Medieval travellers checks

[Coredump]

I am looking for someway for Person A to travel to a far away land, and bring a note with him that he can then trade in for cash. I know they actually had things 'like' this... but not sure exactly how they were implemented.

Assume they are traveling among known cities, either in the same country, or at least trade partners.

Is the writ only for one person? Can it be transfered? Can anyone cash it in? What if you find it on a dead person?

Do you give someone money, and you get the writ to carry? Or is the Writ a kind of IOU, where you only pay if it gets used?

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I had some players find one of these on a body. (Seemed like a neat departure from standard treasure.) But now I have to figure out the mechanics. They are kinda good, so they are even thinking about returning it to the rightful owners. (Long way away, but they will be heading near there soonish.)

Thanks

 

[tjoneslo]

The Knights Templar invented these, to allow their members to travel from europe to the holy land during the Crusades. Do some research on the Templars should turn this up.

In order for this to work, you will need an organization, probably a very rich organization like a church or merchants guild or spell casters guild who issues the documents. Historically, the aspiring knight would go to the local templar temple, give them money, get issued a scroll which describes the person who gave the money, the amount, and covered in seals and the like. When the knight arrives in the Holy Land, the parchment is turned over to the local temple for cash.

In theory the Templars would ship the cash from temple 1 to Temple 2. And there was a charge for this service. It made the Templar's *very* rich. If the people issuing the writs are not already a rich, powerful group, the fact that the writs' are honored will soon make them so.

 

[Wombat]

Several merchants houses had these as well, especially once the big fairs of the 12th and 13th century got into operation; some of these merchant houses later on became early banks.

The point was that carrying a lot of gold is heavy and impractical. If you were a merchant who had family in, say, Bruges and Verona, you could just take a letter of credit with you for the amount you would need. Equally you could issue letters of credit to others. Many of the more important families had branches of their family in multiple cities scattered throughout Europe, working for the betterment of the family as a whole. Each home/office (pretty much interchangeable) would have cash, goods, and workers on hand for a variety of tasks.

Another interesting aspect of these letters is when the letters themselves were traded. The letters of credit came in two general varieties -- bearer and personal. A personal letter would say something like "Luigi of Verona may be given the sum of 300 pounds of silver by Verona weight when this bond is presented"; a bearer letter would say nearly the same thing, but there would be no name, only "the bearer". The use of this second type was that it could be traded between people, often a some discount, and thus act like an open letter of credit; of course there was always the danger that a bearer letter might be stolen, at which point the thief could get the money, but many were willing to take that risk.

By buying and selling these letters back and forth an early form of banking was developed. It is quite a fascinating topic in general. Have fun with this!

 

[Turjan]

These letters were quite common, and they were often the only way to pay interest for some credit. As taking interest wasn't allowed for christians, interest was often hidden within favorable exchange rates. This means that a wealthy merchant paid a certain sum for the equipment of a ship that was run by a not so wealthy captain, and that captain paid the sum back to a branch of the merchant in his destination port, this time in the currency of the destination country. There are countless contracts of this kind known from the Middle Ages. That's why we also know that sea ship trade was incredibly cheaper than trade via land or river routes.

 

[Agback]

The Knights Templar invented these, to allow their members to travel from europe to the holy land during the Crusades.

I think they started out when the Templars were organising pilgrim ships. Pilgrims would give their money to the Templar guards on the ship for safe-keeping, and the Templars would issue a receipt. It wasn't long before the Templars worked out that it was silly to ship boxes of money to the Holy Land and then ship it back again.

If you want a simple explanation of how the international credit system worked in the High Middle Ages, I cannot recommmend better than pages 221-223 of Life in a Medieval City by Joseph and Frances Gies (ISBN 0-06-090880-7).

 

[caudor]

...and they don't take American Express

 

[Turjan]

I found the book "Medieval Trade in the Mediterranean World" (here is a description) quite interesting. The book contains lots of trade documents from medieval times. It's very informative and covers nearly all aspects that come to mind, including slave trade, piracy and war economy. It's something for people who like to deal with the subject in depth, though .

 

[Hand of Evil]

Guilds also would be a form of banking. There is a EN World PDF on the banking guild you may be interested in picking up.

 

[philreed]

You may want to take a look at my A Dozen Documents and Papers.

 

[Coredump]

In a word... Wow...

Thanks guys, this give me in the ideas and input I need to make this work; and resources to go to if I need to refine it.

Thanks a lot.