INTERNAL CONDITIONS
makers of leather slippers for the neighbouring Turkish provinces, with 146 members ; the Pellizzai, or furriers, with 60 members; the Tessjltori, or weavers of cloth, founded in 1491, after one Andrea Pantella of Florence had introduced the industry from Italy in 1416, and in 15 14 it had 137 members. There were in addition many other guilds in other parts of the Republic’s territory, while a number of other industries, such as the goldsmiths, the tanners, the shipbuilders, the dyers, See., were not represented by guilds at all.
   Professor Gelcich quotes the opinions of a number of foreign writers on Ragusan trade in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. The Abate Denina wrote : “ The Ragusans were ever a nation of merchants and traffickers, and are well satisfied to do what the Neapolitans have failed to do, monopolising the export trade of the Kingdom (of Naples), and visiting with their ships all parts of the Mediterranean. Luca de Linda wrote : “ The Ragusans have put on the sea a number of large vessels both for war and for traffic, and on them have travelled as far as the New World. Among other enterprises they served the Catholic King with many ships but a short time since in the expedition against the Gerbi, and with forty vessels in the conquest of Portugal.” Amalthagus in a letter to a friend advises him to settle at Ragusa, as there were in that city many opportunities of becoming rich by trade, for there was much active traffic with the West, and the most industrious nations of Europe, such as the French, the Spaniards, the English, the Flemings, and even the Germans had established colonies there.