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The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 06 - (From Barbarossa to Dante) by Unknown
page 301 of 539 (55%)

A doubtful peace was now concluded with the Danes, but was soon broken
by their renewed plunderings of Hanseatic vessels and the obstacles
placed by them upon traffic. Another passage at arms was required. The
ensuing conflict was the greatest and most glorious ever fought, not
only by the Hansa, but by Germany, upon the sea. In 1367 deputies from
the Prussian, Wendish, and Netherlandish cities assembled in the city
hall of Cologne and there prepared those memorable articles of
confederation which decreed another war with King Waldemar of Denmark;
stipulated the levying of a definite contingent of troops on the part
of the contracting cities; provided for a duty on exports to defray
the expenses of the campaign; and draughted letters of protest to the
Pope, to Emperor Charles IV, and to many of the German princes. That
auspicious day marks a turning-point in the history of the Hanseatic
League, and was fraught with high importance to the whole German
empire. The preliminary history of the Hansa here ends and its
brilliant epoch begins. The warships of the cities and their army so
thoroughly vanquished Denmark that, after two years of warfare, the
Danish royal council and the representatives respectively of the
municipalities, the nobility, and the clergy despatched a commission
of thirty-two to Stralsund to sign a treaty, ostensibly in the name of
their fugitive ruler--a treaty which may justly be said to mark the
climax in the development of the power of the burghers of Germany.

The treaty not only provided for considerable concessions in matters
of navigation and intercourse, but also conceded to the members of the
Cologne confederation, comprising about sixty Hansa cities, the right
to occupy and to fortify for a period of fifteen years the four chief
castles on Skane--Helsingborg, Malmo, Scanov, and
Falsterbo--commanding the sound, the most important maritime highway
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