Conflicts and Legal Transgressions Along Atlantic Maritime Borders

This volume offers a wide-ranging examination of the conflicts that unfolded along the maritime borders of western Atlantic Europe in the late Middle Ages, highlighting the particularities of maritime border contexts at a moment when European societies stood at the threshold of overseas expansion. Through twelve essays spanning the Atlantic façade, from Flanders to the Strait of Gibraltar and the Iberian Atlantic archipelagos, the essays gathered here analyse the diverse forms of confrontation that emerged in these liminal spaces, from military clashes to financial and social disputes, and the environmental tensions unique to coastal and port contexts.

Bringing together varied materials and approaches, the volume examines how the notion of borders was constructed, how royal authorities sought to govern these shifting zones, and how warfare became a decisive force in defining their contours. Economic conflicts are explored, underscoring the dense networks and frictions inherent to Atlantic borderlands, while a key historiographical contribution lies in the integration of environmental perspectives. Together, the chapters presented here reveal how the sea functioned as a perpetual border that shaped both practices and perceptions of boundary-making in the Atlantic world of the late Middle Ages.

List of Illustrations

1. Introduction
Roberto J. González Zalacain and Enrique J. Ruiz Pilares

Section I. Littoral Landscapes, Resources, and Conflicts in the Atlantic World

2. Les zones humides du Médoc à la fin du XVI^e siècle : Place et enjeux dans une économie agraire pauvre
Michel Bochaca
3. Natural Disasters and Pollution in the Channel and Estuary of Bilbao in the Middle Ages*
Ana María Rivera Medina 
4. Exploitation Strategy for the Lagos Coastline in the Late Middle Ages: The Management of Water Resources and the Harnessing of Economic Potential*
Gonçalo Melo da Silva and Ana Cláudia Silveira

Section II. Local Economies, Social Actors, and Tensions in Maritime Borderlands

5. Foreign Merchants and Local Agents in the Bay of Cádiz in the Late Middle Ages: Cooperation and Conflict over Trade
Enrique José Ruiz Pilares
6. An Approach to Conflict and Violence around Tax Collection in the Crown of Castile: Some Examples from Andalusia*
Juan Manuel Bello León
7. ‘Ruined and Destroyed for Such an Exposed, Restrained and New Passage’: Ostend’s Man-made Harbour and the Conflicting Arguments Concerning the Benefits and Costs of the Sea in Fifteenth-century Coastal Flanders Kristiaan Dillen
8. The Atlantic Trade with Medieval Bruges: A Privileged Trade?
Niels Fieremans

Section III. Maritime Jurisdictions, Norms, and Representations of Power

9. The Sea as a Legal Line and Political Border in France at the End of the Middle Ages
Pierre Prétou
10. Anvers face à Zierikzee : un conflit maritime interurbain durant la Révolte flamande à la fin du Moyen Âge
Louis Sicking
11. Rules and Transgressions in Atlantic European Markets: The Case of Portugal’s Maritime Trade in the Later Middle Ages^*
Flávio Miranda (University of Porto)

Section IV. Violence, Expansion, and Transgressions on Atlantic Frontiers

12. Chronicle Narrative and War of Overseas Conquest: The Experience of the Canary Islands^*
Víctor Muñoz Gómez
13. A Sea of Conflict: The Strait of Gibraltar in the Fifteenth Century
Eduardo Aznar Vallejo and Roberto J. González Zalacain
14. ‘Être roi de la mer’ : conception de la puissance maritime en France à travers Le Débat des hérauts d’armes de France et d’Angleterre (milieu du XV^e siècle)
Michel Bochaca