelementsin the
Cf. JorjoTadic, Dubrovackiportreti[Ragusanportraits](Belgrade:SrpskaKnjizevnaZadruga,
I948), pp. 127-28, 2i2; Luigi Villari,The Republicof Ragusa (London: J. M. Dent & Co.,
I904), pp. 273-74, 308-9.
141 BibliothequeNationale (Paris), Fonds Franqais,No. 10772, Reportof Le Maire,French
consulto Ragusa (1758-1764), pp. 84-85.
142 K. N. Kostic,"Gradja za istorijusrpsketrgovine,"Spomenik,LXVI, 2d cl., Book 52,
pp. I65-66; Vinaver,"Trgovina Bara," IstoriskiZapisi, year VI, vol. IX, No. 2 (Cetinje,
1953), pp. 465-67, 472. On the fairof Senigallia,see note 99 and Stoianovich,"L'economie
balkanique,"pp. 178-79.
143Ibid., pp. 114-I7; BibliothequeNationale (Paris), Fonds Franqais,No. 10772, Report
of Le Maire, pp. 87-89, and memoiron Ragusa dated June 1757, p. 122; Felix-Beaujour,
Tableaudu commerce,
II, 256; Villari,RepublicofRagusa,pp. 328, 338.

288
Traian Stoianovich
renewaloftheRagusanmaritime
carrying
trade,as in thegrowthof
theshipbuilding
industry
of Senj and Fiumeand of thecommerce
of Hydraand Trieste,
weretheopportunity
to exportrawmaterials,
especially
wheat,to Italyand Marseilles
fromthecoastalareasof the
eastern
Mediterranean,
and thegeneralgrowthof European,
Russian,
and worldcommerce,
Atlantic,
thehitherto
unprecedented
prosperity
oftheoldMediterranean
andnewAtlantic
society.
BlackSea Trade
A halfcentury
aftertheopeningof the Adriaticto international
trade,theconcept
ofthefreedom
oftheseaswas appliedto theBlack
Sea. The treaty
of Passarowitz
granted
freedom
of commerce
on the
Danubeto Austrian
subjects,
butAustrian
shipsdid notthereby
win
the rightto extendtheirtradeto the sea. The treatyof Kuchuk
Kainarji(I774) authorized
entryand exitthrough
the Bosporusto
Russianmerchant
ships,but the Turksinsistedthisdid not entail
therighttopassto andfromtheMediterranean.
Not untiltheRussoTurkishtreatyof June2I, I783, did Russiaobtainthe indisputable
righttosendhermerchant
shipsthrough
theDardanelles."'
The treaty
of I783permitted
Russianmerchants
to selltheirgoods
toanyOttoman
buyer,
thereby
depriving
specially
privileged
Ottoman
subjectsof theirmonopolyrightsto the purchaseof certainraw
Russianmerchants
materials.
and shipswerethusauthorized
to buy
silk,rice,coffee,
andoliveoil anywhere
in theOttoman
Empireexcept
Constantinople.
They wereevenallowedto exportgrainsthrough
theStraits-ifthesedid notoriginate
in theOttomandominions.
In
oftransit
addition,
theywereno longersubjectto thepayment
duties,
dutiesexacted
ofthemontheirimports
fromtheOttointoandexports
manEmpirewerereducedto 3 percentad valorem,
and theywere
freedfromthepayment
of exceptional
importand exporttaxesand
excises.Similarrights
to Austriain I784, to theUnited
weregranted
Kingdomin i799,toFrancein i802, andtoPrussiain i8o6.'4`
The closingof theBlackSea to theshipping
of thenon-Ottoman
worldhad beenofimmense
to thegrowthof thetradeof
advantage
144 Young, Corps de droitottoman,III, 65-68; Beer, "Die 6sterreichische
Handelspolitik,"
A/iIG,LXXXVI (i899), 82-87; G. I. Bratianu,"Les observations
de M. de Peyssonnel
en I777 sur
1'executiondu trait de Koutchouk-Kainardji,"
Revue historiquedu Sud-est europien, VI
(1929), 347-48.
145 Anthoine,
Essai historique,
pp. I56-57;
Young,Corpsde droitottoman,
III, 68.


Greek merchants.The openingof the Danube, Bosporus,and Dardanellesto theshipsof Russiawas of evengreateradvantageto Greek
tradeand shipping.Russia,like Hungary,lacked a strongmerchant
classand was virtually
withouta Black Sea merchantmarine.Among
the firstmerchantshipsto flythe Russianflag,to bringwines from
theAegeanto RussianBlack Sea ports,to exportgrainsfromOchakov
and Odessa to theMediterranean,
wereGreekshipsmannedby Greek
crews.'46
Maria Theresa'spersecutionof the OrthodoxChurch drove thousands of Hungarian Serbs to South Russia. Greeks and Orthodox
Albanianslikewisesoughthaven in Russia afterthe Greek revoltin
Morea duringthe Russo-Turkishwar of I768-i774. Potemkin'sand
Catherine'sdecisionto recolonizetheUkraineand createmoderntrading or naval ports at Taganrog, Sebastopol,Kherson, Nikolaev,
Ochakov, and Odessa attractedother Greeks and Habsburg Serbs,
bothas tradersand permanentsettlers.147
To draw some of the more
enterprising
elementsof southeastern
Europe and the easternMediterranean,the Russian governmentexemptedforeignsettlersfrom
the disagreeableobligationof quarteringthe Russian soldieryand
grantedthemthe rightto choose theirown local magistrates.
Greek
sailors,Greek merchants,Greek "pettydealers,"and Greek taverns
and coffeehousesconsequentlybecame a commonsightin the new
Russianports.Odessa,foundedin 1794, was rapidlytransformed
into
a great grain emporium.'48
A Hungarian Serb, Sava Tekelija, who
visitedthe port in i8ii-soon to be the birthplaceof the Philike
Hetairia,fatheredby Greek merchants-observesin his autobiography:'14
I was amazedto hearmostlySerbianin thestreets

and coffeehouses.Even the
was thenPetrovic,
burgomaster
a Serb fromNovi Sad. And thereweremany
others.
AftertheSerbianlanguage,Italianwas mostaudible;thenGreek,Russian,
and Turkish.And thereweremanyJews.
In Macedonia, in the Aegean, in Herzegovina,in Sumadija, in

Hungary,in Triesteand Fiume,and in the Black Sea portsof Russia
146 Stoianovich,
"L'economiebalkanique,"pp. 173-74, 260.
147 Pallas,Travels,II, I30-3I; Schwartner,
Statistik,
III, 3i6.
148 Pallas,Travels,I, 484-85; Hertzberg,
Geschichte
Griechenlands,
III, 369.
149 K. N. Kostic,"Gradja za istorijusrpsketrgovine,"Spomenik,LXVI, 2d cl., Book 52,
p. i67 n. The populationof Odessa rose fromless than 5,000 in 1799 to 15,000 in I804. Cf.
J.(oshua) JepsonOddy, European Commerce,ShewingNew Secure Channelsof Trade with

theContinent
ofEurope (London, i8o5), pp. I69-70.

290
Traian Stoianovich
and the Rumanianprincipalities,

Balkan merchants
possessedthe
commonqualityof freedom
to movefromone place
and readiness
as a shepherd
moveswithhis flocks.Oftenthe sonsor
to another,
grandsons
of shepherds,
swineherds,
and of outlaws,theysoughtthe
of the
wealthof greener
and cattlemarkets,
pastures,
of oak forests
in thetowns,of thenonproducers
producers
in theports,and of the
caravans
ofthelandandsea.Theywererarely,
themifever,producers
of grains.Theyperformed
selves,leastof all,producers
tasksor acts
whichthePhysiocrats
uneconomic.
Andtheywere,in fact,
considered
uneconomic
menbefore
theycameto represent
Balkaneconomic
man
par excellence.
VIII
Official
documents
rarelymakea cleardistinction
betweenGreek
andVlachor Greekand Orthodox
A distinction
Albanianmerchants.
notbe absolutely
may,moreover,
essential.
Epirusand southwestern
thenuclearhomeland
Macedonia,
ofVlachsand Orthodox
Albanians,
ofGreeks.Religious
wasalsothehomeland
andcultural
affinities
supthe geographic
plemented
propinquity.
The Vlach and Orthodox
Albanian,
unliketheSerb,lackeda tradition
ofecclesiastical
autonomy.
Finally,in thecentraland easternBalkanzonesGreekwas notonly
thelanguageofculture
butalsothelanguageofbusiness.
Male membersof the morewell-to-do
Vlach and OthodoxAlbanianfamilies
wereconsequently
easilyassimilated
withintheHelleniccommunity;
the womenremainedgenerally
unilingualand thuspreserved
the
ethnicindividuality
ofthetwonational
groups."5
Not onlyVlachsand OrthodoxAlbaniansbut all OrthodoxmerchantsoftheBalkanswerefrequently
identified
in Germany,
Austria,
andHungary
as "Greeks."
After
an official
inspection
tourofHungary
in i755, forexample,the inspectors
advisedthe AustrianGeneral
Commercial
Directorate
thatthetradeof Szentendre
(SentAndreja)
in theComitatofPestwas in thehandsof Greekswho tradedwith
Turkeyand wentregularly
to theLeipzigfairs.The mostfamousof
thesemerchants,
to theirreport,
wereSagarovitz,
Lobanaccording
and the
ovsky,
JanoPopoviz,Ava Kumoviz,thebrothers
Szenkoviz,
All the names,however,
brothers
Prambovan.
appearto be Slavic,
or Armenian,
and Popoviz(Popovic),Kumoviz(Kumovic),
Jewish,
150Popovi6,0 Cincarima,
p. 57.
pp. i6-28; Urquhart,Turkeyand ItsResources,

