III.

Decline of The Merchant Guild

The merchant guilds declined and by the 14th century had almost completely disappeared. The principal cause of their elimination from economic life was the rise of craft guilds, which included in their membership all those engaged in any particular craft, and which monopolized the making and selling of a particular commodity within the cities in which they were organized. As the various craftsmen of a city organized into craft guilds, the merchant guild of that city was gradually deprived of its power to regulate the commerce of that municipality and in time ceased to function altogether. Where the merchant guilds were strongly entrenched in the municipal governments, they also came into conflict with the strong national governments that were coming into being toward the end of the medieval period and frequently yielded their powers to these governments.