Trading post
A factory ( French factorerie or factorie , English factory , Spanish factoría , Portuguese feitoria , Italian fattoria , Dutch factorij ) was the trading post of merchants in other European countries or overseas in the colonial era .
Duties of the factorists
Your manager, called factor or factorist , was the on-site representative of his principal (owner) or the respective trading company, the contact person in all matters, passed reports and information on to the head office and was responsible for goods logistics (proper storage and / or further transport). Since information from the parent company did not arrive until days or weeks later, this was an absolute trust in medieval trading houses like those of the Fuggers and Welsers .
Importance of the factories and their distribution
Traders were founded in Asia, Africa and America in particular and ensured the exchange of goods between European trading companies and the local population. For this purpose, they usually had large stores for goods to be imported and exported. The Hanseatic League had similar branches in the East and North Sea countries as early as the 13th and 15th centuries ; the term trading post did not come into use until the 16th century. The Hanseatic League had trading shops in England ( Boston , King's Lynn ), Norway ( Tønsberg ) and Finland ( Åbo ).
In the 19th century, factories came only in Africa, in the southern part of Asia, in the East Indies, in Canton (China, until 1842), in Nagasaki (Japan, from 1609 to 1858 by the Dutch factory) and in North America (for example the factories of Hudsonbaigesellschaft ago with military equipment and forts). Colonies arose several times from such factories, established by powerful trading companies, which gradually expanded over larger areas.
In the area of mining there were also mining factories .
literature
Primary literature
- Trading offices . In: Brockhaus Konversations-Lexikon 1894-1896, Volume 6, p. 533.
- Trading offices . In: Meyers Konversations-Lexikon . 4th edition. Volume 6, Verlag des Bibliographisches Institut, Leipzig / Vienna 1885–1892, p. 3.
- Meyers Konversationslexikon . 5th edition. 1894
- B. Somerlad: The Fugger's trading post in Leipzig . In: Writings of the Association for the History of Leipzig , Volume 22. 1938
- Max Spindler , Andreas Kraus : Handbook of Bavarian History, Edition 3. History of Swabia. ISBN 3-406-39452-3 , accessed on May 10, 2009.
- Katharina von Ciriacy-Wantrup: Family and inheritance law structures of companies of the Renaissance . ISBN 3-8258-0357-0 , p. 122. accessed on May 10, 2009
Secondary literature
- Götz Pölnitz: Jakob Fugger. ISBN 3-16-814572-6
- Johannes Burkhardt , Christine Werkstetter, Thomas Nieding: Augsburg trading houses in the course of historical judgment. ISBN 3-05-002653-7 .
- Hermann Kellenbenz , Rolf Walter, Archivo de Protocolos de Sevilla, Archivo Histórico Provincial de Cádiz: Upper German merchants in Seville and Cádiz (1525–1560). ISBN 3-515-07740-5 .
- Journal of General Geography, Volume Tenth . Berlin 1861, p. 397 , accessed on May 10, 2009