ConqueringBalkan OrthodoxMerchant 29i

and Szenkoviz(Senjkovic6?)are Serbian.Accordingto thesamereport,
the principalmerchantsof Szamos-Ujvar,namely Martin Versac,
ChristophNowack, JacobPlacent,MartinLucacz, Nicola Christoph,
JacobHankovicz,and SarokanLaslo, were Greeksand Armenians.'5'
Jacob Placent and Sarokan Laslo may have been Armenians,but
Versac (Vrsac), Nowack (Novak), Lucacz (Lukac), and Hankovicz
were probablySlavs and possiblySerbs.Their names,in any case, do
not suggestHellenicorigins,and Greeksonlyinfrequently
hide under
Slavicnames.
BaronFirst,head of a Prussiantradingmissionto Austriabetween
I753 and i755, reported
in his "LettressurVienne"that"lesnegociants
les plus considerables[in Hungary] sont les Raitzes ou ceux de la
religiongrecque."152 Rascians,or Serbs,were stillthe chiefmerchants
of Hungary. Greeks and Greco-Vlachsoutdistancedthem in im-
portanceonlyafteri750.
For a full centuryafteri750, however,Greek was the primary

languageof commercein the Balkans,and Balkan merchants,
regardless of theirethnicorigins,generallyspoke Greekand oftenassumed
Greek names. "Greeks,"oftenof Greek nationality,
were sometimes
"Greeks"onlyin the sensethattheywere not "Latins." In Hungary,
Croatia,and thevillagesof Sremand Backa,theterm"Greek"did not
contain a narrow ethnic significance,for Greeks, Macedo-Vlachs,
Macedo-Slavs,
Wallachians,Bulgarians,Serbs,and OrthodoxAlbanians
were all "Greeks,"that is, of "Greek" religion.The religiousconnotationyieldedeven to the economic: a "Greek" was above all a
peddler or merchant,and in this sense even a Jew could be a
"Greek."153
IX
Islam is not intrinsically
opposed to commercialand economic
progress.The Moslem merchantsof the early centuriesof Arab
dominationwere accomplishedentrepreneurs.
Ottoman Moslems,
namelyAlbaniansand Bosnian and HerzegovinianSlavs, have also
distinguished
themselves
in commerce.The Turks,however,have not
151Fournier,"Handel und Verkehrin Ungarn," Ao6G, LXIX, erste HHlfte(i887),
384-85, 404-I 6. See also thecomments

undernoteII7.
pp.
152Fournier,"Handel und Verkehr,"A/iG,LXIX/i, p. 34i n.
153 K. N. Kosti6,"Gradja za istorijusrpsketrgovine,"Spomenik,LXVI, 2d cl., Book
pp. i8o-8i; Popovi6,0 Cincarima,p.

III, 732.
III;
52,
Mehlan,"Grundlinien,"Siidostdeutsche
Forschungen,

292
Traian Stoianovich
playedan important
rolein international
trade,although-contrary
to
generalopinion-theydid sometimes
go to Europe,namelyto
Vienna.'54
After
visiting
Moreain i794, XavierScrofani
ofSicilyobserved
that
theTurksregarded
as "aussivil que celuid'un
thestatusofmerchant
155 Butwhyshould
agriculteur."
thestatusofmerchant
havebeenless
admirablethanthatof tradesman
or artisan?The statusof intraimperialmerchant
was indeednotlessadmirable,
and manyTurks
wereintraimperial
or domestic
Tradersin foreign
traders.
lands,unlikedomestic
merchants,
wereconstantly
subjectto thepressures
and
corrupting
influences
of alien culturesand civilizations.
Organized
politicaland religionsgroupsof the dominantreligionwerefully
consciousof theirholy missionto reduceforeigninfluences
to a
minimum,'56
althoughtheycould neverfullyclose the doors of the
South
Empiretotheattractions
oftheWest.Jews,
Greeks,
Armenians,
Slavs,and non-Ottoman
merchants
weretherefore
allowedto obtain
controlof the foreigntradeof the Empire.Positionsof executive
authority
in themilitary
apparatus
andpolitical
structure,
on theother
to Moslemsand Turks.
hand,werereserved
GreekOrthodoxy
enjoyeda morefavored
position
in theOttoman
becauseofitscompromise
EmpirethanRomanCatholicism
withthe
stateand subjection
in politicalmattersto the will of the state.
waslessfavored
Catholicism
bothbecauseofitspolitical
independence
and becausetheprimary
enemiesof theOttomanEmpirewerelong
the Catholicpowersof Venice and the Germanic-Roman
Empire
(Austria).
In i557, upon the urgingsof the Serbian-born
Vizier Mehmed
Sokolli(Sokolovic),Suleimanthe Magnificent
the Serbian
restored
whichhad ceasedto existfollowing
patriarchate,
theOttomanconquestofSerbiain 1459. A possiblereasonfortherestoration
mayhave
beento obtainthesupport
of theSerbianclergyagainstthegrowth
ofoutlawbandsamongtheSerbs.DuringtheAustro-Turkish
warof
boththehigherand lowerclergyof Serbiain1593-i606, however,
was thereafter
spiredthepeopleto revolt.The Ottomangovernment
oftheSerbian
mistrustful
church.
154 H.H.S.A., St A. Tiirkei V/27, "Conscription
deren allhier in Wien sich befindenden
Tiirkenund tiurkischen
Unterthanen,"
datedFeb. 7, 1767.
155 (Xavier Scrofani),Voyageen Grece de Xavier Scrofani,Sicilien,fait en 1794 et 1795,
trans.fromItalian by J.F. C. Blanvillain,3 vols. (Paris and Strasbourg,i8oi), III, 101.
156 BernardLewis, "The Impact of the FrenchRevolutionon Turkey," Cahiersd'histoire
mondiale;Journalof WorldHistory;Cuadernosde historiamundial,I (I953),
I05.


thesuspect
theendoftheseventeenth
After
century,
Serbianchurch
theinroadsofthepatriarchate
of
wasno longerabletoresist
effectively
The rebellion
in
and flight
of theSerbianpatriarch
Constantinople.
i690 to Hungary
incitedtheTurksto approvetheappointment
of a
of Pec. For halfa century,
Greekto thepatriarchate
bothSerbsand
Greeksobtained
nominations
to thepatriarchal
see.In themeantime,
theSerbianpatriarchate
however,
becameincreasingly
impoverished.
oftensofthousands
ofSerbsfromOld Serbia-among
The departure
the Serbianchurchof revenuesforthemthe wealthiest-deprived
of Old SerbiabyroughMoslem
merlyavailableto it.The occupation
cattlerustlers,
Albanianherdsmen,
turned
and marauding
irregulars
otherSerbsawayfrompeacefuleconomicpursuits.
The population
of Old SerbiabecamelessSerbianand thepatriarchate
of Serbiabecameinfinitely
poorer.
Another
Serbianpatriarch
fledtoVojvodinain
1737. Meanwhile,
theCourtofViennawas conspiring
to removethe
new metropolitanates
of Belgradeand SremskiKarlovcifromthe
jurisdiction
ofthepatriarch
ofPec.The Sultanthusgladlyaccededin
and
of the patriarchof Constantinople
I766 to the solicitations
Phanariotes
to abolishthepatriarchate
oftheSerbs.'57
The growthofwealthamongtheGreeksled to thegrowthof the
powerof thepatriarchate
of Constantinople,
and thegrowthof the
powerof thelattermade it easierforGreeksto attainwealthand
exercise
politicalinfluence.
At theend of theseventeenth
century,
in
fact,thepatriarchate
ofConstantinople
fellundertheinfluence
ofthe
or wealthy
Phanariote
Constantinopolitan
laymembers
ofthechurch,
of civiland fiscaladministration.
at leastin matters
Throughtheir
control
oftheinstruments
Phanariote
ofcredit,
bankersand businessmencameto determine
notonlythechoiceof bishopsbutof Ottomangovernors
and judges.Monopoly,
beinga politicalquestion,
was
nevera matter
on whichtheOrthodoxchurchhad enjoyedtheopofexpressing
The "laicization"
an opinion.
ofthepatriarchate
portunity
made thechurchevenmoreinsensitive
to questionsof interest
and
or accumulation.'58
Greekmerchants,
capitalformation
moreover,
oftenphilanthropically
diverted
partof theirwealthto thebuilding,
of churches.
upkeep,and renovation
Regardlessof its origin,the
wealththeyretainedthereby
acquiredor appearedto acquirethe
ofthechurch.
sanction
157
158
Hadrovics,Le peopleserbeet sonEglise,passim.

Papadopoulos,Studiesand Documents;pp. 44, 49-60, I39-49; Ranke,Historyof Servia,
pp. 30-3I.

