This dissertation is a quantitative study of the spatial business strategies of 130 late medieval and 16th-century European commercial and banking firms, the business networks of which have been put together for a structural analysis of the European city network between ca. 1300 and ca. 1600. Concretely this investigation has been carried out through the application of an interlocking network model – specifically developed for the study of the present-day global city network produced by the office networks of business service firms – to this historical case study, in order to challenge predominantly hierarchical conceptualisations of city networks which are often influenced by central place theory. After a methodological section, in which solutions are designed for reconciling the geographical model with the particularities of historical research, a first part of the analysis focuses on agency within the network, identifying and reconstructing the multiple spatial strategies used by the different agents. In a second part the overall structure and dynamics in the network are investigated, revealing the operation of Christaller's traffic principle, as well as a cyclical variation in emphasis on continental and maritime nodes within the European city network. More generally, this study demonstrates that the functioning of dynamic transnational networks based upon complementarity and cooperation rather than competition is not limited to our contemporary globalised world, but can also be found in particular historical societies.

Este é um estudo sobre os grupos de carregadores das caravanas do comércio de longa distância na Lunda, em fins do século XIX e início do XX. O objetivo principal é argumentar que esses trabalhadores foram responsáveis pela movimentação da engrenagem do comércio regional no espaço que atualmente compreende o nordeste do território de Angola. Sua importância decorreu do conhecimento especializado que detinham, sem o qual não seria possível a circulação de mercadorias e informações por vastas regiões. O estudo levou em conta os elementos organizadores das caravanas de comércio: diferentes grupos de carregadores, papéis sociais e hierarquias, produtos transportados e itinerários percorridos. O exame destes aspectos possibilitou observar o dinamismo do comércio de longa distância, com o qual se conectavam os negócios internacionais. Em um contexto finissecular, marcado pela pressão da era dos impérios, porque sabiam fazer, os carregadores foram um elemento essencial do comércio de longa distância, muito importante para a vitalidade das sociedades da Lunda. / This study is about long distance porters and the trade in Lunda between 1870 and 1920. I argue that porters played a very important role in the operation of regional trade, being responsible for moving goods and informations in very distance areas. My analysis covers several elements: how porters articulated trade caravans, how they organized themselves in different groups permeated by different social hierarchies, the variety of transported goods and trade routes. These elements reveal the dynamism of long-distance trade - extremely important to the vitality of Lunda societies.

Este é um estudo sobre os grupos de carregadores das caravanas do comércio de longa distância na Lunda, em fins do século XIX e início do XX. O objetivo principal é argumentar que esses trabalhadores foram responsáveis pela movimentação da engrenagem do comércio regional no espaço que atualmente compreende o nordeste do território de Angola. Sua importância decorreu do conhecimento especializado que detinham, sem o qual não seria possível a circulação de mercadorias e informações por vastas regiões. O estudo levou em conta os elementos organizadores das caravanas de comércio: diferentes grupos de carregadores, papéis sociais e hierarquias, produtos transportados e itinerários percorridos. O exame destes aspectos possibilitou observar o dinamismo do comércio de longa distância, com o qual se conectavam os negócios internacionais. Em um contexto finissecular, marcado pela pressão da era dos impérios, porque sabiam fazer, os carregadores foram um elemento essencial do comércio de longa distância, muito importante para a vitalidade das sociedades da Lunda. / This study is about long distance porters and the trade in Lunda between 1870 and 1920. I argue that porters played a very important role in the operation of regional trade, being responsible for moving goods and informations in very distance areas. My analysis covers several elements: how porters articulated trade caravans, how they organized themselves in different groups permeated by different social hierarchies, the variety of transported goods and trade routes. These elements reveal the dynamism of long-distance trade - extremely important to the vitality of Lunda societies.

