Professional Guilds and the History of Insurance: A Comparative Analysis [1 ed.] 9783428580712, 9783428180714

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Comparative Studies in the History of Insurance Law Studien zur vergleichenden Geschichte des Versicherungsrechts Volume / Band 7

Professional Guilds and the History of Insurance A Comparative Analysis Edited by

Phillip Hellwege

Duncker & Humblot · Berlin

Phillip Hellwege (ed.)

Professional Guilds and the History of Insurance

Comparative Studies in the History of Insurance Law Studien zur vergleichenden Geschichte des Versicherungsrechts Edited by /  Herausgegeben von Prof. Dr. Phillip Hellwege

Volume / Band 7

Professional Guilds and the History of Insurance A Comparative Analysis

Edited by

Phillip Hellwege

Duncker & Humblot  ·  Berlin

The project ‘A Comparative History of Insurance Law in Europe’ has received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (grant agreement No. 647019).

Bibliographic information of the German national library The German national library registers this publication in the German national bibliography; specified bibliographic data are retrievable on the Internet about http://dnb.d-nb.de.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, translated, or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without the expressed written consent of the publisher. © 2020 Duncker & Humblot GmbH, Berlin Printing: CPI buchbücher.de GmbH, Birkach Printed in Germany ISSN 2625-638X (Print) / ISSN 2625-6398 (Online) ISBN 978-3-428-18071-4 (Print) ISBN 978-3-428-58071-2 (E-Book) Printed on no aging resistant (non-acid) paper according to ISO 9706 Internet: http://www.duncker-humblot.de

Preface The present volume is the seventh volume resulting from the research project ‘A Comparative History of Insurance Law in Europe’ CHILE. CHILE has received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (grant agreement No. 647019). The contributions to the present volume are based on papers presented at a conference in Augsburg in February 2018. I would like to thank Michael Friedman for his critical comments on an earlier draft of this volume and for, once again, correcting the English. Augsburg, March 2020

Phillip Hellwege

Summary of Contents Phillip Hellwege Chapter 1: Introduction............................................................................................... 9  Dirk Heirbaut Chapter 2: Mutual Aid in the Craft Guilds of the Late Medieval and Early Modern Southern Netherlands (Belgium) ....................................................... 21  Maarten Prak Chapter 3: Guilds and Mutual Aid in the Northern Netherlands .............................. 47  Phillip Hellwege Chapter 4: Professional Guilds and the History of Social Security and Insurance in the German-Speaking World ................................................................ 63  Patrick Wallis Chapter 5: Guilds and Mutual Aid in England ......................................................... 99  Martin Sunnqvist Chapter 6: Scandinavia ........................................................................................... 123  David Deroussin Chapter 7: Guilds, Confraternities and Mutual Assistance in France ..................... 133  Marina Gazzini Chapter 8: Guilds and Mutual Support in Medieval Italy ....................................... 165  José A. Nieto Sánchez and Victoria López Barahona Chapter 9: Guilds, Confraternities and Mutual Support in Medieval and Early Modern Spain ................................................................................................ 193  Jakub Pokoj Chapter 10: Guilds and Mutual Protection Schemes in Poland in the Medieval and Early Modern Periods ............................................................ 217  Balázs Rigó Chapter 11: Guild Support in Hungary (1307–1872) ............................................. 239  Phillip Hellwege Chapter 12: Comparative Analysis ......................................................................... 271  List of Contributors ..................................................................................................... 281  Index ............................................................................................................................ 282 

Chapter 1: Introduction By Phillip Hellwege* A. Professional guilds and the history of insurance ......................................................... 9  B. The state of research on guild support ...................................................................... 10  C. Defining the research object ..................................................................................... 15  D. Methodological problems ......................................................................................... 19

A. Professional guilds and the history of insurance The objective of the present volume is to assess from a comparative perspective (i) whether it is possible to analyse in terms of insurance the support offered by medieval and early modern professional guilds to members in need and (ii) whether guild support had a lasting impact on the development of modern insurance and insurance law. The present volume is part of a research project on a comparative history of insurance law in Europe. The project’s point of departure – together with the project’s research agenda, it is fully mapped out in the first publication resulting from the project1 – is the determination that the state of research on the history of insurance and insurance law in Europe is, from a comparative perspective, unsatisfactory. Foremost, modern literature on the history of insurance and insurance law has developed distinct national narratives. German literature claims that insurance has three roots, the first root being marine insurance, which supposedly is the origin of commercial insurance. Life and fire insurance have allegedly developed from the other two roots: the cooperative protection provided by medieval and early modern guilds, on the one hand, and state-run insurance schemes (which were first established in the 17th century) on the other. German literature furthermore implies that the evolution of insurance law followed identical paths. By contrast, English authors claim that insurance as whole developed from marine insurance. Early on, merchants insured, for example, the lives of a ship’s crew, the starting point for the development of life insurance. And it is ___________ * The present chapter is a shortened version of the introductory chapter to Phillip Hellwege, From Guild Welfare to Bismarck Care. Professional guilds and the origins of modern social security law and insurance law in Germany (2020). 1 Phillip Hellwege (ed.), A Comparative History of Insurance Law in Europe. A Research Agenda (2018).

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usually alleged that the law regulating life and fire insurance developed from marine insurance law, too. Consequently, English scholars suggest that there is only one root for insurance and insurance law: marine insurance (law). The literature on developments in, for example, France, Italy, and the Netherlands follows similar narratives. The overall aim of the present volume is, thus, to test these different narratives and to reassess the history of insurance and insurance law in Europe. To this end, the present volume covers various European countries – the Southern Netherlands (Belgium), the (Northern) Netherlands, England, Germany, Sweden, France, Italy, Spain, Poland, and Hungary – followed by a comparative analysis.

B. The state of research on guild support The state of research on guild support is as unsatisfactory as the state of research on the history of insurance and insurance law, but for different reasons. For the purpose of this introduction I will map out in detail the state of research in Germany; thereafter, I will briefly refer the reader to the state of research in other European countries as has been summarized by the various authors of the present volume. When charting the state of research in Germany, it is best to distinguish three different historiographic contexts in which guild support is discussed. First, there is the history of insurance and insurance law. The respective literature stresses, as has just been pointed out, the relevance which guild support had for the development of modern insurance as well as modern insurance law.2 Hans-Martin Oberholzer, for example, contends ‘that guilds were crucial for forming the idea of insurance’ (‘dass das Gildewesen für die Entstehung des Gedankens des Versicherungswesens ausschlaggebend war’).3 Clemens von ___________ 2 See Hans-Martin Oberholzer, Zur Rechts- und Gründungsgeschichte der Privatversicherung (1992), 59–66; Albert Schug, Der Versicherungsgedanke und seine historischen Grundlagen (2011), especially at 141–144; Peter Koch, Geschichte der Versicherungswissenschaft in Deutschland (1998), 25, 98 f., 225; idem, Versicherungsplätze in Deutschland (1986), passim; idem, Geschichte der Versicherungswirtschaft in Deutschland (2012), 15–19; idem, Versicherungswesen, in: Adalbert Erler et al. (eds.), Handwörterbuch zur deutschen Rechtsgeschichte, vol. 5 (1998), 815–826, 816; Paul Bütow, Versicherung auf Gegenseitigkeit (1883), 9–14; Peter Ulrich Lehner, Entstehung des Versicherungswesens, in: Wolfgang Rohrbach (ed.), Versicherungsgeschichte Österreichs, vol. 1 (1988), 1–44, 13–16; Wolfgang Rohrbach, Versicherungsgeschichte Österreichs von den Anfängen bis zum Börsenkrach des Jahres 1873, in: idem, op. cit., 47–432, 64–72; Heinrich Braun, Geschichte der Lebensversicherung und der Lebensversicherungstechnik (2nd edn., 1963), 13–16; Rudolf Bergmann, Geschichte des rheinischen Versicherungswesens bis zur Mitte des XIX. Jahrhunderts (1928), 2–6; Wilhelm Hagena, Die Ansichten der deutschen Kameralisten des 18. Jahrhunderts über das Versicherungswesen (1910), 8. 3 Oberholzer (n. 2), 66.

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Zedtwitz adds that guild support – even though it reflected the idea of insurance – cannot be categorized as insurance because guild members had no legally enforceable right to support.4 Harald von Waldheim argues that such a legal right was introduced only after 1500,5 and it follows that he would look upon guild support from that point of time as insurance. By contrast, Peter Koch believes that guild members had a legal right to support from the very beginning of the practice’s development:6 ‘Diese Leistungen der Zünfte und Gesellenbruderschaften stehen am Anfang der deutschen Versicherungsgeschichte und leiten ihre erste Periode ein. Um Versicherungen handelte es sich deshalb, weil die Mitglieder der Vereinigungen durch die Entrichtung von Beiträgen und die Beteiligung an Umlagen einen Rechtsanspruch auf Leistungen erwarben, die zunächst gewohnheitsrechtlich feststanden und später in den Satzungen geregelt waren.’ ‘These benefits which were offered by craftsmen’s guilds and journeymen’s confraternities mark the beginnings of insurance history in Germany, and they are the start of the first period of the development of insurance. These benefits do count as insurance because the members of these associations acquired a legal right to them by paying their contributions and by taking part in apportionments – a legal right which initially derived from customary law and which was later provided for in guild statutes.’

However, modern literature on the history of insurance and insurance law does not base these broad claims on any analysis of primary sources. Furthermore, the belief that guilds had an immediate relevance for the development of insurance and insurance law is not uniformly shared. Most prominently, Levin Goldschmidt and Victor Ehrenberg painted in the late 19th century a different picture, one which does not suggest any mono-causal link between guild support and insurance, but which rather points to complex interactions between cooperative associations (like guilds) and insurance.7 Secondly, there is the history of Germany’s modern social security. The relevant literature claims that the support offered by professional guilds had a lasting impact on modern social security. Many authors point to the special relevance of miners’ guilds.8 Ulrich Lauf, for example, proposes that ‘German social security ___________ 4 Clemens von Zedtwitz, Die rechtsgeschichtliche Entwicklung der Versicherung (1999), 75. 5 Harald Waldheim, Das Versicherungswesen in seiner Entwicklung mit besonderer Berücksichtigung der Sozialversicherung (1928), 10. 6 P. Koch, Versicherungswirtschaft (n. 2), 18. 7 Levin Goldschmidt, Handbuch des Handelsrechts, vol. 1/1 (3rd edn., 1891), 40; Victor Ehrenberg, Versicherungsrecht, vol. 1 (1893), 26. 8 Tobias A. Jopp, Insurance, Fund Size, and Concentration (2013), 15; Horst Peters, Die Geschichte der sozialen Versicherung (3rd edn., 1978), 21 f.; Augustin Düttmann, Die deutsche Sozialversicherung in ihrem Entwicklungsgange (1926), 9 f., 46–52; Andreas Bingener, Knappschaft, in: Albrecht Cordes et al. (eds.), Handwörterbuch zur deutschen Rechtsgeschichte, vol. 2 (2nd edn., 2012), 1907–1909, 1907; Georg Greve, Gilbert Gratzel

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originated in miners’ guilds’ (‘In der Knappschaft der Bergleute liegt der Ursprung der deutschen Sozialversicherung’).9 Georg Greve, Gilbert Gratzel, and Eberhard Graf go even further:10 ‘Die Knappschaft ist die älteste Sozialversicherung der Welt und hat das deutsche und europäische Sozialsystem geprägt wie kaum eine andere Institution.’ ‘The miners’ guild is the world’s oldest form of social insurance and shaped the German and European welfare system like no other institution.’

Other authors suggest it was especially seafarers’ guilds which were of relevance for the development of Germany’s modern social security. Melanie Sulzer, for example, states:11 ‘Soziale Sicherungseinrichtungen im Bereich der Seeschiffahrt existieren nicht erst seit Einführung der Bismarck’schen Sozialgesetzgebung. Sie haben ihre Wurzeln in der seemännischen Sozialfürsorge, die unter anderem durch Schiffergilden, Schifferbrüderschaften und Schiffergesellschaften institutionalisiert wurde.’ ‘In the seafaring sector, institutions of social protection have not existed only since the introduction of Bismarck’s social security legislation. These institutions have their origins in maritime schemes of social provision, which were institutionalized by, among others, skippers’ guilds, skippers’ confraternities, and skippers’ associations.’

However, today’s literature often looks upon guild support only as a historical backdrop of Germany’s modern social security. It is often believed that the latter’s history started only in the 19th century. It follows that research focuses on the socio-economic and political setting in which Otto von Bismarck’s social security legislation developed. Often, modern research points only to the institutional continuity from medieval guilds to those of the 19th century without ever analysing in detail the support which the former offered to their members.12 Some authors draw a slightly different picture of the developments. Friedrich Wilhelm Ponfick, for example, argues that the support offered by professional ___________ and Eberhard Graf, Die Knappschaft als sozialer Pfadfinder, in: Michael Fessner et al. (eds.), Auf breiten Schultern. 750 Jahre Knappschaft (2010), 23–38, 23; Hans Thielmann, Die Geschichte der Knappschaftsversicherung (1960), 5; Bergmann (n. 2), 9 f.; Gerald Schöpfer, Sozialer Schutz im 16.–18. Jahrhundert (1976), 71, 75; Frank Weidner, Der lange Kampf um die Einführung von Witwen- und Witwerrenten (2016), 26; Jens Alber, Vom Armenhaus zum Wohlfahrtsstaat (1982), 24; Rudolf Schwenger, Die deutschen Betriebskrankenkassen (1934), 3. The standard account on the history of Germany’s modern social security mentions guilds without overemphasizing their importance: Michael Stolleis, Geschichte des Sozialrechts in Deutschland (2003), 10 f., 37–39. 9 Ulrich Lauf, Die Knappschaft (1994), 7. 10 Greve/Gratzel/Graf (n. 8), 23. 11 Melanie Sulzer, Soziale Sicherungssystem in der Seeschiffahrt (2012), 9. 12 Of a similar tone is the criticism formulated by Jürgen Tampke, Bismarcks Sozialgesetzgebung, in: Wolfgang J. Mommsen (ed.), Die Entstehung des Wohlfahrtsstaates in Großbritannien und Deutschland 1850–1950 (1982), 79–91, 79.

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guilds was not a direct predecessor of modern insurance or social security. Instead he points to the widows’ and orphans’ assurances of the 17th century and, above all, the 18th century. These were, Ponfick claims, the historical link connecting medieval guild support with modern insurance as well as modern social security:13 ‘Die Unterstützungseinrichtungen für die Knappen, Handwerker und Gesellen finden im Zeitalter der Aufklärung ihre Ergänzung in den Hinterbliebenenversicherungskassen für bestimmte Berufsgruppen. Sie stellen das Mittelglied dar zwischen dem aus dem Mittelalter überkommenen und dem neuzeitlichen Versicherungswesen. Man wird wohl annehmen müssen, daß diese Witwen- und Waisenkassen aus den Zunftkassen hervorgegangen sind, indem sie die der Zunft eigene Vielseitigkeit der Aufgaben abstreiften und die Schadensgarantie für den Fall des Todes zum alleinigen Zweck erhoben […].’ ‘Nach alledem müssen wir feststellen, daß die verbindlichen Witwen- und Waisenkassen des Zeitalters der Aufklärung sämtliche Wesensmerkmale der Sozialversicherung aufweisen, nämlich: Ausschluß eines Vertrages über ihr Zustandekommen, keine Auslese der Risiken, gesetzlich festgelegte Leistungen, Rechtsanspruch, öffentlich-rechtlich organisierte Versicherungsträger und teilweise auch Selbstverwaltung. Sie stellen damit eine weitere Wurzel unserer heutigen Sozialversicherung dar.’ ‘The institutions for the support of miners, craftsmen, and journeymen were in the age of the Enlightenment complemented by funds for the benefit of surviving dependants in specific professions. These funds are the link between insurance of the Middle Ages and that of the modern era. One has to assume that these widows’ and orphans’ assurances were developed from guild funds, without being, as guilds were, poly-functional institutions, and that they made guaranteed indemnity in the event of death their sole purpose […].’ ‘In all, we have to conclude that the compulsory widows’ and orphans’ assurances of the age of the Enlightenment exhibit all characteristics of social security schemes, namely membership without contract, no selection of risks, statutorily defined benefits, legal entitlement, public insurance bodies, and at times self-administration. They are, thus, one further root of our modern social security schemes.’

Thirdly, there is the history of professional guilds. Modern literature on the history of such guilds is abundant. Even though it has focused on numerous aspects of their development14 – their origins and genesis, their differentiation, ___________ 13 Friedrich Wilhelm Ponfick, Geschichte der Sozialversicherung im Zeitalter der Aufklärung (1940), 66, 76. 14 See, e.g., Arnd Kluge, Die Zünfte (2009), passim; Sabine von Heusinger, Die Zunft im Mittelalter (2009), passim; idem, Geselle, in: Cordes (n. 8), vol. 2 (2nd edn., 2012), 282–286; Otto Gerhard Oexle, Die mittelalterliche Zunft als Forschungsproblem, (1982) 118 Blätter für deutsche Landesgeschichte 1–44; idem, Conjuratio und Gilde im frühen Mittelalter, in: Berent Schwinekörper (ed.), Gilden und Zünfte (1985), 151–214; Hans K. Schulze, Kaufmannsgilde und Stadtentstehung im mitteldeutschen Raum, in: Schwinekörper, op. cit., 377–412; Jürgen Brand, Zunft, in: Erler et al. (n. 2), vol. 5 (1998), 1792– 1803; Knut Schulz, Zunft, -wesen, -recht, in: Lexikon des Mittelalters, vol. 9 (1998), 686– 690; Gerhard Fouquet, Gilde, in: Cordes (n. 8), vol. 2 (2nd edn., 2012), 383–386; HansPeter Baum, Handwerk, in: Lexikon des Mittelalters, vol. 4 (1989), 1910–1914; Frank

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their internal constitution, their social composition, their political role, their constitutional functions, their rise and fall, the extent of their autonomy and jurisdiction, and their market-regulating functions – their support schemes have rarely been the focus of research.15 In essence, there seems to be only one monograph that has ever fully analysed the social protection offered by German guilds to members in need. It was authored by Sigrid Fröhlich and published in 1976.16 Even though she analyses primary sources from the 13th to the early 19th centuries, there are, from the perspective of the history of insurance and social security, shortcomings in her book. Most importantly, she presents a static picture, and she thereby overlooks important developments. She only hints at some institutional changes occurring especially in the 17th and 18th centuries, foremost the emergence of journeymen’s associations forming separate funds. The only purpose of these funds was to offer support to journeymen in need. Furthermore, she contrasts her historical analysis ending in the early 19th century with Germany’s late 19th-century social security legislation without examining the developments made in the course of 19th century. Finally, she does not include miners’ guilds in her analysis even though their importance is stressed by modern German literature. Her focus is on craft guilds only. In conclusion, German literature generally looks upon guild support as an important root of modern insurance and modern social security. However, neither German research on the history of insurance nor research on the history of social security has ever fully analysed guild support, and the same holds true for research on the history of professional guilds. Turning to the state of research in other European countries, we find a similar unsatisfactory picture. Of course, as guild support is in many European historiographies not seen as a root of modern insurance and insurance law, research on the history of insurance and insurance law only rarely makes reference to guild

___________ Göttmann, Handwerk und Bündnispolitik (1977), passim; Hagen Hof, Wettbewerb im Zunftrecht (1983), passim. See also the accounts by Rudolf Wissell, Des Alten Handwerks Recht und Gewohnheit, 6 vol. (2nd edn., 1971–1988), passim and Otto Gierke, Das deutsche Genossenschaftsrecht, vol. 1 (1868), 344–409. See also the cross-European research offered by Stephan R. Epstein and Maarten Prak (eds.), Guilds, Innovation and the Economy in Europe, 1400–1800 (2008); Sheilagh Ogilvie, The European Guilds: An Economic Analysis (2019); idem, Institutions and European Trade. Merchant Guilds, 1000– 1800 (2011); Maarten Prak and Patrick Wallis (eds.), Apprenticeship in Early Modern Europe (2020). 15 Karl Otto Scherner, Sozialrechtsgeschichte der Neuzeit, (1996) 18 Zeitschrift für Neuere Rechtsgeschichte 102–148, 112 f. 16 Sigrid Fröhlich, Die soziale Sicherung bei Zünften und Gesellverbänden (1976).

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support.17 The authors of the different chapters collected in the present volume have therefore primarily focused on modern research on guilds when summarizing the state of research in their national historiographies. In the case of Belgium, Dirk Heirbaut, for example, points out that ‘handbooks […] on either insurance law or social security law completely ignore mutual aid within the craft guilds’ and that historians are usually not interested in the support offered by guilds to their members, even though recently there has been an increasing interest in guilds again.18 An exception seems to be the Polish discourse: Jakub Pokoj refers to Polish authors who, just like their German counterparts, point to the importance of guild support for the development of insurance, but he also concedes that the Polish literature has not analysed guild support in depth.19 In all, the diverging narratives as to the importance of guild support for the history of insurance and insurance law, as well as the unsatisfactory state of research on guild support, make the overall research question of the present volume worth addressing.

C. Defining the research object The overall objective of the present volume is to assess from a comparative perspective what impact, if any, the support offered by professional guilds to members in need had on modern insurance and insurance law. In so doing, the focus on professional guilds needs explanation no less than the concept of guilds needs clarification. Professional associations, especially of merchants and craftsmen, existed since the Middle Ages throughout Europe. The term ‘professional’ is in the present volume thus not used in a modern, narrow meaning to include only medical doctors, lawyers, architects and the like. It is used to refer to all occupations. In the English language, such professional associations are simply termed guilds. In the German language, an association of merchants is today referred to as a Gilde; an association of master craftsmen is termed a Zunft.20 This distinction ___________ 17 See, e.g., Wallis, p. 101, below; Sunnqvist, p. 124, below; Deroussin, p. 156, below; Gazzini, pp. 173 ff., below. See, however, recently Marco H.D. van Leeuwen, Mutual Insurance 1550–2015. From Guild Welfare and Friendly Societies to Contemporary MicroInsurers (2016). 18 Heirbaut, p. 23, below. See for Italy Gazzini, pp. 173 ff., below. 19 Pokoj, p. 224, below. 20 See Ruth Schmidt-Wiegand, Die Bezeichnung Zunft und Gilde in ihrem historischen und wortgeographischen Zusammenhang, in: Schwinekörper (n. 14), 31–52; idem, Zeche, in: Erler (n. 2), vol. 5 (1998), 1627; Karl Kroeschell and Albrecht Cordes, Einung, in: Cordes (n. 8), vol. 1 (2nd edn., 2008), 1306–1309; Rudolf Luther, Innung, in: Erler (n. 2), vol. 2 (1978), 368–370; P. Spieß, Kaufmannsgilde, in: Erler (n. 2), vol. 2 (1978), 687– 694; Brand (n. 14), 1792; Schulz (n. 14), 687; Franz Irsigler, Zur Problematik der Gild-

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which is drawn in modern language is only partly reflected in the use of these terms in primary sources. Furthermore, a professional association was at times, and depending on local usage, also called an Innung, Einung, Amt, Zeche, or Gaffel. These terms were used in a variety of contexts with different connotations. Furthermore, the term Gilde is used beyond the context of professional associations. Fire guilds (Brandgilden), for example, were established in order to offer mutual help in cases of damage suffered by fire.21 They were often founded in rural neighbourhoods or villages, and they were not restricted to members of a specific profession. And marksmen’s guilds (Schützengilden) had developed into associations for the purpose of defending villages or towns.22 In addition, Germany saw Bruderschaften (confraternities).23 They often served religious and charitable purposes. However, there are certain connections of such confraternities with professional guilds: most importantly, those who were organized in professional guilds would often additionally form confraternities for religious or charitable purposes. Finally, there were Knappschaften. These were nothing other than miners’ guilds. In Germany, guilds thus had a variety of names, and there seem to be no clear-cut definitions of these different terms. Their use varied regionally, and their meaning developed over time. And different forms of associations often coexisted side by side or were even linked to each other. The authors of the different chapters collected in the present volume point to a similar variety of names and a similar diversity of forms of professional associations in other European countries. And in some European countries, it seems to have been the confraternities, which were linked to professional guilds, and not the guild itself which offered support to members in need.24 In Germany, guilds were poly-functional associations.25 Professional guilds regulated all aspects of the respective market. They served religious, charitable, and social functions. And they organized mutual support for members in need. With some guilds the latter aspect was the primary function which they served, ___________ und Zunftterminologie, in: Schwinekörper (n. 14), 53–70; Kluge (n. 14), 21–34; von Heusinger (n. 14), 47–49; Gerhard Dilcher, Die genossenschaftliche Struktur von Gilden und Zünften, in: Schwinekörper (n. 14), 71–111; Wissell, vol. 1 (n. 14), 97–106; Wolfgang Hardtwig, Genossenschaft, Sekte, Verein in Deutschland, vol. 1 (1997), 25–33. 21 On the well-researched history of developments in Schleswig-Holstein, see, e.g., Julius Kähler, Die Gilden in den holsteinischen Elbmarschen (1904), passim; Georg Helmer, Die Geschichte der privaten Feuerversicherung in den Herzogtümern Schleswig und Holstein, 2 vol. (1925), passim. 22 On their origins and development, see Theo Reintges, Ursprung und Wesen der spätmittelalterlichen Schützengilden (1963), passim. 23 Frank Theisen, Bruderschaft, in: Cordes (n. 8), vol. 1 (2nd edn., 2008), 686–689. 24 See, e.g., Sunnqvist, p. 123, below; Gazzini, pp. 167 f., below; Nieto Sánchez and López Barahona, pp. 193 ff., below; Pokoj, pp. 217–220, below. 25 On what follows, compare Otto Gerhard Oexle, Genossenschaft, in: Lexikon des Mittelalters, vol. 4 (1989), 1235.