294
Traian Stoianovich
of thepietyof Greekmerchants
oftenstrikes
the
The formalism
observers
of Greekand Greco-Vlach
eyeof unsympathetic
religious
To question
theirpiety,
is toformulate
theproblem
practices.
however,
erroneously.
GreekOrthodoxmerchants
did nothave to createtwo
codesof moralbehavior,
one formatters
of faithand the
different
otherformatters
of business.
For theGreekmerchant,
religionwas
businessa matterof religion.Religion,
secular-this-worldly-and
andnationwereone;pietism,
andethnic
business,
secularism,
solidarity
or nationalism
werecoexistent.
It is in thislightthatwe mustunderstandthe unhesitating
readinessof the Greekmerchant
colonyof
as a "legallyconstituted
Triesteto describetheirparishcommunity
159
national-civil
anddomiciliar-administrative
economic
brotherhood."
Fromtoptobottom,
fromthepatriarchate
totheparishcommunity,
theGreekOrthodox
churchwas permeated
withan ethnocentric
and
secularoutlook.The Serbs,essentially
informal
evenwhileobserving
forms,
werealsoethnocentric
in theirreligious
practices.
In viewofthe
of theauthority
of theirchurch,
weakening
however,
theyfailedto
as an
an ideologyof the churchor parishcommunity
formulate
"economicbrotherhood"
and latercombinedsecularism
withagnosthanpietism.
The ethnocentrism,
ticismrather
andpietism
secularism,
of neo-Greek,
and Phanariote
Macedo-Vlach,
Orthodoxy
made the
Greek and Greco-Vlachmerchantfundamentally
and religiously
hencemoreredoubtable
thanthe Serbian
in commerce
materialist,
Serbianmaterialism
merchant.
lackeda religious-economic
basis; it
wasmoreephemeral,
lessfundamental.
The Orthodox
"ethic"promoted
theriseofa merchant
classin one
further
respect.
The enormous
numberoffastdaysin theOrthodox
calendarforcedthefaithful
to practice
frugality
religiously
and thus
accumulate
wealthforfuture
investment,
whentimeswerepropitious,
as during
mostoftheeighteenth
century.
X
The AustrianWar Council observedin i699 that Serbswere
bornandtrained"
Germanmerchants
"naturally
fortrade.'60
couldnot
withtheRascians,
to one complaint,
because"der
compete
according
and strictlaws of fastingand habit,
Raize," bound by necessity
159 Popovic, 0 Cincarima,
pp. 69-71.
160 Kostic, DositejObradovic,
pp. 210-II.


Fischenund rohem
"begnigt[e]sich mit Knoblauch,schlechten
161
Speck."'
Afterdiscussingthe new commerceof Greek and Albanian merchantsin Morea, Scrofaniobservedthat no nation could equal the
and diligence.'62JoshuaJepson
Greeksin avarice,thrift,
shrewdness,
Oddy, memberof the Russia and Turkeyor Levant companies,observedthatthe whole of the land and sea tradebetweenRussia and
theBalkansor Aegeanwas in thehandsof Greeks,"on accountof the
extraordinary
assiduity,economy,and personal attendanceto their
businesswhich no foreignercan equal. Their assiduityand personal
attendancenever cease, even during the time Constantinopleis in163
fectedbytheplague,whichdriveseveryforeigner
intothecountry."
It is no accidentthat the wealthiestGreek merchantswere often
Greeks in Vienna, Trieste,or Amsterdam,and later Alexandriaor
Marseilles.Both personand propertywere insecurein the Ottoman
like "good money,"fled
Empire,and thusbothpersonand property,
to areas of greatersecurity.'64
"Some branchesof the migrating
families,"however,were"alwaysleftin Turkey,eitherfromnecessity,
from the possessionof propertyin the country,or fromthe convenienceto bothpartiesin a commercialpointof view.Thus," according to theEnglishtravelerDr. Holland, "byfarthegreaterpartof the
exteriortrade of Turkey,in the exchange of commodities,[was]
carriedon by Greek houses,which [had] residentsat home, and
branchesin variouscitiesof Europe,mutuallyaiding each other,extendingtheirconcernsmuch more variouslythan could be done in
Turkeyalone."165
The conspicuoussuccessof Balkan merchantsis partlyattributable

to the close union thatreignedamong them.Their businesseswere
oftenfamilyaffairs,
with one memberof the familyin the Balkans,
anotherin Austria,Italy,or the Netherlands,and a thirdin Russia,
Egypt,or France.Carryingon businessas a familyaffairallowedthem
to make a more economicemployment
of labor by the avoidanceof
161 Beer,"Die 6sterreichische
Handelspolitik,"
Af6G,LXXXVI (i899),
162 Scrofani,
Voyage,III, ioi.
163 Oddy,EuropeanCommerce,
p. I79.
I53,
n. 84.
164For the commentsof a wealthyGreek merchantin Amsterdamon insecurityin the

OttomanEmpire, see L. S. Stavrianos,The Balkans since I453 (New York: Rinehart&
Company,Inc.,c. i958), p. I45.
165HenryHolland, Travelsin the lonian Isles, Albania,Thessaly,Macedoniaetc. duringthe
Years 1812 and i8I3 (London, i8i5), pp. I48-49. More easilyavailable works in which the
quotationis citedare Stavrianos,
Balkan Federation,p. 30, and David S. Landes, Bankersand
Financeand EconomicImperialismin Egypt(Cambridge,Mass.: Harvard
Pashas; international
University
Press,i958), p. 26.

Traian Stoianovich
296
hadto
orbrokers,
towhichEuropeanmerchants
expensive
middlemen
resort.Religiousand ethnicties,a commonplace of origin,clan
or pohratimstvo
held together
affiliation,
and blood brotherhood
orassociates
whowerenotofthesamebiological
family.
thosepartners
organizedinto
weregenerally
abroad,moreover,
Balkanmerchants
at their
or merchant
guilds,witha "Consul"or "Richter"
companies
headto smoothout discordsand promotethebusinessof theentire
"company."16
won theirwealthby
in foreign
landssometimes
Greekmerchants
banknotes
"arbitrary
and excessive
prices"and discounting
charging
at an "excessive
rate."167 An anonymous
and Turkishsilvercurrency
theGreekswho controlled
theDanuberiver
criticizes
writer
harshly
Vidinand Orsovain thetimeofNapoleon:
tradebetween
withthe Pasha
Everyday the Greeks,and especialythoseof Vidin,conjointly
[Pasvanoglu],make . . . a truemonopolyof thepassageof poorlyladen boats
theircargoesat will, overloading
the
and frequently
spoiledgoods,increasing
boats....
as tax,excise,and customsfarmers,
theirfunctions
Whileexecuting
merchants
by
theywereable to hinderthetradeof rivalor foreign
a portion
ofthebales
openingandappropriating
altering
theircargoes,
tollsor customs.
Through
arbitrary
putin theircharge,and exacting
thecarriers
of
also commonin Belgradeand Svistov,
suchpractices,
168
"inbrevetempo,
miglionari."
Vidinbecame,
and allowanceshould
The sourcesof theseopinionsareunfriendly
are
too
much
to
this
views
in
fact.The
be madefor
accord,however,
and
be ignored.The opinionsof a Frenchconsulon thecommerce
andwithout
be appliedprofitably,
merchants
ofRagusamay,moreover,
to Greeksand otherBalkanmerchants,
thefacts,
as wellas
distorting
169
to Ragusans:
n'estpas savant, mais exploitationen est

Le mecanisme
de [leur] commerce
les Turcs,et pourne pas
epineuse.II fautdes gensfinset deliespourattraper
166 Popovi6,0 Cincarima,
von
p. I36; H.H.S.A., St A. TiurkeiV/26, "Votum des Freyherrn
Borie,"Jan.I0, I766.
167 Pallas,Travels,II, 54.
168H.H.S.A., St A. TiirkeiI/230, memoirin Italian on the importand exporttrade of
Austriawith the Levant,undatedand unsigned,ca. i8oo-6. See also Mehlan, "Mittel-und
III (I938), 90; Herzfeld,"Zur Orienthandelspolitik,"
Forschungen,
Westeuropa,"Sfidostdeutsche
AfoG,CVIII (1920),
270-71
169BibliothequeNationale (Paris), Fonds Fransais,No.

consulto Ragusa,1758-I764, p. 84.
10772,
Reportof Le Maire,French


tomber
dansles piegesouid'autresse laisseroient
prendre.
On pretend
que lorsque
cetartestraffine
et quintessencie
jusqu'a un certainpointil nuita la probity,
et
qu'un parfaithonnetehommequi commencesa fortunene scauroitjamais
devenirun grandnegociant.
Si celaestles Raguzoissontles meilleurs
distillateurs
dans ce genre.Avec un peu d'argentet beaucoupd'activiteils fontdu chemin.
Le mensongeet la mauvaisefoydirigent
toutesleursoperations.
La plupartdes
avec qui ils sonten relationau dehors,et ceuxqui viennent
strangers
a Raguze,
en fontsouventde facheusesepreuves.II n'y a que les marchandsde Naples
en faitde fraudes.
qui les surpassent
of theircommerce
The technique
was basedon wile ratherthan
in theeighteenth
science.
Balkanmerchants
triumphed
century
chiefly
in areasrecently
in thecarrying
tradeandprimarily
openedto coloniAs theneighboring
Balkaninterior.
zationorin theprimitive
sparsely
classesweredeareaswerecolonized,as nativemerchant
inhabited
andhabitsofthepeoples
velopedin them,as thegeography,
economy,
becamebetterknownto foreigntraders,
as
of the Balkaninterior
foreign
traders
beganto learnthelanguagesof the Balkanpeoples,
as thevalueof Austrianexportsto the Balkansbeganto approach
the businesspositionof the Balkan
the value of Austrianimports,
was seriously
merchant
injured.
Austrian
merchants
of theeighteenth
century
werealmostalways
to engagein interretailers.
ThoseAustrians
whonursedan ambition
nationaltradewere oftenignorantor prodigaland behavedlike
"cavaliers."
Theylackeda long businesstradition,
rarelyknewthe
Balkanlanguages,
andcouldnotlearnthebusiness
offoreign
tradein
schoolswerelackingin Austriauntilafter
school,sincecommercial
I750. As Greekmerchants
long refusedto divulgetheirbusiness
Austrian
merchants
had to learnbypersonalexperience.
secrets,
They
couldnotobtainthisexperience,
however,
without
establishing
compin theBalkans,
andthislasttheyhad todeferuntil
toirsorwarehouses
afterI770, whenAustrian
becamelargeenoughtowarrant
it.'70
exports
and sometimes
Austrian
firms
Well-capitalized
government-backed
succeededafterI770 in obtainingthe collaboration
of Greekand
oftherighttosupplyLombardy
Macedo-Vlach
merchants.
Thefarmer
thusformed
CountRuggierStarhemberg,
a partnership
withtobacco,
in I776 withEmmanuel
Rizos,a GreekofSalonika.The enterprise
of
in Seres,Larissa,and
Rizosandthebusiness
acumenofGreekfactors
othernear-by
places,assuredthesuccessof thefirmof Starhemberg,
17O Herzfeld, "Zur Orienthandelspolitik,"Af6G, CVIII (ig2o),
264-65.

