The commodity of the site
I call that a commodious site that serves in such sort as many people thereof need for their traffic and transportation of their goods whereof they have more plenty than they need, or for receiving of things whereof they have scarcity so that this site, standing thus between both, partaketh with both, and groweth rich with the extremes. I say partaketh with the extremes because it cannot otherwise increase the greatness of a city, forasmuch as it must either remain desert or else not serve but for a simple passage.
Derbent, a town seated in the ports of the Caspian Seas, is a very necessary place, to go from Persia into Tartary or from Tartary into Persia: yet notwithstanding, it never grew great nor no famous city, and in these our days there is no reckoning made of it. And the reason is for that it partaketh not of these extremes, but serveth for passage only, and receiveth those that travel to and fro not as merchants and men of commerce and traffic, but as passengers and travellers; and to speak in a word, it is seated sure in a very necessary place, as the case standeth, but not profitably unto itself.
For the selfsame cause, in the straits of the Alps which for the most part do compass Italy, although the Frenchmen, Switzers, Dutchmen and Italians continually do pass by them, there never yet was found a mean city, much less any great and stately one.
The like may be said of many other cities and places. For Suez is a very necessary place for them that came out of the Indies by the Red Sea to Cairo. The islands of St. James, and the Palma and Terceira are necessary for the Portuguese and Spaniards to sail to the Indies, Brazil and to the New World, yet neither is there, nor never will be in those same places, city of good importance. As neither also is there in the islands between Denmark and Sweden, nor yet between Mare Germanicum and Mare Balticum. And Flushing, although it be situated in a passage of incredible necessity, for the commerce and traffic there is between the Flemings, Englishmen and other nations, yet never grew it great but still remains a very little town. But contrariwise Genoa is a great city, and so is Venice, because they partake of the extremes, and serve not only as for passages but much more for store-houses, cellarage and warehouses of merchandise, most plentifully brought unto them. And so is likewise Lisbon, Antwerp and some other. It sufficeth not enough therefore to the making of a city magnificent and great that the site thereof be necessary, but it must withal be commodious to other counties that are borderers, or near unto it.