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as was the case with the aforementioned fire guilds. With other guilds the mutual assistance provided to its members was only one of many functions. This was the case with professional guilds. And with some guilds other functions were prevalent. This was the case with the aforementioned marksmen’s guilds. Again in other cases, support was not offered by the professional guild itself, but by a confraternity linked to the guild. In other European countries, guilds were similarly poly-functional associations.26 Nevertheless, some authors in the present volume point to a functional concentration of guilds and confraternities: in some European countries, there was a rather strict division of responsibilities. Professional guilds primarily regulated the respective market, and the confraternities assumed religious and charitable functions as well as the function of supporting members in need.27 German literature claims that all guilds shared two common characteristics: they were formed voluntarily by oath, and they included the obligation to participate in certain social events.28 With respect to professional guilds, this finding needs to be qualified. Professional guilds evolved into compulsory associations. Those who wanted to practice a certain trade could do so only as member of the respective guild. However, the act of joining was voluntary, and it was done by oath. More importantly, it is not workable to define the present volume’s research object on the basis of these two common characteristics and to include all forms of associations which exhibited them. To define the research object of the present volume in such broad terms would probably mean to include every aspect of medieval life. A narrower approach has to be taken: the present volume’s focus is on professional guilds with the term ‘professional’ being used in a wide meaning to include all occupations. Thus, fire guilds will not be included in most chapters, even though they too are of relevance for the history of insurance. They deserve separate treatment. The same holds true for confraternities which existed outside any professional context: they, too, may have had the function of providing mutual support to members in need, but again it is preferable that they receive separate treatment. Nevertheless, some chapters include those professional confraternities which existed side by side with and were linked to professional guilds. Foremost, focusing on professional guilds (and professional confraternities) was necessary in order to manage the wealth of sources. It was essential in order to ensure that the different chapters could be drawn together in a comparative analysis at the end of this volume. And this limitation was sensible as pro___________ 26

See, e.g., Pokoj, pp. 217–220, below. See, e.g., Deroussin, pp. 138–143, below; Nieto Sánchez and López Barahona, p. 196, below. 28 On formation by oath and the obligation to participate in social events, see Otto Gerhard Oexle, Gilde, in: Lexikon des Mittelalters, vol. 4 (1989), 1452; Brand (n. 14), 1793. 27

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fessional guilds developed mostly in a homogenous context: they existed primarily in towns. By contrast, fire guilds developed, at least in Germany, mostly in rural contexts. Nevertheless, in some contributions to the present volume it was necessary to include references to rural contexts.29 The participants of the conference held in February 2018 had discussed further possible restrictions to the present volume’s research object. It would have, for example, been possible to limit the present volume to compulsory professional guilds. However, whereas such a focus would have worked for some chapters, for others it would have been too narrow. Or it would have been possible to focus on professional guilds to the exclusion of professional confraternities. However, such a limitation would have proven problematic for chapters covering those countries where support schemes were mostly run by confraternities which existed alongside professional guilds. Even though professional guilds existed in basically all European countries and even though they exhibited common characteristics across Europe, their development and the development of their support schemes also showed a number of variances which made it impossible to define the present volume’s research object in a narrower way. Furthermore, the participants of the conference in February 2018 had agreed that it was necessary to cover in each chapter both the Middle Ages and the early modern period. Professional guilds were established in the Middle Ages, and in most European countries they were banned in the early modern period or fell into insignificance; if they have had any impact on the development of insurance, this is likely to have occurred in the early modern period. However, it was not possible to define the time frame covered by the different chapters in a narrower fashion. Again, the developments in the countries covered by the individual chapters were different in detail. The participants of the conference agreed that each author would have the freedom to define the time covered in his or her chapter in such a way that was sensible for the country covered in that chapter. Finally, I have asked all authors to include also legal aspects in their chapters because the present volume is part of a project on a comparative history of insurance law in Europe. However, for authors writing on countries in which support offered by professional guilds had no influence whatsoever on the development of insurance (as an institution), the follow-up question as to the influence of legal aspects of guild support on the development of insurance law may have proven simply nonsensical. In the end, the present volume contains only very little law, and one of its conclusions is, thus, that guild support is of only little relevance for the history of insurance law. This finding is also reflected in the title of the present volume. The provisional title was ‘Professional Guilds and the History ___________ 29

See, e.g., Gazzini, pp. 165 ff., below.

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of Insurance Law’. I have decided to drop ‘Law’ as the provisional title would raise expectations which the volume would not be able to meet.

D. Methodological problems Modern research on the history of guilds has to cope with a number of methodological problems, and the contributors to the present volume had to face these problems, too. On the one hand, there is a wealth of archival sources. Especially guild statutes have survived. In many European countries they have been edited and published. However, these preserved guild statutes primarily address questions concerning the guilds’ market-regulating functions. By contrast, the support offered by guilds to members in need is only rarely regulated in guild statutes. This makes it hard to assess the practical importance of formalized forms of support. On the other hand, many primary sources have been lost and, thus, it may be that certain information on the history of guilds has not survived. This is often the case for guilds’ accounting records, an important source in reconstructing the practical relevance of guild support. However, they may only evidence forms of informal support, which are less important for a legal historian. Furthermore, it is difficult to interpret a small number of guild statutes and guild accounts in such a way that they reflect a uniform practice among guilds: even though the different guilds and guild statutes share common features and characteristic elements, there are variations and differences. In all, modern research on guilds remains for many research questions simply speculative.30 Secondly, the concept of insurance needs some reflection.31 After all, the overall objective of the present volume is to assess from a comparative perspective what impact, if any, the support offered by professional guilds to members in need had on modern insurance and insurance law. Modern definitions of insurance are nevertheless inapt as a point of reference for a historical analysis. Such modern definitions are themselves the product of a long historical development, and they may prove too narrow to categorize historical phenomena. Furthermore, modern concepts of insurance usually define either the sphere of private insurance or that of social insurance. However, at least the German state of research suggests an impact of guild support on both private insurance and social insurance. The difficulties in finding a concept of insurance that is apt for analysing a historical phenomenon such as guild support raises the question whether one should perhaps simply refrain from applying the concept of insurance in the present volume. However, then it would be simply impossible to test the narratives ___________ 30 On these problems for the different countries covered in this volume, see, e.g., Heirbaut, pp. 26 ff., below; Prak, p. 56, below; Wallis, pp. 102 ff., below; Deroussin, p. 137, below. 31 See Phillip Hellwege, Introduction, in: idem (n. 1), 9–26, 25 f.

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found in modern literature. The approach taken in the present volume to address this problem is as follows: there are a number of elements found in modern definitions on insurance. The authors were asked to point out which of these elements are met by guild support as found in primary sources and whether it is thus possible to describe guild support in terms of insurance. Finally, the different chapters had to be put into an order that makes sense. Having read all the entries, I conceived of a variety of possibilities of how to arrange the different chapters. At the end of the day, I have decided to follow a simple order by locality, starting in the centre (Belgium), first moving northwards (Northern Netherlands, Germany, England, and Scandinavia), then moving southwards (France, Italy, and Spain), and finally moving eastwards (Poland and Hungary).

Chapter 2: Mutual Aid in the Craft Guilds of the Late Medieval and Early Modern Southern Netherlands (Belgium) By Dirk Heirbaut* A. Introduction: a historiographical gap ........................................................................ 21 B. The diversity of guild solidarity ............................................................................... 26 C. Guild solidarity as a mark of social status ................................................................ 29 D. Sources of revenue ................................................................................................... 32 E. Allowances and other forms of mutual aid ............................................................... 36 F. Guild solidarity and religion ..................................................................................... 41 G. Conclusion ................................................................................................................ 45

A. Introduction: a historiographical gap Craft guilds1 played an important role in the history of the Southern Low Countries.2 After the victory of Flemish city militias in the Battle of Courtrai (1302), they gained political power in many cities and their economic dominance endured until the armies of the French Revolution swept away the old regime in the Habsburg Low Countries. Their economic role is well-known. Craft guilds had a local monopoly in their sector and in return guaranteed that customers ___________ * This article reiterates, elaborates and corrects the findings of an earlier article in Dutch: Dirk Heirbaut, Een onbekende voorloper van onze sociale zekerheid: de mutualiteiten van de ambachten, in: Rogier De Corte et al. (eds.), De taal is gans het recht. Liber amicorum Willy van Eeckhoutte (2018), 575–601. I would like to thank the participants in the Augsburg workshop on guild solidarity for their remarks and Gerard Sinnaeve, Stefan Huygebaert and Maarten Vankeersbilck for revising my text. 1 By ‘guild’ this article always means ‘craft guild’. For the terminology in French, see Deroussin, p. 136, below. The terminology in Dutch in the Southern Netherlands mirrored French terminology – confrérie (confraternity) = gilde or broederschap; métier (craft guild) = ambacht – and was not the same as the Dutch terminology in the Northern Netherlands: Carlos Wyffels, De oorsprong der ambachten in Vlaanderen en Brabant (1951), 125 f., especially n. 14. 2 On the history of craft guilds in the Southern Low Countries, see Catharina Lis and Hugo Soly (eds.), Werken volgens de regels. Ambachten in Brabant en Vlaanderen 1500– 1800 (1994); Catharina Lis and Hugo Soly (eds.), Werelden van verschil. Ambachtsgilden in de Lage Landen (1997); Sandra Bos, A tradition of giving and receiving: mutual aid within the guild system, in: Maarten Prak et al. (eds.), Craft guilds in the early modern Low Countries. Work, power and representation (2006), 174–193; Bert De Munck, Guilds, labour and the urban body politic. Fabricating community in the Southern Netherlands. 1300–1800 (2018).

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would receive a product of quality. One way of ensuring this was the hierarchical organisation of the craft guild. Newcomers started as apprentices, became journeymen after some time and could finally ascend to the level of master. Over time, the social mobility within the craft guild broke down and masters tried to reserve entry to the most powerful level of the profession to their own children. An extreme example was the Ghent butchers. Although Ghent was by the end of the 18th century one of the biggest cities of the Habsburg Netherlands, its master butchers came from only four families.3 This and other dysfunctions of the system help to explain why the authorities tried to curb the craft guilds’ stranglehold on the economy. Whereas the Habsburg emperor Joseph II failed to do so,4 the French succeeded in abolishing the craft guilds completely with the 1791 Décret d’Allarde, which outlawed coalitions. An infrequently identified victim was the mutual aid of the craft guilds, which generally disappeared together with the guilds themselves. Moreover, the Loi Le Chapelier forbade new professional organisations.5 Nevertheless, in a few cases, associations of mutual assistance survived and in Bruges, some of them even made it into the 20th century.6 A few mutual aid mechanisms, like boxes of journeyman hatters, also survived,7 and they were seen as the first small unions and as strike and mutual aid funds in the 19th century,8 but historical research did not notice that instead of being the first heralds of a new age, they were rather the last relics of the pre-revolutionary past. Thus, there is a link between today’s social security and trade unions on the one hand and the mutual aid of the craft guilds on the other. Nevertheless, it should not be exaggerated. Strike funds and mutual aid associations in the 19th century were most prominent in big factories9 that had nothing to do with the world of the old craft guilds. ___________ 3 Hans Van Werveke, De Gentse vleeshouwers onder het Oud Regime, (1948) Handelingen der maatschappij voor geschiedenis en oudheidkunde te Gent 3–32. 4 Catharina Lis and Hugo Soly, ‘An irresistible phalanx’: journeymen associations in Western Europe, 1300–1800, in: Catharina Lis et al. (eds.), Before the unions. Wage earners and collective action in Europe, 1300–1850, (1994) 39 International review of social history. Supplement II, 11–52, 48. 5 Dirk Heirbaut, Een beknopte geschiedenis van het sociaal, het economisch en het fiscaal recht in België (2013), 29 f., 59. 6 Emiel Huys, Duizend jaar mutualiteit bij de Vlaamsche gilden (1926), 63–66, 106. 7 Lis and Soly (n. 4), 48. 8 Ben-Serge Chlepner, Cent ans d’histoire sociale en Belgique (1956), 28. 9 Cf. Kathlijn Pittomvills, De Gentse maatschappijen van onderlinge bijstand in de eerste helft van de negentiende eeuw. Solidariteit, staking en segmentering?, (1994–1995) Belgisch tijdschrift voor nieuwste geschiedenis 444–457. See also Peter Heyrman, Joris Colla and Noortje Lambrichts, De sociale zekerheid der zelfstandigen in België, 1937– 2017. Solidariteit en verantwoordelijkheid (2017), 31–35; Karel-Peter Companje, R.H.M. Hendriks, Karel Veraghtert and Brigitte Widdershoven, Two centuries of solidarity. German, Belgian and Dutch social health insurance 1770–2008 (2009), 33–35, 40–42, 45–50.

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In spite of guild solidarity’s importance as an ancestor of today’s social security, research has largely ignored guilds. Handbooks for jurists on either insurance law or social security law completely ignore mutual aid within the craft guilds,10 whereas historians are aware of it, but have remained largely indifferent. In part, this is related to the interest in the general history of craft guilds. In late 19th- and early 20th-century Belgium, craft guilds enjoyed some popularity in historical research, in part because of their link with the glorious past of some major cities. Unfortunately, that also made the craft guild attractive to adherents of a new order in the interbellum era. This corporatist movement disappeared after World War II, and the study of the old craft guilds was a victim of its demise.11 Only in the late 20th century did a revival arrive, to a large extent due to Catharina Lis, Hugo Soly and their students,12 but the focus so far has not been on the social role of the guilds,13 for which the literature is rather meagre. Studies on craft guilds may in passing mention their mutual assistance. Unfortunately, the most informative of the general books on craft guilds is Guillaume Des Marez’s study of the Brussels craft guilds during the 15th century, which is more than a century old.14 There are also publications on the history of hospitals and poor relief, which may, in passing, deal with the hospices of craft guilds,15 but the latter were less important than the allowances given as mutual aid. There are only a few studies focusing solely on the craft guilds’ mutual aid, such as a 1995 licentiate’s thesis by Cia Willem on mutual aid in the Ghent craft guilds during the 18th century, supervised by Soly.16 Taking into account that this is a student’s work and that its author had first started on another topic, this is an admirable text, and its reader can only lament that Willem did not follow up her research with a PhD. There is also an article by Hadewijch Masure on boxes for poorer guild members in the duchy of Brabant, in particular Mechelen, Brussels and Antwerp, from ___________ 10

See e.g. Marcel Fontaine, Verzekeringsrecht (2011), 29–33. Catharina Lis and Hugo Soly, Inleiding, in: idem (eds.), Werken volgens de regels (n. 2), 7. 12 Johan Dambruyne, Corporatieve middengroepen: aspiraties, relaties en transformaties in de 16de-eeuwse ambachtswereld (2002); Harald Deceulaer, Pluriforme patronen en een verschillende snit. Sociaal-economische, institutionele en culturele transformaties in de kledingsector in Antwerpen, Brussel en Gent, ca. 1585 – ca. 1800 (2001). 13 This may, of course, change, e.g. with the publication of Bert De Munck, Guilds, labour and the urban body politic: fabricating community in the Southern Netherlands, 1300–1800 (2017). 14 Guillaume Des Marez, L’organisation du travail à Bruxelles au XVe siècle (1904). 15 Thibault Jacobs, Des hôpitaux de métiers à Bruxelles? Nouvelles perspectives sur la charité et la bienfaisance en milieu urbain à la fin du Moyen Age, (2013) Belgisch tijdschrift voor filologie en geschiedenis 215–255; A.M. De Vocht, Het Gentse antwoord op de armoede: de sociale instellingen van wevers en volders te Gent in de middeleeuwen, (1982) Annalen van de Belgische vereniging voor hospitaalgeschiedenis 3–32. 16 Cia Willem, Ambachtelijke zekerheid. Sociale voorzieningen bij negen ambachten in het achttiende-eeuwse Gent (1995; unpublished licenciate’s thesis Ghent University). 11

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1250 until 1600.17 Masure’s research has the great advantage that it tries to explain guild solidarity and its evolution in the broader context of poor relief in general and one can only eagerly await the publication of her doctoral thesis on poor relief and community building in the Southern Low Countries from 1300 to 1600. The third Belgian study on social insurance within the craft guilds has less to recommend it, even though it is the most comprehensive study so far. In 1926 Emiel Huys, a local historian from Western Flanders,18 published a book on 1,000 years of mutual aid in Flemish craft guilds.19 The title itself is already an exaggeration, but Huys may be forgiven for tracing some origins back to the centuries before the craft guilds came into existence. More worrying is the general spirit of amateurism that pervades Huys’s book. Although his biographer was full of sympathy for Huys, he still describes him as ‘rather strongly prejudiced and sometimes too hasty in his conclusions’.20 The 1926 book shows this abundantly. Huys prefers to be pointillistic and does not generalise much. If he does, he is a man with a mission and a message: whereas in his own time solidarity is lacking, the old craft guilds were models of mutual aid. Thus, Huys shows himself to be a cheerleader praising the mutual aid of the old craft guilds. He literally writes: ‘Let us cheer the craft guilds’.21 Huys thereby sorely underestimated the efforts of Belgium’s embryonic social security in his own time. The real breakthrough of social security in Belgium would arrive only in 1944, but even earlier achievements, like the statutory pension acts of 1924 and 1925, had a much larger scope than the mutual aid of the craft guilds.22 This mattered little to Huys, who sorely wanted to make the point that the mutual aid of the craft guilds was a model of Christian charity. In the end, Huys was not so much interested in the history of social insurance and social security, but in proving its Christian origins. As we will show, this led him to miss the point on some crucial issues. Nevertheless, with some exceptions like Willem and Masure, later overviews by Belgian authors of the history of the craft guilds are mostly based on Huys when they deal with mutual aid within the guilds. Another notable exception is a recent book by Bert De Munck on the history of craft guilds in the late medieval and early modern Southern Netherlands. Whereas De Munck did not ___________ 17 Hadewijch Masure, Poor boxes, guild ethic and community building in Brabant, ca. 1250–1600, in: Justin Colson and Arie van Steensel (eds.), Cities and solidarities: urban communities in pre-modern Europe (2017), 115–131. 18 On Huys, see Klaas Maddens, Huys Emiel Louis, in: Nationaal biografisch woordenboek, vol. 3 (1966), 355–357. 19 Huys (n. 6). 20 Maddens (n. 18), 357. 21 ‘Laat ons de ambachten toejuichen’: Huys (n. 6), 63. 22 Heirbaut (n. 5), 60–63, 74 f.

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use any new material and only writes a few pages on guild solidarity, his extensive knowledge of the comparative literature helps in providing a broader perspective.23 There is no good study yet of mutual aid within the craft guilds of the Southern Low Countries, nor can international literature remedy this gap. General works on the history of insurance have wrongly interpreted the material from the Southern Low Countries24 and this also applies to Dieter Schewe’s overview of the history of social and private insurance in medieval guilds,25 which would seem to be the most relevant, as other books, like Fröhlich’s work on Germany,26 focus mostly on one country. Schewe writes a few pages on the county of Flanders, one of the principalities of the Southern Low Countries, which are full of statements unwarranted by the sources.27 However, there is a short, though insightful, article by Sandra Bos which compares the mutuals of the craft guilds in the Southern (today’s Belgium) and Northern Netherlands (today’s Netherlands).28 Ironically, what to Huys was the great strength of the craft guilds in the Southern Low Countries turns out to be their greatest weakness in Bos’s analysis. Instead of being the great driving force of mutual aid within the craft guilds of the Southern Low Countries, religion was actually its major obstacle. Unlike their Calvinist brethren in the North, the craft guilds in the South lavished so much money on churches, altars, processions and religious feasts that less was left for solidarity with guild members in need.29 In short, there are many good reasons for an in-depth study of the history of solidarity within the old craft guilds of the Southern Netherlands. This small contribution, however, cannot serve as such. It can only explore some of the issues, such as the role religion played, and hope that this will serve as call for further research on this topic. Essential for this exploratory study is that both Willem30 ___________ 23

De Munck (n. 2), 252–264. See on this point Dirk Heirbaut, Belgium. Non-marine insurance, in: Phillip Hellwege (ed.), A Comparative History of Insurance Law in Europe. A Research Agenda (2018), 89–110. 25 Dieter Schewe, Geschichte der sozialen und privaten Versicherung im Mittelalter in den Gilden Europas (2000), 66–73. 26 Sigrid Fröhlich, Die soziale Sicherung bei Zünften und Gesellenverbänden. Darstellung, Analyse, Vergleich (1976). 27 Schewe (n. 25), 66–73. In so far as research has been consulted, this is almost limited to Leopold-August Warnkönig’s work on Flemish institutions, which dates from the first half of the 19th century. 28 Bos (n. 2), 174–193. See also her PhD on guild solidarity in the Northern Netherlands: idem, Uyt liefde tot malcander: onderlinge hulpverlening binnen de Noord-Nederlandse gilden in internationaal perspectief (1570–1820) (1998). 29 Bos (n. 2), 189. 30 Henceforth quoted as: WS (Willem, Sources). 24

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and Huys31 supplemented their main text with an edition of sources. In the case of the latter work, the edition of sources, which has a separate numbering, is far more extensive than the main text and enables us to read his sources unbiasedly.

B. The diversity of guild solidarity A major problem for research on mutual aid within the craft guilds is that sources are lacking. In earlier periods or in smaller guilds, a lot of solidarity was informal, and even in more organised guilds it could happen that a destitute guild member received handouts from his brethren or that he or his widow and children were hired for odd jobs to tide them over a hard period. Even if aid was more formal, the guild may not have deemed it necessary to document it or – when documentation existed – to preserve the latter for eternity. In short, many mutual aid activities have not left traces to the present day. In some cases, we can see the tip of the iceberg. For example, around 1460 the stonecutters in Brussels asked the city authorities to confirm their mutual aid system, their box. The box already existed before the city authorities intervened, but it had some trouble functioning, as some guild members refused to contribute to it. Therefore, the city authorities had to step in at the request of the contributing members.32 If it was not for this conflict, we would have remained unaware of the existence of mutual aid amongst the Brussels stonecutters in the 15th century. Guild members may not always have been keen on making their arrangements public, as official recognition also meant that recalcitrant guild members could go to court,33 and therefore we can only wonder how many activities of guild solidarity remain under our radar. In the 13th and 14th centuries, craft guilds and the local city government could be bitter enemies.34 If guilds did not exist, or were not officially recognised, a religious confraternity sometimes helped poorer craftsmen,35 but this seems to have been the exception as most confraternities were not involved in poor relief.36 The coffers of recognised guilds helped both members who could no longer work due to illness or old age, as well as those who had taken part in political unrest and thereby had lost their business.37 This kind of ‘rebellion fund’ was a thorn in ___________ 31

Henceforth quoted as: HS (Huys, Sources). HS, no. 121, 265 (Brussels, stonecutters, 1458–1466). 33 See, e.g., HS, no. 165, 363–369 (Brussels, carpenters, 1749). 34 See on this De Munck (n. 2), 29–72. 35 Masure (n. 17), 122. 36 Paul Trio, Volksreligie als spiegel van een stedelijke samenleving. De broederschappen in Gent in de late middeleeuwen (1993), 267 f., 312–314. 37 On the power struggles between craft guilds and patricians in Flanders during the late Middle Ages, see e.g. Jan Dumolyn and Milan Pajic, Enemies of the count and the 32

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the side of local and central authorities, and wise guilds made sure that they could not seize their money.38 From around 1400 things changed.39 As far as confraternities were involved in aid to poor guild members, their role declined, whereas the guilds stepped up their efforts. Previously, guilds had made no distinction between their other financial activities and their mutual aid. Henceforth, the guilds’ mutual aid schemes started to have separate boxes, with their own special administrators and regulations.40 This as well should not be exaggerated, as until their abolition by the French Revolution, some guilds still lacked a distinct box. The authorities had less trouble in giving the boxes their blessing. Their activities meant less demand for the city’s poor relief,41 and chances were greater that a specialised box’s funds would not be diverted to financing political unrest. The authorities could amend box regulations, allowing them to control the nomination of the box’s official and/or the audit of its accounts.42 The authorities could also remove clauses they did not like, as happened in 1560 with the box of the labourers of Our Lady at the Old Mill Bridge.43 In an extreme case, the authorities could abolish a box. After a Ghent revolt, the Emperor Charles V confiscated all the possessions of the local guilds. However, this also meant that guild members now had to turn to the city’s poor relief, which very soon became overburdened. The emperor had to relent. The guilds recovered some of their goods, so that they could take care of their members in need.44 In the 17th and 18th centuries ordinary mutual aid posed less of a problem, but in many sectors journeymen had their own boxes, which funded collective action.45 Even taking into account the gaps in our documentation, there is no doubt that mutual aid within the guilds took all kinds of forms. In some guilds the members could at best only fall back on the spontaneous help of friends and family, whereas others had a hospice for elderly guild members and a whole array of allowances for destitute colleagues. There was no common policy. Guilds establishing their mutual aid could refer to the regulations of other guilds within the same city,46 but generally they did not see these as models to be copied slavishly. ___________ city. The collective exile of rebels in fourteenth-century Flanders, (2016) Legal history review/Tijdschrift voor rechtsgeschiedenis 461–501. 38 Wyffels (n. 1), 97–99. 39 This article does not deal with the complex factors behind this change. An excellent analysis thereof can be found in Masure (n. 17), 115–131. 40 See e.g. HS, no. 4, 11 (Antwerp, carpenters, 1493). 41 Cf. HS, no. 51, 109 (Antwerp, lumber men, 1618). 42 E.g. HS, no. 172, 381 (Leuven, bakers, 1452). 43 HS, no. 99, 193 (Bruges, labourers of Our Lady at the Old Mill Bridge, 1560). 44 Dambruyne (n. 12), 143. 45 See p. 28, below. 46 E.g. HS, no. 47, 105 (Antwerp, law practitioners and lawyers, 1584).

