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Neutral Flags, European Trade and the Rise of Hamburg in the 17th and 18th centuries
| During the Thirty Years’ War already Hamburg was one of Europe’s major communication hubs, centres of finance and nodes of trade networks and until the end of the 18th century rose to eventually replace Amsterdam. A number of factors facilitated this development: (1) networks created by both foreign immigration and by Hamburg merchant houses setting up branches abroad, (2) the city’s position in the political and economical geography, and (3) the city’s claim to be an independent and neutral city-state. In fact, neutrality was crucial to Hamburg’s rise as a trade metropolis. The neutrality policies of the Imperial City were supplemented by co-operations of Hamburg’s merchant houses with merchants and ship-owners in the much smaller neighbouring port city of Altona which was under Danish rule, whenever Hamburg’s neutral status was questioned either by the Holy Roman Empire or other European powers. Hence, this constellation offered opportunities to by-pass the impediments for overseas trade during warfare and attract sustained trade relations on a European and eventually global scale.
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