City-States and their towns/villages

[SHARK]

Greetings!

I can't respond properly at the moment, as I'm about to go see a movie with my wife. However, upon my return, I shall provide a thorough and detailed response.

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

(Edit--I have returned!)

Well, the Hanseatic League came to power slowly in the beginning because of the following:

(1) There was a rough frontier that encouraged independent solutions

(2) There was a common religion, Catholicism, which united not only the members, but also the nation-states around them.

(3) At the time, because of time, distance, and resources, the nation-states had a difficulty in totally supervising or protecting these frontier settlements and cities alike.

Foir these reasons, the city-states began to form alliances and to look after themselves. As they then formed economic trade-agreements, and determined to come to the aid of another member, the league grew. The Catholic nation-states, though envious of the growing wealth, saw no immediate reason to war against fellow Catholics. Thus, for many years the Hanseatic League prospered--about 250 years or so.

The Hanseatic League began to fail for several reasons, as follows:

(1) The fish migrations in the Baltic changed, with some of the most valuable fish moving to areas further west, in the North Sea. This allowed easier access by the Hanseatic League's competitors, and eroded their leverage in the fishing market, which, because of Good Friday, and the Catholic observation of fish-only on Fridays, that evolved to shift the economic profits of the Hanseatic League significantly.

(2) The Protestant Reformation: This religious upheaval changed the religious demographic of Europe. Now, there were Protestant nation-states that were more than willing to invade the Hanseatic League. The Hanseatic League couldn't fight them all off, and the Catholic nation-states were heavily involved in warfare as well.

(3) The above developments gradually gave rise to different trade routes into the Russian interior and the east being developed over time, that eventually acted as a drain as well on the Hanseatic League's economy.

Gradually, the city-states that made up the Hanseatic League were either conquered, impoverished, or left on their own. Eventually, the Hanseatic League simply ceased to exist.

I hope this has been helpful.

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

 

[Darklance]

Greetings!

I can't respond properly at the moment, as I'm about to go see a movie with my wife. However, upon my return, I shall provide a thorough and detailed response.

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

You just have to love it when he does that.

 

[SoulsFury]

Check this site out for medievaldemographics . I've found it great for doing things like creating kingdoms and was using it just today for detailing some of the city-states & kingdoms in Faerun. The FRCS book also has a page on frontiers, cantons/free cities, city-states and kingdoms. It says to place a town every 150 square miles (15x10) in kingdoms and city-states when in reality, during the middle ages, it was more like every mile or two (like someone else said). I urge everyone to take a look at the link above, the guy has obviously done lots of research.

Nik

 

[SHARK]

*BUMP*

 

[Lawrence of Arabica]

town and country

At risk of repeating what's already been said, let me try summarizing some different models for city-states and the surrouding countryside.

Classical Greece: the typical city would rule an area of pehaps 15-20 miles from its center. There wasn't much political distinction between the urbanized area and the countryside.

Medieval Italy: the cities started just controlling the area within their walls, but gradually they subdued the aristocrats in the countryside, until each city's sphere of control bordered on that of neighboring cities. There was a big distinction between city and countryside. For example, imports had to pass through the city. In some (and perhaps most) cases taxes put an unequal burden on the countryside.

Renaissance Italy: the bigger cities dominated the smaller ones, until eventually just four cities had real independence. Each ruled a far larger territory than in the other eras, and many ways were little different from the territorial states such as France.

Germany: I know less about this, but my understanding is that each Imperial Free City controlled just a very small area outside its walls.

As for the fortresses vs. walls question: the Greek cities had walls but no border fortifications; the German cities had walls but had other options; the Italian cities had both (one of the aims of conquering the countryside being to get control of the fortifications, if nothing else in order to keep them out of the hands of enemies).

 

[Eben]

In a typical medieval setting, states and lords try to extend their sphere of power to it's maximum. Territorial fragmentation and political strife made it difficult for the emperor to extend his influence directly over the whole of his territory, even though he had a legal claim.
(The history of Robert Jordans Wheel of Time series illustrates this in a fictional setting, it's really worthwile reading this aspect in a fantasy setting.)

In a classical setting, there are no legal claims to territory. The territory of a city state is the sum of the territory owned by its citizens. There were no empires like we know them from a medieval setting, only federations of city states united by means of treaty (that treaty could be voluntary or forced.) An "empire" (i.e. Athens) could only be maintained if the head of the federation had to power to keep the sheep in the fold.
This whole concept is much more alien to us, since our temporary mode of a-organistaion is based on the medieval states. (Transformed by 19th century nationalism, but that's a completely different story.)

 

[SHARK]

Greetings!

Yeah, our senses are accustomed to the rule of law. In ancient times, like with the Assyrians, or the Babylonians, or the Romans, when you, as a city-state were encountered, there was usually a choice:

(A) Peacefully join this growing kingdom/empire and get with their program real fast, with lots of smiles and cooperation!

(B) Tell them where they can go, and what they can do with it. This usually resulted in the stubborn city-state being stormed; Most of its people slaughtered, and the rest being broken to the yoke of slavery.

So, that seems to be how things were often done in ancient times!

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

 

[Lawrence of Arabica]

demographics

The web page mentioned above is well thought out, but one thing it doesn't make clear is that there were exceptions to the usual demographic proportions. Both Flanders and Northern Italy were much more urbanized than the average. Many of the cities of northern Italy had to import food, from Sicily for example.

In any case, a city needs to secure some political and economic control over its food supply. Not a few writers seem to forget this, and create cities whose inhabitants seem to live off air, and make money trading gems back and forth. But that's a topic for a different thread.

 

[Eben]

Originally posted by SHARK:
So, that seems to be how things were often done in ancient times!

Agreed! In many cases the result would be just the same, no matter what the juridical differences might have been between biblical-ancient-medieval times.
But personally I feel the distincition matters, both from a sence of historical correctness and for adden flair in a fantasy setting.
I'm glad this toppic came up on these boards. I'll certainly be using lots of these ideas in my future games. Maybe I'll even tackle the challange of brewing a game world that's not based on medieval Europe.

Thanks for the input, everybody!