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Only exceptionally, the authors of new box regulations would expressly refer to an example in another city, as in 1621 when the Brussels journeymen hatters referred to Antwerp regulations from ten years earlier.47 This lack of dominant models enabled each guild to establish a system tailored to its need and finances, but it also led to an enormous diversity. Geographically, there may be some difference, with Brabant craft guilds having more elaborate systems than their Flemish counterparts, the restricted nature of the latter being in part due to the interference of the authorities who deemed some measures unnecessary.48 Research so far has focused almost exclusively on Flanders and Brabant, but these two regions dominated economic life anyway. A special case, however, is Liège. Now a part of Belgium, it did not belong to the Habsburg Netherlands. Guild solidarity in Liège remains unstudied, and it is not clear whether its direct dependence on the Holy Roman Empire and its status as an ecclesiastical principality made a difference.49 Chronological evolutions compounded geographical and professional diversity. In general, it seems that there was an evolution towards more elaborate systems, but there could also be setbacks because a guild was no longer able to finance its mutual aid. Another tendency reflected a general evolution within the guilds. The masters tried to reserve the benefits of mutual aid for their own group. No regulations foresaw help for apprentices, whose training fees nevertheless might finance the box,50 but an apprentice ascended after a few years to the status of a journeyman anyway. Originally journeymen seem to have enjoyed the same rights as masters,51 but from the 16th century onwards the masters excluded the journeymen from guild solidarity.52 At the same time, the masters also started to place more barriers in the way of journeymen who wanted to become masters but who did not belong to an established family of masters, for example by demanding higher entrance fees.53 Journeymen retaliated by establishing their own boxes without interference from the masters.54 During the 16th century, the journeymen boxes functioned only as instruments of journeymen solidarity. In the 17th and 18th centuries, they also served as strike funds. An exceptional case were the journeyman ___________ 47

HS, no. 157, 341 f. (Brussels, journeymen hatters, 1621). E.g. HS, no. 99, 193 (Bruges, labourers of Our Lady at the Mill Bridge, 1560). 49 Emilie Toussaint, Métiers, in: Sébastien Dubois et al. (eds.), Les institutions publiques de la principauté de Liège (980–1794) (2012), 846–867. 50 HS, no. 15, 41 (Antwerp, tailors, 1691). 51 E.g. HS, no. 138, 303 (Brussels, glove makers, 1467). 52 Masure (n. 17), 132. 53 Thus, the box of the Antwerp silk workers both excluded journeymen and demanded a higher entrance fee if a newcomer was not the son of a master: HS, no. 41, 94 (Antwerp, silk workers, 1588). 54 E.g. HS, no. 120, 264 (Brussels, journeymen tailors, 1684). 48

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hatters.55 The administrators of their boxes had a far-reaching power. They could effectively bar a journeyman from the profession, even in other cities, thanks to the exchange of letters56 and documents. Masters could not hire a journeyman hatter unless the latter could present a document on his previous employment, signed by the box master.57 This interesting practice can be seen as a precursor of Napoleon’s livret, a workbook which authorities and employers used to track labourers.58

C. Guild solidarity as a mark of social status Whatever the extent of mutual aid within a craft guild, a common element was the exclusion of outsiders. Only members could enjoy the benefits of guild solidarity and free riders were not allowed. Thus, in principle guilds awarded allowances only to members who had faithfully paid their dues for guild aid.59 A few regulations seem to be milder. They allowed their members to pay with some delay, and in some cases, the destitute guild member could still receive an allowance, if he first made good on his arrears.60 It is doubtful that this went beyond theory, given that such guild members in all likelihood may not have had the financial reserves to settle their debts towards the box. As this indicates, guild solidarity was like an insurance for which one had to pay premiums. This meant that it helped only the moderately well-to-do craftsman who could afford to set aside some money for bad times. If he could not work due to illness or an accident, the guild allowance helped him, but it was understood that he had money of his own. The guild allowance was not so high that it covered the loss of income completely. Calculations for Antwerp show that in the late 15th century journeymen masons received only a day’s wages for a week. In the next century that would even drop to only a third.61 Thus, the guild allowance was not at all a replacement income, but only an additional and provisional allowance. As soon as the craftsman could work again, the allowance ___________ 55 Catharina Lis and Hugo Soly, De macht van ‘vrije arbeiders’: collectieve acties van hoedenmakergezellen in de Zuidelijke Nederlanden (zestiende-negentiende eeuw), in: Lis and Soly, Werken volgens de regels (n. 2), 15–50. 56 ‘eene soete harmonie van mutuele correspondentie’ (‘a sweet harmony of mutual correspondence’) (HS, no. 157, 347 (Brussels, journeymen hatters, 1683)). 57 HS, no. 157, 345 (Brussels, journeymen hatters, 1621). 58 Jeff Horn, The path not taken. French industrialization in the Age of Revolution (2006), 250. 59 E.g. HS, no. 9, 26 (Antwerp, masons, 1581). 60 E.g. HS, no. 111, 229 (Brussels, butchers, 1482–1495). 61 Etienne Scholliers, Loonarbeid en honger. De levensstandaard in de XVe en XVIe eeuw te Antwerpen (1960), 100, 193–195.

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stopped,62 and many regulations even stipulated a maximum period of support,63 though in others poorer brethren could receive aid for years.64 Guild solidarity was meant for craftsmen who could recover, not for those who were definitely on the way down. For those who had only temporarily fallen upon hard times, mutual aid helped them to keep up a good appearance and guaranteed that they were still better off than outsiders.65 However, its impact went beyond the individual craftsman and his family. By helping its members in need, the guild also saved its own face. Its members did not have to demean themselves by begging for alms on the street. Consequently, regulations were very strict against begging craftsmen. They immediately lost their allowance.66 If they no longer had enough means of their own to survive with the guild’s meagre allowance, they were on their own after all. Mutual aid by allowances was only a provisional measure, and not one meant for the truly poor. As such, guild solidarity fit perfectly with public charity in medieval and early modern cities.67 Like public charity, guild solidarity was meant only for the so-called ‘shamefaced poor’, members of the middle classes who only temporarily had to cope with trouble and were expected to get back on their own feet.68 In this context, it is hard to join the praise of Huys for the old guild solidarity. It did not help the people who would have needed it the most, instead serving only to preserve the social status of the individual and his guild in the face of temporary adversity. Because of the link with the guild and the individual’s prestige, regulations disfavoured craftsmen who were adulterous,69 did not respect religious rules,70 drank, gambled,71 frequented whorehouses72 or fought.73 If anything, access to the guild hospices was even more narrowly reserved for better off craftsmen who would not bring their guild to shame. A craftsman who ___________ 62

E.g. HS, no. 1, 3 (Antwerp, heavers, 1457). HS, no. 98, 190 (Bruges, beer transporters, 1645). 64 E.g. HS, no. 167, 372 (Brussels, bakers, 1623), where a guild member had already been receiving aid for eight years. 65 Cf. e.g. HS, no. 1, 3 (Antwerp, heavers, 1457). 66 E.g. HS, no. 147, 327 (Brussels, fullers, 1478). 67 Hadewijch Masure, ‘Eerlycke huisarmen’ of ‘ledichgangers’? Armenzorg en gemeenschapsvorming in Brussel, 1300–1640, (2012) Stadsgeschiedenis 1–21; Jelle Haemers and Wouter Ryckbosch, A targeted public: public services in fifteenth-century Ghent and Bruges, (2010) Stadsgeschiedenis 203–225. 68 On this terminology, see Katherine Lynch, Individuals, families and communities in Europe, 1200–1800. The urban foundations of Western society (2003), 104 f. 69 E.g. HS, no. 121, 267 (Brussels, stonecutters, 1458–1466). 70 E.g. HS, no. 139, 311 (Brussels, barbers, 1467). 71 E.g. HS, no. 129, 285 (Brussels, knife-makers, 1462). 72 E.g. HS, no. 28, 70 f. (Antwerp, second-hand-clothes vendors, 1556). 73 E.g. HS, no. 61, 126 (Antwerp, labourers Werf and Bierhoofd, 1668). 63

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became permanently unable to work could move into a guild hospice which would offer him lodging, heating, clothes, meals, pensions, care and other services.74 The first of these hospices had appeared already in the 13th century,75 but only richer guilds in bigger cities could afford them,76 though smaller guilds could have a few houses for their elderly members.77 Their guests were generally elderly people, sometimes disabled younger people,78 and only very exceptionally a lunatic.79 Primary sources call the hospice’s guests ‘poor’,80 but that term should not be taken at face-value, as only a very small group could afford to go to a hospice. In return for its services, most hospices required a new guest to hand over all of his possessions.81 As the number of places was limited and waiting lists existed,82 guild hospices could afford to be selective. They allowed only masters,83 and the hospice checked a candidate’s financial status and health before accepting him,84 which means that only masters of some means were welcome. Hospice and guest concluded what can be considered a contract of chance. The hospice hoped that the guest would die soon, so that someone else could take his place, whereas the guest hoped to survive for a long time. The hospice may have had the upper hand here. Waiting lists meant that newcomers would already have reached an old age, and the health check would eliminate those who could hope to survive for many years. Once again, the hospice’s pensioners served as ambassadors of their guild. They wore a special uniform, and regulations forbade them from demeaning it by selling it,85 begging or disturbing order. In those cases, the hospice could either temporarily or permanently deny care to a pensioner.86 These were very harsh measures, as the latter was now on his own again, but without his fortune. In short, guild solidarity at times was very far removed from Christian charity, which Huys saw as its origin and inspiration.

___________ 74

See e.g. WS, no. 7, 4 (Ghent, tick weavers, 1571). Wyffels (n. 1), 133. 76 Cf. Masure (n. 17), 119. 77 E.g. HS, no. 95, 187 (Bruges, tailors, 1512). 78 E.g. HS, no. 84, 171 (Bruges, boatmen, 1415). 79 HS, no. 115, 242 (Brussels, vendors, 1468). 80 E.g. WS, no. 7, 3 (Ghent, tick weavers, 1571). 81 E.g. WS, no. 8, 185 (Ghent, tick weavers, 1575–1576). 82 E.g. HS, no. 26, 59 (Antwerp, vendors, 1556). 83 E.g. HS, no. 26, 59 (Antwerp, vendors, 1556). 84 WS, no. 8, 183 (Ghent, tick weavers, 1575–1576). 85 WS, no. 8, 182 (Ghent, tick weavers, 1571). 86 E.g. WS, no. 12, 194 (Ghent, boatmen, 1653). 75

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D. Sources of revenue As is to be expected, the main challenge for guild solidarity was getting enough funding. At first, this was a problem of the guild as such, because its general revenue paid for mutual aid.87 When boxes appeared, it becomes easier to segregate the box’s revenue from other sources of income for the guild. The box regulations clearly indicate its sources of revenue. Nevertheless, the distinction between box and guild revenue could be fluid at times. If the box encountered financial difficulties, it could receive additional funding from the guild.88 On the other hand, when the guild itself needed money, it sometimes reached into the box.89 The latter was not that hard to achieve, if the administrators of the box, the box masters, also had other functions in the guild. Hence, some box regulations decreed that box masters could hold no other function in the guild.90 Even in these cases, it is not clear whether the box had a distinct legal personality. Craftsmen did not bother and contemporary jurists, who themselves had not yet a well-developed concept of legal personality, were not interested in this issue. A traditional source of income for the box were payments, which originally had gone to the guild, but which the latter had transferred to the box, e.g. the entrance fees of new masters,91 tuition fees of apprentices,92 and fines for disturbing order within the guild.93 In general, increases in entrance and tuition fees fell completely into the box.94 With fines the situation could be different. A popular partition scheme awarded a share to the city authorities, another to the prince and left only a third for the box.95 Membership dues brought another stream of revenue into the box.96 Normally all members paid the same amount, with a progressive tariff occurring only very exceptionally. In 1463 the regulations of the Brussels glove makers stated that craftsmen with only a small business and no additional income from rents had to pay only half of the ordinary membership dues.97 Six years later, this milder regime for the poorer glove makers had already

___________ 87

Wyffels (n. 1), 97–99. E.g. HS, no. 9, 22 f. (Antwerp, masons, 1581). 89 Cf. HS, no. 143, 320 (Brussels, barbers and surgeons, 1779). 90 HS, no. 123, 288 (Brussels, second-hand-clothes vendors, this clause dates after 1463). 91 E.g. HS, no. 14, 39 (Antwerp, tailors, 1557). 92 E.g. HS, no. 15, 41 (Antwerp, tailors, 1691). 93 E.g. HS, no. 101, 200 (Bruges, journeymen carpenters, 1753). 94 E.g. HS, no. 14, 39 (Antwerp, tailors, 1557). 95 E.g. WS, no. 1, 172 (Ghent, bakers, 1541). 96 E.g. HS, no. 44, 101 (Antwerp, linen weavers, 1581). 97 HS, no. 135, 298 (Brussels, glove makers, 1463). 88

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disappeared.98 The box had many other sources of revenue, like gifts and bequests.99 If a box ran a surplus, it could invest in rents, which ensured a steady though, on account of inflation, progressively declining source or revenue.100 Hospices could count on their original endowment and thereafter on the goods that their pensioners had ceded at entry as well as on gifts and bequests.101 As may be expected, the eagerness to enjoy a box’s benefits surpassed the willingness to pay contributions. A box could be either obligatory102 or free.103 If the latter, the freedom did not only mean that a guild member could decide whether or not to become a member, but also whether he remained one. The regulations of free boxes tried to prevent the latter by stipulating that all previously paid contributions would remain in the box.104 Sometimes they also charged an exit fee.105 Obligatory boxes had an advantage in that they did not have the problem of members withdrawing, but before such a box could be established, opponents had to be convinced. One way of doing so was by stipulating that the box would be free for guild members at the time of its establishment, whereas for persons who joined the guild thereafter, box membership would be obligatory.106 Collecting membership dues posed many challenges for the administrators of a box. Some boxes imposed upon the members the obligation to bring their contribution to sessions of the box masters,107 others had the box masters or their helpers collect money at the members’ houses.108 Box regulations foresaw varying frequencies for the payment of membership dues, though it seems that weekly payments in many cases only happened at longer intervals.109 Members could insult or injure box masters or their helpers when they tried to collect. Box regulations imposed stiff fines in such cases,110 but this only meant that even more money had to be collected against a member’s will. If the latter refused to pay, the box masters had to make a complaint before the city courts.111 Given the loss ___________ 98

HS, no. 136, 299 f. (Brussels, glove makers, 1469). E.g. HS, no. 28, 67 (Antwerp, second-hand-clothes vendors, 1556). 100 E.g. HS, no. 116, 249 f. (Brussels, vendors, 1473). 101 E.g. HS, no. 116, 252 (Brussels, vendors, 1473). 102 E.g. HS, no. 12, 29 f. (Antwerp, masons, 1750). 103 E.g. HS, no. 123, 270–272 (Brussels, stonecutters, 1483). 104 E.g. HS, no. 12, 30 (Antwerp, masons, 1750). 105 E.g. HS, no. 116, 249 (Brussels, vendors, 1473). 106 E.g. HS, no. 121, 266 (Brussels, stone cutters, 1458–1466). 107 E.g. HS, no. 9, 25 (Antwerp, masons, 1581). 108 HS, no. 121, 268 (Brussels, stone cutters, 1458–1466). 109 Cf. e.g. HS, no. 116, 249 (Brussels, vendors, 1473). 110 E.g. HS, no. 30, 76 (Antwerp, drapers, 1557). 111 E.g. HS, no. 129, 286 (Brussels, knife makers, 1462). 99

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of time and money this entailed, defaulters hoped to escape paying their dues.112 In early modern Antwerp, box masters therefore could ask the city aldermen for a general permit to seize the chattels of defaulting box members.113 The aldermen granted these requests because only small amounts of money were involved and the good functioning of a guild’s box was also in the city’s interest, because it meant less demand on public poor relief.114 A recalcitrant member confronted with seizure by the box masters could go to court,115 but the box masters occupied a better position in this case. Regulations generally declared that defaulters could no longer receive the box’s benefits.116 In addition, the guild could bar them from the profession.117 If the defaulter repented and paid his arrears, box regulations could punish him by imposing a waiting period.118 Obstinate defaulters permanently lost all claims to benefits and nevertheless had to pay the arrears and an additional exit fee.119 This could only enhance the defaulter’s bitterness towards the box. Strange as it may sound, when journeymen boxes appeared, they could more easily collect their dues, at least if masters were willing to cooperate with the box by deducting the membership dues of their journeymen’s wages and paying them into the box.120 In many cases the available sources of revenue were insufficient for financing all expenses. Some guilds, like the Antwerp carpenters in 1493, did not endow their box well at its establishment.121 Seventeen years later the guild already had to find additional revenue for its mutual aid.122 In this case, it may in part be due to the presence of many journeymen of modest means in the guild.123 Even in richer guilds, the box would sooner or later run into trouble due to inflation,124 a sudden rise in the number of guild brothers in need125 or their higher expectations.126 Yet this should not be exaggerated. For example, in 1587–1588 the box ___________ 112

E.g. HS, no. 8, 21 (Antwerp, masons, 1574). E.g. HS, no. 37, 90 (Antwerp, bakers, 1574). 114 HS, no. 51, 109 (Antwerp, lumber men, 1618). 115 Cf. HS, no. 82, 138 f. (Antwerp, painters and glass makers, 1689). 116 E.g. HS, no. 9, 26 (Antwerp, masons, 1581). 117 E.g. HS, no. 17, 48 (Antwerp, cabinet makers, 1507). 118 E.g. HS, no. 139, 311 (Brussels, barbers, 1467). 119 E.g. HS, no. 116, 249 (Brussels, vendors, 1473). 120 E.g. HS, no. 55, 119 (Antwerp, hatters, 1610). 121 HS, no. 4, 9 (Antwerp, carpenters, 1493). 122 HS, no. 5, 11–13 (Antwerp, carpenters, 1510). 123 HS, no. 4, 8 (Antwerp, carpenters, 1493). The reference to poorer guild members was, however, a topos in the documents establishing new boxes: see e.g. HS, no. 2, 4 (Antwerp, corn measurers upon the water, 1470). 124 E.g. HS, no. 9, 22 (Antwerp, masons, 1581). 125 E.g. HS, no. 14, 39 (Antwerp, tailors, 1557). 126 E.g. HS, no. 21, 54 (Antwerp, coopers, 1550–1551). 113

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of the Brussels butchers still ran a surplus,127 and only by 1696–1697 had this become a deficit.128 This means that the box had been able to function for more than a century without encountering the kind of trouble which would have left traces in the sources. Warfare and epidemics were the main unforeseen elements. Wars could lead to more demands on guild solidarity and also to damage to a box’s or hospice’s property,129 or to higher taxes which left not much room for mutual aid.130 Epidemics not only disabled many craftsmen but also made it harder for healthy craftsmen who had to take care of sick family members or who were ordered by the city authorities to close their shop.131 Box’s administrators could increase membership dues when an epidemic struck,132 but this did not help if there were not enough members who remained active. Fraud by the administrators received a good amount of attention in the box regulations. The box masters had to be capable,133 which most of all meant: literate.134 Collegiality was the main guarantee against fraud. Boxes had two box masters who served for two years, with one of them being replaced every year.135 Thus, every year an incoming and an outgoing box master would administer the box. This collegiality sometimes helped to mitigate rising tensions between masters and journeymen, because it allowed both sides to nominate one box master.136 The Brussels glove makers went even further and had two box masters from each group.137 Either the guild members elected the box masters138 or the city authorities appointed them, choosing candidates from a shortlist submitted by the guild.139 Election or appointment as a box master came at a cost. The box master had to put considerable effort in his office and could expect insults or even injury,140 but in most cases he would not be paid.141 There are only a few exceptions, like the box of the Antwerp cabinet makers in 1507.142 Elected or ___________ 127

HS, no. 112, 232, 234 (Brussels, butchers, 1587–1588). HS, no. 113, 235 (Brussels, butchers, 1696–1697). 129 HS, no. 113, 235 (Brussels, butchers, 1696–1697). 130 HS, no. 139, 309 (Brussels, barbers, 1467). 131 HS, no. 28, 71 (Antwerp, second-hand-clothes vendors, 1556). 132 HS, no. 166, 371 (Brussels, carpenters, 1750). 133 HS, no. 6, 14 (Antwerp, carpenters and stone cutters, 1493). 134 HS, no. 118, 259 (Brussels, tailors, 1445–1446). 135 E.g. HS, no. 111, 228 (Brussels, butchers, 1482–1495). 136 HS, no. 147, 328 (Brussels, fullers, 1478). 137 HS, no. 138, 307 (Brussels, glove makers, 1467). 138 E.g. HS, no. 102, 205 (Bruges, journeymen carpenters, 1753). 139 E.g. HS, no. 172, 381 (Leuven, bakers, 1452). 140 E.g. HS, no. 133, 294 (Brussels, boatmen, 1621). 141 Cf. HS, no. 166, 371 (Brussels, carpenters, 1750). 142 HS, no. 17, 46 (Antwerp, cabinet makers, 1507). 128

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appointed box masters therefore tried to refuse this dubious honour and some regulations had to sanction these recusants expressly.143 As the box masters received no pay or appreciation, chances were great that they would try to line their pockets by stealing from the box. Collegiality, however, prevented this. The term box for the guild’s mutual aid mechanism has to be taken literally.144 The money went into a box with two key locks. As each of the box masters had one key, both had to be present to open the box.145 This lessened the chances of theft, but it did not completely eliminate them, as collusion between the box masters was still possible. Therefore, box regulations also prescribed audits by the guild and/or the city administration.146 If done by the former, the audit happened before an assembly of all the guild members. This may be a relic of an older time when the box had been a grassroots arrangement of guild members, which only later received the blessing of the guild leadership and the city administration.147 The audit offered discontent guild members a chance to air their views, as in 1675 when members of the Antwerp surgeons’ guild had caused so much trouble during the annual audit in the city hall, that the guild leadership petitioned the aldermen in order to exclude ordinary guild members from these proceedings in the future.148

E. Allowances and other forms of mutual aid The box could offer succour in many cases of hardship. In general, it supported craftsmen who were unable to work due to circumstances beyond their control,149 in particular illness and workplace accidents.150 Medieval regulations were very strict on illness. The latter only counted when the craftsman had to remain in bed. As soon as he went out of his house, he forfeited his allowance.151 Early modern regulations could be milder, but they awarded the ambulant ill a smaller allowance.152 Box regulations struggled with defining workplace accidents. Their drafters more or less knew what counted as a workplace accident, but they failed to develop a precise well-defined concept, which is understand___________ 143

E.g. HS, no. 164, 362 f. (Brussels, carpenters, 1741). E.g. HS, no. 93, 184 (Bruges, corn heavers Carmers Bridge, 1466). 145 E.g. HS, no. 6 (Antwerp, masons and stonecutters, 1493). 146 E.g. HS, no. 4, 11 (Antwerp, carpenters, 1493). 147 Cf. HS, no. 123, 272 (Brussels, stonecutters, 1483). 148 HS, no. 70, 132 f. (Antwerp, surgeons, 1675). 149 HS, no. 41, 96 (Antwerp, silk workers, 1588). 150 E.g. HS, no. 6, 15 (Antwerp, masons and stonecutters, 1493). 151 E.g. HS, no. 1, 3 (Antwerp, heavers, 1457). 152 E.g. HS, no. 157, 343 (Brussels, hatters, 1621). 144

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able as even 19th century Belgian law had trouble with this.153 Therefore, the simple term ‘accident’ in some box regulations may be misleading, as other documents make clear that only the victims of workplace accidents could call on the box.154 Thus, the box regulations for the Brussels stonecutters around 1460 refer to injured craftsmen without any further qualification,155 but in 1478 it became clear that the box only intended to help the victims of workplace accidents.156 Many box regulations offer some indications of what their drafters considered to be workplace accidents: the accident had to be work related and not due to the victim’s own recklessness.157 The latter was an umbrella term that covered all kinds of reproachable behaviour which had resulted in injury: drunkenness, fighting158 and visits to whorehouses,159 but also working at night or on Sundays and holidays.160 A few box regulations allowed the box masters to show grace and help a craftsman who was injured because of his own recklessness.161 Whereas illness and accident were the main preoccupations, other reasons for awarding an allowance were rarer. Only a few box regulations cover old age162 and infirmity;163 but for those situations, guild hospices, when available, provided an alternative. A few older regulations may also mention debtor’s prison, service in the city militia or the prince’s army164 and pilgrimage.165 In those cases, the allowance had to support the craftsman’s family.166 Unlike some religious charities,167 guild boxes did not offer help to craftsmen who had to support a larger-than-normal family. All kinds of obstacles existed for craftsmen who wanted to call on the box. Newly established boxes tried to generate money for a few years before they started to dole it out. Hence, regulations decreed that the box at first would stand ___________ 153 See Bruno Debaenst, Een proces van bloed, zweet en tranen! Juridisering van arbeidsongevallen in de negentiende eeuw in België (2011). 154 E.g. HS, no. 6, 15 (Antwerp, masons and stonecutters, 1493). 155 HS, no. 121, 265 (Brussels, stonecutters, 1460). 156 HS, no. 122, 269 f. (Brussels, stonecutters, 1478). 157 E.g. HS, no. 171, 380 (Leuven, old shoemakers, 1555). 158 E.g. HS, no. 61, 126 (Antwerp, labourers Werf and Bierhoofd, 1668). 159 E.g. HS, no. 28, 70 f. (Antwerp, second-hand-clothes vendors, 1556). 160 E.g. HS, no. 74, 147 (Bruges, heavers, 1291). 161 E.g. HS, no. 6, 17 (Antwerp, masons and stonecutters, 1493). 162 E.g. HS, no. 44, 99 (Antwerp, linen weavers, 1581). 163 E.g. HS, no. 93, 184 (Bruges, corn heavers Carmers Bridge, 1466). 164 E.g. HS, no. 90, 181 (Bruges, rich heavers, 1452). 165 E.g. HS, no. 85, 173 (Bruges, wine stevedores, 1420). 166 HS, no. 89, 179 (Bruges, fish porters, 1460). 167 HS, no. 108, 221 (Brussels, confraternity of Saint Eloi, 1446).