Southern Turkey’s Amuq Valley has been described as a point of convergence bridging distant regions within the ancient Near East. Through an in depth techno-typological and chemical characterization study of 290 obsidian artefacts, this research details changes in deep-time patterns of obsidian use from the Late Neolithic to Early Bronze Age (6000 BCE – 2400 BCE), arguing that shifting traditions of consumption reflect socio-economic developments both within and beyond the Northern Levant. These artefacts come from the three sites of Tell al-Judaidah, Tell Dhahab and Tell Kurdu, the material excavated during the 1930’s by the University of Chicago’s Oriental Institute. Methodologically raw material sourcing was achieved using energy dispersive X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy (EDXRF) in the well-established McMaster XRF Lab [MAX Lab]. With these artefacts’ raw materials all being exotic to the Amuq Valley, originating from various outcrops in Cappadocia, the Lake Van region and Transcaucasia (Turkey and Armenia), over 1000km away, this study not only offers new insight into how Amuq Valley communities engaged in long-distance relations, but also contributes to a larger, deep-time regional study of obsidian consumption as a proxy for understanding significant shifts in Near Eastern socio-economics, from hunter-gatherers to the earliest states. In turn, this study, by employing an Annales school framework to consider practice over deep time at the local and supra-regional level further contributes to an ‘archaeology of the long-term’. / Thesis / Master of Arts (MA) / This research involved the chemical analysis of 290 artefacts of archaeological obsidian – a naturally occurring substance made of crystallized lava - as a means of studying ancient exchange systems in the Near East. More specifically, this study covers archaeological periods from 6000 B.C.E. (Late Neolithic) to 2400 B.C.E. (Early Bronze Age) in the Amuq Valley region of southern Turkey. These artefacts were procured during excavations under the Oriental Institute Museum (University of Chicago) beginning in the 1930s. All artefacts are exotic to the Amuq Valley from several known obsidian outcrops in Anatolia (Turkey), some over 1000km away. Analysis was conducted using X-ray fluorescence (XRF) to match each artefact to its geological origin thereby identifying the range of exotic materials were exchanged across long-distances. The goal of this research was to uncover social and/or economic dynamics of the Amuq Valley through deep-time with regards to the greater obsidian trade network of the Near East.

Résumé. Le mémoire s’intéresse à l’émergence historique de la coopération économique régionale comme forme non-hégémonique de coopération. Nous y proposons une approche alternative au problème de l’origine de la coopération systémique, par rapport à la conception d’origine hégémonique de la coopération systémique, propre aux théories néolibérale et néoréaliste. Plutôt que par le biais des théories du marché, l’origine de la coopération est approchée par le biais des processus caractérisant l’anarchie-même tel le processus de construction anarchique des formes de guerre. Et plus spécifiquement, des formes de guerre dont l’usage soumet la structure anarchique à des contraintes extrêmes, mettant celle-ci en crise, exemplifiée par la chute de la puissance hégémonique, la fin d’un système hégémonique et le début de coopération systémique non-hégémonique, de nature plus régionale et économique. En privilégiant l’approche historique, nous insistons notamment sur l’impact critique du commerce au loin et du crédit international dans la construction par la structure anarchique des formes de guerre que la puissance hégémonique ne peut plus supporter. / Historical origins of regional economic cooperation as a non-hegemonic form of cooperation. Abstract. This thesis examines the emergence of the regional economic cooperation as a non-hegemonic form of cooperation. We propose an alternative to the prevailing conception of hegemonic origin of systemic cooperation, proposed by the neorealist and neoliberal theories. Rather than relying on theories of the market, we focus instead on some critical processes of the anarchical structure itself, such as creation of forms of war by anarchy. More specifically, we focus on the forms of war that put the anarchical structure under maximal strain, bringing it to an overwhelming systemic crisis, the fall of a hegemonic power, the end of a hegemonic system, and the onset of a non-hegemonic systemic cooperation of more regional and economic nature. Prioritizing the historical approach we stress especially the role of long-distance trade and international credit in the construction, by the anarchical structure itself, of forms of war impossible for the hegemonic power to withstand.

Résumé. Le mémoire s’intéresse à l’émergence historique de la coopération économique régionale comme forme non-hégémonique de coopération. Nous y proposons une approche alternative au problème de l’origine de la coopération systémique, par rapport à la conception d’origine hégémonique de la coopération systémique, propre aux théories néolibérale et néoréaliste. Plutôt que par le biais des théories du marché, l’origine de la coopération est approchée par le biais des processus caractérisant l’anarchie-même tel le processus de construction anarchique des formes de guerre. Et plus spécifiquement, des formes de guerre dont l’usage soumet la structure anarchique à des contraintes extrêmes, mettant celle-ci en crise, exemplifiée par la chute de la puissance hégémonique, la fin d’un système hégémonique et le début de coopération systémique non-hégémonique, de nature plus régionale et économique. En privilégiant l’approche historique, nous insistons notamment sur l’impact critique du commerce au loin et du crédit international dans la construction par la structure anarchique des formes de guerre que la puissance hégémonique ne peut plus supporter. / Historical origins of regional economic cooperation as a non-hegemonic form of cooperation. Abstract. This thesis examines the emergence of the regional economic cooperation as a non-hegemonic form of cooperation. We propose an alternative to the prevailing conception of hegemonic origin of systemic cooperation, proposed by the neorealist and neoliberal theories. Rather than relying on theories of the market, we focus instead on some critical processes of the anarchical structure itself, such as creation of forms of war by anarchy. More specifically, we focus on the forms of war that put the anarchical structure under maximal strain, bringing it to an overwhelming systemic crisis, the fall of a hegemonic power, the end of a hegemonic system, and the onset of a non-hegemonic systemic cooperation of more regional and economic nature. Prioritizing the historical approach we stress especially the role of long-distance trade and international credit in the construction, by the anarchical structure itself, of forms of war impossible for the hegemonic power to withstand.