Den7nark and the Leagtie 307 



Eostock, Wismar, Llibeck (the most famous of all the 

 Hansa towns), which, with Hamburg, which had an out- 

 look to the German Ocean, were the founders of the 

 League. Other more inland towns, such as Cologne, joined 

 it. But originally it was designed to protect or to com- 

 mand the trade of the Baltic. Its greatest establishment 

 out of Germany proper was Wisby. It soon began to 

 have corresponding places of business or factories, 

 Kontors as they were called, in Eussia, in Scandinavia, 

 and in England. In Xorway it had them at Oslo and 

 at Bergen. Bergen had, during the civil war, grown 

 to be the most important town in Norway ; and the 

 Bergen Kontor of the Hansa soon began to absorb all 

 the trade of the country. 



The Hansa did not establish its power unopposed. 

 There were frequent quarrels between the Germans and 

 the natives in Bergen. But the latter were so little 

 supported by their government that the foreigners soon 

 began to show the greatest insolence, and to act as if 

 the whole city were theirs. Then, about the middle 

 of the fourteenth century, the Hansa gave such a 

 display of its power that all the Scandinavian countries 

 were reduced to a virtual submission to it. 



This state of things was provoked by the action of 

 the King of Denmark. During the fourteenth century, 

 while Norway was sinking more and more into a posi- 

 tion of dependence, and was preparing to be united to 

 the other Scandinavian countries, Denmark, after a long 

 period of internal struggle and consequent weakness, 

 once more rose to power under its king, Waldemar, 

 called Waldemar Atterdag or 'Day again,' It was 

 Waldemar who conceived the idea of getting possession 



