In 1616, the town of Wanfried was named in the "Verzeichnis der fürnembsten Städte Europas" (“Directory of Europe’s Finest Cities”) as an important trading centre. As a starting point for shipping on the Werra, whose river system had been secured by locks at Eschwege and Allendorf, the town grew into a trading centre in which wares of all kinds were traded. After the goods had cleared the "Auf der Schlagd" customs office, they were consigned to the town's warehouses, shortly thereafter to be shipped out again overland. The shippers brought mostly goods from the coastal cities bound especially for Thuringia and Bavaria, important destinations there being the trading centres of Leipzig and Nuremberg.