ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the construction of the framework of relations began after the Christian conquest of the territory, from the middle of the thirteenth century onwards. The precedents of mercantile development during the Muslim period did not prevent this construction from being based on new foundations. The circulation in several directions of agricultural crops and textile products demonstrates the prominence that trade soon achieved in Valencia. In Valencia at the beginning of the period we can detect the presence of groups consisting of native and foreign operators, who were well versed in commercial dealings. These groups spread their business all over the kingdom, but they also made it possible for the territory to be connected, now on a regular basis, with many seafaring regions: Granada and North Africa, Majorca, Sicily and Sardinia, Catalonia and what is now the south of France, and even with the Atlantic coast of Andalusia.
