Marseille

Marseille has rich archives and yet, paradoxically, they have inspired only a small number of studies of its commercial activities and its outreach in the Middle Ages and early modern period. ¹ A first synthesis dealt with these themes in the late 1940s, but it was based on old and fragmentary source publications, a biased body of judiciary sources, and focused on case studies. Moreover, it interpreted economic evolution as having had a close relationship with political events. ² The works available in those days dealt with commercial techniques. ³ Since then, remarkable new interpretations have been proposed of Marseille’s commercial structure since the thirteenth century, especially with regard to its position in the Levant, ⁴ and comparative studies have been started with the great ports of the western Mediterranean, especially with Genoa and Pisa. ⁵ New insights have been gained on the social groups involved in the exchanges, and on navigation techniques. ⁶ The main bulk of source material, however, has consisting of the notarial archives of the fourteenth to sixteenth centuries, has not yet been analysed systematically. ⁷ On the other hand, archaeological research has brought notable testimonies about the port infrastructure to the fore, ⁸ and the typological study of imported artefacts has provided indications about the city’s exchanges and the technical models – in particular, ceramics originating from the production areas near Valencia, in Catalonia, and North Africa. ⁹