Prof. Thorold Rogers repeatedly generalises (_Six Centuries of Work and Wages_, p. 157; _Holland_, p. 49; _Economic Interpretation of History_, p. 11) that the Turkish conquest of Egypt (1517) blocked the only remaining road to the East known to the Old World; and that thenceforth the trade of the Rhine and Danube was so impoverished as to ruin the German nobles, who speedily took to oppressing their tenants, and so brought about the Peasants' War, while "the Italian cities fell into rapid decay." Whatever be the truth as to Germany, the statement as to Italy is very doubtful. The Professor confessedly came to these conclusions from having observed a "sudden and enormous rise in the prices of all Eastern products" at the close of the first quarter of the sixteenth century, not from having ascertained first the decay of the Italian cities. Now, H. Scherer expressly notes (_Allgemeine Geschichte des Welthandels_, 1852, i, 336), that Selim I, after conquering Egypt, made terms with his old enemies the Venetians (who were then the main Eastern traders in Italy) and "bestowed on them all the privileges they had under the Mamelukes." Prof. Rogers states that "the thriving manufactures of Alexandria were at once destroyed." Scherer states that Selim freed from imposts all the Indian wares brought into his States through Alexandria, while he burdened heavily all that came by way of Lisbon. Heyd sums up (_Histoire du commerce du Levant_, éd. fran. 1886, ii, 546), that "under the new régime as under the old, Egypt and Syria remained open to the Venetian merchants." It is hard to reconcile these data with the assertions of Prof. Rogers; and his statement as to prices is further indecisive because the Portuguese trade by sea should have availed to counteract the effect of the closing of the Egyptian route, if that _were_ closed. But the subject remains obscure: Prof. Gibbins (_History of Commerce in Europe_, 1891, pp. 56, 57) follows Rogers without criticism. The difficulty is that, as Scherer complains (i, 272), we have very few records as to Italian trade. "They have illustrated nearly everything, but least of all their commerce and their commercial politics." The lack of information Scherer sets down to the internecine jealousy of the cities. But see the list of works of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries given by Heyd, i, p. xvii _sq._, and his narrative, _passim_.