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still,168 or, more literally, would remain closed.169 In many guilds new members of the box had to pass a waiting period before they called on the box.170 Others avoided that by imposing high entrance fees on newcomers. A combination of both systems was also possible.171 The new member could opt for either accepting the waiting period or paying the entrance fee and skipping the waiting period, or at least shortening it. Guilds did not really think of bad risks. At most, they tried to avoid elderly newcomers, e.g. persons over 50 for the box of the Brussels journeymen carpenters in 1750.172 The Antwerp masons in 1609 only accepted new members younger than 30.173 As already indicated, craftsmen who still owed arrears were not eligible for allowances from the box. The craftsman had to report his illness or accident to the box master immediately or within a short time period, e.g. eight days.174 The box masters could then inspect his situation by going to his sickbed175 and deciding on his request for aid. The craftsman had recourse against their decisions by appealing to the guild administration176 and, if that failed, to the local aldermen.177 If the box masters decided to offer aid, the latter could consist of cash payments, but also of handouts of food, drinks or fuel, free housing, and payment of doctor’s costs.178 A guild’s specific circumstances could determine the form its solidarity took. Thus, in the bakers guild, the distribution of bread can be taken for granted.179 As soon as the craftsman could work again, guild solidarity came to an end.180 Box masters were keen on checking up on the craftsman at home. Therefore, regulations forbade craftsman from receiving guild support to reside outside the city.181 Guild solidarity aimed both at helping craftsmen in need and distinguishing the guild from outsiders. A corollary of the latter was the guilds’ wish to avoid social distinctions. This clashed with the reality of awarding allowances. The act of receiving an allowance put its recipient in an inferior position and made clear that also within the guild a social gap existed. The guilds tested several solutions. ___________ 168

E.g. HS, no. 6, 15 (Antwerp, masons and stonecutters, 1493). E.g. HS, no. 36, 88 (Antwerp, tanners and shoemakers, 1557). 170 E.g. HS, no. 121, 265 (Brussels, stonecutters, 1458–1466). 171 HS, no. 111, 229 (Brussels, butchers, 1482–1495). 172 HS, no. 166, 370 (Brussels, carpenters, 1750). 173 HS, no. 10, 27 (Antwerp, masons, 1609). 174 HS, no. 6, 15 (Antwerp, masons and stonecutters, 1493). 175 Cf. HS, no. 16, 44 (Antwerp, St. Martin’s guild, 1500). 176 E.g. HS, no. 17, 48 (Antwerp, cabinet makers, 1507). 177 E.g. HS, no. 13, 32–37 (Antwerp, masons, 1753). 178 Willem (n. 16), 164. 179 HS, no. 100, 197 (Bruges, bakers, 1709). 180 HS, no. 1, 3 (Antwerp, heavers, 1457). 181 E.g. HS, no. 129, 285 (Brussels, knife makers, 1462). 169

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If their members had illusions of grandeur, the guild acted in secrecy. Thus, at the establishment of their box the Antwerp law practitioners and lawyers decided that the box had to pay its allowances ‘discreetly’.182 A more common practice was the fining of guild members who reproached a brother for having accepted guild solidarity.183 Many box regulations awarded allowances for illness or accident regardless of the actual needs of a craftsman.184 If rich and poor equally received support, it was not possible to distinguish them from one another. To ensure this, the rich could not even refuse an allowance they did not need.185 However, box regulations then added that the rich could always return to the box what they had received,186 which gave them a chance at showing both their riches and their generosity. The regulations for the Brussels second-hand-clothes vendors ordained that a craftsman could not dispute a choice a richer colleague had made.187 This seems to indicate that, at least in this guild, rich craftsmen who kept the payments they received could count on criticism from their fellows. It is a shame that we do not have more data on this, because this would allow us to determine whether guild solidarity was more of a social security system than a social insurance system, thus implying a return on investment. The situation of women was very diverse. Most guild hospices did not allow women,188 although there were exceptions to this rule,189 and some guilds had a few houses for elderly women.190 If a married man entered a hospice, his possessions would be split between the hospice, his wife and his children,191 and it is not clear whether this happened respecting local customary law. As for allowances from the box, regulations could allow unmarried women to be members of the guild and have the same duties and rights as their male colleagues,192 though this was not always to everyone’s liking. For example, in Bruges in 1560 the city authorities removed a clause from a draft regulation that awarded equal rights to unmarried women.193 Many boxes just ignored married women,194 as ___________ 182

HS, no. 47, 107 (Antwerp, law practitioners and lawyers, 1584). E.g. HS, no. 30, 76 (Antwerp, drapers, 1557). 184 E.g. HS, no. 129, 288 (Brussels, second-hand-clothes vendors, 1463). 185 HS, no. 139, 310 f. (Brussels, barbers, 1467). 186 E.g. HS, no. 116, 245 f. (Brussels, vendors, 1473). 187 HS, no. 129, 288 (Brussels, second-hand-clothes vendors, 1463). 188 E.g. WS, no. 6, 178 (Ghent, tick weavers, 1486). 189 HS, no. 114, 237 (Brussels, vendors, 1424). 190 E.g. HS, no. 168, 373 (Brussels, bakers, 1666). 191 HS, no. 26, 58 (Antwerp, vendors, 1556). 192 HS, no. 67, 128 (Antwerp, schoolmistresses, 1662). 193 HS, no. 99, 193 (Bruges, labourers of Our Lady at the Old Mill Bridge, 1560). 194 E.g. HS, no. 17, 45–48 (Antwerp, shrine makers, 1507). 183

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they assumed that help for the husband sufficed.195 Other boxes also awarded allowances to wives, though they might receive less.196 Alternatively, an allowance was conditional upon the previous payment of membership dues for or by the wife.197 Inability because of childbirth was expressly excluded by some regulations,198 whereas it is nowhere mentioned as a cause for an allowance, so that this was in all likelihood a common rule. Many widows received guild allowances or were helped by odd jobs for which the guild employed them. However, most widows profited more from another guild practice. In theory, during her marriage, married women had been incapable of acting in law. In reality, however many small businesses were ‘cooperative’ enterprises, with husbands working in the back and their wives selling in front.199 Hence, guilds allowed a widow – who most of the time had at least a usufruct in her husband’s workshop and tools200 – to continue, though henceforth with a salaried journeyman in her service.201 These widows also had to become members of the box.202 A widow had to live respectably.203 If she did not or remarried outside the guild, she lost her rights,204 in part because the guilds wanted to prevent outsiders from entering the guild through marriage to a widow. Children could count on less sympathy from the guild. Guild hospices considered them disturbances of their guests’ peace,205 and the boxes did not care for them, unless dues for them had been paid previously.206 The idea was that the parents, or rather the father would take care of his children and that the box, by providing for him in case of inability, would also help his children. As indicated above, guild regulations did not offer help to craftsmen who had to support a larger-than-normal family. If only one parent died, the other generally continued ___________ 195

Cf. HS, no. 28, 65 (Antwerp, second-hand-clothes vendors, 1556). HS, no. 116, 246 (Brussels, vendors, 1473). 197 HS, no. 30, 74 (Antwerp, drapers, 1557). 198 HS, no. 116, 246 (Brussels, vendors, 1473). 199 Kaat Cappelle, ‘In de macht, plicht en momboorije van heuren man’. De rechtspositie van de getrouwde vrouw in Antwerpen en Leuven (16de eeuw), (2016) Pro memorie 48–68; Shennan Hutton, Women and economic activities in late medieval Ghent (2011), 60. 200 For the details of matrimonial property law and the law of succession in the Southern Netherlands, see Philippe Godding, Le droit privé dans les Pays-Bas méridionaux du 12e au 18e siècle (1991). 201 Marianne Danneel, Weduwen en wezen in het laat-middeleeuwse Gent (1996), 349–353. 202 HS, no. 118, 260 (Brussels, tailors, 1445–1446). 203 HS, no. 111, 230 (Brussels, butchers, 1482–1495). 204 HS, no. 121, 267 (Brussels, stone cutters, 1458–1466). 205 Cf. HS, no. 114, 238 (Brussels, vendors, 1424). 206 HS, no. 30, 74 (Antwerp, drapers, 1557). 196

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41

the business, which was to the advantage of the children.207 If both parents died, the guild did not support the orphans. In fact, orphans who became apprentices still had to pay a tuition fee, which in many cases went into the box for mutual aid.208 Thus, these orphans contributed to guild solidarity but did not profit from it. By the time an orphan could become a journeyman, his guardians might have had to sell some of his inheritance, including his father’s workshop.

F. Guild solidarity and religion There is a marked contrast between the research of Huys on guild solidarity in the Southern Netherlands and the comparison which Bos made between the Southern and Northern Netherlands. In the Southern Netherlands, fewer people received an allowance, and it was also smaller than in the Northern Netherlands. More generally, Bos contrasts Catholic countries (the Southern Netherlands, France, Italy and Spain) with the Northern Netherlands and Germany. In the Southern group, guild solidarity was lacking, whereas it could be very elaborate in the United Provinces and Germany. The Habsburg, i.e. Southern, Netherlands then fall somewhere between those two.209 This, however, disregards regional and religious differences in Germany or the presence of mutual aid in France.210 As to the comparison between the Northern and Southern Netherlands, there is no denying that there may have been differences. After all, the general insurance context was different. Whereas insurance in land failed to break through in the Southern Netherlands,211 it flourished in the Northern Netherlands.212 That the latter were Calvinist and the former remained Catholic may have played a role. In a nutshell: the Southerners wasted money on churches, altars and processions; the Northerners did not and, thus, had more available for their mutual aid.213 The question is whether it was really that simple. Many boxes in the South antedate the Reformation, and the establishment of boxes in the North after the

___________ 207

Danneel (n. 201), 349 f. E.g. HS, no. 14, 39 (Antwerp, tailors, 1557). 209 Bos (n. 2), 174–193. 210 See Deroussin, pp. 133 ff., below and also e.g. Lis and Soly (n. 55), 26. 211 Heirbaut (n. 24), 101 ff. 212 Jacques Van Gerwen and Marco Van Leeuwen, Zoeken naar zekerheid. Risico’s, preventie, verzekeringen en andere zekerheidsregelingen in Nederland, 1500–2000, vol. 1: De rijke Republiek: gilden, assuradeurs en armenzorg 1500–1800 (2000); Marco Van Leeuwen, Mutual insurance 1550–2015. From guild welfare and friendly societies to contemporary micro-insurers (2016). 213 Cf. Bos (n. 28), 192. 208

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Reformation may as well have to do with economic development.214 For the Northern Netherlands, Bos inventoried all the systems of mutual aid, whereas we do not have any comparable research for the South. Bos concludes that in the North, ‘at most 15 per cent of the guilds has special funds for needy members’.215 On the other hand, for Antwerp she states that: ‘At any given point in time, roughly one-third of the guilds in Antwerp would thus have had a poor box or similar provisions. This situation is believed to have been typical for all cities in Brabant.’216 In Flanders, however, Bos assumes boxes to have been less common.217 Masure argues that boxes were even more common in Brabant than has hitherto been assumed. For Mechelen, she indicates that out of about 60 guilds (including more informal occupational confraternities), 43 had a box. Of the remaining 17, only five may not have had a box.218 At least in Mechelen a guild could not be taken seriously if it did not have a box.219 For Brussels and Antwerp, Masure assumes that ‘at least half of the guilds, but in all likelihood more, had poor boxes’.220 The sources seem to support her. In 1575, the Antwerp gardeners, fruit merchants and basket makers claimed that all other guilds already had a box. This was hyperbole, as it was only in 1584 that the Antwerp law practitioners and lawyers established their box.221 However, they claimed at that time that almost all other guilds already had a box, which seems to indicate that a guild without a box had become uncommon in Antwerp. Even if we stick with Bos’s lower percentage, we are left with the impression that in Brabant the share of guilds with a separate box was double that of the Northern Netherlands, although the Brabant boxes helped fewer people and gave them lower allowances. That is, however, also up for dispute. For example, Bos compares second-hand-clothes vendors in Brussels with shipyard carpenters in Amsterdam,222 but the situation of the latter was exceptional.223 Nevertheless, even if some caution is warranted, one can agree with Bos that craft guilds in the Southern Netherlands could have invested more in their mutual aid. For example, in comparison with Germany, they did not support the orphans of deceased guild members.224 ___________ 214 For all the elements which caused the establishment of a new box, see Masure (n. 17), 115–131. For the rise of boxes in the Northern Netherlands, see Prak, pp. 47 ff., below. 215 Bos (n. 2), 192. 216 Bos (n. 2), 176. 217 Bos (n. 2), 176. 218 Masure (n. 17), 123. 219 Masure (n. 17), 127 f. 220 Masure (n. 17), 123 f. 221 HS, no. 47, 105 (Antwerp, law practitioners and lawyers, 1584). 222 Bos (n. 2), 189. 223 See Prak, p. 47, below. 224 Fröhlich (n. 26), 72–77.

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Lacking detailed statistics, this article can only mention some elements in need of further research. First of all, religion did play a role. Huys was not wrong in that analysis. Religion permeates the regulations on guild solidarity. Some of the oldest regulations support a craftsman’s family during his pilgrimage. Fines for blasphemy and working on Sundays or holidays protected order in the guild, but also religious observance. Sinners, e.g. adulterers, would not receive support from the box.225 The guild could organise masses for its patron saint and the souls of deceased members. In 1753, the box for the journeyman carpenters in Bruges left no doubt about its priorities: no allowances would be paid during the first three years after its establishment, but it would pay for masses for deceased members and their wives.226 Another Bruges box required the recipients of its allowance to pray daily for the souls of deceased guild members.227 Yet, it is remarkable that many box regulations remain silent on the topic of prayer and masses. In the hospices, religion dominated life, at least in the theory of their regulations. Thus, in a Ghent guild hospice in 1571, the pensioners had to go to mass and pray for half an hour a day, and they were fined for gambling, drunkenness during prayer or mass, lying and blasphemy.228 Religion also permeated regulations in another way. Box regulations had no concept of force majeure. At best involuntary illness or accidents had been sent by God himself.229 One may wonder whether this attitude was that different from the Calvinist North and, even more, whether it was the only obstacle for the development of guild solidarity in the South. An example from the history on insurance law should instil some caution. In the 16th century, the Spanish central authorities forbade life insurance, which had become popular in Antwerp. It is easy to assume that this was due to Catholic unwillingness to speculate on someone’s death, but a first administration of Catholic aldermen in Antwerp disregarded this ban, whereas their rebellious Calvinist successors applied it.230 A guild could indeed only spend its money once. If a part231 or all232 of the income from fines, for example, went to altars, masses and candles, it was lost for guild solidarity. In some cases, financial problems were in part caused by expenses for religion.233 Therefore, it could happen that the rank and file resisted when the guild administration spent too much on showpieces of a church. In ___________ 225

See p. 30, above. HS, no. 103, 205 (Bruges, journeymen masons, 1753). 227 HS, no. 101, 200, 206 (Bruges, journeymen carpenters, 1753). 228 WS, no. 7, 181–184 (Ghent, tick weavers, 1571). 229 HS, no. 171, 380 (Leuven, old shoemakers, 1555). 230 Heirbaut (n. 5). 231 E.g. HS, no. 73, 140 (Antwerp, wheelbarrow porters, 1708). 232 HS, no. 25, 57 (Antwerp, crane operators, 1556). 233 E.g. HS, no. 83, 167 (Bruges, smiths, 1471). 226

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1675, the deacons of the Antwerp surgeons tried to defend their purchase of beautiful decorations by pointing out that these enhanced the prestige of their guild and the city. The ordinary craftsmen replied that the money would have been much better spent in aiding the poor of the guild.234 In short, if some preferred religion to mutual aid, others did not. However, it would be wrong to see religion only in a negative light, as it stimulated gifts and bequests. One should also not forget that the distinction between religious and material support may reflect our today’s thinking too much. For many craftsmen, their spiritual and material welfare may have been equally important.235 Last but not least, elements other than religion also played a role, like the general context of poor relief in a city, as Masure has shown,236 but also the financial possibilities of guild members, their willingness to contribute to guild solidarity and the mechanisms for bringing defaulters to heel. For example, generally journeymen had less means than masters, but if a journeyman box was financed by deductions from wages paid by the masters, it could be in better financial health than masters’ boxes. A crucial element may have been the attitude of local and central authorities. Research so far has focused on Flanders and Brabant. In the former, craft guilds were more rebellious and more controlled by central authorities, as the repression of the Ghent guilds after their revolt against Charles V shows. Within one principality of the Habsburg Netherlands, city authorities could also develop different policies. In Flanders, the Bruges aldermen seem to have been more likely to amend draft regulations of boxes and remove novelties which they did not like.237 This may in part explain why some of the associations of mutual aid in Bruges survived the French Revolution,238 as they were relatively harmless. Religious influence also seems to have been more important in Bruges than elsewhere.239 At the other end of the spectrum, in Brabant, we find Antwerp, where the city aldermen were very cooperative with the guilds and fully recognised the boxes’ importance. They were even willing to allow box masters to seize the chattels of defaulting members. Therefore, it may be wrong to generalise too much, and for a comparison with the Northern Netherlands, it may be interesting also to take into account the interference of local and central authorities.

___________ 234

HS, no. 71, 134 f. (Antwerp, surgeons, 1675). Cf. De Munck (n. 2), 251–256. 236 Masure (n. 17), 115–131. 237 HS, no. 93, 184 (Bruges, corn heavers Carmers Bridge, 1466). 238 Huys (n. 6), 63–66, 106. 239 See pp. 41 ff., above. 235

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G. Conclusion Guild solidarity could manifest itself in many different ways. A complex interplay between the wishes of guild administrators, ordinary guild members and local and central authorities played a role but so did the financial means of guilds and their members, and religious influences. All these elements determined what shape guild solidarity would take. As the factors behind it changed over time, so did guild solidarity. In fact, De Munck argues that the evolution went from charity to an insurance system, which helped only those who had previously been willing to contribute,240 and the box regulations indeed reflect this evolution. Thus, a well-funded guild solidarity became the privilege of only a small group of craftsmen who could afford it. Even in larger cities, not all guilds had a box. Many craftsmen in smaller cities or in poorer guilds could, in all likelihood, fall back only on occasional help from friends and family, and a large majority of the population did not belong to a guild at all. Even the best-organised guilds never combined all of the practices mentioned above. Thus, what this article describes is a box of tools the craft guilds could use for mutual aid, but some of them never even opened the box, whereas those who did never took out the same tools or never used them in the best or a uniform way. This limited character and diversity constitute the main difference between guild solidarity and today’s social security, which surpasses it in scope.241 Nevertheless, guild solidarity is worth studying because it shows that the dream of more security for working people, however imperfectly realised at the time, has a venerable history.

___________ 240

De Munck (n. 2), 251–260. In this sense, I do agree with Heyrman/Colla/Lambrichts (n. 9), 31–35, who see this continuity more for today’s self-employed than for employees. 241

Chapter 3: Guilds and Mutual Aid in the Northern Netherlands By Maarten Prak A. Introduction .............................................................................................................. 47  B. The emergence of guild mutual aid .......................................................................... 50  C. Scale of guild coverage in the 17th and 18th centuries ............................................... 52  D. Scope of guild insurance in the 17th and 18th centuries ............................................. 56  E. Alternative forms of mutual insurance before and after the abolition of the guilds (1820).............................................................................. 60  F. Conclusion ................................................................................................................ 61

A. Introduction In the second half of the 18th century, the Amsterdam shipwrights’ guild supported on average 40 of its members with compensation for the loss of income due to illness.1 At the time the guild had around 1,700 members, suggesting a 2.5% illness rate, very modest by modern standards. On top of that, around 100 elderly shipwrights, no longer capable of performing their physically demanding jobs, were supported as well with what we might call a basic pension. Neither the illness payments nor the pensions came anywhere near covering the full income of a shipwright. In full employment, a shipwright could expect to earn almost eleven guilders each week, whereas the compensation was two-anda-half and three guilders per week for illness and old age, respectively. The Amsterdam shipwrights were a bit of an anomaly in the world of the crafts. Most of them, even when they called themselves ‘masters’, were actually wage-workers, employed by the very large shipyards of the Dutch East India Company and the Admiralty, which both employed up to 1,000 shipwrights, or they were employed otherwise by one of the around 50 privately owned shipyards that employed on average 100 men each. Of these 7,000 shipwrights, only a minority were members of the guild, although that group increased rapidly during the 18th century, possibly only for the reason of joining the insurance fund. ___________ 1 Sandra Bos, ‘Uyt Liefde tot Malcander’: Onderlinge Hulpverlening binnen de NoordNederlandse Gilden in Internationaal Perspectief (1570–1820) (1998), 85–110, 350. For a summary in English, see idem, A tradition of giving and receiving: mutual aid within the guild system, in: Maarten Prak et al. (eds.), Craft guilds in the early modern Low Countries. Work, power, and representation (2006), 174–193.

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Another characteristic of the shipwrights was their close-knit community: most of them lived in the relatively small area where the shipyards were concentrated, and the occupation was – in what was unusual for Amsterdam – dominated by locals. The expenses which were incurred in covering the payments to members who were ill and incapacitated were funded from a variety of sources. New members paid a hefty 43 guilders on joining the guild. On top of that, the members collectively provided 10,000 guilders annually in membership dues, around half of all revenues. The guild, moreover, collected fines from members and shipyard bosses for various infringements of the guild regulations. The guild owned a capital portfolio of real estate and government bonds, delivering around 1,500 guilders in rents and interest annually. Nonetheless, the guild was struggling to amass the circa 4,000 guilders required for the sickness benefits and the almost 11,000 guilders for the elderly members. Poverty is a challenge for all societies because of what we might call the welfare puzzle. The puzzle is that because all societies have poor people, poverty is clearly a social issue that cannot be blamed on the individual poor. At the same time, we have to acknowledge that, in most societies some but by no means all people are poor, raising a suspicion that the poor are doing something wrong that causes their poverty. Because poverty is a general risk, most societies have provisions to shelter their populations from the risk of poverty, but 20th-century experiments with not assigning the individual any responsibility to overcome his or her poverty have come to naught. The answer to this puzzle is the so-called mixed economy of welfare. As Marjorie Mayo shows, even fully developed modern welfare states combine state-funded, community-sponsored and private welfare arrangements.2 A similar mix existed in the pre-modern society with which this paper is concerned. Striking the right balance was the challenge – then and now.3 Within the wider framework of this mixed economy of welfare, local communities created a dense network of charities, of which a surprising number were funded by participants. These ranged from hospitals, to religious brotherhoods, to neighbourhood associations and on to guilds. Most of these organisations were offering assistance to either their poor members or even to the general poor of their local community, but this was at the discretion of the organisation and could fluctuate according to the availability of funding. Although we will have to come back to such informal support, the core of this paper is about forms of insurance ___________ 2 Marjorie Mayo, Communities and Caring: The Mixed Economy of Welfare (1994); see also Marco H.D. van Leeuwen, Guilds and middle-class welfare, 1550–1800: Provisions for burial, sickness, old age, and widowhood, (2012), 65 Economic History Review 61–90, 82. 3 Peter Lindert, Growing public: Social Spending and Economic Growth Since the Eighteenth Century, vol. 1 (2004), ch. 12.

