King Haakon V's Privilege to Hamburg from the Manuscript Collection of the Tomsk State University Research Library

This paper is devoted to the privilege granted by Norwegian king Haakon V (1299-1319) to merchants from Hamburg in the presence of representatives of the Hamburg City Council on July 22, 1318. The original manuscript of this privilege is stored in the Department of Manuscripts and Rare Books of the Tomsk State University Research Library. There were two copies of this privilege for each party - Norway and Hamburg respectively. The manuscript from Tomsk is a copy for Hamburg, and it was kept in the Hamburg City Archive, but after the end of the Second World War it came to the USSR with the collection of medieval charters from the archives of Hamburg and Lubeck. The text of this privilege is well known and was published in the 18th and 19th centuries. In this article, the original text is transcribed and translated from Latin into Russian. The article shows that this privilege was one of the many similar ones, in which Norwegian kings under the circumstances and the pressure from the Hanseatic promised not to violate the previous treaties. From the beginning of his reign, the Norwegian king systematically derogated from his commitments. The bilateral treaty between Norway and Hamburg had been signed in 1296. The document from Tensberg is a rare exception: the Norwegian king acknowledged the committed violations. It is not addressed to the local officials, but directly to the representatives of the other side. The representatives of Hamburg took advantage of the presence of Archbishop Eilif of Nidaros and four other Norwegian bishops at the provincial church synod in Tensberg. They engaged the clergy members as guarantors that the crown would not violate the treaty again and would adhere to the free trade regime introduced for Hamburgers. The document from Tensberg was a hidden message of prelates to the Germans that they were ready to be reliable trading partner for Hamburg merchants, and their authority would ensure the regime of special favor for the descendants of this Hanseatic city. One of the representatives of Hamburg was the Prior of the Dominicans. It shows the close interweaving of church, diplomatic and commercial ties important both for the Norwegian and the German sides and supported simultaneously by the royal power and the supreme church prelates. The death of King Haakon V in 1319, the conclusion of the Swedish-Norwegian union entailed reshuffling in the state administration, did not allow Hamburgers (and, more broadly, the Hanseans) to use the promised guarantees they undoubtedly counted on.

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