Questions tagged [trade]
Trade deals with transactions for goods and services. Trade has historically been one of the chief ways in which individuals have interacted with each other. Trade is one of the main ways that countries interact with each other, as well as individuals interact with each other.
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Did Comecon [even] fail to standardize container sizes?
This is from a 1983 NYT article:
Other obstacles to the bloc's growth include a wider railway gauge in the Soviet Union than that in most other countries of Eastern Europe, the absence of modern ...
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How did Egypt turn from "Breadbasket of the Mediterranean" to second-biggest importer of grain?
Egypt is currently undergoing a severe economic crisis. One key reason is that it is importing much of the grain needed to feed its population (and livestock), and this has become expensive/difficult ...
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How was coffee brewed in Philadelphia (or surrounding area) in 1904?
I am writing a story about a physician in Philadelphia in 1904. I read that Hills Bros. packaged the first 'vacuum packed tins' of coffee. I just don't know if there was enough distribution that he ...
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Has the USA ever sanctioned Israel? [closed]
The USA has always been a strong supporter of Israel. In comparison, USA has repeatedly sanctioned Iran. When searching if USA has ever sanctioned Israel, didn't find anything.
Has USA ever sanction ...
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Who on ship was responsible for purchases during the Age of Sail?
Who on a trade ship was ultimately responsible for purchasing cargo in foreign ports, and was this a recognized position or more of an ad hoc thing? I assume the ship's owners were the ones who ...
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Why did Lübeck not have colonies like other strong city-states?
Why did Lübeck not have colonies, far away trading-posts or even more land like other strong city-states? They had a big fleet and a big army as well.
For example the city-state of Venice was rich on ...
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Were there any well-established land trade routes in the US colonies around 1700? What did they look like?
I'm considering running a ttrpg campaign set in the US colonies in the early 1700s. The campaign is going to begin around the Salem witch trials and go from there. The players will need to travel ...
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When was the most amount of commercial trade carried by sail powered ships?
What was the apogee of sailed based trade? Which civilisation, in which period, had the largest volume of maritime trade under sail?
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Why did the Ottoman Empire gave exclusive trading rights to Venice? [closed]
Why did Ottoman Empire decided to give Venetian merchants exclusive trading rights, which allowed them to monopolize spice trade? Wouldn't it be more profitable for Ottomans to allow free trade so ...
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Why do biscuits depict ships?
I have noticed that several brands of biscuits have ships on them and have wondered why that is.
A friend suggested that this is for historical reasons but I couldn't find any evidence of that.
Where ...
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Is there validity to the claim of a scavenger hunting barter economy in the history of money?
I've read in economics textbooks, and seen in videos like this, saying that before money, there was a barter economy was based on a coincidence of wants, and people would have to go on basically a ...
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Was there regular contact by the general population between the Spanish Netherlands and the Dutch Republic during the second half of the 17th Century?
Was there commercial or social interactions between the general populations of the Dutch Republic and the Spanish Netherlands after the Eighty Years War?
Would a person living in Aardenburg, ...
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In a medieval city how large a market was needed relative to population? [closed]
In a large medieval city fed by the agricultural product of the area, plus imports such as grains, spices, fish, etc. and also serving as a regional hub for the exchange of trade goods, what ...
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What prevented empires with territory in North Africa from expanding south of the Sahara? And vice versa [closed]
Almost all empires I've seen that existed north of Sahara, did not expand to the south. And the empires south of the Sahara did not expand to the north (except for post 15th century European ...
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What factors accounted for the pattern of caranvanserai across Eurasia? [closed]
This is a question we had in an AP World History test last week:
I was able to answer (c) correctly (improvements in sea navigation and technology caused more and more people to transition from land-...
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How were taxes collected for traveling merchants in the middle ages?
I've done research on taxation in the middle ages. I found this answer particularly helpful. (What was the average percentage of taxes in Europe during the Middle Ages?). It mentions that merchants ...
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What would have been the price of a loaf of bread in 1645 Amsterdam?
I want to know how much a loaf of bread would cost in Amsterdam in the year 1645.
Preferably I'd like the pricing of a bakery near the harbor but a comparison of the bread prices between the harbor ...
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What is the oldest "commercial logo" known? [closed]
I'm writing a paper on logos, iconography and different forms of identifications for trade activities. The paper starts with history of logos, which is pretty easy and known. However, I'm wondering: ...
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Was merchant Hugh McCulloch the first Scotsman to set foot in California?
In June 1822 the Scottish merchant Hugh McCulloch landed at San Diego from the brig John Begg. He was the founding partner of the business McCulloch Hartnell & Co which for three years from 1 ...
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Why didn't Indonesians/Indian Ocean traders bring marsupials to Asia and placental mammals to Australia/New Guinea?
When Alfred Russel Wallace went to Indonesia and studied biology, he noticed that marsupials lived in the Eastern Islands (Australia, New Guinea, Sulawesi, Makulu Islands, North Makulu Islands, The ...
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How did the Hansa organize river trade in the 14th and 15th centuries?
How did the Hansa accommodate the transition from sea to river trade along a trade route? Would river travel have been controlled by one group of people, e.g., Guild of the River Oder Merchants? Would ...
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How did (riverine) toll castles operate?
Toll Castle
A toll castle (WP) was a castle built either on a river, lake, or road intended to guard that trade route:
Such castles were usually placed at strategic locations, such as border ...
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Was there a trade link between the medieval Hungarian Kingdom and the Mali Empire?
This is very much a cold question as I have found no writings on any link. However, I do know that there was West African and European trade links long before colonialism and quite a bit of Mali gold ...
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Why were so many of the earliest banks founded by cloth merchants?
I recently noticed that a lot of early banks, including Metzler and Berenberg, were founded by cloth merchants. Any idea why this particular line of trade was most conducive to setting up investment ...
