“生产不足”论:对西欧中世纪城市兴起问题的新思考

Deficiency of Products A New Review to the Rising of Medieval Towns in Western Europe

公元11世纪后城市的兴起,为西欧封建社会注入了充满生机的活力,孕育了更新的经济关系和社会力量,最终导致西欧发生了深刻变化。完全可以说,这是西欧封建社会与同时代的中国和东方相比较所具有的一个最大也是最重要的不同点。那么,是一股什么动力促使和推动中世纪西欧城市兴起呢? 这是一个古老的论题,但却长久不衰地吸引着历史学家们的兴趣。国内外史学界今天主要有两种解释。流行于西方的商业起源论,描述了中世纪城市兴起的某些客观过程,但却忽视了社会生产力尤其是手工业的发展,没有能够说明中小城镇广泛兴起的原因。而且。

This article makes a new pointvtew to the problem of the rise of towns in the middle times in Western Europe. The author assumes that the low level of agricultural productivity is the basic economical background of the development of commerce and the rising of towns in Western Europe. Trade with Levant and eastern Europe was necessary for western Europe to gain the materials of living. Therefore the towns gradually became the market-places of trade commodities and the produce-places of manufactures mainly for the international and interregional trades. Morever, because in want of subsistence materials, many peasants who was unable to feed their families became the original settlers of these rising towns