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that met two criteria. First, a fund was established separate from the rest of the guild finances, with the purpose of collecting regular contributions from the members towards a specified goal. Secondly, there would be regular pay-outs of fixed amounts of money to contributors who met the existing criteria. In essence, charity is given out at the discretion of the benefactor, whereas under insurance the beneficiaries have a formal claim on the fund. In this chapter, we are concerned with the latter. Charity was a different element of the welfare system.4 As Marco van Leeuwen has explained in a recent survey of mutual insurance in the Netherlands from the late Middle Ages to today, such funds had to overcome several obstacles inherent in all forms of insurance.5 Insurance is basically a tool to share a particular risk among a large number of people, on the assumption that not all of them will be affected by the same risk simultaneously. Sharing risks is tricky for several reasons. One is ‘moral hazard’: people may increase behaviour against whose risks they are insured because they know they will be covered when things go wrong. This risk is probably low with burial insurance, but serious when it comes to covering the loss of income from illness. Furthermore, people might report themselves as sick a lot more readily if they know their income will not be affected, and they may, thus, act fraudulently. Another problem for mutual insurance is ‘adverse selection’. This is actually acute for people who share the same occupation, if that occupation brings certain health risks. A third problem is size. If the community supporting the insurance fund is small and close-knit, the likelihood is that they will all succumb to the flu at the same time, forcing the fund to make huge expenditures in a short time. Given these risks, we can assume that guilds first had to reach a certain membership size to make the establishment of a fund feasible. We also have to assume that they inserted mechanisms into the fund’s procedures to deal with moral hazard and fraud, such as limits on the duration of support, or an initial waiting-time before the fund started to pay, or a certification by a medical doctor or other independent party to independently verify the claimant’s illness. This paper seeks to outline both the features (scope) and dimensions (scale) of the system of guild insurance in the Dutch Republic of the 17th and 18th centuries. It does so by combining the results of several studies on the topic as they ___________ 4 About the welfare system, see Maarten Prak, Armenzorg 1500–1800, in: Jacques van Gerwen and Marco H.D. van Leeuwen (eds.), Studies over zekerheidsarrangementen. Risico's, risicobestrijding en verzekeringen in Nederland vanaf de Middeleeuwen (1998), 49–90, and abbreviated: idem, The Carrot and the Stick: Social Control and Poor Relief in the Dutch Republic, Sixteenth to Eighteenth Centuries, in: Heinz Schilling (ed.), Institutionen, Instrumente und Akteure sozialer Kontrolle und Disziplinierung im frühneuzeitlichen Europa. Institutions, Instruments and Agents of Social Control and Discipline in Early Modern Europe (1999), 149–166. 5 Marco H.D. van Leeuwen, Mutual Insurance 1550–2015: From Guild Welfare and Friendly Societies to Contemporary Micro-Insurers (2016).

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have been published, in Dutch and in English, over the past two decades, with some additional data derived from researching primary sources.

B. The emergence of guild mutual aid Social care by guilds first appeared in what was to become the Netherlands in the late Middle Ages. In 1387, the carpenters’ guild in the Holland town of Dordrecht required each member to pay four pennies each week for support of poor members of the guild. In 1448 the shoemakers’ guild in ’s-Hertogenbosch (or Den Bosch, also known as Bois-le-Duc) in the province of Brabant promised aid to its impoverished members. These were, however, unusual features of Dutch guilds at the time.6 Instead, such mutual aid was forthcoming from confraternities. For Utrecht, between 1300 and 1580, as many as 101 confraternities have been recorded, although not all were simultaneously active. One dated from the 12th century, ten from the 13th and 34 from the 15th century. It has been estimated that during the late Middle Ages every second adult male in Utrecht joined at least one but often more confraternities during his lifetime. Members were expected to participate once a week in a mass reading in front of the confraternity altar. Indeed, the accounts of three of the Utrecht confraternities from the decades around 1500 show a predominance of religious spending, with poor relief to the members constituting only a very small proportion of their expenses. Of these confraternities, eight were connected to one of the craft guilds. The role of confraternities and guilds was to change fundamentally as a result of the Reformation. In the Netherlands, the Reformation was introduced during the late 1570s and 1580s, as part of the Dutch Revolt. The transformation was, however, uncoordinated and partial, in the absence of a strong national authority and given the minority position of the Calvinists. Amsterdam only joined the rebel cause in 1578, and despite an agreement that Roman Catholics could continue with their rituals, all public display of the Catholic faith became illegal within months. Nonetheless, confraternities continued into the 17th century, but then slowly but surely disappeared.7 Instead, guild funds became much more important as sources of mutual aid. For the guilds, the Reformation implied that the spending on altars and masses was now also prohibited. In an ordinance for all local guilds, the Amsterdam town council forced them to divert religious expenses, and expenses associated with ‘other useless superstitions, drunkenness ___________ 6

Bos, Tradition (n. 1), 177. Benjamin Kaplan, A clash of values: The survival of Utrecht’s confraternities after the Reformation and the debate over their dissolution, (2000) 16 De Zeventiende Eeuw 100–117. 7

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and indecent gluttony’, to welfare.8 Was Amsterdam exceptional? In Utrecht the pre-Reformation traditions survived much longer, allowing guilds to continue with food distributions and – perhaps more remarkably – burial in common guild graves.9 Still, the diminished spending opportunities for religious purposes must have increased the financial scope for welfare everywhere in the Dutch Republic, as is also suggested by the significant increase in the number of guild welfare schemes in the second half of the 16th century (Table 1 below). In 1615, when the Utrecht confraternities were dissolved, 42 were still active, some accepting both Protestants and Catholics among their members, and 15 of these 42 confraternities were funding general poor relief. However, they had also expanded their social activities and had increased the traditional expenses on drinks and meals.10 The impact of the Reformation was important, but the process of mutual aid through guilds, which it kick-started, was actually continued throughout the 17th century when most guilds were established, as Table 1 seems to indicate. More specifically, the second half of the 17th century was the heyday of such guild funds. Table 1: Timing of establishment of guild funds in selected Dutch towns11 22%

Leiden

3,300

2,083

1,307

645

598

55%

Utrecht

810

1,250

750

682

792

42%

Amsterdam

Another way to measure the scale of guild funds is to see how many guilds reported the ownership of government bonds in a national guild survey in 1798. The data are in Table 6. Table 6: Guilds with government bonds in 37 Dutch towns, by town size (1798)19 Towns

Guilds with bonds

All guilds

Percentage with bonds

20,000

6

56

224

27%

Amsterdam

1

45

46

98%

Total

37

223

770

29%

Table 6 demonstrates two things. The first is that the presence of guild funds was not a straightforward function of town size. This is surprising because one might assume that a minimum number of contributing members was necessary to make the establishment of a fund worthwhile. The smaller towns indeed display the lowest percentage, but the percentage for the towns with over 20,000 inhabitants is not significantly higher. The other observation is that Amsterdam is a complete outlier. Its very high percentage demonstrates that, even though the town’s size was no doubt a contributing factor that made the establishment of guild funds easier, their emergence in Amsterdam was also stimulated by local authorities. The formal ruling from 1578, forcing guilds to channel their former religious expenditures into welfare schemes, may well have been a turning point, creating a particular local path.20

___________ 17

Population divided by the number of guilds. Source: Bos, Uyt liefde (n. 1), 51, 142, 201, 245. 19 Source: Van Genabeek (n. 13), 64 (Table 6). 20 Bos, Uyt liefde (n. 1), 249. 18

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D. Scope of guild insurance in the 17th and 18th centuries Many guilds, it seems, were providing informal support to members and their relatives in dire straits. By definition, these forms of support have been poorly documented. For Utrecht, Sandra Bos has found that such informal support was substantial. In Arnhem, where formal arrangements were possibly as rare as in Utrecht, we also find informal assistance.21 The bakers’ and brewers’ guild in Arnhem provided fuel and food to one of their impoverished members in the winter of 1762–1763, and were supporting another with regular deliveries of rye throughout 1764 and into 1765. When the family moved to another town where the wife obtained a position as midwife, they were sent off with more rye. The same guild also distributed bread to the general poor of Arnhem.22 In the province of Zeeland, very few guild funds have been uncovered by a comprehensive study of the guilds in the province’s towns. It looks as if the carpenters’ fund in Zierikzee, established in 1751, was the first in Zeeland. In that same year the guilds of Vlissingen (also known as Flushing in English) established a common insurance fund to support their members’ widows and orphans. This was called a ‘society’ and was not directly regulated by any of the guilds. Membership was only for guild members and was not compulsory.23 These examples suggest that in the Dutch Republic’s periphery, formalised guild insurance was exceptional. Due to the survival of documents we are, obviously, much better informed about formal assistance. Most of the examples stem from the 18th century. ’s-Hertogenbosch, or Den Bosch, was a city of around 12,000 inhabitants in the second half of the 18th century. It was a garrison town, but it also had a significant lace industry and acted as a commercial centre for a substantial rural hinterland. In 1798–1799, when a general survey of the guilds was undertaken to prepare for their abolishment, Den Bosch reported 22 guilds. Cunningly, the local government, which was fiercely opposed to the abolishment, had left out nine service guilds, claiming that their members were really ‘officials’ and therefore not covered by the survey. In all, we can say that the city numbered around 30 guilds, with a total membership of 1,250 members, among the 4,750 households. By implication, almost 30% of households were connected to the corporate system. The largest guild organised the local shopkeepers, who numbered 500.24 ___________ 21

Bos, Uyt liefde (n. 1), ch. 4. Gelders archief Arnhem, Archief 2001 Gasthuizen en gilden in Arnhem, 1478: resoluties Bakkers- en Brouwersgilde, 27 December 1762 (fol. 83r), 16 April 1765 (fol. 88r–v), 26 June 1766 (fol. 93v). More examples in 1517a–t, the Guild’s accounts 1758–1798. 23 Bert Remmerswaal, Een duurzame alliantie: Gilden en regenten in Zeeland, 1600– 1800 (2009), 137 f. 24 Maarten Prak, Republikeinse veelheid, democratische enkelvoud. Sociale verandering in het Revolutietijdvak: ’s-Hertogenbosch 1770–1820 (1999), 89, 91. 22

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One of these guilds was the skippers’ guild, with a separate welfare fund. In 1773, the guild fund had 2,600 guilders in the bank. This was no doubt due to the generous contributions made by the members. Whenever a skipper joined the guild, he had to pay 6.30 guilders to the fund up front. Annual dues of 1.25 guilders were levied on each member, plus weekly dues that added up to another five guilders each year. Skippers from other places arriving in Den Bosch also had to make a compulsory contribution. Together, these revenues allowed the guild to pay out 50 guilders when a member passed away, plus two guilders each month to four elderly members. The skippers’ guild fund benefitted from the affluence of its members, who could afford to contribute substantially and who made few claims. Therefore, it was decided to expand the burial allowance to everyone in the member’s household, and in 1779 the idea was floated to double the pensions for the elderly. In 1793 pensions were tripled from 50 cents to 1.5 guilders each week, they were awarded to all members over 60, and a similar allowance was made to members incapable of working due to illness, provided a doctor would certify the condition.25 The skippers of Den Bosch were fortunate to have such a well-endowed fund. The tailors’ guild fund managed to support 23 out of 98 members who were ill in 1774 – some were even compensated for the doctor’s bill. However, the burial allowance had been abolished in 1760. And in 1775 the overseers of the fund wanted to introduce a doctor’s certificate to establish that the claimant was suffering from a temporary illness instead of permanent infirmity attributable to old age. In 1784, the fund’s disbursements were adapted to the strain between revenue and expenditures. Still, members who were ill could expect one guilder each week, and families of the deceased a one-time payment of 15 guilders. The elderly would be supported to the extent that the fund could afford this.26 This was still very expensive. One of the members, a Martinus Schruijders, was already so poor in 1774 that he was incapable of contributing to the fund. Between 1776 and 1792 the fund paid out an estimated 500 guilders to this one person. In 1792, when he was deaf, blind and hardly mobile, he nonetheless claimed that the fund owed him another 337 guilders. His claim was rejected because, it was said, there were even more desperate cases among his former colleagues.27

___________ 25 Stadsarchief ’s-Hertogenbosch, Archief van de stad 1262–1810, 394: 27 October 1771 (fol. 410r–412v) and 8 December 1773 (fol. 491r–492r); 690: 3 January 1779 and 6 February 1793. 26 Stadsarchief ’s-Hertogenbosch, Archief ambachts- en schuttersgilden, 221: Rekening van de bus van het droogscheerders- en kleermakersgilde 1774; Archief van de stad 1262–1810, 396: 29 March 1775 (fol. 124r–125v); 695: 4 February 1784. 27 Stadsarchief ’s-Hertogenbosch, Archief van de stad 1262–1810, 703: 5 September and 28 November 1792.

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These data from ’s-Hertogenbosch highlight an important aspect of guild ‘insurance’. Technically, members paid into a fund in the reasonable expectation of a payment when they were ill or elderly or otherwise fell within the terms. The example of Martinus Schruijders already suggests that this was not necessarily how things worked. To be eligible for a weekly payment of 1.5 guilders from the box of the carpenters’ guild of ’s-Hertogenbosch, the claimant had to be over 65 years of age, a contributor for at least 25 years and, finally, ‘deemed genuinely poor and suffering by the majority of the guild’s members’. However, three members complained in August 1775 that, although eligible and the recipients of the regulated amount until December 1774, they had received smaller amounts subsequently, and only intermittently.28 In the same year, 1775, the administrators of the box of the carpenters’ guild reported that already in 1760 the elderly had been denied further payments because there was no money. Only the sick remained eligible for benefits from the box. However, this had not been sufficient to restore the box’s financial health, and now the administrators proposed to the town council to change the rules again, and to force claimants to produce a statement from a medical doctor that he was suffering from ‘a serious disease, accident or illness’, and not merely from aging.29 In 1784, the members of the same guild decided to change the terms and accept claims from members over 70 years of age who were not necessarily ill – but only inasmuch as the fund’s finances would permit this.30 The opposite problem also existed. As we saw above, the box of the local skippers’ guild was found to be in such healthy financial condition – because the members did not expect to become so poor as to qualify for the burial pay-out – that they wanted the means-testing scrapped. Other measures also expanded the membership’s opportunities to claim benefits. These three examples strongly suggest that the small size and familiarity of the membership was perhaps a problem for guild funds, but this also pointed the way out of their problems. The annual reports on the funds’ finances, and the fact that everyone was a stakeholder, made it easier for administrators to persuade members – and the authorities – that reform was really necessary. It also seems to have been acceptable to the membership to informally cut the benefits of long-time claimants to protect the fund’s finances. Even if Schruijders may have been an extreme example because of the length of his incapacity and the resulting appeal to the guild fund, weekly disbursements were likely to become expensive under any circumstances. Therefore, many ___________ 28 Stadsarchief ’s-Hertogenbosch, Archief van de stad 1262–1810, 396: 4 January 1775 (fol. 4r–5v) (quote) and 30 August 1775 (fol. 308v–311r). 29 Stadsarchief ’s-Hertogenbosch, Archief van de stad 1262–1810, 396: 29 March 1775 (fol. 124r). 30 Stadsarchief ’s-Hertogenbosch, Archief van de stad 1262–1810, 695: 4 February 1784.

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guilds kept to the safer one-off payments associated with the death of a member, and possibly his partner, which was in effect a contribution to the burial costs. In Den Bosch, the general meeting of the tanners’ and shoemakers’ guild decided unanimously in March 1767 to create a fund for this purpose. On the occasion of a master passing away, his relatives were to receive 30 guilders; if his wife died, 20 guilders would be paid to those left behind. The haberdashers had created such a fund in 1756, and the surgeons made similar provisions in 1780.31 In all, nine guilds in Den Bosch are known to have had a welfare fund.32 In terms of guild insurance, Den Bosch might be described as being on the semi-periphery: some of the local guilds had elaborate insurance schemes, but this was far from common. The same applies to Utrecht, as we have already seen. Of 72 guilds that have been identified in Utrecht, 19, or 26%, at one time had a special insurance fund. Of these, eleven also owned a guild grave in which the poorer members and their wives might be interred.33 In Dordrecht, the most southern town of Holland and also the town with the oldest urban privileges, none of the local guilds had a separate welfare fund.34 However, most guilds paid out when the guild member fell ill – but for six weeks only. The amounts were very small, a token really. Some guilds made a one-time payment of a few guilders, again too little to survive financially for more than one or two weeks.35 Detailed data from the local coopers’ guild fund demonstrate the pattern. This guild paid two guilders a week, but only a few members were covered for more than six weeks, and beyond 18 weeks was exceptional apart from a brief spell in the second half of the 1770s. It is likely that sick payments had to remain limited in time because there had not been any capital accumulation allowing for the provision of extended payments.

___________ 31 Stadsarchief ’s-Hertogenbosch, Archief ambachts- en schuttersgilden, 168b: various documents relating to the tanners’ and shoemakers’ guilds; 357: extract resolution 9 October 1756; 345: notarial deed 1 May 1780. 32 Aart Vos, Burgers, broeders en bazen: Het maatschappelijk middenveld in ’s-Hertogenbosch in de zeventiende en achttiende eeuw (2007), 183. 33 Nico Slokker, Ruggengraat van de stedelijke samenleving: De rol van de gilden in de stad Utrecht, 1528–1818 (2010), 172; also Bos, Uyt liefde (n. 1), ch. 4. 34 Bos, Uyt liefde (n. 1), 273 f. 35 Eric Palmen, De gilden en hun sociale betekenis, in: Willem Frijhoff et al. (eds.), Geschiedenis van Dordrecht van 1572 tot 1813 (1998), 221–233, 221 f.

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Maarten Prak Table 7: Length of sick payments (in weeks) in Dordrecht coopers’ guild, 1755–178436 1–6

7–12

13–18

19–24

25–30

Total

1755–1759

18

1

0

0

0

19

1760–1764

11

0

0

0

0

11

1765–1769

24

1

4

1

0

30

1770–1774

23

5

7

1

0

36

1775–1779

19

4

0

6

0

29

1780–1784

12

7

8

1

3

31

Total

107

18

19

9

3

156

It was the same in Zwolle, where no guild funds existed at all during the 17th and 18th centuries; a handful of journeymen funds were found in Zwolle, however, suggesting that it was not a lack of local knowledge that had frustrated guild insurance. Delft and Gouda, on the other hand, had twelve and five guild funds respectively, and Rotterdam even had 15.37 The implication of the geographical distribution of guild funds suggests that it was not a case of provincial, institutional path-dependence. Otherwise, Dordrecht should have had funds, and Zeeland or ’s-Hertogenbosch should not have.

E. Alternative forms of mutual insurance before and after the abolition of the guilds (1820) In some medieval towns in the Netherlands, neighbours developed informal systems of mutual help. From the 16th century, some of these arrangements were formalized into voluntary insurance schemes. They have been found in the Holland towns of Delft, Haarlem, The Hague, Leiden and Rotterdam, but also in Deventer, Groningen, Utrecht and Roermond, i.e. in the less prosperous regions of the country. These so-called neighbourhood guilds provided financial assistance on the occasion of childbirth and burial. Only one or two also provided support in the event of illness. Membership was voluntary but subject to social pressure. Alongside these neighbourhood guilds, other voluntary schemes emerged. The majority of these were launched in a guild context, but now the membership was separated from guild membership in the sense that guild masters could, but were not required to, join the insurance scheme.38 Compared to ___________ 36

Source: Palmen (n. 35), 222 (Table 12.1). Bos, Uyt liefde (n. 1), 267, 275, 278, 285. 38 Van Genabeek (n.13), 44–52, 71–77. 37

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the guild schemes, these voluntary insurance schemes were insignificant in scale, but this would change after 1800. The Constitution of 1798 – the first the Netherlands had ever had – formally abolished guilds. It took, however, another two decades before this was finally achieved in 1820. In the meantime, Dutch guilds survived in a sort of limbo, often under a new name that tried to disguise the purpose of the organisation. During those two decades, not only the guilds themselves but also many local governments campaigned for their survival. One important argument that local governments brought to bear was the expected increase in social spending if guild charity and their insurance funds were dismantled.39 In light of the steep increase in social spending by various welfare institutions, caused by a serious economic downturn during these years, this anxiety was not entirely imaginary. After guilds were finally and comprehensively abolished in 1820, fears about the collapse of their funds looked initially misplaced. In many places former guild funds were transformed into friendly societies providing mutual insurance against the same risks formerly covered by guilds, i.e. loss of income due to prolonged illness or the death of the main breadwinner. These friendlies often remained specifically related to a particular trade, even though the membership gradually widened to take in other occupations as well. However, slowly but surely these funds disappeared or became independent of the trade.40 Instead, voluntary insurance became the norm and a shared occupation declined as a feature binding the membership. A revival started around the middle of the century, when the first trade unions were launched. These also set up their own insurance schemes, consciously copied from the former guild schemes.41 In various ways, the ‘mutual tradition’ continued into the 20th century and has survived until the present.42

F. Conclusion The question that inspires this volume is whether guilds provided a form of early mutual insurance – and, if so, how this was achieved. For the Dutch Republic, the answer is most certainly in the affirmative. In some towns of the Dutch Republic a substantial percentage of the population was covered by a guild fund, covering one, and sometimes more, of the common risks of life, i.e. a loss ___________ 39 M.G. de Boer, De ondergang der Amsterdamsche gilden, (1932) 47 Tijdschrift voor Geschiedenis 129–149 and 225–245, 228, 231, 236. 40 Van Genabeek (n. 13), 84 Table 7. 41 Van Leeuwen (n. 5), ch. 3. 42 See also Marcel van der Linden (ed.), Social security mutualism: The comparative history of mutual benefit societies (1996).

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of income due to illness or death. This form of social insurance was given a first boost during the Reformation, when religious spending by the guilds was curtailed. In subsequent decades, the Dutch economy also grew vigorously, creating income surpluses that might be spent on insurance. However, the demand for such insurance increased significantly during the final decades of the 17th century, when the Dutch economy started to stagnate. Demand continued to increase during the 18th century. Although the size of the membership was an important pre-condition for the establishment of a guild fund, there is no strong correlation between town size and the number of guild funds. Amsterdam, where almost all guilds had a separate fund to support members who had met adverse circumstances, was a case sui generis, and its exceptional position may have been due to more than size and wealth, it being instead the result of a deliberate strategy by the local government. This result therefore still leaves us with the puzzle of why some towns and some guilds provided this form of insurance and others did not. For the case of Amsterdam, it could be argued that it combined two stimuli. At the end of the 16th century there was strong support from the local government for social spending by guilds. The Amsterdam authorities saw guilds as an important element in their ‘mixed welfare economy’. They still did so two centuries later, when the national government sought to abolish guilds. The other factor was its size, which made it easier for Amsterdam guilds to overcome the problems inherent in mutual insurance. Other towns in the Dutch Republic were substantially smaller, reaching at best one-third of Amsterdam’s population, but more often significantly less. So far, no satisfactory explanation has been suggested for the pattern of guild insurance and its absence across the entire Dutch Republic.

Chapter 4: Professional Guilds and the History of Social Security and Insurance in the German-Speaking World By Phillip Hellwege* A. Introduction .............................................................................................................. 63 B. Guild support from the Middle Ages to the 17th century .......................................... 64 I. Supporting master craftsmen and their families ................................................ 64 II. Supporting journeymen ..................................................................................... 70 III. Supporting miners and their families ................................................................ 74 IV. Conclusion ........................................................................................................ 78 C. Guild support and insurance in the 17th and 18th centuries ....................................... 79 I. Supporting craftsmen and their families............................................................ 79 II. Supporting miners and their families ................................................................ 84 III. Contextualizing the process of transformation .................................................. 84 IV. Conclusion ........................................................................................................ 88 D. The evolution of Germany’s modern social security schemes in the 19th century .... 88 I. The crafts .......................................................................................................... 89 II. The mining sector ............................................................................................. 90 III. Factory workers ................................................................................................ 91 IV. Poor relief and municipal health insurance funds ............................................. 92 V. Conclusion ........................................................................................................ 93 VI. Bismarck’s social security legislation ............................................................... 94 E. Guild support and modern insurance? ...................................................................... 96 F. Conclusion ................................................................................................................ 97

A. Introduction The present chapter will assess whether it is possible to analyse the support offered by medieval and early modern professional guilds in Germany in terms of insurance and whether guild support had a lasting impact on the development of Germany’s modern insurance and insurance law as well as social security and social security law. It will thereby test today’s state of research, which indeed claims that modern insurance and social security are rooted in guild support.1 In ___________ * The present chapter is a summary of Phillip Hellwege, From Guild Welfare to Bismarck Care. Professional guilds and the origins of modern social security law and insurance law in Germany (2020), which has been published in parallel to the present volume and which fully explores the developments in Germany. 1 See Hellwege, pp. 10 ff., above.