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How would you address a merchant in the High Middle Ages?
If you were to address a powerful and affluent noble with a wide monopoly over trade in the 11th-13th centuries, what would you call them? (Assuming you are of lesser rank to them) Would it be Sir, ...
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Had there been instances of national states banning harmful imports before the mid-19th C Opium Wars?
Background
To my current understanding, James Matheson in his »The British trade with China« argued that China might have originally had the right to refuse trading with Britain, but that they lost ...
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Which EU countries insisted on unanimous voting for trade deals?
Question prompted by this tweet by Jo Maugham in reaction to a HuffPost article:
Humiliating, really, but if we leave the EU we'll have to brown-nose every single one of the Member States: ...
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What effect did the Bronze Age collapse have on India?
There was direct trade between Mesopotamia and India from the 3rd millennium BCE, and indirect trade as far back as the 9th millennium BCE.
I'm wondering what effect the Bronze Age collapse (c. 1200 ...
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By when was the Manila galleon well known?
Spain managed to start up the Manila galleon system in the 1560s, linking the Philippines with Mexico. The Spanish crown used its control of non-free labor in New Spain to extract precious metals. On ...
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Approximately how much travel time was saved by the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869?
Understanding that there were a few variables involved, approximately how much travel time was saved by no longer having to travel around Africa after the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869?
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Was there trade among African empires?
I've been searching, without success so far on mainstream history media (mainly references given by teachers, references on Wikipedia and stuff like this) and have not found any evidences (or proofs ...
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What sort of signage did ballrooms require?
Manufactured goods in early California had to be imported. In 1842 the prominent merchant Thomas Larkin wrote to John Paty in Hawaii: "Sir, I wish you would purchase in Oahu for me the following ...
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What title did the merchants permitted to deal with Canton's 13 Factories carry?
What I know:
During the period leading up to the Opium Wars, trade into China from Europe was locked down to 13 buildings in Canton known as the 13 factories. European merchants were only permitted to ...
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Where did the Roman money involved in the spice and luxury trade end up?
In the book "The Roman Empire and the Indian Ocean" by McLaughlin, which is a very interesting read, he states that annual bullion going to buy luxuries in India was around 50-100 million sesterces ...
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Did the Axis engage in trade with other countries during the war?
In Europe, Germany had occupied several countries while actively being at war with the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union and the United States while Japan had been expanding through most the ...
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How many British people died due to war/trading activity in the East India Company (EIC)
Are there estimates that give an approximation of the total number of casualities per year or at least per decade (e.g. in the way Wrigley and Schofield report outmigration numbers in their Population ...
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Ports with ships in the commercial Halifax trade, late 18th Century
Halifax, Nova Scotia, was founded by the British in 1749; I am interested in the commercial trade during the French Revolutionary Wars, 1792 thru 1798, which is the period of the First Coalition.
The ...
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Range of sailors' ages on a typical Pacific trading ship in 1810
This question is about crew ages on trading voyages in the North Pacific around 1810. The number of crew members on these voyages was often in the low dozens. Funding could come at least in part from ...
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What were the native North American concepts of property rights and market exchange?
I just saw a documentary about the colonial time in North America and how the Lenape people sold the Delaware valley to Europeans. In this program a current Lenape "chieftain" claimed that ...
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What are the three major differences between the first and second silk road? [closed]
Apparently, there were 3 periods when the Silk Road was very popular and I am having trouble finding out when they were.
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The origin of symbols used for transferring information over large distances [closed]
The information about the origin of writing systems is a bit difficult to piece together, to find when the first accounts of "writing used to transfer information over large distances". For example, ...
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What's the rationale for shipping coins back to Spain from its colonies?
Since the days of Pirates! the thought of capturing the Spanish treasure fleet on its way back somewhere in the Spanish Main was a primary target because of all the gold and silver it transported to ...
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What was the tonnage carried in the Triangle Trade?
I'm interested in metrics regarding trans-atlantic trade in the era of the sail.
The specific timespan doesn't matter.
The specific cargo also doesn't matter.
I've searched but not found any ...
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Why did the Chinese not use military power to force out early Portuguese, Dutch and English trade encroachments?
From what I understand, during the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries, the Chinese were more advanced in trade and warfare than the Portuguese and Dutch who tried to (and eventually succeeded in) take over ...
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How extensive and developed was the ancient Kushite (Nubian) horse trade?
In 1997 there was a fascinating paper published called The Horses of Kush by Lisa A. Heidorn in the Journal of Near Eastern Studies which summarized some finds about the popularity of horses from Kush ...
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Did Greek traders visit the Philippines in the 1st century AD?
According to the article Cebu, a Port City in Prehistoric and in Present Times,
The Visayan Islands had earlier encounter [sic] with the Greek traders in 21
A.D.
This is repeated in the ...
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Was Rome exporting its trash to Egypt as an early example of recycling?
During the time that Egypt was a Roman province, it shipped large quantities of grain to Rome until 330 AD. The article Trade Routes and Commercial Products of Roman Pompeii says:
Egypt was ...
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Six bulls for ship's provisions
The Ortega family at Rancho Refugio did a brisk business in clandestine trade with visiting ships.
According to Katherine Plummer, in March of 1815, the Forester stopped there and loaded firewood, ...
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How far would the average Silk Road caravan travel during the early reign of Justinian?
So what I am asking is not the total travel distance that the Caravan would travel in a lifetime; instead I am asking how far they would tend to go one-way on a two-way trip and how long that trek ...
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What did parchment and papyrus cost in the Roman Empire?
How much do we know of the costs of parchment and papyrus in Roman Empire? I'm especially interested in their cost ratio. So far I found some accounts for the other ends of the antiquity: in 301 a ...
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