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The book surveys the role of Portuguese and Sephardic merchants in the contraband tobacco trade in the late sixteenth- and early seventeenth-century Atlantic world. It offers a historical-geographic perspective linking Amsterdam as an emerging staple market to a network of merchants of the “Portuguese Nation,” examining the illicit trade in the context of rivalry between Spain and the Dutch Republic during the Eighty Years’ War.
“In the seventeenth century, Amsterdam became one of the world’s chief tobacco markets. Yda Schreuder reveals the key role played in this development by Portuguese Jews. These recent immigrants, who collaborated with fellow merchants in the Iberian Peninsula, obtained much of their tobacco through smuggling in Spanish America” —Wim Klooster, Robert H. and Virginia N. Scotland Endowed Chair in History and International Relations, Department of History, Clark University, USA.
“Little-known materials from the Engel Sluiter collection at the UC Berkeley Bancroft Library allowed Yda Schreuder to shed new light on the early seventeenth-century development and expansion of the tobacco trade from Tierra Firme and Hispaniola. Schreuder, a leading expert on Sephardic trading networks in the early modern Atlantic, presented with Portuguese and Amsterdam’s Sephardic Merchants in the Tobacco Trade in the Early Seventeenth Century a fascinating study on the widespread web of contraband, smuggling, bribery, and fraud in which the trade in the ‘Devil’s Weed’ flourished” —Professor Jeroen DeWulf, Berkeley Research University of California, USA.
“This thorough account traces the deep involvement of Portuguese people and Sephardic Jews in the transatlantic tobacco trade. Schreuder closely follows the entangled ties that brought together diverse groups in illicit trade. The result was the rise of tobacco as a global commodity. Through her clear analysis of the existing sources, Schreuder lays the groundwork for subsequent studies on this important topic” —Melissa Morris, Assistant Professor of History, University of Wyoming, USA.
List of Figures; Preface; Portuguese and Amsterdam Sephardic Merchants in the Tobacco Trade in the Early Seventeenth Century; The Contraband Tobacco Trade with Spanish America: Tierra Firme and Hispaniol; Portuguese Merchants and the Tobacco Trade with Tierra Firme; Portuguese Merchants and the Tobacco Trade with Hispaniola; Conclusion; Bibliographic Notes; Index