Welser family
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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Welser was a German banking and merchant family, originally a patrician family from Augsburg, that rose to great prominence in international high finance in the 16th century as financiers of Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor. Along with the Fugger family, the Welser family controlled large sectors of the European economy, and accumulated enormous wealth through trade and the German colonization of the Americas. The family received colonial rights of the Province of Venezuela from Charles I, King of Spain, in 1528, becoming owners and rulers of the South American colony of Klein-Venedig (within modern Venezuela), but were deprived of their rule in 1556. Philippine Welser (1527–1580), famed for both her learning and her beauty, was married to Archduke Ferdinand, Emperor Ferdinand I's son.
Claiming descent from the Byzantine general Belisarius, the family is known since the 13th century. By the early Age of Discovery, the Welser family had established trading posts in Antwerp, Lyon, Madrid, Nuremberg, Sevilla, Lisbon, Venice, Rome and Santo Domingo. The Welsers financed not only the Emperor, but also other European monarchs.
