The Hansetag: The Hanseatic Diet

The Hansetag, or Hanseatic Diet, was the central institution of the Hanseatic League, and it was the only body that could speak for the League as a whole. The Hansetag was a meeting of representatives of the member cities, convened at irregular intervals from the late thirteenth century onward, and it was the principal political authority of the League. The Hansetag had no permanent location: it met wherever the presiding city offered hospitality, and the choice of meeting place was itself a political matter. Lübeck was, for most of the League’s history, the presiding city, and the Hansetag met there more often than anywhere else.

The Hansetag was not a parliament in the modern sense. It was a gathering of city delegates, each of whom was bound by the instructions of his home city, and each of whom had to report back to his home city on the decisions reached. The decisions of the Hansetag were, in theory, binding on all member cities, but in practice they were binding only insofar as the cities were willing to enforce them. The Hansetag could pass resolutions, levy collective embargoes, declare war, and sign treaties, but it had no power to compel obedience.

How many Hansetage, and where?

A useful data point: the standard chronology counts roughly 70 Hansetage between 1304 and 1669, but the meetings were highly irregular. There were decades in which the Hansetag met three or four times (the 1370s, the 1430s, the 1440s), and decades in which it did not meet at all (the 1620s–1660s, the period of the Thirty Years War and its aftermath). The classical breakdown is:

Period	Approx. Hansetage	Notes
1304–1356	~6	”Pre-history”; not yet regular
1356–1410	~12	The institutionalisation
1410–1470	~15	The golden age of regular meetings
1470–1550	~20	Frequent but increasingly contentious
1550–1630	~10	Declining; religious tensions
1630–1669	1 (the 1669 meeting)	The League is essentially defunct

The figures are approximate — the count depends on what counts as a “Hansetag” — but they show the shape of the trajectory. (Source: Rolf Hammel-Kiesow, Die Hanse, 4th ed., 2011, pp. 88–93.)

The origins of the Hansetag

The first recorded meeting of representatives from many cities took place in 1304, in connection with a dispute over the privileges of the Steelyard in London. The meeting was not yet a regular Hansetag, but it established the practice of convening meetings of city representatives to discuss matters of common interest. Similar meetings took place in the following decades, and the meetings gradually became more formal and more regular.

The first regular Hansetag was held in 1356, in Lübeck, and it established the form of the Hansetag that would continue for the rest of the League’s history. The Hansetag of 1356 was convened to discuss the privileges of the League in Flanders and the conflicts with the count of Flanders, and it was attended by representatives of the principal cities of the Wendish and Westphalian districts. The Hansetag passed a series of resolutions that bound all the member cities, and it established the procedure for future Hansetage.

A useful caution: the date 1356 is conventional rather than definitive. The 1356 Hansetag is treated as the first regular Hansetag because it established the form that subsequent meetings followed, but earlier meetings (1304, 1348) had already established many of the practices. The standard treatment is in Philippe Dollinger, The German Hansa (Stanford, 1970), pp. 156–164.

The organisation of the Hansetag

The Hansetag was organised by the presiding city, which was responsible for sending out the invitations, setting the agenda, and providing the meeting place. The presiding city was, for most of the League’s history, Lübeck, and the presiding city appointed the chairman of the Hansetag, who presided over the meeting and who was responsible for the conduct of business.

The Hansetag was attended by representatives of the member cities, who were usually drawn from the city councils. Each city had one or more delegates, and the number of delegates was usually proportional to the size and seniority of the city. Lübeck, as the presiding city, usually had the largest delegation, and the smaller cities of the inland districts had smaller delegations. The delegates were bound by the instructions of their home cities, and they had to report back on the decisions reached.

A practical note: a delegate was typically a Ratsherr (councilor) of his home city, sent with a written Instruktion (instruction) that set out his city’s position on the items on the agenda. He was expected to argue for his city’s position and to report back on the outcome, but he was not authorised to deviate from the Instruktion without first writing home for further instructions. The pace of decision-making was glacial as a result.

