The Marocco Company or Barbary Company was a trading company established by Queen

Elizabeth I of England Elizabeth I (7 September 153324 March 1603) was Queen of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death in 1603. Elizabeth was the last of the five House of Tudor monarchs and is sometimes referred to as the "Virgin Queen". Eli ...

in 1585 through a patent granted to the Earls of Warwick and Leicester, as well as forty others. When she wrote the patents, Elizabeth emphasized the value of the region's ''"divers Marchandize... for the use and defence"'' of

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe ...

. The privilege of the company was to benefit from exclusive trade for

Morocco Morocco (),, ) officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is the westernmost country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It overlooks the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria to A ...

for a period of 12 years, until its charter expired in 1597. Queen Elizabeth sent her Minister Roberts to the Moroccan sultan

Ahmad al-Mansur Ahmad al-Mansur ( ar, أبو العباس أحمد المنصور, Ahmad Abu al-Abbas al-Mansur, also al-Mansur al-Dahabbi (the Golden), ar, أحمد المنصور الذهبي; and Ahmed al-Mansour; 1549 in Fes – 25 August 1603, Fes) was t ...

to reside in Morocco and obtain advantages for English traders. A treaty signed in 1728 extended these privileges, especially those pertaining to the safe-conduct of English nationals.

Background and origins

The formal beginning of Anglo-Ottoman relations dates back to correspondence between

Elizabeth I Elizabeth I (7 September 153324 March 1603) was Queen of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death in 1603. Elizabeth was the last of the five House of Tudor monarchs and is sometimes referred to as the "Virgin Queen". Eli ...

and the

Ottoman Sultan The sultans of the Ottoman Empire ( tr, Osmanlı padişahları), who were all members of the Ottoman dynasty (House of Osman), ruled over the transcontinental empire from its perceived inception in 1299 to its dissolution in 1922. At its hei ...

Murad III Murad III ( ota, مراد ثالث, Murād-i sālis; tr, III. Murad; 4 July 1546 – 16 January 1595) was Sultan of the Ottoman Empire from 1574 until his death in 1595. His rule saw battles with the Habsburgs and exhausting wars with the Sa ...

which led in May 1580 to an

agreement Agreement may refer to: Agreements between people and organizations * Gentlemen's agreement, not enforceable by law * Trade agreement, between countries * Consensus, a decision-making process * Contract, enforceable in a court of law ** Meeting ...

between the two rulers that

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ...

merchants could pass safely through Ottoman-controlled seas and port in the eastern

Mediterranean The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on ...

and the Barbary Coast of

North Africa North Africa, or Northern Africa is a region encompassing the northern portion of the African continent. There is no singularly accepted scope for the region, and it is sometimes defined as stretching from the Atlantic shores of Mauritania in ...

. This essentially granted trading privileges to the English, who for various reasons, mainly

piracy Piracy is an act of robbery or criminal violence by ship or boat-borne attackers upon another ship or a coastal area, typically with the goal of stealing cargo and other valuable goods. Those who conduct acts of piracy are called pirates, v ...

, had been unable to trade efficiently in the Mediterranean since the 1550s, and in September 1581, the Turkey Company was established as a joint-stock venture to take advantage of this new monopoly on regional trade. In 1585, the Barbary Company, separate from the Turkey Company and the

Venice Company The Venice Company was an English chartered trading company established in 1583 to monopolise on trade in and around the Venetian colonies in the Mediterranean Sea. In 1592, the Venice Company merged with the Turkey Company to form the renowne ...

(1583), who also operated in the Mediterranean and later merged into the

Levant Company The Levant Company was an English chartered company formed in 1592. Elizabeth I of England approved its initial charter on 11 September 1592 when the Venice Company (1583) and the Turkey Company (1581) merged, because their charters had expired ...

in 1592, was established with many of the same merchant investors, with a focus on trade along the

Atlantic The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the " Old World" of Africa, Europe ...

coast of

. Morocco was at that point the main source of

sugar Sugar is the generic name for sweet-tasting, soluble carbohydrates, many of which are used in food. Simple sugars, also called monosaccharides, include glucose, fructose, and galactose. Compound sugars, also called disaccharides or do ...

for the English market, prior of course to the development of the

West Indies The West Indies is a subregion of North America, surrounded by the North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea that includes 13 independent island countries and 18 dependencies and other territories in three major archipelagos: the Greate ...

plantations in the 1600s.

The Company

Headed by

Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester, (24 June 1532 – 4 September 1588) was an English statesman and the favourite of Elizabeth I from her accession until his death. He was a suitor for the queen's hand for many years. Dudley's youth was o ...

and

Ambrose Dudley, 3rd Earl of Warwick Ambrose Dudley, 3rd Earl of Warwick, KG (c. 1530 – 21 February 1590) was an English nobleman and general, and an elder brother of Queen Elizabeth I's favourite, Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester. Their father was John Dudley, Duk ...

, the Barbary Company achieved little regulation of affairs and was never incorporated, with its first charter expiring in 1597. It was not even formally named as the Barbary Company, a conventional title. Nor was there a provision of a governor or a court of assistants like with most companies at the time. The charter itself was merely a collective licence to two noblemen and around 40 London merchants for exclusive trade with Morocco for 12 years. The main act of trade the company engaged in was the trade of English cloth for Moroccan sugar, though at its inception, there were complaints from merchants in

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

that the cloth was being sold excessively cheaply while the sugar was being acquired at expensive rates. Many of the company’s members also ended up trading for the Levant Company due to the close geography and intertwining of interests, the success of the latter probably contributing towards the commercial defeat of the Barbary Company. Allardyce Nicoll (2002), Shakespeare Survey With Index 1-10, Cambridge University Press

References

Bibliography

* George Cawston,

Augustus Henry Keane Augustus Henry Keane (1833–1912) was an Irish Roman Catholic journalist and linguist, known for his ethnological writings. Early life He was born in Cork, Ireland.George Grant MacCurdy, James Mooney and A. B. Legía - Antonio Flores, ''Anthrop ...

, ''The Early Chartered Companies (A.D. 1296-1858)'' The Lawbook Exchange, Ltd., 2001 {{Chartered companies Chartered companies Trading companies of England 1585 establishments in England Defunct companies of the United Kingdom Trading companies established in the 16th century

Background and origins

The Company

See also

References

Bibliography