Bank?

[hellexpress]

there are merchant banks in the games, but did they really exist for those islamic factions, and esatern horde factions during medieval period?

[HolyDevil]

why not? i don't recall any historic detail on horde merchant guilds either....

there are some "IF"'s in the game to make it balanced, and as for islamic factions, in medieval period they were a lot more open to science than christians, but i think they weren't "greedy" for merchant guilds, at least thats my conclusion about them for all i read....

anyway, in the end, balance issues, nothing more, and its not historically innacurate either

[Ichon]

there are merchant banks in the games, but did they really exist for those islamic factions, and esatern horde factions during medieval period?

Most of the banks in Islamic area in this period were actually run by non Muslims. Jews, Greek Orthodox Christians, and a few other smaller Christian communities. Prescription against usury and interest rates was common in both Christian and Islamic communities. The basis for much of the myths about greedy and rich Jews was based on this aspect... and see the result when a Christian knight order become bankers- easy for them to be grouped under 1 brand and attacked. Having various small non-Christian groups control banks made it more difficult to lump them into 1 common enemy. Much of the hate of the inquisition against Jews was first stirred up because Jews originally were bankers and part of wealthy caste of Moors but as seen at the time as "partial" Christians their property was originally safe from Reconquista but due to their helping Muslims finance wars with Christians and greed on the part of some spanish nobles who wanted their property it was easy to find pretext and history from the bible to make them enemies. IE- usury, jews killed the christ etc. So Moorish Spain and the coastal trade cities of western europe which had originally been refuge for Jews from Eastern Roman empire become hostile and the Jews there often had easy access to trade ships and funds so they took their knowledge and trade contacts to Italy were things were politically disorganized and no one was in strong enough position to lead attacks against them. Of course they needed protection even so and the old aristocratic families of Italy were happy to provide for a piece of the action which once they learned the process they eventually took over and allowed Inquisition to spread to Italy and those Jews then fled again... many into Germany which was relatively stable and becoming more involved in longer distance trade with selling white meat fish from Baltic to Catholics all over Europe who were not allowed to eat red meat many days of the week.

Jews also fought against Crusaders as they were victims of looting and persecution even more often than Muslims as Crusader armies marched toward holy lands they viewed Jews as acceptable targets to gain funds to pay for supplies on the way to fight Muslims. Eastern Orthodox Romans had since prior to Justinian had long standing tradition of not allowing Jews to hold property and there was death penalty for a Christian to marry into Jews or converting. So many Jews left area under control of Byzantines and went to Islamic regions where since true Muslims couldn't be bankers but the Muslim leaders recognized the need for banking they were left in a strange position of being unwelcome but viewed as helpful to commerce. Then later Muslim rulers recognized them as a source of revenue since they paid much higher taxes to the state in their position as non-Muslims and also controlling much of the sea commerce and long distance trade which had high profits and thus could afford high tax rates which the Muslim population was happy to see Jews and other non-Muslims pay. Which meant that Jews in Muslim regions were competing with traders from Italy... and helped the Italian merchant families have a reason to persecute Jews from whom they had first provided safety to.

Part of the tension in Italy was also due to banking... Venice, Genoa, became merchants first before being Catholics and after taking over banking from the Jews they used it to greatly facilitate trade and bring even more money to Italy. The Pope did not like this as it eroded Church teaching on money traders and also was confronting Papal power in Italy where the bankers began controlling more people as those people had actual monetary debt to the bankers vs only owing the Catholic church a spiritual debt... pretty obvious who won. Pretty soon the banking families were getting Popes appointed from their own ranks who then went out and turned the Catholic church into a monetary institution were before it had been a feudal one and through that institution reintroduced the importance of money over feudal obligations and led the the reformation. Venice and Genoa gained dominance in trade over Greeks partially due to better banking institutions and charters being led by the powerful families and this protected where Byzantines families power rested on controlling agricultural lands and bankers were seen as lesser status and thus not protected.