ABSTRACT
The thriving mercantile firms of southern Spain, including numerous Genoese commercial houses, invested heavily in the initial 15th-16th-century voyages to the New World. The branches they soon set up in the early colonies in turn financed many of the expeditions that ventured across the Americas and also provided the settlements with African slaves. Merchants characteristically participated in the conquests and established businesses in the newly founded cities. Many prospered and their numbers expanded, as they provided vital services to the new societies, transferring precious metals-and later other profitable commodities-to Europe in exchange for items the colonists required to enjoy a comfortable, European-oriented way of life.
