Gênes et l’Afrique du Nord Vers 1450: les voyages «per costeriam»

Abstract

All the seaboard nations of the Mediterranean North coast feel interest to trade with the Maghreb and do already realize activities over there. However, all of them do not act in the same way, and the city of Genova seems to follow a very special policy in this area. The commerce between Genova and the Maghreb used, during the XVth century, to benefit from a kind of peace: few acts of piracy, few reprisals, few slave captures: in Genova, the slaves coming from the Maghreb were extremely unfrequent, and the tradesmen and skippers usually bought back the captives. The originality of the navigation system lies in the trips that the notaries call «per costeriam». They are, in fact, long maritime voyages; the really big ships go straight from England to the Orient -or vice versa- bordering the African coast, without going back upwards to the North nor calling at Genova, which supposed a gain of time and money. For these trips, the skipper enjoys a very large margin of initiative and assumes important responsibilities: the navigation, the loading and unloading the bales of goods -specially English woollen cloth-, but also and above all, the selling of these produces. This implies to call frequently at the Maghreb -sometimes on a mere large beach- and to stop at several markets and visit Muslim tradesmen. These trades «per costeriam» are real adventures and the captains acquire so a large and useful experience of the oceans, of the coasts and of the populations which are different from their Christian world.