Cliff shipping
The clip navigation on the southern Baltic coast is an early form of coastal shipping in the rural areas. Klipphafen was the name given to a provisional landing site in the shoreline of the Baltic Sea, to which the producers of the surrounding area, past the regular port locations, either delivered their goods for shipping to the buyer or customer either directly or even further with their own boats and ships across the sea other places. This meant that further middlemen were excluded, which was advantageous in terms of time and price for both parties.
In the Middle Ages , this type of trade seems to have been practiced particularly in the Mecklenburg and Pomeranian coastal areas. The Hanseatic seaside towns were quite angry with this custom, which disregarded their stacking rights and reduced their profits. The merchants probably coined derogatory terms such as clipper port , peasant shipping or shipbuilders .
At the beginning of the 15th century, the clipping ports became a particular nuisance for the Hanseatic League , when more and more Dutch ships came to the Baltic Sea area to trade in this type of ship. The Netherlands , at that time often threatened by famine, urgently had to import grain and other agricultural products cheaply and in large quantities, and so it was no small trade that was carried out without the participation of the Hanseatic League. It has countered it with many edicts, but has hardly achieved anything.
It was almost impossible to use force against the clipper ports, as they were mostly only operated temporarily and had hardly any constructive facilities that could have been destroyed. Only occasionally did the Hanseatic League intervene in nature in order to at least make free trade from the shore more difficult. In 1395, for example, the Permin , an arm of the water that connected the Saaler Bodden with the Baltic Sea, was closed with sunk barges. In the long run, the undertaking did not seem to have been crowned with greater success: as recently as the 17th and 18th centuries, several Hanseatic cities filed repeated complaints with the Swedish crown against peasant shipping in the region of the Fischland-Darß-Zingst peninsula .
This trade from the shore, which probably flourished in all Baltic Sea countries from 1400 to 1800, formed a real livelihood for the coasts. This was also seen by sovereigns like a Danish king who responded to complaints from urban merchants in this way. And the Mecklenburg rulers not only tolerated the cliff ports and farming trade, but also promoted them themselves, of course also for reasons of power politics, in order to counter the mighty Hanseatic League. This trade brought losses to the local merchants in the affected countries, which on the whole will certainly have been limited. Maritime trade was later legitimized in the coastal villages.
literature
- Walther Vogel : History of German shipping: First volume: From primeval times to the end of the XV. Century , Salzwasser Verlag, Paderborn 2013 (reprint from 1915)
- Jörg Scheffelke (ed.): 125 years of the Ostseebad Zingst , Sutton Verlag, Erfurt 2006
- Helga Schultz : Social and political debates in Rostock in the 18th century , Böhlau Verlag, Erfurt 1974
- Karl Pagel: The Hanseatic League , Georg Westermann Verlag, Braunschweig 1965
- Rudolph, Wolfgang: Maritime culture of the southern Baltic coast . Ship pictures and prestige ceramics of the driving people. Rostock 1983, p. 130 .
Web links
- Culturegraph Bibliography for Klipphafen
Remarks
- ↑ This process was well organized: the Dutch merchants did not limit themselves to the coastal areas, but penetrated far into the hinterland, where they established contacts with farmers, landowners and village communities and did their business. In the course of the 16th century, English traders are said to have joined them.
- ↑ Vorpommern was Swedish from 1648 to 1815.