Compare the role of cities and trade in Europe with any other region in the world.

The cities of Europe were not only centers of trade and crafts, places of residence of influential persons (both worldly rulers and princes of the Church), centers of education, but also centers of self-government, “platforms” where democratic traditions were “honed” (“the city air makes free” ). No wonder the kings of Europe relied on the support of the burghers in their confrontation with the nobility. Similar traditions, however, took place in the cities of medieval Russia (the most famous examples are Pskov and Novgorod). And at the same time, the politics of medieval cities was determined by wealthy and influential families who became the “new nobility”.