Comerţul, navigaţia şi construcţiile navale la Dunărea de Jos în secolul al XVIII-lea. Consideraţii preliminare

Abstract

The Danube ports, connected to Ottoman trade even before the conquest of the Black Sea, became increasingly tied to the Ottoman economy with the intensification of the vassal dependency of the Romanian Principalities on the Porte and their economic integration. They make the course of the Danube a transportation route of great importance for the Empire’s supply, military and civilian needs. For the Ottomans, the ports at the
Lower Danube fulfilled a threefold function: firstly, outlets for the agricultural, animal, and handicraft products of the hinterland, secondly, transit (but also market) points for goods that came from the terrestrial trading of the Ottoman Empire with the entire European area, and thirdly, import and export centres of the Empire’s maritime trade. The dispute between the Ottoman Empire, Russia, and Austria is what draws the directions for the events in the space between the Carpathians, the Danube, and the Black Sea, from both economic, political, and military perspectives. The events at the end of the 17th and the beginning of the 18th century are the beginning of the fall of the Ottoman Empire, opening the path for a fight for supremacy in Eastern Europe and at the mouths of the Danube.