The Hanseatic League: the past

The Hanseatic League was an organisation of North German merchants involved in foreign trade from around 70 cities and 100 to 130 towns. These towns and cities were located in an area which is covered today by seven European countries: from Zuidersee in Holland to the West to Estonia on the Baltic to the East, from Visby in Sweden to the North down to a line connecting Cologne, Erfurt, Wroclaw and Krakow in the South. With this region as their basis, the Hanseatic merchants developed an economic sphere of influence which in the 16^th century extended from Portugal to Russia and from Scandinavia to Italy, an area which covers 20 European countries today. In its heyday, the Hanseatic League was so powerful that imposed trading blockades against kingdoms and principalities in order to protect its financial interests, and even went to war in exceptional cases.

From the 13th to the mid 15th century, the Hanseatic League essentially dominated foreign trade in Northern Europe, but never managed to achieve a monopoly. The Hanseatic merchants provided West and Central Europe with luxury goods, food and raw materials from North and East Europe, including for example fur, wax, grain and fish together with flax, hemp, wood and derived wood products such as pitch, tar and potash. In return, the Hanseatic merchants brought back to these countries the manufactured products from the West and South such as cloth and metal goods, particularly arms, and spices.

The foreign trade merchants pursued business objectives. But since the second half of the 14th century, the Hanseatic Cities tried to create a firmer alliance organisation for mutual support against sovereignty claims from the nobility. They also hoped to use the firmer alliance to encounter problems resulting from growing competition from English, Italian and South German merchants and Dutch freighters and from the emerging state structures in the trade destination countries. And so it was external pressure which brought the cities of the German Hanseatic League closer together.

However, developments could not be stopped and resulted in a decline in the influence of the Hanseatic League, even if it still saw huge growth in the 16^th and 17^th centuries. But eventually the emergency of national and territorial economies left no more space for a multi-regional community such as the Hanseatic Cities and their merchants. The last formal convention of the historical Hanseatic League met in 1669 in Lübeck.

The Hanseatic League: the present

THE HANSE (Link: http://www.hanse.org/) is an active network between cities which in historical terms belonged to the league of merchant cities, i.e. the historical Hanseatic League, or entertained lively trade with these cities. This network of cities was founded in Zwolle in Holland in 1980, since when it has been the world's largest voluntary community of cities. At the moment The Hanseatic League has 163 cities as members (link: http://www.hanse.org/hanse_staedte.php?lg=de) in 15 different countries.

THE HANSE has given itself the task of taking the Hanseatic cross-border idea and its historical experience to revive the ideas and spirit of the European city/town, to promote self-awareness of the Hanseatic cities and to develop cooperation between these cities/towns. The aim of THE HANSE league of cities is to make a contribution to the economic, cultural, social and governmental unification of Europe, and in this context to enhance the self-awareness of the cities and towns so that they can perform their tasks as a place of living democracy. In order to achieve this ambitious aim, for the first time in the history of the Hanseatic League, in 2000 THE HANSE gave itself statutes to stipulate the cornerstones for its activities.

The following activities in particular are to help set up and fulfil the objectives and tasks:

Public relations work underlining the common aspects of the Hanseatic cities

Exchange of culture and traditions

Know-how, social and information transfer

Enhanced economic and trade contacts

Involvement of the youth (Youth Hansa) in the development of THE HANSE

The Westphalian Hanseatic League:

Strength through commonality

Hamburg, Bremen and Lübeck are three large Hanseatic cities which are well known as such today. And yet it was primarily merchants from Westphalia who settled in Lübeck on their trading journeys to the Baltic, using it as their base for developing contacts in Riga, Nowgorod and beyond in the Russian trading area.

Towards the end of the 20th century, former Hanseatic cities in Hesse, Lower Saxony and Westphalia have revived the old league.

The founding charter of the Westphalian Hanseatic League was signed in 1983 and stipulated the old imperial and Hanseatic town of Herford as Hanseatic headquarters; by 2005, this league counted 43 members, with more to follow.

The member cities of this old and new HANSE want to prove that the old Hanseatic thought can once again contribute to enhancing the appeal of a city and exert the attraction expected of a Hanseatic city.

More information at: http://www.hansebund.org/