[18] The word rendered Guilds is “Scholarum.”  The crafts at Venice
    were united in corporations called Fraglie or Scholae, each of
    which had its statutes, its head called the Gastald, and its place
    of meeting under the patronage of some saint.  These acted as societies
    of mutual aid, gave dowries to poor girls, caused masses to be
    celebrated for deceased members, joined in public religious
    processions, etc., nor could any craft be exercised except by members
    of such a guild. (Romanin, I. 390.)

[19] A few years after Ser Marco’s death (1328) we find the Great Council
    granting to this Peter the rights of a natural Venetian, as having
    been a long time at Venice, and well-conducted. (See App.  C, Calendar
    of Documents, No. 13.) This might give some additional colour to M.
    Pauthier’s supposition that this Peter the Tartar was a faithful
    servant who had accompanied Messer Marco from the East 30 years
    before.  But yet the supposition is probably unfounded.  Slavery and
    slave-trade were very prevalent at Venice in the Middle Ages, and V.
    Lazari, a writer who examined a great many records connected
    therewith, found that by far the greater number of slaves were
    described as Tartars.  There does not seem to be any clear
    information as to how they were imported, but probably from the
    factories on the Black Sea, especially Tana after its establishment.

A tax of 5 ducats per head was set on the export of slaves in 1379, and as the revenue so received under the Doge Tommaso Mocenigo (1414-1423) amounted (so says Lazari) to 50,000 ducats, the startling conclusion is that 10,000 slaves yearly were exported!  This it is difficult to accept.  The slaves were chiefly employed in domestic service, and the records indicate the women to have been about twice as numerous as the men.  The highest price recorded is 87 ducats paid for a Russian girl sold in 1429.  All the higher prices are for young women; a significant circumstance.  With the existence of this system we may safely connect the extraordinary frequence of mention of illegitimate children in Venetian wills and genealogies. (See Lazari, Del Traffico degli Schiavi in Venezia, etc., in Miscellanea di Storia Italiana, I. 463 seqq.) In 1308 the Khan Toktai of Kipchak (see Polo, II. 496), hearing that the Genoese and other Franks were in the habit of carrying off Tartar children to sell, sent a force against Caffa, which was occupied without resistance, the people taking refuge in their ships.  The Khan also seized the Genoese property in Sarai. (Heyd. II. 27.)

[20] “Stracium et omne capud massariciorum”; in Scotch phrase “napery
    and plenishing.”  A Venetian statute of 1242 prescribes that a bequest