The city-states, which had once nursed the new economy, were now beginning to strangle it. The guild restrictions which had kept up the quality of Florentine woolens or Venetian glass or Genoese weapons were now, in order to maintain the traditional privileges of their members, preventing an influx of new workers and new capital. The state power of the cities, and their armed forces, were not now strong enough to police transportation routes, guard the sea lanes, put down brigandage and the vagaries of barons who did not realize that their world was ending.