Trajan Stoianovich
298
whichsupplied
Lombardy
withMacedonian
tobaccoandAustriawith
largequantities
ofMacedonian
andThessalian
cotton
andsilk.'7'
In i777, the Austriangovernment
createdthe Orientalische
Friesische
Handlungs-Compagnie
and gave it the rightto tradein
Serbia,Bosnia,Macedonia,Bulgaria,Wallachia,and Moldavia.The
of Baronvon
company
was initially
placedunderthesole direction
Fries,Daniel Zepharovich,
and NicolausPatsatsi(alias Constantin
Mosca).In shorttime,however,
theGreekor Greco-Vlach
merchants
UruscioKoatza (WrussioCoacza) and AthanasioHatsiGeorgwere
allowedtopurchase
capitalstockandmademanagers
ofthecompany.
The firmplannedto establishits own warehouses
in Zemunor
Pancevo,in Roseor Galati,and in Kilianovaor Ismael(Izmail). At
ithadtorelyon theservices
ofa Greekor Greco-Vlach
first,
however,
forwarding
agentin Zemun,who transshipped
to Viennathecotton
Koatza dispatched
fromSeres.The othercompanymanager,Hatsi
fromtheAustrian
Georg,traveled
to Wallachiawithletters
governon thecomment,requesting
PrinceYpsilanti
to placeno restrictions
to
of wool and callingon him to issuea rescript
pany'spurchases
local Wallachianmagistrates
ordering
themto favorthe commerce
of thecompany.'72
The collaboration
merchants
of Greekand Macedo-Vlach
with
Austrianbusinessenterprises
allowed a few Austriantradersto
copenetrate
theBalkanmarket.
Moreover,
Austro-Greek
commercial
operation
and theAustro-Turkish
tradeagreement
of i784 permitted
a remarkable
ofAustrian
to theBalkans.The ratio,in
growth
exports
moneyvalues,betweenAustrianexportsto and importsfrom
Macedoniaand Thessalythusrosefromi:i6 in I770 to I:3 twenty-
fiveyearslater.173
beneficial
to Balkantraders,
commercial
collaboration
Initially
with
171 Svoronos,
Le commerce
de Salonique,pp. i82-84.
172 H.H.S.A., St A. Tirkei V/26, letterfromHallmayrto di Gamera,ImperialVice-Consul
in Salonika,Nov. 3,
March29,
I779;
1777;
ibid., lettersto PrinceYpsilantiof Wallachia,Jan. 6, 1778, and
of Julyi,
ibid.,convention
I777,
creatingthe Orientalische
Friesische
and undated instructions

Handlungs-Compagnie,
to the "griechischeHandelsleute"Wrussio
Koatza and AthanasioHatsi Georg. Zepharovichwas ennobledin 1782 for having brought
about five hundred"Turkish and Greek families"to Austria since 1755, thus aiding the
development
of Austriancommerceand industry.
Cf. Popovic,0 Cincarima,p. ioo. A certain
Hadschi Patzazi, born in Woscopolic. I72I, enteredAustriaas a merchantc. 1738 and
established
permanent
residencein Vienna in I75I. In I766 he was livingin the Fleischmarkt,
and was in partnership
with AthanasCanat and
the Viennesequarterfor Greek merchants,
Alexio Georg Goco. He importedabout 5o,ooo florins'worthof wool and cottoneach year
and expectedto remainin Vienna untilthe arrivalof an unnamedbrother.This brothermay
have been Nicolaus Patsatsi.Cf. Enepekides,GriechischeHandelsgesellschaften,
pp. 9-I0.
173 Gandev, "T'rgovskataobmena," Godilnikna SofliskijaUniversitet,
XL (I943-44),
i6;
Tableau du commerce,
Felix-Beaujour,
II, I63-65.


Austrian
businesses
thepre-eminence
undermined
eventually
of Ottomanmerchants
in thetradeof theDanubianbasin.Intensepressure
was appliedupon themduringthe secondhalfof the eighteenth
century
to becomeHabsburgsubjects.By i8oo, verymany-ifnot
most-former
Ottomanmerchants
resident
in thevariousHabsburg
provinces
acknowledged
politicalallegianceto the Habsburgmonarchy.'74
At thesametime,theGermansand Magyarsof Hungary
begantooffer
serious
commercial
competition
to theSerbsandGreeks
and used theirpoliticalpowerto destroythe economicpowerof
GreekandSerbianmerchants.
Butthemostserious
camefrom
rivalry
theJews,
whoacquired
therightin i796 tobecomeAustrian
subjects.'75
BetweenI765 and i8oo,only5 or6 Ottoman
Jewsand an averageof
I35 Christian
Balkantraders
wentannuallyto theLeipzigfairs.Betweeni8oo and i8i8, however,
thenumberof OttomanJewsat the
Leipzigfairsrosetoa yearly
averageof20, whilethenumber
ofBalkan
Christian
traders
sankto a yearlyaverageof 45. Betweeni8i9 and
visitedtheLeipzig
i839, whenan averageof 65 OttomanChristians
fairs,the averagenumberof annuallyvisitingJewishmerchants
fromTurkeyroseto 3I. The ratioof OttomanJewsto Ottoman
Christians
at theLeipzigfairswas thusI :25 beforei8oo and I :2 after
i8oo.176DuringtheNapoleonicwars,moreover,
Austrian
Jewsbegan
to displaceGreektraders
in theRumanianprincipalities.'77
The commerceof Greekmerchants
thusbeganto shrinkin somepartsof
Continental
Europebefore
theWarofGreekIndependence.
The intensified
Balkankiriali
warsandfeudalrazziashurttheoverland tradefora halfcentury
afterI790. The merchant
in theoverlandtradealso suffered
fromthecontraction
of his Germanmarkets
theintroduction
of cheaperAmericancottonand English
following
orGermancottonyarn.The Aegeanor Mediterranean
maritime
merchant,on theotherhand,succeeded
in perpetuating
his successes
by
capturing
a goodlyportion
oftheFrenchMediterranean
trade.
Products
of theirmilieu,Balkanmerchants
in theoverlandtrade
performed
withbrilliant
successso long as the substructure
of the
Europeanand Balkaneconomies
remained
basically
unchanged.
The
nineteenth
century,
however,was a dynamicrevolutionary
epoch.
174 Popovic',0 Cincarima,
pp.' 99-03.
175 Gelber,"Contribution
'a 'histoiredes Juifsespagnolsa Vienne,"Revue des Etudesjuives,
XCVII ( 93J4), I27.

176GheronNetta, Die Handelsbeziehungen
zwischenLeipzig und Ost- und Stidosteuropa
bis zum Verfallder Warenmessen
(Zurich:Gebr.Leemann& Co., 1920), pp. 141-47.
177 G. Zane, "Die 6sterreichischen
und deutschenWirtschaftsbeziehungen
zu den ruminischen
Firstentiimern
1774-1874,"
Weltwirtschaftliches
Archiv,XXVI (1927 II), Chronikund Archivalien,p. 46.

300
Traian Stoianovich
revolution
oftheeconomic
thepressures
Forcedtoyieldgroundbefore
in the overland
Greekmerchants
and theobstacleof civildisorder,
ofthepolitical
revolution.
Deep seedsof antitradewerealsovictims
in theSerbianwarsof
forexample,
wereimbedded
Greeksentiment,
and in the laterWallachianuprisingof Tudor
nationalliberation
Greekshad to compete
withthe
Afteri8i5, moreover,
Vladimirescu.
classesof Austriaand Hungary,as well as
new nationalmerchant
convinced
as withtheJews.Finally,theGreekWar of Independence
the Turksof the need to deprivethe Greeks,at leasttemporarily,
statusin the Empire.The forceof naof theirspeciallyprivileged
in Attica,
enabledtheGreeksto createa Greeknation-state
tionalism
andtheAegean;it enabledtheSerbsto carve
Morea(Peloponnesus),
outofthewoodsandwildsofSumadija.
nation-state
a semiautonomous
in central
Europe
alsohurtGreekbusiness
Buttheforceofnationalism
of therelatively
strongSerbianmerand causedthetransformation
and opclassof Hungaryintoa dominated
chantand professional
middleclass.
pressed
XI
The demandof the Balkanpeoplesforthegoodsof Europewas
smallerthanthedemandoftheWestforthegoodsoftheBalkans.A
was thatGreekand otherBalkanmercomplaint
Austrian
constant
"good"
ornomoney
atall andexported
in"bad"money
brought
chants
In view of the low BalkandemandforAustriangoods
money.178
to createa
government
untilafteri770 and thedesireoftheAustrian
alternatives
andimport
thefollowing
merchants,
classofnativeexport
wereopento Balkantradersin Austriaand Hungary:i) to invest
andinthetradeofVienna,
commerce
theirprofits
inlocalandregional
Trieste,Fiume,and Leipzig; 2) to use themto importgoods to
Alexandria,
and other
AustriafromHamburg,London,Marseilles,
ports;3) to remitthemto theirfamilies
EuropeanandMediterranean
in spiteofAustrian
restrictions;
4) to divertthemto philanthropy;"79
and bankers.
and 5) to becomemoneylenders
178 Popovic',0 Cincarima,
p. io5; Herzfeld,"Zur Orienthandelspolitik,"
AfdG,CVIII
252.
(I920),
179 On the philanthropy

of Greek, Serbian,and Macedonian merchants,see: M. Kostic,
et
"Srpsko trgovackonaselije,"Istoriskieasopis, V (1955), 183-84; Gervinus,Insurrection
p. 104; K. N. Kostic,"Gradja za istorijusrpsketrgovine,"Spomenik,LXVI, 2d
regeneration,
apodemoi,p. I4; FirminDidot,
cl., Book 52, pp. I64-65; Vakalopoulos,Oi dytikomakedones
Notes d'un voyage,pp. 139, 38I-82; G. Chassiotis,L'Instructionpublique chez les Grecs
par les Turcs jusqu'2 nos jours (Paris, I881), p. 53; Ljuben
depuisla prisede Constantinople
istorija[Domesticsourcesof Macedonianhistory],
Lape, ed., Domas'niizvoriza makedonskata
I. Nakazanie na G'urc'inKokale [Memoirsof G'urcin Kokale] (Skopje: Naucen Institutza
naMakedonskiot
Narod,1951), pp. 3-I8.
Nacionalna
Istorija


