Virtual Grub Street: Shakespeare Authorship, March the 17th and Social Media. p. 2.

[cont'd] ...might also have proven unnecessary for present purposes and been rolled over for new bills of exchange redeemable in Italy. That country was well ahead of most of the rest of the world and featured bank branches that could be depended upon to lawfully redeem bills of exchange issued by other branches, other banks or by wealthy depositors.

In his letter of March 17, De Vere writes of the valued assistance of one Benedict Spinola by way of arranging for “bills of credit” with the pertinent Italian institutions. Spinola will mention providing such bills of exchange in at least one later letter [1] [Link]. Elsewhere financial transactions involving travelers, however, still largely occurred at the fairs and on much rarer occasions at the shops of especially wealthy merchants.

But that is not all. The Frankfurt fair included a horse and military equipment fair. If the Earl did not intend to rent horses, for the trip across the Alps that always started in Southern Germany, with all the additional frustration and risk that entailed, he would have intended to buy a horse at Frankfurt and to sell it shortly before entering Padua (where the prices were kept low by the constant flow of horses for sale).

Also he would likely want to travel in company that could fend off brigands and that knew the best routes. Venetian merchants found Frankfurt a particularly attractive fair. Most were Jewish and Leipsig, the site of the next fair in the circuit, was not nearly as welcoming. Some part of their caravans regularly returned over the Alps from Frankfurt. For a modest fee, they would agree to provide a guided tour, meals and tolls included, south to Padua and Venice.

While this alone does not prove that Edward de Vere was Shakespeare, we know that The Bard was well aware of some, at least, of these facts, when Shylock cries out: “Why there, there, there, there, a diamond gone cost me two thousand ducats in Franckford,…”[2]. It also gives depth to our knowledge that can prevent embarrassment or even transfer that embarrassment onto those endless hordes of Stratfordian trolls who know so little about the vitally important times and context of Shakespeare.

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[1] Purdy, Gilbert Wesley. “How Edward de Vere Didn't Depart Italy (it turns out).” http://gilbertwesleypurdy.blogspot.com/2017/07/how-edward-de-vere-didnt-depart-italy.html. Virtual Grub Street, July 19, 2017. Citing “March 23. 685. Benedetto Spinola to Lord Burghley.” Calendar Of State Papers, Foreign Series, of the Reign Of Elizabeth, 1575-77. London: Longman & Co., Paternoster Row; Trubner & Co., Ludgate Hill : 1880. 277.

[2] Shakespeare. Merchant of Venice, III.i.79.

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