Long sheds without walls covered the display of goods. Silks, woolens, armor, weapons, leather goods, hides, pottery, furs, and every conceivable object or style of goods could be found there.
Around the outer edge of the market where the great merchants had their displays were the peasants, each with some small thing for sale. Grain, hides, vegetables, fruit, goats, pigs, and chickens, as well as handicrafts of various kinds.
Always there was entertainment, for the fairs attracted magicians, troupes of acrobats, fire-eaters, sword-swallowers, jugglers, and mountebanks of every kind and description. The merchants usually bought and sold by the gross; hence, they were called grossers, a word that eventually came to be spelled grocer. Dealing in smaller amounts allowed too little chance for profit, and too great a quantity risked being left with odds and ends of merchandise. The White Company had come from Spain with silk and added woolens from Flanders. Our preferred trade was for lace, easy to transport and valued wherever we might go.
Merchants were looked upon with disdain by the nobles, but they were jealous of the increasing wealth and power of such men as the Hansgraf, Lucca, Johannes, or a dozen others among us.
The wealth of nobles came from loot or ransoms gained in war or the sale of produce from land worked by serfs, and there were times when this amounted to very little. The merchants, however, nearly always found a market for their goods.
At the Provins fair there were all manner of men and costumes: Franks, Goths, Saxons, Englanders, Normans, Lombards, Moors, Armenians, Jews, and Greeks. Although this trade was less than a century old, changes were coming into being. Some merchants were finding it profitable to settle down in a desirable location and import their goods from the nearest seaport or buy from the caravans.
Artisans had for some time been moving away from the castles and settling in towns to sell their goods to whoever passed. Cobblers, weavers, coppers, potters, and armorers had begun to set up shops rather than doing piecework on order. The merchant-adventurers were merely distributors of such goods.
The finest cloth was made in England and Flanders, woven from wool clipped from sheep grazing on the damp grounds near the sea where they grew the finest wool. Cloaks made from this wool were in great demand, and the greater the distance from the point of origin the better the price. This was the reason the Hansgraf and his company had decided upon the venture to Kiev.
Such cloth was worth fifty times its cost in Kiev, and furs purchased there would bring a fine profit in Byzantium or Italy. Such an extended journey, if successful, could make the fortune of every man present.
The Church looked upon the merchants with disfavor, for trade was considered a form of usury, and every form of speculation considered a sin. Moreover, they were suspicious of the far-traveling merchants as purveyors of freethinking.
Change was in the air, but to the merchant to whom change was usual, any kind of permanence seemed unlikely. The doubts and superstitions of the peasants and nobles seemed childish to these men who had wandered far and seen much, exposed to many ideas and ways of living. Yet often the merchant who found a good market kept the information for his own use, bewailing his experience and telling of the dangers en route, anything to keep others from finding his market or his sources of cheap raw material. Regardless of what the Church as an institution felt, the convents, monasteries, and churches were among the merchants’ best customers. Vestments worn by Church prelates were usually the product of Moorish weavers. I found them, with few exceptions, eager for books or news and to listen to the experiences of the merchants. Despite attempts to impose a pattern from above, the priests and monks in villages and towns were a part of the change that was altering the face of Europe and tempering its opinions. One such came to my stall in the market to buy a bit of brocade for a vestment. We talked of the material, of Córdoba, of books, and finally of medicine.
“The Arabs,” I said, “believe in absolute cleanliness of the hands and instruments before beginning an operation.”
“I have heard”—he looked at me with worried eyes—”that Maimonides has ventured to criticize Galen himself.”
“And rightly so.”
He was shocked. “Is there nothing on which we can place a finger and say, ‘This is so, this is correct’?”
“Perhaps, but the one law of the universe seems to be change. Everything is in a state of flux, and it is better so.”
He shook his head in disagreement, yet not in total disagreement, I was sure. “Speak softly,” he said, “such remarks are better unheard.”
A thought seemed to occur to him. “You are not he who—?”
He knew I was the one. Nor could I well deny it, for he might question others to verify if I was the man who disputed the teacher at the university.
“I trust your friendship. What I say is as one scholar to another. At the end of the fair I leave Europe, probably never to return.”
“What was it you said?”
“That Bernard of Clairvaux was a fool in taking issue with Abelard. I believe Abelard was a fine scholar, and we need more like him.”
“I agree with much of what he taught.” He looked at me. “You are fortunate to travel. Possibly a pilgrimage is what I need.”
We talked of changes in the laws of the Franks brought about by the presence of the merchants, by their dealings with each other and with the towns. Charlemagne had begun it by promoting travel within his empire, but the merchants caused basic changes in the law by introducing elements foreign to earlier thinking.
In a civilization based primarily upon agriculture, with all law based upon the use of land, we merchants brought new considerations. Authority stemmed from the king, the Church, and the great barons, and all property was rooted in the land. Merchants were subject to few of the existing laws, so they had evolved codes of their own for use among themselves. Local courts began to have recourse to these laws in settling disputes in which merchants were involved.
These laws made the merchant a privileged person, free of the laws that bound the citizens. The barons, enjoying taxes paid by the merchants as well as the trade they introduced, offered special treatment to merchant caravans. The tall young monk whose special interest was the law was intrigued by this. It fitted his mind for the acceptance of change.
The Comtesse, who had never witnessed a fair, was very excited. Donning a costume from Arabia that one of the wives in the caravan offered her, she emerged to enjoy it. People had come from miles away to sell their goods or simply to enjoy the performances and the excitement. Aside from our own caravan, now merged with that of Peter, five others were present. One was Italian, another was from Armenia; Germans from the shores of the Baltic, Venetians, and Netherlanders were all attending the fair.
We merchants had our own argot, and our signals to warn of impending trouble. Within a few minutes after the fair opened all the merchants knew about Count Robert and who it was he sought. Among us we numbered more than a thousand tough, seasoned fighting men. The jugglers, magicians, and acrobats were our allies also, and the various companies knew each other from many previous meetings. No matter what differences they might have with each other, and they were few, all stood together against trouble.
Suddenly, at my elbow, there was a word. Turning, I saw the wrinkled, wily old Khatib! Khatib, from Córdoba! My friend the beggar, the thief, the purveyor of information!
“Ah, but it warms my heart to see you!” He gestured. “I am with the jugglers.”
Opening a hollow in the handle of his dagger, he took out a rolled up bit of writing.
I have not forgotten. V.
The Comtesse saw it, glancing quickly from it to me. “From a woman?”
Khatib grinned at me, bowing elaborately to her. “What leopard does not recognize the tracks of another leopard?”
He spoke in Arabic, but she replied quickly, “You liken me to a leopard?”
We were astonished, for neither had guessed that she spoke Arabic, yet why not? She had grown up in a castle in an Arab land.
“All women are huntresses; all are deadly.”
“I am not surprised that this man is your friend,” she said to me. “You think alike.”
Without comment I showed her the note. She lifted an eyebrow, then handed it back. “I wonder what you could have done that would make anyone remember you past the second day?”
“I do not expect to be remembered,” I said, “only enjoyed.”
Suddenly there was a burst of cheers, and we turned to see a man doing a handstand with one hand atop a tall pole held by another man. Then the jugglers, a sword-swallower, and others were crowding about.