A verylargeportionof the merchantsof the Danube-Tisza-MuresSava-Kupazone of commercebegantheircommercialcareersas muleteers.The thriftier
and more enterprising
muleteersbecameforwarding agents,and the forwarding
agentswho made good began to importand exporton theirown account.Finally,mostforwarding
agents
and import-export
merchants
engaged,at leastoccasionally,
in moneylending,whilea fewofthemoneylenders
becamebankersofmorethan
justlocalrenown.
Belgradeand Zemun,where politicalfrontiers
and a multiplicity
of land and riverroutesjoined togetherand wheregoods had to be
transferred
fromone carrierto another,were important
etapesin the
processof capitalformation.
It is therethatmuleteers,
like the membersof the Solar merchantfamilyof the Macedoniancarryingvillage
of Katranitsa,becamewealthycommission
or forwarding
agents.Petar
Icko of Katranitsa,who knew Greek,Serbian,Turkish,and several
other European languages,also made his wealth in Belgrade and
Zemun.A commission
agentin Zemunin 1794, IRkobecameInspector
of Marketsfor the Governorof Belgradein i795 and later "Consul
of the Greekmerchants"of Belgrade.Upon the Governor'sassassination in i8oi, he fledacrossthe Sava to Zemun withhis brotherand
many other Belgrade merchants.Later he enteredthe diplomatic
serviceof Karadjordje.180
Forwardingagents and merchantswho made good in Belgrade,
Sarajevo,Zemun,Vidin, or the ferrytown of SlavonskiBrod on the
Sava sometimeswent on to Vienna. The numberof Ottomanmerchantsresident
in Viennagrewfrom50 to 6o in i760 to I34 in i768
and severaltimesthisnumberin I783, or morethanfiveand perhaps
even ten timesin a quarterof a century.In general,thesemerchants
werewealthierthantheircompatriots
in thetownsof Hungary.Their
total capital equaled an estimatedtwo million florinsin 1763; this
was approximately
equivalentto the total value of currentannual
Austrianimportsfrom Macedonia and Thessaly and to an eighth
of the totalcapitalof the "mostdistinguished"
nativeand naturalized
Austrianmerchantsof Vienna.'8"
180 Popovic,0 Cincarima,pp. 47 n., 107, I36, 449; K. N. Kostic',"Gradja za istorijusrpske
trgovine,"Spomenik,LXVI, 2d cl., Book 52, pp. I72-73,
177.
181Herzfeld, "Zur Orienthandelspolitik,"
AfG, CVIII (I920),
245, 293; Tomadakis,"Les
communauteshelleniques," Mitteilungend. dsterr. Staatsarchivs,ErgdnzungsbandIII.
Vol. II, 459, Kostic,Dositej Obradovic,p. 38 n. The comparisonof the capitalof
Festschrift,
Greek and native Austrianmerchantsin Vienna is from Herzfeld. Of the I34 Ottoman
merchants
presentin Vienna in 1766, I3 were "Turks" or Moslems,i8 were Jews,2I were
Armenians,and 82 (five of thesewere artisansratherthan merchants)were Greeks,Vlachs,

302
Traz'an Stoianovich
The history
of the Darvarfamilyof the Macedo-Vlach
carrying
theroleofZemunin capitalformation
villageofKleisouraillustrates
merchant
and ofViennain absorbing
capitalintobankingenterprise.
A member
oftheDarvarfamily,
forexample,
wentto Zemunaround
ofKatranitsa.
After
i750-at aboutthesametimeas theSolarfamily
in Zemun,thehouseof Darvarshifted
amassinga smallfortune
its
centerof businessin the I770's to Vienna.In i790, MarkoDarvar
openeda bankin Vienna,theestimated
capitalof whichexceededa
millionflorins
in i800.182
The Sinamerchant
ofMoschopolis
settled
in Sarajevoc. I750,
family
thenwenton to SlavonskiBrod,and finallyestablished
itselfin the
Austriancapital.Simon G. Sina (I753-i822), who was born in
Sarajevoand movedto Viennawithhis parents,
starteda banking
enterprise
of Europeanrenownin the Austriancapitaland became
theforemost
importer
ofcottonand woolfromtheOttomanEmpire
blockadeofNapoleonicFranceand Europe.Three
duringtheBritish
yearsbefore
hisdeath,he wasennobled.
His son,BaronGeorgeS. Sina,
inherited
theaffairs
ofthefamily
bankandobtained
ofa large
control
shareof thewool,cotton,and tobaccoimportand exporttradeof
Austria
andHungary."83
The probabledeclinein thetotalnumberof Greekmerchants
in
central
Europeafteri8oois thusalsotheresultofthegrowth
oflarge
business
andtheconcentration
ofcapitalin thehandsofhighfinance.
The newfinanciers
in Austriawereoftenof Balkanorigin,but,like
the Sina family,developedcosmopolitan
interests
and werepartly
denationalized,
first
bytheiradoptionofa newstyleoflife-thestyle
of a noblessede robe-and finallyby exogamous
marriage,
thatis,
outsideoftheethnicandreligious
marriage
community
oftheoriginal
family.
Greekbankersaroseinitially,
however,
notin Viennabutin Constantinople,
whereafteri700 the Phanariote
Greekschallenged
the
oftheJewsandArmenians.'84
banking
monopoly
In thefinaldecades
of the eighteenth
century,
Greekbankerswereactivein almostall
ofthelargertownsandportsofTurkey.
Ottoman
bankers-Greeks,
as
Macedo-Slavs,and Serbs.An additional134 Ottomanmerchantswho did businessin Vienna
wereabsentfromViennain 1766 but expectedto returnin the near future.Cf. H.H.S.A. St A.
TiirkeiV/27, "Conscriptionderen allhierin Wien sich befindendenTilrken und tiirkischen
Unterthanen,"
Feb. 7, 1776; Enepekides,Griechischc
Handelsgesellschaften,
pp. vi, 42.
182popovic, 0 Cincaima, pp. 124-25,
347.
183 Ibid.,pp. 149-56.
184 Stoianovich,
"L'Vconomiebalkanique,"
pp.199-200, 297.


well as Jewsand Armenians-exerted
theirinfluence
in I795 to obtain
thecollectionofinterest,
a firmanlegitimizing
an acthitherto
tolerated
in practicebutfrownedupon or denouncedbyIslamiclaw. The firman
orderedthe imprisonment
of all debtorswho refusedto fulfilltheir
obligationsto theircreditors,
the bankersand moneylenders
of the
capital and otherlarge Ottomancities.What is good for the state,
arguedthe firman,is legitimateand desirable.The Empireneeds the
servicesof moneylenders,
who supplyfundsto tax collectors,
public
farmers,and otherstateagents.If the moneylenders
do not receive
interest,
theycannotrendertheseservices.
Interest,
therefore,
is legitimate
and shouldbe paid, along withtheprincipal."8Influencedby secularorientedJews,Greeks,and Armenians,the Ottomanstatetook a step,
howevershort,towardssecularization.
By the time of Napoleon, Greeks were lending money even to
Moslemlandowners,in returnfora mortgageon theirproperties.
If,
as sometimeshappened,an indebtedlandlordfailed to repaya loan
plus the high rateof interest,
the creditordid not attemptto collect
the collateral;thiswould have attractedthe hostility
of the dominant
religion,forsecularism
had not seepedbeneaththesurface.Instead,he
obtainedmonopolyrightsto the landlord'sfuturesurplusesat prices
belowthecurrent
marketlevel.'86
To obtain loans for needed expenses,Wallachian and Moldavian
peasantswere oftenobligedto sell theircropsin anticipationof the
harvest.To satisfythisurgentdemand,Greek and Vlach merchants
fromMacedoniaand Epirusdevelopedthe habit,especiallyafterI750,
of goingwiththeirmoneybagsfromvillageto village,estimating
the
anticipatedcrop of each indigentRumanian peasant,settinga low
value upon it, and lendingmoneyto whoeverwould take it in exchangefor the rightto a particularfuturecrop.'87Greek merchants
were also moneylendersin Hungary, Transylvania,and CroatiaSlavonia.'88
Serbianmerchantslikewiseengagedin moneylending
but had less
money to dispose of than Greek and Macedo-Vlach traders.The
popularmoralcode,moreover,
hinderedtheSerbfromtakingpridein
185 Svoronos,
Le commercede Salonique,pp. 39I-92.
186A. N., Aff.Etr. B"' 415, copy of a memoirpresentedto the Duc de Richelieuby the
StudentVice-ConsulMareescheau(?), Nov. I3, I820, entitled"Reflexionssur la situation
politiqueet commercialde la Francedans les etatsdu GrandSeigneur."
187 Raicevich,Osservazioni,
pp. I27-28.
188Fournier,"Handel und Verkehrin Ungarn,"AfdG,LXIX, ersteHalfte (I887), p. 408;
Marczali,Hungary,pp. 73-74; Schwartner,
I, 364-68.
Statistik,

