ABSTRACT
Situated on the western coast of Norway, Bergen had sailing access to both the North Sea and eastwards into the Baltic. When a band of Danish Crusaders visited Bergen in 1198, they were impressed with the town and its bustling trade, telling of an urban community where every language in the world could be heard, and where all goods imaginable were at hand – where there was such abundance of dried fish and stockfish that it could not be counted nor measured. 1 Starting in the fourteenth century Bergen became a major hub for trade in Northern Europe and for hosting one of the four Hanseatic Kontore. Historians suggest that most of the Norwegian foreign trade revenues during the late medieval period came from the export of fish from Bergen’s harbour.