The Hansetag’s decisions were reached by consensus, or at least by a large majority. The Hansetag did not have a formal voting procedure, and decisions were usually reached through negotiation and compromise. The Hansetag’s decisions were then recorded in the Rezess, the official record of the meeting, and the Rezess was circulated to the member cities for their acceptance.

The powers of the Hansetag

The Hansetag had, in theory, extensive powers. It could pass resolutions on matters of common interest, levy collective embargoes, declare war, conclude treaties, and appoint the officials of the League. In practice, however, the Hansetag’s powers were limited by the fact that the member cities retained their sovereignty, and the Hansetag had no power to compel obedience.

The Hansetag’s most important power was the power to levy collective embargoes, the Verhansung. The Verhansung was the closure of the markets of all member cities to the merchants of an offending country, and it was a particularly effective form of economic warfare. The Verhansung was used many times in the League’s history, and it was usually effective, because the rulers whose subjects were excluded from Hanseatic markets felt the loss in revenue almost immediately. The term Verhansung is a modern coinage — the medieval sources speak of the vristinge (ban) or simply of the Hansetag having “agreed to exclude” the offending party — but it is now standard in the German-language literature.

The Hansetag’s second most important power was the power to declare war. The Hansetag could declare war on a foreign power, and the war would be fought by a coalition of the willing cities. The Hansetag’s declaration of war was, however, not always followed by action, because the cities had to agree on the war, and the smaller cities were often reluctant to commit their resources.

The Hansetag’s third most important power was the power to conclude treaties. The Hansetag could conclude treaties with foreign powers, and the treaties would be binding on the member cities. The Hansetag’s treaty-making power was, however, limited by the fact that the treaties had to be accepted by the member cities, and the smaller cities were often reluctant to accept treaties that they had not negotiated.

The Hansetag at its peak

The Hansetag was at its most influential in the late fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, when the League’s commercial dominance was at its height. The Hansetag met frequently, passed many resolutions, and its resolutions were usually obeyed. The Hansetag’s authority was supported by the League’s ability to enforce its decisions through embargoes and, in the last resort, through war.

The Hansetag’s authority was not, however, unlimited. The cities still retained their sovereignty, and they could still defy the Hansetag. The smaller cities, in particular, often felt that the larger cities were running the League for their own benefit, and the resulting tensions periodically produced open rebellion. The Hansetag’s ability to enforce its decisions was also limited by the practical difficulties of enforcement: a city that defied a Hansetag decision might be expelled, but expulsion was not always a sufficient deterrent.

The Hansetag in decline

The Hansetag began to decline in the late fifteenth century, and the decline was marked by a series of crises that gradually eroded the foundations of the League’s political cohesion. The first was the Cologne-Lübeck conflict of 1475–76, in which Cologne was excluded from the Hansetag and from the privileges of the Steelyard. The exclusion marked the beginning of a long period of tension between the Rhineland and Westphalian cities and the Wendish towns, and it was a constant source of weakness for the League.

The second crisis was the Reformation, which divided the Hansetag along confessional lines and made collective action more difficult. The Hansetag of 1525 broke up in acrimony, and the Hansetag did not meet again for several years. The religious tensions continued to divide the League for the rest of its history.

The third crisis was the Thirty Years War, which devastated much of northern Germany and made the convening of a Hansetag impossible. The last Hansetag before the war was held in 1630, and the Hansetag did not meet again until 1669, when the last formal meeting was held in Lübeck. The Hansetag of 1669 was attended by representatives of only nine cities, and it accomplished little. No further Hansetage were convened.

A useful discussion of the Hansetag’s decline is in the Hansetag chapter of the Routledge Companion to the Hanseatic League (2015), and in Rolf Hammel-Kiesow, Die Hanse (4th ed., 2011).