304
Trazan Stoianovich
A Serbwho becamea moneylender

activities.
was,in
moneylending
a "Greek,"a rogue,a foreigner.
theeyesof his peasantcompatriots,
theSlavsas kondrokephalai
The Greeks,
on theotherhand,regarded
or simpletons."89
blockheads
ofMacedo-Vlach
toa Serbian
historian
andethnographer
According
and nineof the eighteenth
origin,the Greeksand Macedo-Vlachs
In the
people"par excellence.
teenthcenturies
werea "philanthropic
was the
however,
theirphilanthropy
eyesof theirSlavicneighbors,
ofreligion."
and"arithmetical
conception
resultoftheirethnocentrism
The Greeksand
Theypaidfortheiractsofsinbyactsofphilanthropy.
Balkanlandswerea
Macedo-Vlachs
of Hungaryand thenon-Greek
topreserve
smallminority
strove
desperately
and,likeotherminorities,
Extroverted
inbusiness
theirnational
andcultural
bynecessity,
identity.
in sociallifebychoiceand rarelyinvitedSlavs
theywereintroverted
themtheirsocialand
to theirhomes,becausetheydid notconsider
In
intellectual
equals and becauseof theirfearof de-Hellenization.
of their
businesstheywereshrewdand sharp;in the management
ofbeingmisers.190
domestic
affairs,
theygaveeveryappearance
In certainvillagesof Croatiaand northern
Bosnia,theadventof
acGreeksand Vlachs,towardsthe end of the eighteenth
century,
Previous
theprocess
ofsocialdifferentiation.
to theirarrival,
celerated
thesevillagesweredividedby religionintotwo distinct
geographic
(Croat
(SerbOrthodox)anda "Latin-town"
areas,a "Christian-town"
RomanCatholic).The new Greekand Vlachimmigrants
createda
thirdvillage center,the "markettown" (varos or varosica).191This
occurredalso, and perhapson a largerscale,in certaintownsof the
Balkan interior,such as Monastir,whereVlach craftsmen
and meror Vlach-emporium.192
The emergence
chantsformeda Vlach-cvarsija,
of a village-varosica
did not resultin the deorientaliand Vlach-cvarsija
zation of the Balkan town and village,but it did promotephysical,
social,and psychicmobility.It did createcertainempathicconditions
community
into
favorableto thetransformation
of a tradition-oriented
a transitional
society.
Serbian merchantswere oftencriticalof theirGreek and Vlach
189For an excellentdiscussionof the factorsdividingand unitingthe Balkan peoples,see
L. S. Stavrianos,"Antecedentsto the Balkan Revolutionsof the NineteenthCentury,"
XXIX 0957), 335-48.
journalofModernHistory,
190Popovic,0 Cincarima,
pp. 65-8I, 270.
191 Mil. S. Filipovic,"O 'varosicama'u selima" [The "Towns" in the villages], Glasnik
Drultva,XXIX, No. I (Belgrade,I949), p. 37.
SrpskogGeogra/skog
192'Vakalopoulos,Oi dytikomnakedones
apodemoi,p. 26.


but Serbian and Rumanian peasants were
(Tsintsar) competitors,
openlyhostile,forGreeksand Greco-Vlachswere not only ethnically
different
but challengedthe veryphilosophyand economicbasis of
theirsocieties.The Greek revolutionof i82I was not translatedinto
a general Balkan insurrection
against Ottoman authorityprimarily
because Serbian,Wallachian, and other non-Greekmerchantsand
peasantsdistrusted,
envied,or hated both the Greek nouveauxriches
and thePhanariotepatriciate.193
The Greeks and Macedo-Vlachsof the Balkan overland trade
furnishedthe South Slavs and Moldo-Wallachswith the nucleus of
an urbanmiddleclass smartin the ways of businessof economically
underdevelopedareas. The Greek merchantsof the Mediterranean,
who were constantly
in contactwiththe underdeveloped
areas of the
easternMediterraneanand economicallywell-developedarea of the
West,developednew businesshabitsand a new businessoutlookas a
resultofthedual natureof theirbusinessrelations.
To a greaterdegree
thantheircounterparts
in Hungary,ifnotAustria,theyabandonedthe
principleof commerced'e'changein favorof the principleof trade
turnover,
or commercede circulation.By the end of the Napoleonic
in Marseilleswereaccustomedto
wars,forexample,Greekmerchants
buyingFrenchgoodson creditand quicklydisposingofthem.Withthe
moneytheygot for theirgoods theyboughtwheat and made loans
in the moneymarketsof the Levant,whereinterestrateswere three
timesas high as in the West. Aftersellingtheirgrains in Italy or
Marseilles,theyrepaidtheirdebts,obtainednew credits,and hastened
to repeatthe same seriesof operations."8
Betweenthe treatyof Passarowitzand the Congressof Vienna,the
Greekbusinessmanpassedthroughseveralstages:carter,commission
or forwarding
and finally
agent,independentmerchant,
moneylender,
193R. W. Seton-Watson,
A Historyof the RoumaniansfromRoman Times to the Completionof Unity(CambridgeUniversity
Press,I934), pp. I96-98; Vuk S. Karadzi6,Pisma [letters]
(Belgrade:Prosveta,I947), p. 73; Stavrianos,
Balkan Federation,pp. I3-I4, 26; Vuk Karadzi6,
"'Pravitelstvujuscijsoviet serbskij za vremena Kara-Djordjijeva ili otimanje ondagnjijeh
velikasa oko vlasti" [The "Serbian ExecutiveCouncil" in the time of Karadjordje], Vuk
Karadzic'(uz izboriz Vukovihistoriiskih
spisa) [SelectionsfromVuk's historical
writings],ed.
Ilija Kecmanovi6(Zagreb: Prosvjeta,I95I), pp. 75-78; K. N. Kosti6, "Gradja za istoriju
srpsketrgovine,"Spomenik,LXVI, 2d cl., Book 52, p. I78; Todor StefanovicVilovski,"Srpski
Beograd;postanaki razvitaksrpskevarosii kulturnei drustveneprilikeu njemu (1820-A850)"
[Serbian Belgrade; the making and developmentof the Serbian town and the culturaland
social conditionsprevalenttherein,I820-I850], Srpski Knjizevni Glasnik,XXVI, (Belgrade,
I9II),
305-8.
194A. N. Aff.Etr. B"'. 233, "Resumdde l'Inspectiongeneratedu Levant," by Felix de
de Salonique,pp. 360-6I.
Beaujour,i8i8; Svoronos,Le commerce

306
Trajan Stoianovich
banker and parfaitne'gociant.The parfaitnegociant acted on the
isnota handsome
profit
on
activity
principle
thattheobjectofbusiness
altogether.
The
object
might
frustrate
business
everytransaction;
this
of handsomeprofits
is the realization
of business,
on the contrary,
of extimeand timeagainbyneverallowinga lull in theprocesses
theoperations
of carrier,
mercombining
changeand by knowingly
or banker.The Greekbusinessman
generally
chant,and moneylender
themanufacturing
stagebecauseoftheabsencein theOttobypassed
market.
manEmpireofan adequateinternal
XII
tothefounding
contributed
GreekandSerbianmerchants
financially
of booksin theirrespective
national
of schoolsand dissemination
to the
Theywerealso receptive
languagesamongtheircompatriots.
attitudes
towards
the
idea
of
national
Their
ideasoftheEnlightenment.
One-and perhaps
thelargest
wereambivalent.
however,
independence,
thinkin termsof political
did not originally
-group of merchants
Anothergroupfavoredpoliticalindependence
onlyif
independence.
or entailedonlythe transfer
of
it did not entailsocialrevolution,
thatis,fromtheTurksand
wealthfromone smallgroupto another,
smallbutdialecA thirdgroup,numerically
Moslemsto themselves.
evenat the costof
desirednationalindependence
ticallyimportant,
socialrevolution.
of the Empireand the declineof the
The territorial
contraction
thewealthofMoslem
townsthreatened
purchasing
powerofOttoman
this
To
offset
their
landlords
administrators.
threat,
theyintensified
and
thepeasantry,
initially
allowingnativemertacticsof expropriating
in placingtheproperty
oftheexpropriated
chantstoactas middlemen
Towardtheendoftheeighteenth
market.
peasanton theinternational
theircupidity
gotthebestofthem.Paradingas the
century,
however,
foremost
certain
amongthemPasvanoglu
ofinflation,
chiefs,
opponents
ofthetownsofBulgariaand Bosnia
ofVidin,arousedtheinhabitants
which
policiesof the centralgovernment,'95
againsttheinflationary
to prosperamidthe
allowednew-ruraland semiurban-merchants
miseries
oftheartisanclass.
feudallords,
a coalitionof disgruntled
This seignorialreaction,
195
Olivier,Voyagedans l'Empireottoman,1,204.


