An overview

The European silk production has been growing at least since the late seventeenth century. There are no data but the evidence of growth in France, in Lombardy (since around 1650) and in other areas of northern Italy (but not in the south) is abundant. The increase was suddenly halted in the 1780s by a crisis in the French market which was worsened by the French revolution. However, it does seem that during the Napoleonic years growth resumed, albeit at a slower pace, so that output in 1810 was higher than thirty years before. Peace brought about an era of prosperity for the silk industry. The number of looms, which unfortunately is not a good proxy for output, grew from 18,000 to more than 70,000 in Lyons (1810–1857), from 2,600 to 7,300 in Krefeld (1816–1858), from 6,000 to 25,000 in Zurich (1830–1855). The output of raw silk grew quite fast in Lombardy (between 1.5 and 2 per cent pa.) and even faster in France (around 3.5 per cent) or in Piedmont (nearly 6 per cent pa. in the 1820s). These data are not exceptionally reliable, but the growth is consistent with the increase of exports from Italy and the Middle East, which would not have been feasible without a growth in output, as these areas exported most of their production. The production of silk was also rising in China (throughout the whole Ming period) and in Japan, although these trends were independent of the increase in European consumption.