172 THE HISTORY OF COMMERCE. 
Africa by Mahomet and his followers, about the middle of the seventh 
century, must have necessarily shaken the Ostromic, or Greek Kingdom ; 
since the Arabs or Mahommedans, at one time by Islam inspired, and 
to conquests impelled, like a violent and incessant stream spread them- 
selves over Spain itself, and far into Asia and Africa, and tore away 
from the Greek Empire, Syria, Asia Minor, and Egypt. Neverthe- 
less, Constantinople yet maintained its political and commercial im- 
portance, although for a long time subjected to multifarious battles. 
But near it, rose towards the end of the eighth century, Bagdad 
on the Tigris, the seat of oriental luxury, and of the power of the 
Caliphs. This became the centre of a varied and wide-spread com- 
merce, and a principal seat of art and science, rivalling the city of 
Damascus in splendour, which had become great through its manu- 
factures in cotton, silk, leather, and steel goods. Aleppo, also in Syria, 
where the Arabs had spread themselves, at this time had commercial 
connections with China and Java, and as far as Morocco and Spain ; in 
the ninth century it already trafficked with Canton, and at that time 
tea, arrack, and porcelain were known to them. 
Thus much for the East. After that, Western Europe having 
recovered herself from the storms and disturbances brought down on 
the Germanic stem through Bome's decline, had formed herself new 
states. Then first flourished on the Spanish Peninsula, under the 
dominion which the Moors or Mahommedan Arabs had forced upon 
Morocco at the commencement of the eighth century, near the old 
Punic and Boman colonies, Cadiz, Seville, Malaga, Carthagena, Cordova, 
Granada, Murcia, Valencia, Tarragona, Barcelona, Saragossa, Toledo ; 
Spanish cities, raised through industrial arts, which the Moors revived, 
aided by the cultivation of the soil, and the prosperity of commerce. 
Already the South of France had established a brisk traffic with the 
Levant ; and the old colony of Marseilles, worthy of her origin, had 
come to be regarded as the most important mercantile place of Western 
Europe, next to which Ayles, Narbonne, and Bordeaux, Tours, Soissons, 
and Paris, distinguished themselves by their manufactures and com- 
merce, and Lyons and St. Denis became renowned through their mer- 
cantile fairs. But notwithstanding this apparent happy commencement 
in Spain and France, the succeeding times (equally also in the Nether- 
lands and Northern Germany, through the repeated Norman invasions, 
the wars with England, and the endless Moorish battles,) were in the 
highest degree unfavourable to the prosperity of both States, so that 
although the wine and salt exportation from both countries, especially 
to the Netherlands and England had begun to be brisk, yet their com- 
merce up to recent times remained on the whole passive. 
About the time of Charlemagne, a.d. 800, Germany began to acquire 
a flourishing character. Under his rule, rural economy and the indus- 
trial trades made for themselves rewards. The people commenced most 
of the present German products, and worked especially in flax, wool, 
