Paper short abstract:

The paper's objective is to explore the role that Italian merchants managed to secure thanks to the relationship they maintained with the political and commercial  élites  of  the Iberian peninsula and their profitable  to  penetration  into Atlantic trade.

Paper long abstract:

The paper focuses  on  the role of a group of Italian merchants, based in Lisbon, that were engaged in sugar and slave trade in the Atlantic islands, between the XVI and the XVII centuries.

At that time, the system of contracts which regulated the exploitation of commercial routes  in  the Atlantic was dominated by an Iberian élite, which, by taking advantage of its economic power, succeeded to  reach  a  prominent  position  vis-à-vis the political power. After the unification of the crowns, that system survived and the commerce with the Atlantic remained largely centred in Lisbon, although Seville became the  organizational centre of slave trade with India of Castile and the Habsburgs fostered policies to limit  foreign presence in the colonial commerce.

The paper's objective is to explore the role that Italian merchants managed to secure thanks to their relationship with the political and commercial  élites  of  the Iberian peninsula and their profitable  penetration  into trade routes dominated by greats Portuguese and Castilian contractors.

The aim is to reflect upon the structures of exchanges that were at the base of the creation of informal networks that were built in relation to overimposed commercial strategies, trying to understand what identities the commercial agents adopted to guarantee the success of their operations. In this context, the relation with the central power was fundamental to comprehend which interests, the Crown on the one hand, the merchant groups on the other, exploited to their advantage to reach their commercial objectives.