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a first step, the different forms of support as offered by professional guilds from the Middle Ages to the 17th century will be analysed.

B. Guild support from the Middle Ages to the 17th century I. Supporting master craftsmen and their families Many guild statutes do not make explicit how guilds supported members in need and which requirements had to be met in order for a guild to step in. The 1614 statutes of the shoemakers’ guild in Münster, for example, simply stated:2 ‘Da auch jemant im amt zur armut oder unvermögenheit geraten wurde, dem soll man nach vermögen des amptes behülflich sein zu seiner notturft.’ ‘If someone of the guild has fallen into poverty or disability, he shall receive help from the guild within its capabilities.’

Even though the statutes are unspecific as to the form of support, they do specify one requirement of support which was common in medieval and early modern guild statutes: guilds offered support only if they were in a financial position to do so. Other statutes made explicit the procedure to be observed when deciding whether and how to support a member in need. The 15th-century statutes of the skippers’ confraternity in Strasbourg in today’s France may serve as an example:3 ‘Wer es ouch das der brüder einer oder me siechtagen und krankheit halb zů armůt keme, also das er mangel an siner libesnarunge hette, bittet und begert er danne das man im durch gotteswillen uf der brůderschaft zů stüre komme, so süllent die vier büssenmeister zůsammen gon und süllent noch zwen redeliche manne oder viere zů in nemen, die ouch in der brůderschaft sint, und süllent do miteinander eins werden was sie dem armen brůder, durch got, zů stüre geben wöllent us der büssen; und was das merteil unter inen (eins) wurt, das soll vollezogen und gehalten werden.’ ‘If it happens that a brother through one or more days of infirmity or illness becomes half impoverished, so that he is short of food, and if he then asks the confraternity for, and requests, help through God’s will, then the four Büchsenmeister [office holders of the confraternity] shall visit him, and they shall take two or four other honest members along. And there they shall agree what they can give from the box, through God, to the impoverished brother; and what the majority of them agrees on, that shall be done.’

The statutes mention a further requirement that was common for medieval and early modern guild support: not all ill members received support; the ill member had to suffer from financial need. Other guild statutes were more specific with ___________ 2 Cited from Robert Krumbholtz, Die Gewerbe der Stadt Münster bis zum Jahre 1661 (1898), 416. 3 Cited from Johann Karl Brucker, Strassburger Zunft- und Polizei-Verordnungen des 14. und 15. Jahrhunderts (1889), 439.

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respect to the forms of support. Foremost, guilds granted loans which recipients had to repay.4 Here again, a guild offered a loan only if the member was in financial need and if the guild had sufficient funds. Some guilds developed a third requirement that the person in need had not experienced the misfortune by his own fault, as the 1595 statutes of the weavers’ guild in Hamburg exemplify:5 ‘Dar ock einer der ambtsvorwanten […] mitt livesschwackheitt beladenn und uth unvormogenheit sich de notturfft nicht beschaffen konde, demsulven schall uth der gemeinen bussenn de hulpliche hand gelehnet werdenn, jedoch so schall van densulven, wann se wedderumb genesen, und idt in ehrem vormogenn is, solchs mit dankbarkeit wedderumb erstadet werden. Averst hirvann scholen desulven, de sich sulvest dorch ehr eigen schultt unnd vororsakung ein unglugk vorhengenn […], solcher hulpe nicht werdig geachtet sondern darvonn gentzlich uthgeschlaten sin.’ ‘If a guild member […] is burdened with infirmity and if he cannot through incapacity earn his living, he shall be lent a helping hand from the common box, but if he shall recover again and if he is capable to do so, then he shall repay it with gratefulness. However, those, who suffer misfortune through their own fault or causation […], shall not be regarded worthy to receive such help […].’

The 1375 statutes of the shoemakers’ guild in Riga in Latvia exhibit a further characteristic of early guild support:6 ‘weret dat en man van unsem werke krank worde und he nicht en hedde to vorterende, deme sal de olderman don VI ore […]. Wert he ok toreke und mach id betalen, so sal he id betalen weder dem werke; heft he is nicht, so solent almosen wesen.’ ‘If it happens that a man of our profession falls ill and if he has nothing to eat, then the Ältermann [office holder of the guild] shall give him six ore […]. If he recovers and if he is in the position to repay, then he shall repay the received sum to the profession; if he is not, then the sum shall be considered to have been alms.’

Thus, recipients who did not regain both their physical and financial wellbeing saw the loan converted to a manner of non-repayable alms. Furthermore, some guilds only granted a loan if the recipient was able to give surety, and many statutes stated that a guild could enforce the claim for repayment of the loan also against the recipient’s estate.7 ___________ 4 Sigrid Fröhlich, Die soziale Sicherung bei Zünften und Gesellenverbänden (1976), 82–85. 5 Cited from Otto Rüdiger, Die ältesten Hamburgischen Zunftrollen und Brüderschaftsstatuten (1874), 310. 6 Cited from Friedrich Georg von Bunge, Liv-, Esth- und Curländisches Urkundenbuch nebst Regesten, vol. 4 (1859), 315. 7 See the sources reproduced in Moritz Meyer, Geschichte der Preussischen Handwerkerpolitik, vol. 1 (1884), 226 (bakers’ guild, Ziesar, 1650); Camillus Nyrop, Danmarks Gilde- og Lavsskraaer Fra Middelalderen, vol. 2 (1895–1904), 51 (smiths’ guild, Flensburg, 1425); ibid., 29 (tailors’ guild, Schleswig, 1415); Friedrich Horsch, Die Konstanzer Zünfte in der Zeit der Zunftbewegung bis 1430 (1979), 105 (wine tavern innkeepers’ guild, Konstanz, 1343).

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In addition to loans, guilds could grant non-repayable financial support. Such cases are mentioned in guild statutes only exceptionally. The 1397 statutes of the coopers’ guild in Cologne are one of these rare examples, making explicit that disabled, blind, old, and sick guild members may receive a pension:8 ‘Vort of einich van den broideren lam, blint of so alt wurde, alsodat hei arm wurde […] asverre hei dat sin neit tuischlichen noch boisslichen hinbracht en hedde, so begerent ind willent si, dat man deme lamen, blinden of alden, kranken broidere van irre broiderschaf wegen us irme schrijne, of da asvil in is, of antwer van in gemeinligen zo neimen, alle dage geven ind leveren laissen soilen echt moirgin, aslange eme got des levens gan, ain eincherleie hindernisse.’ ‘If some of the guild brothers become lame, blind, or old and if they thereby fall into poverty […] and if it so happened without fraud and wickedness and if they so want and wish, then one shall give the lame, blind or old, ill guild brother from the box […] every day […] as long as they live […].’

According to Sigrid Fröhlich, the prime example of non-repayable financial support concerned the costs of a guild member’s funeral.9 However, other authors claim that contributions towards funeral costs were not a common form of support.10 And again, support was granted only if the deceased member’s family did not have the financial means to pay for the funeral. Next to financial support, guilds also offered different forms of non-financial support to members in need. Some guilds ran hospitals, they paid hospitals for caring for sick and old members, or they organized internally for the care of sick members.11 For guilds these forms of support may have involved financial investments, but members did not receive any payments directly from their guilds. Nevertheless, some guild statutes make explicit that members had to repay the costs of care after having recovered.12 An old or ill master craftsman who was unable to work could experience financial difficulties. Above all else, he lost his source of income. For such situations, guilds developed various means of support.13 Most importantly, the ill master craftsman was allowed to borrow a journeyman from another master craftsman in order to perform his work during the time of his illness. Or he was allowed to hire an extra journeyman. Similar means applied when a deceased master craftsman was survived by a widow. She was allowed to continue her husband’s ___________ 8 Cited from Heinrich von Loesch, Die Kölner Zunfturkunden nebst anderen Gewerbeurkunden bis zum Jahre 1500, vol. 1 (1907), 14 f. 9 Fröhlich (n. 4), 105 f. 10 Volker Martens, Toten- und Knochenbruchgilden im Herzogtum Schleswig (1967), 30 f. 11 Rudolf Wissell, Des alten Handwerks Recht und Gewohnheit, vol. 2 (2nd edn., 1974), 457–460. 12 See, e.g., the source reproduced in Meyer (n. 7), 290 (barber surgeons’ guild, Altmark and Prignitz, 1669). 13 Fröhlich (n. 4), 81 f.; Wissell, vol. 2 (n. 11), 466.

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business with the help of an additional journeyman. The details of the widow’s right differed greatly.14 In some guilds the widow was allowed to continue the workshop only if she had children. Or the right was restricted to one year or to the time she remained unmarried. Or she had the right without any restrictions. Only few guild statutes address the problem of how orphans of deceased members were supported. According to the 1589/1598 statutes of the slipper makers’ guild in Bremen, such orphans were taken into apprenticeship by a fellow guild brother or they were supported by the guild in learning another profession.15 Finally, guild members had to participate in a deceased member’s funeral, the guild would ensure that the funeral was appropriate and would hold masses for its deceased members.16 Heinrich von Loesch correctly observed that it is these forms of support which are most often mentioned in guild statutes.17 However, in some cities these forms of support were not organized by guilds, but by confraternities which existed alongside professional guilds.18 Did members in need have an enforceable legal right against a guild for support? The answer to this question links to the aspect of guild autonomy.19 Guilds often had the autonomy to enact statutes regulating internal affairs, and they often had jurisdiction over internal matters. The extent of their autonomy and jurisdiction differed regionally and developed over time. Autonomy together with jurisdiction meant that it was in the hands of the guilds to decide whether their members had a right to financial support. And indeed, modern literature stresses that guilds were only under a moral obligation to support members in need.20

___________ 14 See, e.g., the discussion of Christine Werkstetter, Frauen im Augsburger Zunfthandwerk (2001), 144–280. 15 Reproduced in Victor Böhmert, Beiträge zur Geschichte des Zunftwesens (1862), 85. 16 Fröhlich (n. 4), 101–104; Richard Günther, Das Zunftwesen der Stadt Bad Salzuflen (1930), 43; Krumbholtz (n. 2), Einleitung, 156 f. 17 von Loesch, vol. 1 (n. 8), Einleitung, 133. 18 Eduard Bodemann, Die Älteren Zunfturkunden der Stadt Lüneburg (1883), lxxiv–lxxviii. 19 von Loesch, vol. 1 (n. 8), Einleitung, 88–93, 99; Arnd Kluge, Die Zünfte (2009), 357–363; Günther (n. 16), 35–37; Wilhelm Dettmering, Beiträge zur älteren Zunftgeschichte der Stadt Strassburg (1903), 31–59; Krumbholtz (n. 2), Einleitung, 140– 149; Meyer (n. 7), 31; Bodemann (n. 18), xxiv–xxxviii; Herbert Engemann, Die Gilden der Stadt Goslar im 15. und 16. Jahrhundert (1957), 16 f., 24–27; Franz Nigge, Die alten Gilden der Stadt Lünen (1912), 16, 37–41, 56–58; Wissell, vol. 2 (n. 11), 177–257. 20 Ralf Lusiardi, Caritas – Fraternitas – Solidarität, in: Hans-Jörg Gilomen et al. (eds.), Von der Barmherzigkeit zur Sozialversicherung (2002), 139–151, 143.

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Beneficiaries of the different forms of support were primarily guild members. However, guilds were poly-functional institutions, serving also charitable functions. They, thus, also supported the poor people of their communities.21 It was compulsory for those who wanted to work in a profession to join the respective guild. The entrance requirements were aligned to the guilds’ primary function – that is regulating all aspects of the respective profession.22 Most fundamentally, those who wanted to join a guild as master craftsman had to fulfil the respective professional requirements: professional training, fulfilling the required journeyman years, and the making of a masterpiece. Additional requirements reflected the political functions of guilds as well as the moral and religious standards of their times. Often only legitimate children and people of free birth were admitted. Sometimes candidates had to be citizens of the respective town or eligible to become citizens. Finally, an entrance fee had to be paid. The entrance requirements for children of guild members and for journeymen marrying a master’s widow or daughter were less strict than for other candidates.23 In particular, they often had to pay a lower entrance fee than external applicants. Professional guilds had to cover the costs which they incurred fulfilling their many social, religious, and charitable, functions. And guilds had to finance the support for members in need. As long as financial support took the form of a loan, only relatively small funds were necessary. If a guild maintained a hospital the costs were, of course, higher. Guilds generated their income from entrance fees, fines, periodical contributions, and other charges.24 If a guild had to incur expenditures which could not be covered by existing funds, it may have apportioned these costs between its members. Finally, guilds may have received donations, they could give loans on interest to members and also to external persons, and they might have had property which they rented out. The generated interest and rents were with some guilds a very substantial source of income. At first, there were no separate funds for financing each function. Instead, the generated ___________ 21 Fröhlich (n. 4), 63; Hans Hemmen, Die Zünfte der Stadt Oldenburg im Mittelalter, (1910) 18 Jahrbuch für die Geschichte des Herzogtums Oldenburg 191–304, 219, 249; Walther Tuckermann, Das Gewerbe der Stadt Hildesheim bis zur Mitte des fünfzehnten Jahrhunderts (1906), 82 f. 22 See, e.g., Knut Schulz, Handwerksgesellen und Lohnarbeiter (1985), 209–315; Engemann (n. 19), 30–52, 91–93; Nigge (n. 19), 23–27; Franz Eulenburg, Über Innungen der Stadt Breslau vom 13. bis 15. Jahrhundert (1892), 13; Horsch (n. 7), 40–43; Frank Göttmann, Handwerk und Bündnispolitik (1977), 77–90; Hagen Hof, Wettbewerb im Zunftrecht (1983), 89–109; Kurt Wesoly, Lehrlinge und Handwerksgesellen am Mittelrhein (1985), 239–262; Wissell, (n. 11), vol. 1 (2nd edn., 1971), 125–273, vol. 2, 1–33. 23 Bruno Bucher, Die alten Zunft- und Verkehrs-Ordnungen der Stadt Krakau (1889), xxix–xxxiii; Krumbholtz (n. 2), Einleitung, 112 f.; Bodemann (n. 18), xliii; Nigge (n. 19), 25; Gerda Bergholz, Die Beckenwerkergilde zu Braunschweig (1954), 19–21; Harald Uhl, Handwerk und Zünfte in Eferding (1973), 73 f.; Wissell, vol. 2 (n. 11), 34. 24 Fröhlich (n. 4), 39–51.

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income went into one fund and all expenses were paid out of it. However, later in the development, a certain differentiation occurred. Foremost, poor boxes were established serving the function of supporting members in need.25 According to a widespread view in modern literature, the support offered by professional guilds to members in need is a root of modern insurance. Other authors claim that Germany’s modern social security schemes are rooted in medieval guild welfare. However, until the 17th century the support offered by professional guilds to master craftsmen and their dependants in need cannot be described in terms of insurance.26 Granting loans for the purpose of bridging a time of financial hardship or allowing a widow to continue her deceased husband’s workshop are forms of capacity building and nothing more. Furthermore, professional guilds were poly-functional institutions: they regulated the respective professions, they served social as well as religious functions, and they supported members in need. For insurance historians the mixing of these functions is an important point: in the context of marine insurance it is stressed that one can only speak of insurance once the insurance aspect in the sea loan contract was isolated and transformed into a separate contract.27 And guild support was not granted whenever a risk eventuated: the guild member had to be in financial need. Here again, this is not in line with modern insurance thinking. In addition, it seems that guilds were at first under only a moral obligation to grant help and support. However, according to the modern understanding, an institution only counts as insurance if the insured has a legal right to the insured sum as consideration for paying premiums. Finally, it seems that it was always dependent on the thenexisting financial capacity of the guild whether it would offer support. Thus, the support offered by craft guilds to masters and their dependants cannot be described in terms of insurance. For a legal historian, this finding may be of little relevance. He or she may include in his or her research on the history of insurance law institutions which are not covered by definitions of insurance for the purpose of working out the origins and genesis of legal principles of modern insurance law, as such legal principles may be rooted in institutions which themselves do not count as insurance. However even from this perspective, an analysis of guild support as it had developed from the Middle Ages to the 17th century is of no avail. First, even though professional guilds offered support to members in need, the entrance requirements did not aim at controlling the risk pool. Foremost, there were no requirements with regards to the state of health or the age of candidates. One should not draw the conclusion that guilds were underdeveloped in this respect. As long as financial support primarily took the form of a loan, the ___________ 25

Fröhlich (n. 4), 61. See also the analysis of Lusiardi (n. 20), 142 f. 27 Compare Peter Koch, Versicherungswesen, in: Adalbert Erler et al. (eds.), Handwörterbuch zur deutschen Rechtsgeschichte, vol. 5 (1998), 815–826, 818. 26

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need to have entrance requirements that controlled the risk pool was less evident. Secondly, one could say that the problem of moral hazard had been addressed: some statutes explicitly excluded support if the member had caused the illness by his own acts or by his own fault. However, one has to concede that the idea of excluding help in such situations is self-evident and that the rules found in guild statutes were not very sophisticated. Thirdly, there are no rules to be found in guild statutes addressing problems of fraud – i.e. a guild member fraudulently demanding support without being in need. It seems probable that it was not a problem likely to arise. Guilds were small associations, and in medieval and early modern towns the members of one profession often lived in the same street. Means of social control were most probably sufficient to prevent fraud. Finally, rules defining the risks covered by guilds were underdeveloped, and provisions addressing the question of how to react to an increase in risk did not exist. II. Supporting journeymen Fröhlich argues that establishing journeymen’s associations and initiating separate funds for the support of journeymen were of special importance in the evolution of such support into insurance.28 The needs of journeymen differed from that of master craftsmen. Typically, journeymen were not married, and often they were not allowed to marry.29 Consequently, there was no need to support any dependants. Fröhlich suggests that journeymen suffering from illness were initially supported by the master craftsmen for whom they worked.30 Arnd Kluge adds that they had a right to their regular wages while being sick.31 Fröhlich refers to sources dating back to the 13th century. Yet, in some cities master craftsmen seem to have been under no such obligation.32 Furthermore, it is questionable whether it is possible to conclude from the few sources available that such obligation was of general application.33 Finally, the surviving primary sources are ambiguous as to the requirements regarding when sick pay had to be offered, specifically

___________ 28

See Hellwege, p. 14, above. Arno von Dirke, Die Rechtsverhältnisse der Handwerks-Lehrlinge und Gesellen nach den deutschen Stadtrechten und Zunftstatuten des Mittelalters (1914), 49; Wesoly (n. 22), 132. 30 Fröhlich (n. 4), 32, 91–93. 31 Kluge (n. 19), 325. 32 Uhl (n. 23), 113. 33 Schulz (n. 22), 196; Rainer Schröder, Zur Arbeitsverfassung im Spätmittelalter (1984), 171 f. 29

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whether it was paid only for work accidents or also in cases of illness.34 The support offered by master craftsmen to journeymen is, of course, not directly relevant to the present contribution: such support was not offered by guilds, but by individual masters in their function as employers. Nevertheless, as long as the journeyman was cared for by the master, there was no need for the guild to step in.35 Initially, journeymen were members of master craftsmen’s guilds even though they were not full members. Consequently, they benefited from guild support, and the details ran parallel to the position of master craftsmen. Journeymen, too, received financial support foremost in the form of loans.36 And loans were the standard form of support even where there was a separate box for the benefit of journeymen,37 thus putting a question mark behind Fröhlich’s proposition that establishing such separate journeymen’s boxes was of special importance for the development of guild support into insurance. However, there are again some rare instances in which a guild paid to a journeyman financial support in the form of weekly allowances which did not have to be repaid.38 Finally, journeymen received support from their own associations. The crafts saw a long process of emancipation of journeymen, which in many German territories culminated in separate journeymen’s associations.39 The development ___________ 34 See, e.g., the 1270 laws of the city of Hamburg, reproduced in Johann Martin Lappenberg, Die ältesten Stadt- Schiff- und Landrechte Hamburgs (1845), 48, and the 1511 statutes of the coopers’ guild in Freiberg, reproduced in Konrad Knebel, Handwerksbräuche früherer Jahrhunderte insbesondere in Freiberg, (1886) 23 Mitteilungen des Freiberger Altertumsvereins 27–90, 28. 35 See, e.g., the source reproduced in Meyer (n. 7), 290 (barber surgeons’ guild, Altmark and Prignitz, 1669). 36 Fröhlich (n. 4), 96; Wissell, vol. 2 (n. 11), 451, 457; Otto Blümcke, Die Handwerkszünfte im mittelalterlichen Stettin (1884), 110; Schulz (n. 22), 198; Ossip D. Potthoff, Kulturgeschichte des deutschen Handwerks mit besonderer Berücksichtigung seiner Blütezeit (1938), 100. And see the sources reproduced in Nyrop (n. 7), 417 (coopers’ guild, Flensburg, 1488); Wilhelm Stieda and Constantin Mettig, Schragen der Gilden und Aemter der Stadt Riga bis 1621 (1896), 355 (hatters’ guild, Riga, 1595); Benno Schmidt, Frankfurter Zunfturkunden bis zum Jahre 1612, vol. 1 (1914), 90 (coopers’ guild, Frankfurt, 1355); Karl Siegl, Die Egerer Zunftordnungen (1909), 105 (millers’ guild, Eger/Cheb, 1586). 37 See the sources reproduced in Bodemann (n. 18), 172 (slipper makers’ guild, Lüneburg, 1525); Krumbholtz (n. 2), 149 (baking profession, Münster, 1569); Meyer (n. 7), 351 (lorimers’ guild, Berlin and Cölln, 1683). 38 Fröhlich (n. 4), 62, 94; Uhl (n. 23), 113. See the source reproduced in Rüdiger (n. 5), 9 (barbers’ confraternity, Hamburg, 1452). 39 Wilfried Reininghaus, Die Entstehung der Gesellengilden im Spätmittelalter (1981), 29–70; Wesoly (n. 22), 306–315; Karl Heinrich Kaufhold, Das Handwerk der Stadt Hildesheim im 18. Jahrhundert (2nd edn., 1980), 106–111; von Loesch, vol. 1 (n. 8), Einleitung, 78; Fröhlich (n. 4), 31–35, 97, 115; Krumbholtz (n. 2), Einleitung, 88 f.; Meyer

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occurred with regional differences. The details of the support offered by these associations ran parallel to that offered by master craftsmen’s guilds. Here again, financial support was foremost offered in the form of a loan.40 In addition to loans, journeymen’s associations could exceptionally grant financial support which the recipient did not have to repay. The prime example was the costs associated with a funeral for impoverished members. However, the associations tried again to secure reimbursement either from close relatives or from the deceased’s estate.41 Finally, starting in the 15th century, there is at least one example which suggest that journeymen’s confraternities also paid allowances in cases of need due to illness. Fröhlich refers to the 1479 statutes of the linen weaver journeymen’s association in Strasbourg in today’s France:42 ‘[…] wer’ es sach, das ein brůder siech wurde, das got lang wend, und in den spital kem, dem sol man alle tag ein d geben us der brüderschaft büchse.’ ‘[…] if it happens, that a brother falls sick, that this lasts long, and that he has to go to a hospital, then one shall give him each day one denar from the confraternity box.’

The statutes do not mention that a journeyman had to repay the amount which he had received after having recovered. By contrast, according to the 1591 statutes of the journeymen’s confraternity for the wool, linen, and trousers knitting crafts in the city of Freiburg, sick journeymen received a weekly allowance only on the basis of a loan:43 ‘Zum fünf und zwenzigsten ist sonderlich hierinnen abgeredt, wann under ermelten wullen- und leynenknappen, auch hosenstrickerhantwerks gesellen einer in seinem werendem dienst krank und solcher in spittal oder andere der statt Freyburg verordnete heüsser komen wurde, demselben solle man uß der brueder- und gesellschaft büchsen, so lange er krank ligt, alle wuchen syben pfenning zu geben schuldig sein; und im fahl einer in seiner hochbeschwerlichen krankheit etwas mehr bedürftig, soll man ime auß der büchsen zu seiner hochen notturft darleihen. Wann ime gott der allmechtig widerumb zu seiner gesuntheit hilft, soll er als ein redlicher gesell alles, so ime also auß der büchsen fürgestrekt werden, wiederumb zu erlegen schuldig sein; sturbe aber solcher gesell und nichtz verließe, soll es auch todt und ab sein, es seye dan das er von

___________ (n. 7), 24; Konrad Hermann Metger, Die Statuten des Verbandes der Schmiedegesellen in Flensburg aus dem 15., 16. und 17. Jahrhundert (1883), 1 f. 40 Fröhlich (n. 4), 137–140; Reininghaus (n. 39), 145 f.; Wesoly (n. 22), 329; Wissell, vol. 2 (n. 11), 451; Schmidt, vol. 1 (n. 36), Einleitung, 71 f.; Lusiardi (n. 20), 141; Schulz (n. 22), 198; Georg Schanz, Zur Geschichte der deutschen Gesellen-Verbände (1877), 71 f.; Knoll, Handwerksgesellen und Lehrlinge (1931), 49–58. See also, e.g., the sources reproduced in Stieda/Mettig (n. 36), 290 (glazier journeymen’s confraternity, Riga, 1542); Hermann Alexander Berlepsch, Chronik der Gewerke, vol. 4 (1850), 71 (confraternity of the shoemaker journeymen, Arnstadt, circa 1650); Schanz, op. cit., 171 (association of the furrier journeymen, Strasbourg, 1404); Schmidt, vol. 2 (n. 36), 275 (statutes of the cooper journeymen, Frankfurt, 1559). 41 Fröhlich (n. 4), 168–170; Krumbholtz (n. 2), Einleitung, 91. 42 Cited from Schanz (n. 40), 221. See Fröhlich (n. 4), 142. 43 Cited from Schanz (n. 40), 280.

