TSEG - The Low Countries Journal of Social and Economic History

Navigational Practices and the Use of the Leeboard on Shallow Draft Riverine and Coastal Craft in the Yangzi and Rhine Estuaries

Leonard Blussé — 2024-04-30

Both in the shallow Yangtze and Rhine deltas, flat-bottomed sailing craft made use of leeboards to prevent the drift of the ship when reaching or sailing close-hauled. Without a doubt, the leeboard was invented earlier in China, but contrary to what is
often suggested, the Dutch leeboard was not adopted from the Chinese example. Its invention should be considered an independent act, a case of convergence. The leeboard was introduced in the Low Countries simultaneously with the adoption
of the fore-and-aft ‘jib and spritsail’ rig and the transformation from narrow to broader ship hulls during the late Middle Ages. Over time the Dutch leeboard was further refined in form: deep and narrow leeboards for seagoing fishing vessels and round and shallow leeboards for the sailing barges and pleasure craft on lakes, canals, and rivers.

Wooden Boats and Shipping Organizations in the Middle Reaches of the Yangtze River (1700-1850)

Yao Chen — 2024-04-30

Between 1700 and 1850, there were an estimated 125,000 wooden boats in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River, with a load capacity of more than two million tons. The transport capacity and the wide distribution of these boats demonstrate that the relationship between multitiered markets was growing closer, and China’s national market was expanding more widely. In this period, direct supervision from government was so difficult to implement effectively that the task of ensuring the safety and order of water transportation fell to the commercial agencies, such as boat brokers 船行 and quay controllers 埠头. The wooden-boat shipping business in the middle Yangtze River during the Qing dynasty was not in a totally disordered state. The spontaneously formed boatmen gangs 船帮 and boatmen lineages 船民家族 played an active and influential role in a specific area of local river transportation in the middle Yangtze River, illustrating that local arbitration and mediation mechanisms were formed to deal with socioeconomic conflicts among shipowners, merchants, local communities, and local governments in the regional commercial transportation network. However, it was not until the end of the nineteenth century that a powerful shipping institution or merchant’s organization that could effectively regulate the water transportation emerged, nor were there socioeconomic mechanisms set up to deal with the many kinds of shipping disputes that existed in the reaches of the middle Yangtze.

‘It Is Said That at Least 300,000 rt of Capital are Required for a Raft Trade’

Ralf Banken — 2024-04-30

Although the Dutch timber trade from the seventeenth to the nineteenth century has been the subject of many historical studies, the development of the capital-intensive timber wholesale trade has remained rather underexposed by economic historians with regard to the actors involved. This is surprising since a capital of up to 600,000 Reichstaler had to be raised for the Dutch timber trade; amounts that were hardly invested in any other commercial enterprise in Germany at the time. The article therefore focuses on the timber wholesalers of the eighteenth century and analyzes in detail, based on our own archival research and previous research results, how the timber wholesalers organized their business (business strategies, business practices, etc.) and what significance their income had for the economic development of the participating economic regions of West and South-West Germany in the long term. It appears that around 1750 the German timber wholesaler and the timber companies from the Black Forest had long since driven out their Dutch competitors and acquired large fortunes. With the Dutch timber trade, capitalist practices (creation and management of companies, accounting, new methods of credit financing, etc.) also spread, which also formed an important building block for the further development of the South-West and West German economy. However, the most important thing was undoubtedly the emergence of a risk-loving entrepreneurial class with a sufficient capital base and business knowledge, which had long since broken away from 'artisan' self-reliance. Because the timber wholesalers often also invested their capital acquired in the Dutch timber trade in other industries, and these often formed a crystallization point for the West and South-West German industrialization after 1815, it can be said that the timber trade with the Netherlands not only generated an enormous volume in the eighteenth century and supported West German economic growth from 1740 onwards, but in the long term also contributed to the economic and social structural changes of the nineteenth century.

Competition between Dutch Skippers, German Ship-owners, and the Transition to Steam

