Foreign merchants residing in Bristol

[calcabrina]

Hello,

From the years 1570 to 1580, given the troubles between England and Spain, were there merchants of Iberian or Italian extraction that had set up shop in Bristol?

Thanks!

[Bevis Gittens]

The Anglo-Spanish war was between 1585-1604 so between 1570 and 80 there would be no reason for Iberian or Italian merchants not set up in Bristol, except perhaps an English mistrust of Foreign Catholics; that said giving it's situation as one of the major trading ports in England I would imagine there would be a fair foreign population of merchants but I can't say for sure.

James

[Bevis Gittens]

Done a quick search on the good old interweb and found a recently published book 'Bristol: Ethnic Minorities and the City, 1000-2001' by Madge Dresser and Peter Fleming.

Hear is the blurb on the publishers web page

Our project paperback 'Bristol: Ethnic Minorities and the City 1000-2001' is now available to buy.

Bristol has always been ethnically diverse but this aspect of its history has never before been systematically traced over such a long period. Research in Bristol charts 1001 years of the presence and experience of ethnic minorities in the city. How were they received, how did they survive and how did they affect the city's sense of its own identity?

The Bristol EPE project is an investigation of the cultural and social life of ethnic minorities in the city as well as an analysis of the political reactions their presence has generated. It features, where possible, the personal accounts and perspectives of established residents, the immigrants themselves and their Bristol-born descendants, to complement those provided by official government documents and academic studies.

The project makes use of a wide range of historical sources including:

* Business and estate records
* Family trees and other genealogical material
* Personal papers such as diaries, account books and letters
* Local government, police and court records
* Religious and community group records
* School log books and medical records
* Printed sources such as newspapers, trade directories, playbills, political campaign literature, and posters
* National datasets such as the census, taxation, naturalisation and custom records
* Photographs, paintings and artefacts
* Maps, plans and architects drawings
* Folktales, folk remedies, jokes and songs
* Oral testimonies and recorded interviews

Might be worth getting through the library?

Available from Amazon:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Bristol-Ethnic- ... 1860774776

[John Waller]

Book Chapters

Section One: Medieval and Early Modern Bristol

Chapter 1 The Bristol Jewry to 1290
Chapter 2 Ethnic Minorities in the Middle Ages
Chapter 3 Ethnic Minorities, 1500-1685

Section Two : Bristol in the Atlantic era c. 1685-1835

Chapter 4: Religion and Refugees, 1685-1835
Chapter 5: The Welsh in in the 18th Century
Chapter 6: The Irish, c.1685-c.1835
Chapter 7: The Black Presence, 1688-1835


Section Three: Victorian and Edwardian Bristol


Chapter 8: Jews in the Age of the Early Evangelical Revival
Chapter 9: Immigrants and Protestant Culture
Chapter 10: Catholics and Jews, 1837-1910
Section Four: Bristol in the Twentieth Century


Chapter 11: Ethnic diversity in the 20th Century
Chapter 12: African-Caribbean Migration, 1948-1990
Chapter 13: South Asians, 1947-2001
Chapter 14: Displaced People: Poles, Somalis and Others