urbanmerchants,
mastercraftsmen,
speciallyprivileged
opportunist
anda wildanddepressed
armedLumpenproletariat,
threatened
toplace
theMoravaroute,chiefartery
ofBalkancommerce,
in a squeezeplay
theJanissaries
between
ofBulgariaandtheJanissaries
andfeudallords
ofBosnia.Theirveryexistence
theembryonic
nowthreatened,
Serbian
ruralmiddleclass of battle-trained
half merchants
pig merchants,
andhalfwarriors,
calledupontheSerbian
toresist,
peasantry
promising
to lead and defendthem,withor withoutthe centralgovernment,
againstthefeudalreaction.
A fewmerchants
and well-to-do
owners
ofproperty
triedto niptherevoltin thebud;196 theTurks,however,
wereinsufficiently
and theSerbianpeasantwas
readyto compromise
to resisttheattempt
determined
to reducehimto serfdom.
Although
theywereamongthemostprominent
politicaland militaryleadersof theSerbianRevolution
of I804,"'1thepig and cattle
traders
plannedto avertsocialrevolution.
The wealthycattletrader
MladenMilovanovic,
forexample,agreedwithKaradjordjein i803
ontheimperative
needtoriseagainstthedahije,orJanissary
chieftains.
Although
possessing
propercredentials
fromtheGovernor
ofBelgrade
andfromvarious
agasorlandlords,
hadtopayillegaltolls
Milovanovic
five,six,or moretimesbeforehe couldreachtheAustrianfrontier
withhis pigsand cattle.This he couldnotsuffer,
and so he joined
Karadjordje.He did not,however,
desirethe elimination
of trade
barriers
and monopolies
as an end in itselfbut onlythe transfer
of
such monopolies
fromtheirpresentpossessors
to himselfand his
friends
and associates.
ManyBelgrademerchants,
indeed,laterfound
theoppression
ofthenewSerbiancondottieri
no lessonerous
thanthat
oftheJanissaries.'98
Of theeighteen
Greeksaccusedin Viennain the1790's ofmembershipin therevolutionary
club of RhigasVelestinlis
Pheraios,
which
wasplotting
thetransformation
oftheOttoman
Empireintoa pseudoBalkanrepublic,
Jacobin
no morethana thirdweremerchants.
In other
ofi percentofthetotalnumber
words,onlya fraction
ofGreekmerchantsin the Habsburgdominions
entertained
closelinkswiththe
revolutionary
conspiracy.'99
The insurrectionist
plansand dreamsof
Such,in anycase,is theviewof Vuk Karad'i6. Cf.Pisma,pp. i8i-82.
197K. N. Kostic',"Gradja za istorijusrpsketrgovine,"Spomenik,LXVI, 2d cl., Book 52
(1926), pp. i68-70.
198 Jankovic,
0 politickimstrankama,p. 35; Karadzic, "'Pravitelstvujuscij
sovietserbskij',"
ed. Kecmanovic,VukKaradiic, pp. 70-74.
199A. Dascalakis,RhigasVelestinlis;
la Revolutionfranpaise
et les preludesde l'indtpendance
hellenique,thesisforthe Doctorates lettres(Paris, I937), pp. I53-64.
196

308
Traian Stoianovich
authorities
bya Greek
theclub,moreover,
wererevealedto Austrian
Demetrius
Oeconomus
ofTrieste.2"'
merchant,
societyfoundedin
The PhilikeHetairia,a secretrevolutionary
andthecreation
thespreadofGreekculture
Odessain i814 topromote
empire,
conChristian
ofa Greeknationalstateor ofa neo-Byzantine
was profestained452 enrolledmembers
in i8i9. Its membership
6onotables,
as follows:153 merchants
andshippers,
sionally
distributed
or secretaries,
22 teachers
23 officials
36 fighting
men,24 clergymen,
io doctors,
exercising
miscellaneous
4 lawyers,
i6 persons
andstudents,
Ofthemembers
ofunidentified
profession.
professions,
and104 persons
areknown,44 percentweremerchants
or shippers
whoseprofessions
and41 percentweremembers
ofthebureaucracy
andintelligentsia.""
of thePhilikeHetairiaremainedsmalluntilits
The membership
conservative,
thatis, untilafteri8i9. Beforeits
leadership
became
out of severalhundreds
deradicalization
onlyone Greekmerchant
The Greekmerchant
ofthesociety.
who
wasa member
JohnPriggos,
complained
thattheTurkdid not
madehisfortune
in Amsterdam,
realizethat"thewealthofhissubjects
is thewealthofhiskingdom,"
statethatwould
GreekChristian
and yearnedforan independent
ofHydra
honortheprinciple
Buttheleadingmerchant
ofproperty.202
declinedto join the
and laterpoliticalleader,GeorgeKoundouriotes,
Philike Hetairiawithoutwrittenevidencethat the conservative
genius.203
Capodistrias
wasitsdirecting
thenaturallimits
To saymoreonthissubject
wouldbe togo beyond
matter
of thisstudy.If we haveapproached
at
all, it is to draw
the
and comparative
oftheentire
attention
totheneedforcritical
analysis
of treating
the
periodbetween1770 and i830 and to thedesirability
as partsof a greater
Serbianand Greekwarsof nationalliberation
and smoldering
revolts
which
whole,linksin thechainofrevolutions
and LatinAmericain thehalfcentury
firedEurope,Anglo-America,
or moreafteri775. The destinies
of theBalkanmiddleclasseswere
interlocked
withthefortunes
and misfortunes
of themiddleclasses
at no previous
oftheiremergence;
oftheWestfromtheverymoment
timeweretherelations
between
theBalkansandtheWestso intensive
andextensive,
andofthe
however,
as inthetimeoftheEnlightenment
FrenchRevolution.
Ibid.,pp. 132-33.
C W. Crawley,"JohnCapodistriasand the Greeksbefore 821i," CambridgeHistorical
journal,XIII (I957), 179.
202 Stavrianos,
TheBalkans
since1453, p. 145.
23 Crawley,"JohnCapodistrias,"
CambridgeHistoricaljournal,XIII (I957), 179.
200
201


the
We havetriedin thisstudyto examinethefollowing
problems:
factors
contributing
to theriseand expansion
of thetradeof Balkan
thenationaland regionalorigins
of
merchants,
and areasofoperation
thesemerchants,
and theevolution
frompeddlingand carting
to the
We haveevenconsidered,
although
bankingstageofbusiness
activity.
theroleofcompeting
farfromexhaustively,
nationalisms
intheshrinkafteri8oo
ingofthecontinental
tradeofGreekand Serbianmerchants
ori815, thefunction
as agents
ofBalkanmerchants,
especially
Greeks,
inthetransformation
ofthetradition-oriented
community
intoa transiandtheambivalence
ofBalkanmerchants
social
tionalsociety,
towards
andevennational
in spite(or because?)oftheiracceptance
revolution,
ofthevaluesoftheEnlightenment.
class
The mainfactors
inthegrowth
ofa BalkanOrthodox
merchant
werethefollowing:
i) thepartialadoptionof theprinciple
of freedom
of tradein certainmedieval
kingdoms,
suchas Serbiaand Bosnia,in thefourteenth
century,
and in theOttoman Empireitself,whichhopedto centerthe commerce
of the worldaround
in thesixteenth
Constantinople,
century;
2) theurbanrevival
and towndevelopment
ofthesixteenth
century;
3) thetransformation
of theBlackSea intoa mareclausum,openonlyto Ottoman ships,1592-I774;
4) therealizationof exportsurplusesthroughthe growthof a wool-producing
pastoraleconomyand throughthe expansionof serfdomand cultivationof
agricultural
exportcrops,especiallycottonand grains,i6oo-i8oo;
fromTurkeyto western
and centralEurope,i66o-i8oo;
5) Jewishemigration
in many
thesettlement
ofnon-Turks
6) urbandemographic
decline,necessitating
towns,i66o-i8oo;
7) the decline of Ottoman urban manufacturesand the abandonment of industrial protectionismat the very moment that westernand central European
stateswere encouragingthe developmentof industry;
8) the colonization of lands without a merchant or middle class: Hungary,
between i690 and i8oo, and South Russia, Crimea, and the Ukraine, between
I750 and i8I5;
perseverance,
9) thebusinesstechniquesof Balkan Orthodoxmerchants:frugality,
wile, acting as middlementhemselvesbut avoiding the servicesof othermiddlemen, runningtheir businessesas familyaffairs,and acceptingthe counsel and
arbitrationof a "consul" or judge of theirown nationalityand religion;
the developmentamong the Greeks of a secular moralityin union with
i0)
ratherthan separatefromor hostileto Orthodoxpietism;and
the reopeningof the Black Sea to non-Ottomanships afterI774.
ii)
Duringmostof the five-hundred

yearperiodof concernto us,
of OrthodoxfaithwereGreeks,a few
thechiefBalkanmerchants

Traian Stoianovich
3IO
and Serbs,the firstin theeasternprovincesof the Empire

Armenians,
and in Italy and westernEurope and the last in the Adriaticand
Hungariantrade.The tradeof Greek merchantswiththe West was
centuryand did not resumeon
at the end of the sixteenth
interrupted
the same scale until afterthe peace of Passarowitz,which brought
peace to the Balkans. The
almosta centuryof relativeinternational
trade of Greek merchantsin the Ottoman Empire itself,in the
and in the Black Sea area grew at an acDanubian principalities,
ratebetween1500 and i815. OrthodoxSerbianmerchants

celerated
but theirtradeassumed
were alreadyactivein the sixteenthcentury,
trade
afterthe declineof the continental
moreimportant
proportions
of Ragusa and the migrationof manywealthySerbsfromOld Serbia
and Macedoniato Hungaryand Vojvodina.In theperiodbetween17I8
and 1750, theSerbscaptureda largepartof theHungarianretailtrade
and partof the overlandforeigntradebetweenTurkeyand the Pannonian basin. Bulgarianmerchantsbegan to engage in international
tradeafteri750 but did not achieveprominenceuntilafterthe treaty
(i829).
ofAdrianople
Macedo-Vlachmerchantstradedwith Italy and engaged in intraand perhapsin

imperialcommercebeforethe end of the seventeenth
however,until
They did not achievedistinction,
century.
the sixteenth
thepeace of Passarowitz.Afteri740, manyof them,along withmany
in Ruse,Svistov,Vidin,Pancevo,Belgrade,
Greeks,becameforwarders
Zemun,SlavonskiBrod,Sisak,and Karlovac,all tradingtownssituated
betweenthe Habsburgand Ottoalong thenew Danube-Savafrontier
of routesof comman empires,all at significant
pointsof convergence
of empire,wheremerchantshad to stop to pay
merceand frontiers
theirgoods to othercarriers.Afteri750, Greek
customsand transfer
emigratedin largenumbersto Hungary
and Macedo-Vlachmerchants
offeredverystiffcompetition
to
and Austria,wheretheyimmediately
theSerbs.
All the Balkan Orthodox ethnic groups except the Serbs were
subjectedto Hellenizationafterthe Ottomanconquestof the Balkans,
althoughtheHellenizationprocessdid not attainintensiveproportions
and eighteenth
centuries,
whenGreekbecamethe
untiltheseventeenth
principalBalkan language of commerceand culture.By becoming
"Greek" one acquiredhighersocial status.Men of wealth thus took
pridein beingcalled"Greek,"and OrthodoxAlbanian,Vlach,MacedoSlav, and Bulgarianmerchantsof the eighteenthcenturynormally

