The Hansa Towns

The Hansa Towns is by Helen Zimmern. The writer says that in order fully to understand the importance and bearing of the League the story must begin earlier than its history proper would seem to warrant. The text says the Hanseatic alliance, in fostering its own interests, in aggrandizing and enriching itself, was working also for all humanity, since it created and enlarged the idea of public right. The text asks whether we can grasp a state of things when wrecking was considered a legitimate occupation, and when barons who deemed themselves noblemen lay in wait within their strong castles to pounce on luckless traders, and either deprived them wholly of their wares or levied black mail under the name of toll.

The text says conflicts of interest arose from the inequalities in the position of different members of the League, for instance because the interest of the maritime towns was not always that of the inland ones. The text says that to this day, though despoiled and shorn of their honour, the cities call themselves proudly the Hanseatic towns.