Hein A.M. Klemann — 2024-04-30

In the nineteenth century, Rhine skippers faced new competition. Firstly, in 1830, the Mainz Act abolished the monopolies on part of the Rhine for skippers from certain states. This created competition between skippers and also gave steam navigation more of a change on the river. The traditional skippers who had their ships towed upstream by teams of up to ten horses, but sailed downstream, now had to become more efficient. To this end, the horse stations were reorganized. However, from 1843 a train also ran from Antwerp to Cologne. This form of transport also posed a threat to the skipper. Moreover, the railways needed fixed bridges, meaning that a ferry or a pontoon bridge was no longer sufficient for traffic across the Rhine. This was probably the reason that small skippers gave up towing with horses around 1860 and started to use a steam tug in upstream direction. Downstream they continued sailing on the wind and current. Only at the end of the nineteenth century, after a huge process of normalization of the river, did the scale of Rhine navigation increase substantially. It made Rhine navigation competitive again against the railways. German Rhine shipowners, often connected to large German industrial companies from the Ruhr area, began a process of increasingly longer tugs, with increasingly powerful tugboats and barges with increasing loading capacity. In doing so they threatened the position of the small, independent, mostly Dutch Rhine skippers. From now on, those skippers also had to be tugged both upstream and downstream and had to purchase increasingly larger iron or steel barges. Such investments did not result in more revenue per trip but kept the trip at least somewhat rewarding enough to continue. However, to finance the investments in new barges, many Rhine skippers were forced to give up their homes on shore and take their families on board. This not only limited the costs of their household, but also allowed savings by having the wife and children do the work of the skipper's servant. In this way they stayed in business, but not without becoming impoverished.

Cátia Antunes (ed.), Pursuing Empire. Brazilians, the Dutch and the Portuguese in Brazil and the South Atlantic, c. 1620-1660

Irene Vicente-Martín — 2024-04-30

Misha Ewen, The Virginia Venture. American Colonization and English Society, 1580-1660

Joris van den Tol — 2024-04-30

Emmanuel Kreike, Scorched Earth. Environmental Warfare as a Crime Against Humanity and Nature

Martijn Lak — 2024-04-30

Fabrice Bensimon, Artisans Abroad. British Migrant Workers in Industrialising Europe, 1815-1870

Ad Knotter — 2024-04-30

Peter Stabel, The Fabric of the City. A Social History of Cloth Manufacture in Medieval Ypres

Alka Raman — 2024-04-30

Rachel Dixon, Infanticide. Expert Evidence and Testimony in Child Murder Cases, 1688-1955

Sara Serrano Martínez — 2024-04-30

Erik Odegard, Patronage, Patrimonialism, and Governors’ Careers in the Dutch Chartered Companies, 1630-1691. Careers of Empire

Henk Looijesteijn — 2024-04-30

Janna Everaert, Macht in de metropool. Politieke elitevorming tijdens de demografische en economische bloeifase van Antwerpen (ca. 1400-1550)

Arie van Steensel — 2024-04-30

Moritz Föllmer en Pamela E. Swett (red.), Reshaping Capitalism in Weimar and Nazi Germany

David Hollanders — 2024-04-30

Peter de Waard, Het geheim van Beursplein 5. Het turbulente verhaal van vijftig jaar Amsterdamse effectenhandel

Jaap Barendregt — 2024-04-30

David Graeber. Piratenverlichting. Zeerovers, zelfbestuur en de verborgen oorsprong van de verlichting

Wim De Winter — 2024-04-30

Karwan Fatah-Black, Slavernij en beschaving. Geschiedenis van een paradox

Leo Balai — 2024-04-30

Laura van Hasselt, Geld, geloof en goede vrienden. Piet van Eeghen en de metamorfose van Amsterdam 1816-1889

Huibert Schijf — 2024-04-30

Frans Grijzenhout (red.), Kunst, kennis en kapitaal. Oude meesters op de Hollandse veilingmarkt 1670-1820

Filip Vermeylen — 2024-04-30

Joost Welten, Dansen rond de troon van Willem I. De hoven in Den Haag en Brussel, 1813-1830

Els Witte — 2024-04-30

Leila Marie Farah en Samantha L. Martin (red.), Mobs and Microbes. Global Perspectives on Market Halls, Civic Order and Public Health

Wouter Ronsijn — 2024-04-30

J.W.J. Burgers, E.C. Dijkhof en G. van Herwijnen (red.), Bureaucratie in wording. Studies rond de kanselarijregisters van de Hollandse grafelijkheid in de Henegouwse periode, 1299-1345

Gerrit Verhoeven — 2024-04-30

The Yangtze and the Rhine, two Major Rivers Systems

Hein A.M. Klemann — 2024-04-30

This introduction to the articles about the Rhine and the Yangtze as well as transport on these rivers emphasizes how innovation plays a role throughout both subjects for this collection. In two articles here, this innovation took the form of the movement of a capitalist, business mentality from the coastal areas, where there was already plenty of seafaring and trade, to the interior via the river. In the eighteenth century, this was the case both along the Rhine and along the Yangtze as can be seen from the articles by Ralf Banken and Yao Chen. The articles by Blussé and Klemann, rather, focus on more concrete technical innovation. Blussé shows how similar circumstances, independently of each other, led to similar technical innovations in the Yangtze and Rhine deltas. Klemann looks at the consequences of nineteenthcentury mechanization for Rhine navigation, especially for the small Rhine skippers.