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seinen eltern etwas vermöchte, solle dasselbige alles von solichen billig bezalt werden.’ ‘Twenty-fifth, it is agreed, when one of the wool or linen journeymen, and also one of the journeymen of the trousers knitting craft, falls sick while being employed and if such journeyman goes to a hospital or to another house designated by the town of Freiburg for such purposes, then one shall be obliged to give to the same each week seven pennies from the confraternity box, as long as he lies sick; and in the case he needs more due to a highly troublesome illness, then one shall give him from the box more in the form of a loan. When God the Almighty helps him to recover, then he shall as an honest journeyman repay everything that he has received from the box; however, if such journeyman dies and if he leaves nothing behind, then it [the received sum] shall also be extinguished and off, unless he receives something from his parents, then this shall be justly paid by them.’

Already at the end of the 16th century, the painter, glazier, and saddler journeymen’s association in Münster introduced a mechanism for how journeymen paid their fees to their confraternity.44 Journeymen, in their journeyman years, did not pay the confraternity themselves. Rather, the master craftsmen deducted the fee from their salary, and the confraternity then collected the fees from the master craftsmen. It may be assumed that this mechanism was introduced in order to see that journeymen did not travel on without having paid their fees. With master craftsmen’s guilds, only their members had to pay the periodical contributions. By contrast, with journeymen’s associations the master craftsmen were in some areas obliged to contribute to the associations’ funds without being a member and without benefiting from the funds.45 The statutes of the linen weavers’ guild in Münster, for example, stated in 1614:46 ‘Item solle auch ein neuer meister den semtlichen knechten 1/2 M. als 6 Sch. Münsterisch eins zu verrichten schuldig sein.’ ‘And a new master craftsman shall be liable to pay to all journeymen a half mark or six Münster shillings.’

The reference to a ‘new master craftsman’ suggests that it was a non-recurring entrance fee which had to be paid when attaining the status of a master craftsman. The fee had to be paid to ‘all journeymen’. This suggests that the fee benefited the entirety of the journeymen. It may be presumed that this practice developed from the fact that initially master craftsmen were obliged to support the journeymen who worked for them. However, Fröhlich argues that this was not a common practice.47 ___________ 44

Reproduced in Krumbholtz (n. 2), 344 f. Rauert, Ueber Gesellen-Brüderschaften und die Verpflichtung zur Verpflegung erkrankter Handwerks-Gesellen, (1842) 1 Archiv für Geschichte, Statistik, Kunde der Verwaltung und Landesrechte der Herzogthümer Schleswig, Holstein und Lauenburg 78–93, 79. 46 Reproduced in Krumbholtz (n. 2), 303. 47 Fröhlich (n. 4), 122 f. 45

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III. Supporting miners and their families The profession of miners developed in a different setting than the crafts. As the result of a long period of development, mining rights were eventually held by the sovereigns of the different German principalities. At times they themselves exploited the mines, but more regularly they granted privileges to that end. Furthermore, sovereigns early on regulated in detail the mining sector, established a public mining administration and enacted mining legislation. Thus, whereas the development of the crafts was shaped autonomously, the mining sector was early on characterized by state regulation. In the crafts, there are only a few sources suggesting that master craftsmen were obliged to care for sick journeymen whom they employed. By contrast, 16th-century mining legislation started to regulate such an obligation in detail: mine operators had to support miners in the event of work accidents, as Part II, Art. 85 of the 1548 Mining Act for the Free Royal Mine St. Joachimsthal (Jáchymov in today’s Czech Republic) exemplifies:48 ‘Und so ein Arbeiter inn der Gruben / oder an anderer der Gewercken arbeit / an glidmassen / arm / oder beyn brechen / oder der gleichen fellen schaden nimmet / So sol demselben von der Zechen / ob die fündig were / acht wochen das lohn / vnd das Artzgelt volgen / Aber auff andern Zechen / die da nicht fündig / sondern mit zupuss gebawet werden / die sollen dem Arbeiter vier wochen sein lohn / vnd das artzgelt entrichten.’ ‘And when a worker in the mine / or when doing other works / breaks his limbs / arm / or leg / or if he suffers from a similar damage / then the mine / if it is already exploited / shall pay him his wages for eight weeks / and also the costs of the doctor / but with other mines / which are not as yet exploited / but which are still being built / they shall pay him his wages for four weeks / and they shall give him the costs of the doctor.’

Mine operators also had to cover the funeral costs if the miner had died at work.49 Furthermore, miners established their own guilds. These were more comparable to journeymen’s associations than to master craftsmen’s guilds:50 both ___________ 48 Bergkordnung des freyen königlichen Bergkwercks Sanct Joachimsthal / sambt anderen umbligenden und eingeleibten Silberbergkwercken (Zwickau 1548). See also Adolf Menzel, Sociale Gedanken im Bergrecht, (1891) 32 Zeitschrift für Bergrecht 482– 511, 507–509; Heinrich Imbusch, Das deutsche Knappschaftswesen (1910), 15–17; Hans Thielmann, Die Geschichte der Knappschaftsversicherung (1960), 22–24; Wilhelm Ebel, Gewerbliches Arbeitsvertragsrecht im deutschen Mittelalter (1934), 87; Gerhard Dapprich, Geschichtliche Entwicklung der Knappschaft, in: Bundesknappschaft (ed.), 10 Jahre Bundesknappschaft (1979), 19–54, 22–24. 49 See, e.g., Allgemeine Bergordnung für sämmtliche churfürstliche Lande und Gebiete of 1669 reproduced in Johann Josef Scotti, Sammlung der Gesetze und Verordnungen, welche in dem vormali-gen Churfürstenthum Cöln … ergangen sind, vol. 1/1 (1830), 391. 50 Wolfgang Rohrbach, Versicherungsgeschichte Österreichs von den Anfängen bis zum Börsenkrach des Jahres 1873, in: idem (ed.), Versicherungsgeschichte Österreichs, vol. 1 (1988), 47–432, 67.

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journeymen’s associations and miners’ guilds represented the side of the economically dependent workforce. However, there is one marked difference between miners and journeymen. Whereas the latter were at first unmarried or even required to remain unmarried, miners often had families. Consequently, miners’ guilds, just like master craftsmen’s guilds, had to address the problem of how to support dependants of deceased members. At times, it was optional to join the miners’ guilds. However, the applicable public mining acts often introduced compulsory membership. Early mining legislation was often silent as to the exact form which support offered by miners’ guilds took. However, there are some indications that initially the support ran parallel to that offered by masters’ guilds and journeymen’s associations in the crafts. Miners’ guilds also granted loans, as the 1548 Mining Act for the tin mine in Hengst (Hřebečná in today’s Czech Republic) exemplifies:51 ‘So ein Gesell aus der Knappschaft krank würde, so soll man ihme, nach Gelegenheit seiner Krankheit und nach Bergmeisters, Geschworenen und Eltisten Erkenntnus aus der Büchsen leyhen, doch daß der krank, so viel möglichen zu thun, solch wiederumb zu erlegen, […].’ ‘When a journeyman from the miners’ guild falls sick, then one shall give him a loan from the guild box, depending on the circumstances of his sickness and on the basis of the knowledge of the Bergmeister [office holder in the public mining administration], the Geschworene and the Älteste [office holders of the guild], but the sick shall, as much as possible, repay such [moneys] again, […].’

The decision to grant such a loan was not made by the guild alone. Office holders in the public mining administration were involved in reaching this decision. This is a marked difference to the crafts, which were at first shaped by guild autonomy. In the mining sector, however, financial support went beyond loans. The many forms of capacity building undertaken for the support of incapacitated master craftsmen, their widows, and orphans simply did not work for miners. And indeed, there are numerous references to non-repayable forms of financial

___________ 51 Cited from Menzel (n. 48), 508. See Hermann Löscher, Die erzgebirgischen Knappschaften vor und nach der Reformation, (1956) 92 Blätter für deutsche Landesgeschichte 162–190, 176; Helmut Wilsdorf, Zur Geschichte der erzgebirgischen Bergbrüderschaften und Bergknappschaften (1986), 6; Otto Hue, Die Bergarbeiter, vol. 1 (1910), 293; Lahmeyer, Die Bergknappschaftskassen des hannoverschen Harzes, (1861) Zeitschrift für das Berg-, Hütten- und Salinenwesen im Deutschen Reich 306–315, 306; Andreas Bingener, Armenkaste oder Knappschaftsbüchse? in: Michael Fessner et al. (eds.), Auf breiten Schultern. 750 Jahre Knappschaft (2010), 52–59, 58; Wilhelm Weizsäcker, Sächsisches Bergrecht in Böhmen (1929), 227.

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support.52 The General Mining Act for all Territories of the Electorate of Cologne (Allgemeine Bergordnung für sämmtliche churfürstliche Lande und Gebiete) of 1669 made clear, for example, that Gnadengeld (mercy pay) could be paid from the box of the miners’ guild:53 ‘Demnach Berwercks herkommens, daß jeder Hauerknecht […] wochentlich 4. schwäre Pfenninge oder den halben Theil von einem Groschen Büchsengelt geben, so sollen die Schichtmeister oder Steiger bey der Lohnung bemelter Arbeiteren, wan sie die Büchsen-Pfenninge nit selbst erlegen, von dem Lohn abziehen, […] deß SonnAbends sollen die Schichtmeister solch Büchsengelt […] denen ältesten der Knapschaft zahlen und solches in ein Buch wöchentlich unter jedes Schichtmeiesters Rubric einzeichnen, mit welchem Buch sie Quartalig dero Einnamb justificiren, wan nur arme, kranke oder sonst gebrechliche Bergleuthe und dero Wittiben und Waisen in das Bergambt suppliciren und darauff ihnen ein gewisses an Gnadengelt verordnet, oder was sonsten armen Leuthen auß der Knappschaft gesteuret wird, sollen die ältesten der Knapschafft von diesen Büchsenpfenningen die Zahlung thun […].’ ‘In accordance with mining traditions, that each worker […] weekly gives four heavy pennies or half a groschen as box money, the shift-masters or Steiger [supervisor in the mines] when paying these workers, if they do not pay the box pennies themselves, deduct them from their wages, […] on Saturdays the shift-masters shall pay the collected box money to the Ältesten [office holders] of the miners’ guild and they shall record it weekly in their books under each shift-master’s entry, and with the book they shall verify the quarterly income; and the Älteste of the miners’ guild shall pay from the box pennies, when there are poor, ill or in any other way infirm miners or their widows and orphans supplicating to the Bergamt [office of the public mining administration] and thereupon are prescribed a mercy pay [Gnadengeld] […].’

It is striking that the application to receive the Gnadengeld had to be addressed to the public mining administration and not to the guild itself. Furthermore, miners’ guilds funded hospitals or paid hospitals to care for sick members.54 Finally

___________ 52 Andreas Bingener, Zur Entwicklung des Knappschaftswesens in Tirol, in: Christoph Bartels (ed.), … höchst verpönte Selbst-Hülfe … (2012), 26–45, 37; idem, Das knappschaftliche Rechnungswesen vom 16. bis zum 18. Jahrhundert am Beispiel der Freiberger, Schneeberger und Johanngeorgenstädter Knappschaftsrechnungen, in: ibid., 64–87, 76. 53 Cited from Scotti, vol. 1/1 (n. 49), 332. 54 Georg Greve, Gilbert Gratzel and Eberhard Graf, Die Knappschaft als sozialer Pfadfinder, in: Fessner (n. 51), 23–38, 25 f.; Andreas Bingener Bruderschaften und soziale Sicherheit, in: ibid., 60–70, 63–69; idem, (n. 51), 54; idem, Tirol (n. 52), 31; Andreas Bingener, Christoph Bartels and Michael Fessner, Die große Zeit des Silbers, in: Klaus Tenfelde et al. (eds.), Geschichte des deutschen Bergbaus, vol. 1 (2012), 317–452, 419. See also Johannes Langer, Die Freiberger Bergknappschaft, (1931) 61 Mitteilungen des Freiberger Altertumsvereins 18–92, 46 f.

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also with miners’ guilds, guild members had to participate in a deceased member’s funeral, the guild ensured that the funeral was appropriate, and the guild paid towards the funeral costs.55 In order to fund the support for miners in need, each miner had to pay an entrance fee as well as weekly contributions. Often the latter were deducted from the wages and paid directly into the guild box as the Mining Act of Schlaggenwald exemplifies:56 ‘Es soll ein itzlicher Schichtmeister oder Steyger eynem jeden Arbeiter die wochen einen pfenning an seinen Lohne abziehen und am Sonnabend […] in die Büchsen antworten.’ ‘Each shift-master or Steiger [supervisor in the mines] shall deduct each week one penny from the wages of each miner and shall pay it each Saturday […] into the box.’

In the crafts, this mechanism was an exception. Furthermore, mine operators had to contribute to the guild box, too. It was common that guilds held shares in the mine. The General Mining Act for all Territories of the Electorate of Cologne (Allgemeine Bergordnung für sämmtliche churfürstliche Lande und Gebiete) of 1669, for example, stated:57 ‘Obzwar die Anzahl der Küxse in der Gewerckschafft auff 128 Theile eingetheilet, so sollen in Ansehung Vns vier Erb-Küxse, worunter ein Küxs demjenigen, auff dessen Grunde gesuncken und eingeschlagen, frey gebawet, 124 verzubuesset und darauff Anlage geschehen. Betreffend über diese Anzahl die drey freye Küxse, sollen im Aussbeut-Register Unseren Berg-Stätten zu Erhaltung Kirchen, Schulen un den Armen berechnet werden.’ ‘Even though there are 128 mining shares in the mine, there shall be for us four hereditary mining shares, including one mining share for him on whose ground the mine is operated […]. Concerning the three free mining shares, they shall be accounted for the maintenance of churches, schools, and for the poor.’

Finally, the accounts were audited by the public mining administration, and they also had to be laid open to all miners.58 It is argued by some that miners had a legal right to support.59 However, others claim that guilds granted aid on a purely voluntary basis, especially the

___________ 55 See, e.g., the source reproduced in Hermann Löscher, Das erzgebirgische Bergrecht des 15. und 16. Jahrhunderts, vol. 2/3 (2009), 307 (Freiberg, around 1553). See further Wilsdorf (n. 51), 6; Karl Rabenau, Das bayerische Knappschaftswesen (1909), 21. 56 Cited from Menzel (n. 48), 508. 57 Cited from Hermann Brassert, Berg-Ordnungen der Preussischen Lande (1858), 568. 58 See the Goslar 1538 Mining Act, reproduced by Dapprich (n. 48), 37. 59 Menzel (n. 48), 508 f.

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Gnadengeld given to widows and orphans.60 On the one hand support was dependent on the guild having sufficient funds, and it seems that the public mining administration together with the guild’s office holders had some discretion when deciding whether to grant support.61 On the other hand, the entitlement to support was recognized in public legislation. Thus, whereas in the context of the crafts it is clear that, at first, there was no legally enforceable right to support, the position is less clear in the mining sector. IV. Conclusion Modern literature claims that today’s insurance and insurance law as well as today’s social security and social security law are rooted in medieval guild support. The present analysis comes to a different conclusion. In the crafts, guilds indeed offered support to master craftsmen, their dependants, and journeymen, but the different forms of support cannot be described in terms of insurance. Primarily, they were forms of capacity building. And they did not raise any legal problems comparable to those faced by modern insurance or social security. It follows that the legal regime found in guild statutes from the Middle Ages to the 17th century to regulate guild support is not in any form a root of modern insurance law or social security law. The mining sector presents itself differently. Starting in the 16th century, the sector knew forms of support which may be qualified at least as pre-insurance: old and incapacitated miners as well as widows and orphans received financial support in the form of a Gnadengeld, which they did not have to repay. Furthermore, there are certain details in the mining sector which are reminiscent of Germany’s modern social security. Firstly, the contributions which miners owed to the guilds were often deducted from their wages and paid directly to the guilds. Secondly, mine operators had to contribute to the guild funds, too. Thirdly, already in the early 16th century, miners’ guilds had become closely connected to the public mining administration. Even though there were elements of self-administration, the public mining administration was strongly involved in supervising how the guild funds were administered. Finally, in the mining sector public mining legislation defined the legislative framework in which miners’ guilds acted and in which miners’ guild could enact their guild statutes defining the details of guild support. ___________ 60 Bingener, Rechnungswesen (n. 52), 77; Hans-Joachim Kraschewski, Das Spätmittelalter, in: Tenfelde (n. 54), 249–316, 304; Werner Ogris, Geschichte des Arbeitsrechts vom Mittelalter bis in das 19. Jahrhundert, in: idem, Elemente europäischer Rechtskultur (2003), 575–607, 600. 61 See the discussion by Max Metzner, Die soziale Fürsorge im Bergbau (1911), 105; Imbusch (n. 48), 13.

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C. Guild support and insurance in the 17th and 18th centuries The 17th and 18th centuries saw a first phase of transformation of guild support. In the crafts, new means of support gradually gained importance which may be described in terms of pre-insurance. By contrast, the mining sector had already developed forms of pre-insurance in the 16th century. Here, these forms of support were simply refined. I. Supporting craftsmen and their families The 16th century and then foremost the 17th and 18th centuries are said to have seen a decline of craft guilds. Furthermore, guild autonomy came under pressure and state intervention increased, resulting in the Reichszunftordnung (Imperial Guild Ordinance) of 1731. According to its Art. 1, craftsmen were no longer allowed to associate without the approval of public authorities, and they did not any longer have the autonomy to enact their statutes without the approval of the public authorities. On the basis of the Reichszunftordnung, the different principalities and imperial cities enacted their own craft and trade legislation. Furthermore, journeymen’s associations were in the aftermath of the Reichszunftordnung prohibited in many German territories. In these territories, separate funds or boxes for the benefit of journeymen within, and under the supervision of, master craftsmen’s guilds may, however, still have been permitted. And in some guilds there developed separate poor boxes, death boxes covering funeral costs, and sick boxes.62 Yet here again, the development of such separate boxes was by no means uniform. As in earlier times, the participation in theses boxes was mostly compulsory. However, there are also examples where the participation in such poor boxes was voluntary. In substance, the intervention of state legislation did not bring fundamental changes. Many of the traditional guild rules survived. Only where there was need for reform did the authorities further revise traditional customs. Consequently, granting loans to members in need remained the primary form of financial support offered by guilds.63 Widows still had the right to continue their deceased husband’s workshop.64 Sick or incapable master craftsmen were still allowed to ___________ 62 See, e.g., Art. 12 f. of the 1734 statutes of the yarn weavers’ guild in Brandenburg: Corpus Constitutionum Marchicarum, vol. 5/2/10, Anhang, 5. 63 See, e.g., the sources reproduced in Moritz Meyer, Geschichte der Preussischen Handwerkerpolitik, vol. 2 (1888), 350 (Art. 46 of the Handwercks-Ordnung für das Königreich Preussen of 1733); Rudolf Wissell, Der soziale Gedanke im alten Handwerk (1930), 57 (masons’ guild, Reval/Tallinn, 1762). 64 See, e.g., Part II, Title 8, § 238 of the Allgemeines Landrecht für die Preußischen Staaten, reproduced in Hans Hattenhauer (ed.), Allgemeines Landrecht für die Preußischen Staaten von 1794 (2nd edn., 1994), 466.

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continue their workshops with the help of an additional journeyman.65 The position of sick journeymen saw some changes. The Allgemeines Landrecht für die Preußischen Staaten Landrecht (General Prussian Territorial Law) of 1794, for example, no longer mentioned the master craftsman’s obligation to care for a journeyman who was in his services. Instead, it introduced a tiered system of responsibilities: primarily, it fell upon the journeymen’s box to support sick journeymen. If such box did not exist or if it did not have sufficient funds, the guild box stepped in. And if the guild box did not have sufficient funds, municipal poor relief had to support sick journeymen in need.66 In the late 17th century and then foremost in the course of the 18th century, forms of pre-insurance were added to traditional support schemes. Late 17th-century guild statutes increasingly exhibited the concept of non-repayable alms as support in situations in which – hitherto – loans would have been granted, as the 1683 statutes of the tailors’ guild in Luckenwalde exemplify:67 ‘Wenn ein Meister verarmen solte, und nicht Lebens-Mittel hette, soll denselben auf sein Anhalten auss der Lade eine Allmosen gereichet werden.’ ‘If a master becomes impoverished and if he lacks food, then one shall give him on his request alms from the guild box.’

The same statutes made explicit that orphans were helped with alms, too. Another, very sophisticated, example comes from the 1683 statutes of the confraternity of the Sager or Saager (presumably: sawyers) in Hamburg:68 ’18) Wann einer oder ander von der Saagerbrüderschafft alt und unvermögend ist, der seine Arbeit nicht mehr verrichten kann, der soll bis auf ein Jahr lang wochentlich haben 1 [Mark] 8 [Schilling]. Nach verflossenem Jahr aber soll er alsden haben 1 [Mark] Lübisch, so ihm aus den Armenladen wochentlich soll gegeben werden. Befällt er aber wieder in Krankheit, der soll gleichfalls wochentlich 1 [Mark] 8 [Schilling] haben. 19) Wann einer oder der ander unter der Brüderschafft von denen, so in Arbeit stehen und arbeiten können, in Krankheit fället oder sonsten in der Arbeit der Brüderschaft zu Unglück kähme, soll derselbe aus der Armenlade wochentlich haben 1 [Mark] 8 [Schilling], bisz er wieder zu seiner Arbeit gelangen kan, worüber auch gute Auffsicht und Obacht von der Brüderschaft soll gegeben werden. 20) Wan einer oder der ander unter denen Brüdern am Montag und Dienstag arbeitet und mit schleuniger Kranckheit befällt, dass er am Mittewochen nicht kan arbeiten, so soll er die Woche sein Kranckengeldt, nehmlich 2 [Mark] haben. Gehet er aber aus und gleich nicht arbeitet, so hat er die Woche nichts zu fordern. […]

___________ 65

See, e.g., Part II, Title 8, §§ 345 f., reproduced in Hattenhauer (n. 64), 469. Part II, Title 8, §§ 353–355, reproduced in Hattenhauer (n. 64), 469. 67 Cited from Meyer (n. 7), 339 f. 68 Cited from Rüdiger (n. 5), 208 f. 66

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22) Wann einer oder der ander unter der Sagerbrüderschafft mit dem Tode wird abgehen, soll demselben, es sey Mann oder Frau oder Wittwe, aus der Armlade jedem zur Begrägniszkost sechs Reichsthaler […] gegeben werden. 23) Wann unter der Brüderschafft ein Man am Montag oder in der Wochen bisz den Sonntag hinzu stirbet oder todt über der Erde stehet, so soll gleichfalls dessen nachgelassene Wittwe die […] 2 [Mark] dieselbe Woche über zu genieszen haben. 24) Würde auch von der Sagerbrüderschaft einig Sohn oder Tochter mit Tode abgehen, so sollen die Söhne und Töchter, wan sie ihr elfftes Jahr erwachsen oder darüber, zur Begräbnisz aus der Armenladen haben drey Rthlr., die aber im zehnden Jahre begriffen, bis 5 Jahr nur 2 Rth. haben, und die kleinen Söhne und Töchter nur 1 Rth. Die aber ihr Jahren erwachsen und zur Heyraht gelanget sindt, haben nichts zu genieszen und sindt gäntzlich ausgeschlossen. […] 26) Wann auch eine Wittwe unter der Bürderschafft mit Kranckheit befället, soll dieselbe wochentlich aus der Armlade geniszen 12 [Schilling].’ ‘18) If one or the other of the sawyers’ confraternity is old and impoverished and if he is unable to perform his work, he shall receive for one year each week one mark and eight shillings. However, after one year he shall have one Lübeck mark, which he shall receive weekly from the poor box. However, if he falls sick again, then he, too, shall also have weekly one mark eight shillings. 19) If one or the other from the confraternity, who is working and who is able to work, falls sick or otherwise experiences misfortune while working with the confraternity, then he shall receive from the poor box weekly one mark eight shillings until he is able to work again, which should be carefully supervised by the confraternity. 20) If one or the other from the confraternity works on a Monday and a Tuesday and then is inflicted with a quick ailment so that he is not able to work on a Wednesday, then he shall receive for the week a sick pay of two marks. However, if he has gone out and immediately is unable to work, then he cannot claim anything for the week. […] 22) If one or the other from the sawyers’ confraternity dies, then the same, regardless of whether it is a man or a woman or a widow, shall receive from the poor box six imperial talers […] towards the funeral costs. 23) If a man from the fraternity dies on a Monday or in the week by the Sunday […], then his surviving widow shall receive […] two marks in that week. 24) If a son or a daughter from the sawyers’ confraternity dies, then the sons and daughters, when they are eleven years of age or older, shall receive three imperial talers from the poor box towards the funeral costs, when they are five to ten years of age, they shall receive two imperial talers, and the small sons and daughters only one imperial taler. Those, however, who are of age and who have married will receive nothing. […] 26) If a widow from the confraternity falls sick, she shall receive weekly twelve shillings from the poor box.’