ConqueringBalkan OrthodoxMerchant 3II

identified
themselves
as such.Class-conscious
Slavicpeasantsalso appliedtheterm"Greek"to mostmerchants,
if theyconparticularly
sideredthemrogues,
although
a portion
oftheBalkanmerchant
class
wasno doubtenlightened.
One ofthechiefnovelties
oftheHellenizing
eighteenth
century
was
theemergence
oftwopreviously
unimportant
merchant
groups:i) the
ofHydra,Spetsai,
merchants
several
othersmallAegeanislands,
Morea,
andthecoastofAlbania,and2) themerchants
ofMacedonia,
Thessaly,
and Epirus.The firstgroupwas made up of Albanians,
who were
dividedbyreligion
intotwosub-groups:
theMoslemAlbaniansailors
and shipowners
of Moreaand theAlbaniancoast,and theOrthodox
Albaniansailors,merchants,
and shipowners
of the smallerAegean
islands.The merchants
of Macedonia,Thessaly,and Epiruswere
predominantly
Vlachs,althoughGreeksand Macedo-Slavs
werealso
foundamongthem.But the male membersof well-to-do
Vlach,
Macedo-Slav,
and OrthodoxAlbanianfamilieswere completely
or
partlyHellenizedby i8oo. The French,Germans,
Hungarians,
and
Russiansto whomtheycarriedtheirgoods all identified
themas
"Greeks."
The Hellenizationof the uppersocial strataof the non-Greek
BalkanOrthodoxpeoplesmade possiblethe emergence
of a single,
relatively
united,inter-Balkan
merchant
class,whichwas of Greek,
Vlach,Macedo-Slav,
and Bulgarian
ethnicorigin,
butcalleditselfand
wasknowntoothers
as "Greek."The onlyimportant
groupofBalkan
merchants
Orthodox
whichpartlyor whollyrejected
identification
as
"Greeks"
wastheSerbs,
andeventheybegantoundergoHellenization
beforethetableswereturnedin i82i and theprocess
ofde-Hellenizationbegan.
On thebasisofgeographic
originandareaofoperation,
both"Greek"
and Serbiantraders
fellintotwogroups.One groupofmerchants
was
ofmaritime
andnear-maritime
originand specialized
in themaritime
trade.The otherwasofcontinental
originand specialized
in theoverlandtrade.Butbothgroupsbegantheircareers
as carriers,
and certain
members
ofbothgroupswereinitially
piratesor brigands,
or theassociatesof suchadventurers.
EventhePhanariote
Greeks,who were
transformed
intoa kindof"noblesse
de robe,"wereoriginally
peddlers,
althougha few were able to tracetheiroriginsto the Byzantine
aristocracy.
Manymerchant
familieswereoriginally
poor,but poor
or well-to-do,
thepossessors
ofspecialprivileges
theywere"free,"
and

312
Trajan Stoianovich
ofrights
totheprotection
oftheRussian,
orHabsburg
Ottoman,
states,
or ofother,
notnecessarily
politically
sovereign,
protection-producing
enterprises.
Balkanmerchants
thefollowing
passedthrough
stagesofprofessional
orsailors,
orpiracy
affiliation:
i) muleteers,
peddlers,
withbrigandage
as a sideline;2) commission
withmoneylending
agentsorforwarders,
as a sideline;3) independent
and
merchants;
withpolitics
4) bankers,
political
administration
as a sideline;and5) statesmen,
withbusiness
as a sideline.At theendoftheseventeenth
almostall Balkan
century,
Orthodox
merchants
fellintothefirst
at theendofthe
twocategories;
thereweremanyin thethirdand fourthand evenfifth
eighteenth,
categories.
The functions
of Greekmerchants
in Mediterranean
and world
tradecontinued
to growafteri8oo,but theroleof Greeks,Vlachs,
and Serbsin thecontinental
traderemainedmoreor less stableor
declined.
This declineis attributable
to thespreadof brigandage,
the
adventoftheIndustrial
Revolution
in western
andcentral
Europe,the
of theBalkantradein thehandsof fewerand more
concentration
Balkanmerchants,
powerful
andtherivalry
ofnewnationally
conscious
Greektradestagnated
bourgeoisies.
or shrankonlyon thecontinental
front,
whileitrecovered
intheOttoman
Empireitself
after
a temporary
eclipseduringtheWar ofGreekIndependence
in the
and prospered
Mediterranean.
Serbian
ontheotherhand,declined
trade,
on all fronts.
AftertheSerbianwarsofnationalliberation,
theTurksidentified
the
nameof"Serb"withtheactofrebellion
and ceasedto favorSerbian
commerce.
At thesametime,Austria
and Hungaryprotected
Magyar,
German,and Jewish
theGermanization
and
merchants,
encouraged
oftheSerbian
middleclass,and,failing
Magyarization
in this,deprived
manySerbsof openingsin commerce,
publicadministration,
and
theliberalprofessions.
Disgruntled
by the personaland politicalinsecurity
in Turkey,
Greekand Serbianmerchants
closedrankstemporarily
with the
andfurnished
peasantry
theleadership
oftheSerbian(i804-i815) and
Greek(i82i-i829) warsofnationalliberation.
Byand large,however,
bothGreekand Serbianmerchants
favored
onlylimitedsocialrevolution.Theydesiredto transfer
fromtheTurksand Moslems
property
to themselves
and,afterthat,toestablish
existing
property
on a secure
basis,thatis, to prevent
the loss and acquisition
of property
except
in accordance
withlawsdetermined
in theinterest
oftheirownclass.
The merchant
classwas sociallyrevolutionary
in one otherrespect:
it

ConqueringBalkan OrthodoxMerchant 3I3

produceda desireamongmanypeasantsto imitatecertainaspectsof
class.
thestyleoflifeofthemerchant
The high pointof interaction
and interpenetration
betweenthe
thevehicleofnativeBalkanmerchants
BalkansandtheWestthrough
occurred
betweenI7I8 and i8i5, and especially
afteri740. Afteri8i5,
and otherrepresentatives
thenativemerchants
yieldedto writers
of
the"intelligentsia"
and bureaucracy
as theprimary
bearersof ideas
as carriers
of materialgoods.Still
and evendeclinedin importance
undoneandcomparatively
unknown
is thefascinating
largely
story
of
ofideas.
as collector
theBalkanmerchant
anddisseminator
TRATANSTOIANOVIcH, Rutgers
University


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The Conquering Balkan Orthodox Merchant

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ConqueringBalkan OrthodoxMerchant 235

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2 BogumilHrabak, "Uticaj primorskih

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Conquering Balkan OrthodoxMerchant 237

I, pp. 73-82, I78-80, i88.

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1h0On"Turkish" merchantsin Lyons, see JacquesPannier,"Calvin et les Turcs," Revue

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ConqueringBalkan OrthodoxMerchant 239

havingalmostdoubledin a periodof two decades.Cf. Franz

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ConqueringBalkan OrthodoxMerchant 241

trans.fromthe2d enlargeded. byJosephMcCabe (London: T. Fisher

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22Walter Hahn, Die Verpflegung

G(uillaume) A(ntoine) Oliver, Voyagedans l'Empire

pendantles six premieres

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Conquering Balkan OrthodoxMerchant 243

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The growthof Balkantownspromoted

The centerof worldcommerce

29 N. Iorga,"Histoiredes Juifsen Roumanie,"Bulletin,Acad. Roumaine,II, No. i (Jan. i,

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ConqueringBalkan OrthodoxMerchant 245

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withouta Jewin I520, contained52 Jewishfamiliesin I546, 300 Jews

in I578, and 2,000 Jewsin i664. Monastir counted 34 Jewishfamiliesc.

Probablylevelingoffin Constantinoplebeforei600,36the Jewish

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ConqueringBalkan OrthodoxMerchant 247

in i68o to less thanone-tenth

38 HubertPernot,ed., Voyageen Turquie et en Grecedu R. P. Robertde Dreux, aumonier

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ConqueringBalkan OrthodoxMerchant 249

Belgrademore than 50,000. The inhabitantsof these towns-Turks,

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the plaguespreadeasilythroughthe largetownsand

The practiceof polygamy

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ConqueringBalkan OrthodoxMerchant 25I

elementfellperhapsfrom50 to 20 per centof thetotal,whilethe

I8o8 (Paris, I822), pp. 33, 4I.

51 Referencesare given in note 38. For a somewhatdifferent

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to the adventof Albanian or Bosnian

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ConqueringBalkan OrthodoxMerchant 253

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ConqueringBalkan OrthodoxMerchant 257

For twentyyearsAmbelakiawas "leftalone,"69 and it prospered

(London, i833), p. 53.

66Edward Daniel Clarke,Travelsin VariousCountriesof Europe,Asia and Africa(London,