Trading Places: The Public and Private Spaces of Merchants in Sixteenth-Century Antwerp

Fifteenth- and sixteenth-century merchants had a variety of commercial places at their disposal, including private spaces such as houses and warehouses, as well as public spaces like market squares. As Antwerp grew in prominence as a world entrepôt, merchants expressed a need for places in the city where they could congregate to conduct business more peculiar to merchant capitalism. The development of the Bourse, or exchange, in the sixteenth century shows how merchants attempted to regulate public places for their own needs. Antwerp was a city where the activities of merchants were closely associated with prosperity, even when the demands of the merchants were at odds with the interests of the wider population.