548 



HANOVER 



HANSEATIC LEAGUE 



Hanover, is situated on a sub-tributary of the 

 Weser, 78 miles SE. of Bremen, 112 S. of Ham- 

 burg, and 158 W. of Berlin. It consists of the 

 old town, with narrow streets and medieval houses, 

 and the handsome modern town, lying north, east, 

 and south-east of the older portion. The most 

 interesting buildings are the town-hall, founded in 

 1439, with antique sculpture and fine frescoes ; the 

 royal library, with 170,000 volumes and 4000 MSS., 

 incunabula, archives, and valuable state papers ; 

 the theatre, one of the largest and dramatically one' 

 of the most important in Germany ; the palace of 

 King Ernest Augustus, with a library and collec- 

 tions of coins, arms, and engravings ; the museum, 

 with good natural history and art collections ; the 

 royal state palace ; the Kestner Museum, with 

 Etruscan, Greek, and Roman antiquities and a 

 collection of engravings (120,000) ; the polytechnic 

 school, formerly a ducal castle ; the castle church, 

 in which are preserved a collection of medieval 

 church utensils, relics, many of them brought from 

 Palestine by Henry the Lion in 1172, and an altar- 

 piece by L. Cranach ; the 14th-century ' market ' 

 church, with stained glass and monuments ; and 

 the ' new town ' church, with an elegant tower and 

 the tomb of Leibnitz, who died in Hanover. The 

 magnificent railway station, perhaps the finest in 

 Germany, should also be mentioned. Hanover was 

 the first place in Germany that was lighted with 

 gas (1826). In the immediate vicinity of the town 

 is the royal palace of Herrenhausen, whose beauti- 

 ful grounds and gardens are open to the public. 



Since Hanover became a centre of the North 

 German railway system, its manufactures have 

 greatly increased in importance. Amongst the 

 Foremost industries are railway repair shops, iron- 

 founding, typefounding, the manufacture of piano- 

 fortes, india-rubber goods, tobacco, linen, sugar, 

 chocolate, hardware, brewing, and distilling. 

 Pop. ( 1871 ) 87,641 ; ( 1880) 122,843 ; ( 1890) 163,153. 

 Hanover is the birthplace of the brothers Schlegel ; 

 Iffland the actor and dramatist ; Louisa, queen of 

 Prussia ; Sir William Herschel ; and the historian 

 Pertz. In the 14th century the town was a member 

 of the Hanseatic League, and in the loth it had 

 a prosperous trade, which, however, declined con- 

 siderably during the troublous times of the Refor- 

 mation. From about 1640 its importance rested 

 mainly on the fact that it was the residence of the 

 duke and elector. The revival of its industry 

 within recent years has also brought with it a 

 revival of commerce. See works by Hartmann 

 (1880)andKalbe (1886). 



Hanover, a post-village of New Hampshire, 

 pleasantly situated near the east bank of the Con- 

 necticut, 55 miles NW. of Concord. It is the seat 

 of Dartmouth College (1770), which is richly en- 

 dowed, and possesses a library of 65,000 volumes. 

 It includes a medical school and the state college 

 of agriculture and mechanic arts. Pop. ( 1900) 1884. 



Hansard, a well-known name in connection 

 with the printing of the British parliamentary 

 records. Luke Hansard, born in 1752 at Norwich, 

 came to London in 1770, and worked for some years 

 as compositor in the office of Hughes, printer to 

 the House of Commons, whom in 1798 he succeeded 

 as sole proprietor of the business. He died in 1828 ; 

 but his descendants continued to print the parlia- 

 mentary reports down to the beginning of 1889. In 

 1837 a bookseller named Stockdale brought an 

 action for libel against the Messrs Hansard, the 

 libel consisting of statements in the parliament- 

 ary reports which the latter had printed, and after 

 more than one trial the judges decided in favour of 

 Stockdale. To obviate any similar case an act of 

 parliament was passed, directing that proceedings 

 against persons for publication of papers printed 



by order of either House of Parliament are to be 

 stayed by the courts of law, upon delivery of a 

 certificate and affidavit that such publication is by 

 order of either House. Cobbett's Parliamentary 

 History of England from 1066 to 1800 was con- 

 tinued from 1806 by the son and successors of Luke 

 Hansard ; and the name Hansard has been since 

 then given to the printed reports of the debates in 

 parliament. But the speeches there printed are 

 not taken down by a special staff of shorthand 

 writers ; they are extracted in the gross from the 

 London morning newspapers. They are usually 

 sent to the peers or members by whom they were 

 spoken for revision and correction. See Biograph- 

 ical Memoir of Luke Hansard ( 1829) and Report of 

 Select Committee of House of Commons (1828). 



Hanseatic League, or HANSA, a politico- 

 commercial association or league of cities in 

 the north of Germany and the adjoining states, 

 which flourished all through the middle ages. 

 Neither the circumstances out of which it grew, 

 nor the date of its origin, can be precisely deter- 

 mined. The original germs of the union may un- 

 doubtedly be recognised in those fortuitous or tem- 

 porary combinations of merchants, trading along 

 the same routes or in the same places, which were 

 formed for purposes of mutual protection, whether 

 from pirates at sea or from robbers on land, at any- 

 rate from the thousand and one vexations anil 

 dangers to which the isolated trader was in those 

 rude times constantly exposed. In course of time 

 more permanent associations were founded abroad, 

 partly for mutual protection, partly for the purpose 

 of securing from the rulers of the state they were 

 domiciled in more favourable conditions for trade, 

 partly in order to control the market and exclude 

 from participation in it all who were not members 

 of their own body. 



The earliest guild of German merchants estab- 

 lished in a foreign country seems to have been 

 founded in London in or before the 12th century. 

 Certain it is that traders from Cologne were 

 at that time settled there in the enjoyment of 

 special trading privileges. This guild was viewed 

 with favour by the English kings, who from 

 time to time conferred upon its members valuable 

 prerogatives and advantages, in return for services 

 which the wealth and connections of the guild 

 allowed it to render to them. Thus it was with 

 money borrowed from them that Edward III. 

 carried on his campaigns in France. This royally- 

 fostered colony of Easterlings (whence 'sterling,' 

 from the purity of their coined money), as they 

 were called by the English, subsequently, about 

 1474, developed into the powerful association 

 known as the Merchants of the Steelyard. Other 

 guilds existed later at Boston, Hull, York, &c. 

 Another important centre of the Hanseatic cities 

 in the early years of their confederation was 

 Wisby, on the island of Bornholm in the Baltic. 

 Here, although the guild embraced merchants from 

 several towns, the influence of Liibeck reigned 

 supreme, as that of Cologne did in London. This 

 station was the chief depot for the trade with 

 Russia, and with the German colony of Livonia, the 

 name given at that period to all the eastern seaboard 

 of the Baltic as far north as the Gulf of Finland. 

 Wisby was also the mother-city of a no less important 

 Hanseatic settlement at Novgorod, near Lake Ilmen, 

 in Russia. At Witten, in the province of Skane, 

 the southern portion of Sweden, which during the 

 greater part of the middle ages belonged to Den- 

 mark ; at Bergen, on the west coast of Norway ; 

 and at Bruges in Flanders there were Hanseatic 

 dep6ts of first-rate importance, besides numerous 

 others of secondary consequence scattered along 

 the shores of the North and Baltic seas. Most of 

 these trading-colonies were governed by their own 



