17世紀後半のレヴァント交易の中の商人、市場と利潤 : トーマス・パーマーを中心として
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概要
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The purpose of the paper is to clarify the state of the Levant trade in the later seventeenth century through the correspondence and related evidences belonging to a Levant merchant, Thomas Palmer. Palmer was at Constantinople between 1673 and 1681 as the head of a ragione (association of factors) responsible for the sales of the woollen cloth and the purchase of return goods to London. After 1681, Palmer left a copybook of correspondence dispatched to Levant in which the difficulties the Levant Company faced were vividly described. Although the Levant merchants were wealthy as individuals, the fate of the Company was different. The Company had to cope with the mounting competition from the East India Company as far as the import of silk was concerned. Often, it is only by these struggles against the latter on the political scene that the decline of the former has been explained. The present paper aims to shed another light on the competition between the two trading organizations ; namely, the quality of silk imported. There is striking evidence that the massive import of silk from India had influences on the behaviour of the Levant merchants represented by Palmer. Woollen cloth was sent to Levant only as a means of buying rerurn cargo ; silk. The export of cloth dwindled when there was an ample supply of silk from India. In order to send the proccedings of the sales of cloth, Palmer devised cambio, a sort of documentary bill contracted with French/Dutch merchants in Levant. In other words, cambio was symbolic of the contracting purchase of silk in the area, due to the losing battle against Indian silk in London market. The Levant Company was often accused of being a monopoly. But it is clear from the paper that the organization suffered from severe competition from the East India Company, thus decreasing profitability. The only means through which a Levant merchant could profit was to increase the absolute amount of capital invested in the trade, and receive accruing interest. It was not the form of organization but the market that determined the fate of the two Companies.
- 麗澤大学の論文