Innovation and Creativity in Late Medieval and Early Modern European Cities

Karel Davids is Chair of Economic and Social History in the Faculty of Arts and the Faculty of Economics at the VU University Amsterdam, the Netherlands. His publications in English include Religion, Technology, and the Great and Little Divergences: China and Europe Compared c.700-1800 (2013); The Rise and Decline of Dutch Technological Leadership. Technology, Economy and Culture in the Dutch Republic, 1350-1800 (2008); and numerous articles on technological, economic and maritime history. Bert De Munck is a Professor in the Department of History at the University of Antwerp, Belgium. He has published on urban history, craft guilds and apprenticeship, vocational training and the circulation of knowledge, and the 'repertoires of evaluation' regarding skills and products. His publications include Gated Communities? Regulating Migration in Early Modern Cities (2012) (co-edited with Anne Winter); Technologies of Learning. Apprenticeship in Antwerp from the 15th Century to the End of the Ancien Régime (2007); and Learning on the Shop Floor. Historical Perspectives on Apprenticeship (2007) (co-edited with Hugo Soly and Steven L. Kaplan).