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What kept the Hanseatic merchants from travelling into the Mediterranean with their own ships? What was so different with the Italians travelling the searoute to Flanders?
A couple of reasons are obvious:
The Northeners took several centuries longer to get acquainted to compasses and maps.
While there were hardly any illiterate Hanseatic merchants, their captains often were analphabets. Which makes the use of maps more problematic.
The Atlantic is much more dangerous than the sheltered North Sea,Baltic and Mediterranean. Which makes compasses almost indispensable.
They did not really need to go there. The Italians were coming to Bruges and London anyway, and the landroute through France and Germany was also relatively reliable.
But I don't really understand why they did not try compasses. Was knowledge of them not accessible?
Which dire situation is needed to stir up the sedate traders and make them risk the voyage?
And do I miss more important reasons?
For instance, I don't know whether their ships, mostly cogs for that matter, are suitable for the Atlantic, and how their cargo capacity compares to Italian ships of that time.