The Hamburg sawyers’ confraternity offered non-repayable financial support instead of loans. Furthermore, the statutes exhibit a detailed catalogue of predefined benefits which members were to receive, thereby eliminating any discretion which guild office holders had in deciding whether and how much support a guild

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would grant. The 1683 statutes suggest that a member had a legal entitlement to support, thus overcoming the idea that guilds were only under a moral obligation to grant support. Art. 19 of the 1683 statutes obliged the guild to carefully check whether sick guild members had come to health again, thereby addressing problems of fraud which to that point had been largely been ignored in guild statutes. Finally, the 1683 statutes suggest that support was aligned to the loss which members suffered: parents received different sums towards the funeral costs of deceased children depending on the deceased’s age, and it may be presumed that funeral costs differed, too. Finally, financial support was paid out of a separate poor box. In all, the Hamburg sawyers’ confraternity offered under its 1683 statutes support which can already be described in terms of insurance. Nevertheless, guild statutes from the 17th and 18th centuries suggest that the transformation from support to pre-insurance or even insurance was a complex process which was not coordinated by any means. The developments were driven by local actors, namely the guilds and the public authorities of the different cities and territories. Some guilds remained deeply rooted in earlier traditions. Others developed their support schemes further. In all, it seems to have been a process of trial and error. Consequently, it is not possible to reconstruct a clear chronological evolution. A sick box which attracted the attention of both contemporaries69 and modern scholars is the one established in Würzburg in 1786.70 According to Philipp Michaelis, the idea for it was developed by a master craftsman in the hat making profession.71 It was restricted to journeymen and apprentices, but it was open to journeymen and apprentices of all professions working in Würzburg. Thus, it was no longer a box established by a specific guild or by the journeymen of a specific profession. It was called the Kranke-Gesellen Institut (Sick Journeymen Institution). Each member had to pay a weekly contribution of one kreuzer. In return, members received free medical treatment. Journeymen working in the trade, not in the crafts, as well as surgeon journeymen had to pay one-and-a-half ___________ 69 See, e.g., Philipp Michaelis, Wohltätiges Institut für kranke Handwerksgesellen in Würzburg, (1791) 13/6 Ernst Gottfried Baldingers Neues Magazin für Aerzte 523–544; Anonymous, (1786) Real-Zeitung 13–17; A.F. Hecker, Beantwortung der von der königlichen Societät der Wissenschaft in Göttingen auf den Monat Julius 1793 aufgegebene Preisfrage, (1793) 3 Neues Hannöverisches Magazin 1346–1360, 1354; Heinrich Georg Hoff, Gesammelte sehr merkwürdige Briefe aus dem letzten Jahrzehend, vol. 2 (Graz 1794), 135–164. 70 Fröhlich (n. 4), 148–150; Wilhelm Reubold, Beiträge zur Geschichte der Krankenkassen von Würzburg, (1904) 46 Archiv des historischen Vereins von Unterfranken und Aschaffenburg 1–26; Margarete Wagner-Braun, Zur Bedeutung berufsständischer Krankenkassen innerhalb der privaten Krankenversicherung in Deutschland bis zum Zweiten Weltkrieg (2002), 34. 71 Michaelis (n. 69), 523.

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kreuzer, but they also received extra benefits. The support offered by the box was no longer dependant on the sick member being in financial need. The medical treatment was undertaken in the Juliusspital, a hospital dating back to the 16th century.72 It received 25 kreuzer per day for each patient. The following years saw discussions of how to reform and finance public health care for the poor. In 1793, A.F. Hecker spoke of forming different Assekuranzklassen (classes of assurance):73 he estimated the annual number of hospital patients in a town of 20,000 inhabitants. He argued that the numerous hospitals run by the different guilds or confessions which existed in many towns should be merged together to make hospitals more cost efficient. He then estimated the annual costs of running such a hospital. Hecker suggested to divide a city’s population into four classes. Depending on their income, members had to make different contributions. The contributions were voluntary, but only those who contributed were to be admitted to the hospital. Following the example of Würzburg and these discussions, similar sick boxes were established in Bamberg (1789, 1790), Munich (1810, 1813), Schweinfurt (1814), Stuttgart (1819, 1827), and Solingen (1836).74 The entrance requirements to guilds with compulsory membership were reformed in the 17th and 18th centuries. More importantly, entrance requirements were developed for voluntary poor, sick, and death boxes. Journeymen who were already sick when applying for membership as well as journeymen suffering from epilepsy were, for example, not admitted to the Würzburg 1786 journeymen’s sick box. The provisions on guild finances continued to follow traditional lines in the 17th and 18th centuries. Members had to pay entrance fees, periodical contributions, and fines to guilds and also to separate poor, sick, and death boxes. However, there were again reforms. Guild statutes made clear that funds had to be used for the support of poor members and that it was forbidden to waste the funds on banquets and feasts. The 1683 statutes of the lorimers’ guild in Berlin and Cölln, for example, simply stated:75 ‘Alles Geldt, so vermöge dieses Privilegii zusammenkompt, soll nicht zu Mahlzeiten, Wein, Bier, oder Brantwein sondern allein zu der Armen Nothurfft angewendet werden.’ ‘All moneys, which are collected on the basis of theses privileges, shall not be spent on wine, beer, or spirits, but shall only be spent for the relief of the poor.’

___________ 72 Peter Kolb, Das Spital- und Gesundheitswesen, in: Ulrich Wagner (ed.), Geschichte der Stadt Würzburg, vol. 2 (2004), 540–568, 542. 73 Hecker (n. 69), 1352–1358. 74 Kluge (n. 19), 334. 75 Cited from Meyer (n. 7), 353.

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Finally, there was a gradual development towards acknowledging a legal right of support. Fröhlich refers to a case from 1730 in the city of Cologne in which Peter Pauli, a wool weaver journeyman, turned to the town council:76 According to the statutes of the confraternity, each journeyman had to pay into the box every fortnight four Albus – an Albus was a silver groschen. In the event of illness, a journeyman was to receive a weekly sick pay of half an imperial taler and in the event he was bedridden six shillings. Pauli turned to the town council claiming that he had paid into the box for 22 years, but the confraternity declined to offer sick pay although he was ill and bedridden. According to Fröhlich, the confraternity then wanted to fine Pauli simply for having turned to the town council. Pauli again appealed. The town council decided that the confraternity could not fine Pauli and that it had to adhere to its statutes. II. Supporting miners and their families Miners’ guilds did not witness the same fundamental changes in the 17th and 18th centuries as guilds and journeymen’s associations did in the crafts. As early as in the 16th century, the support offered by miners’ guilds may be qualified as pre-insurance. Nevertheless, there were a number of improvements. At first, ill or incapacitated miners, widows, and orphans did not receive a pre-defined sum. Rather, it was a discretionary decision of the public mining administration how much they were to receive. Starting in the middle of the 18th century, the sum to be paid as Gnadengeld became pre-defined.77 Consequently, public mining authorities faced the problem of achieving financial and actuarial soundness, without always succeeding.78 III. Contextualizing the process of transformation Even though the support schemes in the crafts and the mining sector did not run parallel, they nevertheless did not develop in isolation from each other. HansJoachim Kraschewski observed that in the city of Goslar members of urban guilds were often shareholders in mines.79 The mining sector and the city’s craft guilds were, thus, linked to each other. And these interactions left their marks in guild statutes and mining acts. In the crafts, it was, for example, common to give ___________ 76

Fröhlich (n. 4), 146. See the example discussed by Bingener, Rechnungswesen (n. 52), 77 f. 78 Wilhelm Bülow, Das Knappschaftswesen im Ruhrkohlenbezirk bis zum allgemeinen preußischen Berggesetz vom 24. Juni 1865 (1905), 27–29, 36–38. 79 Hans-Joachim Kraschewski, Zur Arbeitsverfassung des Goslarer Bergbaus am Rammelsberg im 15. und 16. Jahrhundert, in: Karl Heinz Ludwig and Peter Sika (eds.): Bergbau und Arbeitsrecht (1987), 275–304, 282 77

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a Zehrpfennig to journeymen, a mechanism which functioned as follows: A journeyman came to a town to find work. If he did not find an open position, he continued with his journey. On his departure he was given a Zehrpfennig. Zehren simply means to live from, and a Pfennig is a penny. Thus, a Zehrpfennig was the money which fed him when he continued his journey to the next town. The Zehrpfennig also appeared in mining acts.80 Furthermore, the process of transformation from simple support to pre-insurance followed a general trend. Since the 16th and then above all in the 17th and 18th centuries, numerous institutions for the benefit of people in need emerged. Some of these institutions were inspired by the support offered by professional guilds. Some were based on ideas of charity. And others may be placed into the greater context of an emergence of ‘insurance thinking’. By 1588, marine insurance had arrived in Hamburg,81 and starting in 1591, Hamburg brewers had started to conclude mutual fire contracts.82 Drawing on the experiences with these contracts, the first public fire insurance scheme was introduced in Hamburg in 1676. Life annuity schemes and tontines were products serving pension-like functions,83 and they raised actuarial problems which were discussed throughout Europe.84 These developments should not be analysed as being distinct from each other. It seems, instead, that contemporaries were aware of the connections between them, which is to say that an ‘insurance thinking’ materialized. This proposition is already supported by the observation that in the second half of the 18th century, the public mining authorities became aware of the actuarial problems involved in the schemes established for the support of miners. Furthermore, an observation by Klaus-Dieter Rabstein regarding a skippers’ death fund which was established in 1618 in Bremen to cover funeral costs suggests that it was influenced by marine insurance thinking: the contributions to the fund were dependant on the destination of a specific journey, thus reflecting the specific risk of death.85 It is an early example of a professional guild trying to correlate the contributions towards the box with the risk it promised to cover. ___________ 80 See, e.g., General-Privilegium für die Bergleute im Herzogthum Cleve, Fürstenthum Moers und Graffschaft Marck of 1767, reproduced in from Bülow (n. 78), 83. 81 Phillip Hellwege, Germany, in: idem (ed.), A Comparative History of Insurance Law in Europe. A Research Agenda (2018), 171–197, 172. 82 Hellwege (n. 81), 178. 83 On the development of tontines see, e.g., the contributions in Phillip Hellwege (ed.), The Past, Present, and Future of Tontines. A Seventeenth Century Financial Product and the Development of Life Insurance (2018). 84 See, e.g., Phillip Hellwege, A History of Tontines in Germany. From a multi-purpose financial product to a single-purpose pension product (2018), 111 f. 85 Klaus-Dieter Rabstein, Sozialrechtliche Entwicklungstendenzen in der Seeschifffahrt der Freien Hansestadt Bremen (1970), 59.

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The Hamburg General Feuer-Cassa was established in 1676 as Germany’s first state-run fire insurance. Its statutes had 16 articles, four of which addressed the problems of how to support firefighters who had been injured or incapacitated while fighting a fire and how to support their widows and orphans.86 The Hamburg fire contracts, first concluded in 1591 and thereafter regularly renewed, did not embody any similar provisions.87 Title 14, Art. 3 of the Hansische Seerecht (Hanseatic Maritime Act) of 1614 included a provision for the benefit of sailors who had been incapacitated while defending a ship:88 the loss they suffered was treated as a case of general average. The 1676 statutes did not simply translate the 1614 provision into the context of fire insurance. Rather, they went beyond, addressing the support for widows and orphans and adding a provision on funeral costs. The 1676 statutes also went beyond fire ordinances. Article 39 of the 1685 Fire Ordinance of the city of Hamburg, for example, stated only that an incapacitated firefighter should be supported.89 In fact, the 1676 statutes seem to parallel the support offered by miners’ guilds to widows and orphans. Nevertheless, there is no clear proof that the 1676 statutes consciously drew on any earlier models. Factory health insurance schemes existed since the 18th century. They were established by factory owners for the benefit of their workers. These funds supported sick factory workers, but they often also paid a pre-defined sum in the event of their death. The health insurance scheme initiated in 1717 at the Blaufarbenwerk (blue dye works) in Niederpfannenstiel is said to be one of the oldest, or even the oldest, of such scheme.90 Niederpfannenstiel is today part of Aue, then a mining town. In 1789, a similar fund was established for the benefit of the workers of the Königliche Porzellan-Manufaktur (Royal Porcelain Factory) in Berlin. According to Arnulf Siebeneicker, it was Friedrich Anton Freiherr von Heinitz and Friedrich Philipp Rosenstiel who had developed the idea for the fund and who had drafted its first statutes. Both had made a career in the mining administration.91 It thus seems likely that these first factory health insurance schemes were inspired by miners’ guilds. The first Witwen- und Waisenkassen (widows’ and orphans’ assurances) are thought to have been established in the 17th century.92 Modern literature claims ___________ 86 Reproduced in Wilhelm Ebel, Die Hamburger Feuerkontrakte und die Anfänge des deutschen Feuerversicherungsrechts (1936), 84. 87 The fire contracts of 1591, 1620, 1622, and 1640 are reproduced in Ebel (n. 86), 66–83. 88 Reproduced in Johann Andreas Engelbrecht, Corpus iuris nautici (Lübeck 1790), 143 f. 89 Der Stadt Hamburg Anno 1685. Neu revidirte Feuer-Ordnung (Hamburg 1685). 90 Rudolf Schwenger, Die deutschen Betriebskrankenkassen (1934), 11. 91 Arnulf Siebeneicker, Offizianten und Ouvriers (2002), 349. 92 Clemens von Zedtwitz, Die rechtsgeschichtliche Entwicklung der Versicherung (1999), 137; Friedrich Wilhelm Ponfick, Geschichte der Sozialversicherung im Zeitalter

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that the Pfarr-Wittwen Kasten (pastors’ widows’ box) of 1636 in the Duchy of Brunswick-Lüneburg was the first such fund.93 It was founded for the benefit of widows of Protestant pastors. Yet Bernd Wunder has identified some earlier examples in Saxony dating to the second half of the 16th century.94 These funds were established in different settings:95 the position of widows and their need for support differed greatly in the different Protestant territories, and they went through a development of over 300 years. At first, they were established by local actors. They were often initiated by, or with the support of, the sovereigns of the respective territories. However, sometimes they were based on private initiatives. Furthermore, their financial designs and their internal structures differed greatly. Some such funds were compulsory whereas with others membership was voluntary. In all, the term Witwenkasse covered all sorts of different societies, boxes, and funds for the support of widows and orphans. There never was any paradigm of such an assurance. It seems clear that these funds had no connection to the support offered by craft guilds. However, it is likely that they took the support offered by miners’ guilds as a model. This suggestion is supported by the statutes of the 1636 fund in Brunswick-Lüneburg. The statutes refer to earlier plans to establish such an assurance under the reign of Julius, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg.96 He ruled the Principality of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel from 1568 to 1589. Under his reign, the Principality became Lutheran. This raised the problem of how to provide for pastors’ widows. Earlier in 1552, his father had gained control over the mines at the Rammelsberg,97 and Julius actively reformed the economy of the Principality, rebuilt the public mining administration, and expanded the mining sector. Thus, it is likely that Julius was familiar with the support schemes ___________ der Aufklärung (1940), 56 f.; Wilhelm Ebel, Memorabilia Gottingensia (1969), 73–100; Gerald Schöpfer, Sozialer Schutz im 16.–18. Jahrhundert (1976), 143–149. 93 Hans Schmitt-Lermann, Der Versicherungsgedanke im deutschen Geistesleben des Barock und der Aufklärung (1954), 31. 94 Bernd Wunder, Pfarrwitwenkassen und Beamtenwitwen-Anstalten vom 16.– 19. Jahrhundert, (1985) 12 Zeitschrift für Historische Forschung 429–498, 441–443. 95 Wunder (n. 94), 433–439; Silke Kröger, Armenfürsorge und Wohlfahrtspflege im frühneuzeitlichen Regensburg (2006), 304 f.; Peter Borscheid, Geschichte des Alters (1987), 72–74; W. Stockmann, Die Versorgung der Prediger-Wittwen und Waisen in der evangelisch-lutherischen Kirche der Provinz Schleswig-Holstein, (1892) 22 Zeitschrift der Gesellschaft für Schleswig-Holstein-Lauenburgische Geschichte 303–474; D.Th. Woltersdorf, Die Konservierung der Pfarr-Wittwen und -Töchter bei den Pfarren und die durch Heirat bedingte Berufung zum Predigtamte in Neuvorpommern und Rügen, (1902) Deutsche Zeitschrift für Kirchenrecht 177–246; Friederike Gollmann, Das Leben protestantischer Pastoren in Deutschland vom Ende des 17. Jahrhunderts bis zur Mitte des 19. Jahrhunderts (Diplomarbeit, Universität Wien, 2010), 81–90. 96 Chur-Braunschweig-Lüneburgische Landes-Ordnungen und Gesetze, vol. 1 (Göttingen 1739), 840. On Julius see, e.g., Hans-Georg Aschoff, Die Welfen (2010), 52–58; Hans-Joachim Kraschewski, Wirtschaftspolitik im deutschen Territorialstaat des 16. Jahrhunderts (1978), passim. 97 Aschoff (n. 96), 52.

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offered by miners’ guilds when facing the problem of how pastors’ widows should be provided for. IV. Conclusion A first phase in the transformation of guild support commenced in the second half of the 17th century. In the crafts, traditional forms of capacity building subsisted. However, new means of support gradually gained importance. These may now be described in terms of pre-insurance or even insurance. Furthermore, guild statutes started to address legal problems which modern insurance and social security face as well. The process of transformation, however, occurred mostly in the crafts. The mining sector had already developed forms of pre-insurance in the 16th century. Here, these forms of support were simply refined. These developments did not occur in isolation. The 17th and 18th centuries saw an emergence of ‘insurance thinking’ influencing guild support and vice versa. Furthermore, it is likely that the support offered by professional guilds served as a model for factory health insurance schemes as well as for widows’ and orphans’ assurances.

D. The evolution of Germany’s modern social security schemes in the 19th century The industrial revolution caused fundamental economic and social transformations resulting in new challenges to traditional support schemes. Foremost, factory workers were not covered by traditional guild support. As a reaction to these challenges, legislators became more active in regulating and further developing support and insurance schemes for the benefit of workers. These legislative activities occurred mostly on a state or even local level, often in an uncoordinated fashion. Diverse support schemes existed in parallel. And legislation followed different traditions and adopted different approaches. Finally, the developments were marked by conflicting interests of the different stakeholders.98 Municipalities had an interest that support schemes were financially sound in order to relieve municipal poor relief. And for the same reason they wanted to see that support schemes had a size that made them unlikely to fail. Journeymen, by contrast, had conflicting interests when it came to merging together the support schemes in place for different professions, particularly where the involved professions entailed different risks of illness or incapacity. For the same reason, the interests of journeymen and factory workers were not congruent. And finally, when it came to the question of how these funds and schemes were to be financed, there were ___________ 98

Rauert (n. 45), 83; Ute Frevert, Krankheit als politisches Problem (1984), 257 f.

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conflicting interests on the side of employers (factory owners and master craftsmen) on the one hand and their employees (journeymen and factory workers) on the other hand. I. The crafts During the French period, craft guilds were abolished in many German territories, but thereafter re-established.99 Journeymen’s associations remained banned, but journeymen still had the right to have their own support boxes. Guilds were abolished only in the second half of the 19th century, but even after that point their support boxes continued to exist. Consequently, legislation still regulated guilds in the first half of the 19th century by simply drawing on earlier traditions. However, there were also trends bringing the crafts closer to miners’ support funds. Legislation, for example, only defined the regulatory framework for guild support, leaving many details to municipal legislation and guild statutes. According to a Saxon act of the year 1810, master craftsmen had to deduct the journeymen’s contributions towards the support box from the journeymen’s wages, they had to hand them over to the respective box, and the boxes were administered by the master craftsmen’s guild under the supervision of public authorities.100 There were differences as to whether only journeymen had to pay contributions or whether also the master craftsmen had to contribute to the box for the benefit of the journeymen working for them.101 According to § 124 of the Austrian Trade Act (Gewerbe-Ordnung) of 1859, employers had to make contributions not exceeding half of the employees’ contributions, and the employees’ contributions were fixed at a maximum of 3% of the salary.102 In Württemberg, Art. 49 of the New Trade Act (Neue Gewerbeordnung) of 1862 authorized municipalities to oblige employers in the trades to make periodic contributions towards local hospitals so that their employees would be cared for in case of illness, and Art. 45 authorized district authorities to oblige factory owners to raise contributions from their workers to a similar end.103 The decision as to whether membership in such boxes and funds was compulsory was indeed often made at the local level through municipal legislation. The Prussian General Trade Act (Allgemeine Gewerbeordnung) of 1845 followed a similar approach in § 169.104 And ___________ 99

Brand, Zunft, in: Erler (n. 27), 1792–1803, 1801. Mandat, die Abstellung verschiedener Innungsgebrechen betreffend, 7 December 1810, reproduced in Georg Eduard Herold, Die Rechte der Handwerker und ihrer Innungen (1835), 141. 101 Manfred Simon, Handwerk in Krise und Umbruch (1983), 241. 102 (1859) Reichs-Gesetz-Blatt für das Kaiserthum Oesterreich 619–650. 103 (1862) Regierungs-Blatt für das Königreich Württemberg 67–86, 80–82. 104 (1845) Gesetz-Sammlung für die Königlich Preußischen Staaten 41–78. 100

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§ 57 of the Act concerning the Formation of Trade Councils and Miscellaneous Amendments to the General Trade Act (Verordnung, betreffend die Errichtung von Gewerberäthen und verschiedenen Abänderungen der allgemeinen Gewerbeordnung) of 1849 authorized municipalities to oblige employers to contribute to the support box for the benefit of journeymen, but the employers’ required contributions were not allowed to exceed 50% of the journeymen’s contributions. II. The mining sector The French period did not have the same impact on miners’ guilds as it had on master craftsmen guilds.105 It thus seems that the mining sector was shaped by uninterrupted continuity. Mine operators were still liable to pay miners for four/eight weeks of sick pay, but this obligation was often restricted to work accidents.106 In some mining districts, membership in miners’ guilds seems not to have been compulsory.107 It still proved to be a challenge for the public mining administrations to generate sufficient income for the guilds so that they were able to fund the support schemes.108 To that end, some acts started to distinguish between miners and low-income day labourers, and only the former were guild members and covered by their support schemes.109 The wages of day labourers were too small for them to contribute to such schemes. The miners’ contributions were deducted from their pay and paid by the mine operators into the guild box.110 In addition, mine operators still had to contribute to the miners’ guilds, too.111 And at times it proved necessary that the treasury balanced an accrued

___________ 105 Harry Karwehl, Die Entwicklung und Reform des deutschen Knappschaftswesens (1907), 16. 106 Christian Heinrich Gottlieb Hake, Commentar über das Bergrecht (1823), 185 f.; Johann Ferdinand Schmidt, Versuch einer systematisch geordneten Darstellung des Bergrechtes im Königreich Böhmen, vol. 1 (1833), 256, 353. 107 Bülow (n. 78), 41. 108 See, e.g., F. Herthum, Sammlung der in dem Fürstenthume Schwarzburg-Rudolstadt und theilweise auch in dem Fürstenthume Schwarzburg-Sondershausen erschienenen bergrechtlichen und bergbaulichen Vorschriften (1866), 131 (Verschriften über die Bergzehnt-Armuths-Kasse, Schwarzberg, 1840); Bülow (n. 78), 63; Otto Reisel, Die Entstehung und Entwicklung des ‘Saarbrücker Knappschaftsvereins’ (1925), 16 f. 109 Bülow (n. 78), 63. 110 Hake (n. 106), 186; Schmidt, vol. 2 (n. 106), 104. 111 Hake (n. 106), 186; Carl J.B. Karsten, Grundriss der deutschen Bergrechtslehre mit Rücksicht auf die französische Bergwerkgesetzgebung (1828), 312; Carl Friedrich Richter, Neuestes Berg- und Hütten-Lexikon, vol. 1 (1805), 103, 591; Bülow (n. 78), 42.

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deficit.112 It is clear that miners received guild support not only for work accidents, but also for a non-work-related case of illness.113 Apart from that, the benefits which miners received varied in the different principalities and mining districts.114 Furthermore, guild support often depended on the number of years which a member had paid into the box; and as the contributions may have differed according to the wages earned, the financial support similarly varied.115 In addition, different measures were introduced to prevent fraud on the side of the miners.116 Finally, legislators still defined only the general framework of guild support, leaving the details to guild statutes. III. Factory workers Should factory workers in need be supported by municipal poor relief? Should factory owners establish health insurance schemes for the benefit of their workers? Should it be mandatory for factory workers to join such schemes? Who should finance such schemes: factory workers and/or factory owners? According to modern literature, these questions were subject to debate in the first half of the 19th century.117 Yet already in the 18th century, health insurance schemes for the benefit of factory workers had first been introduced by factory owners for the benefit of their employees. Such schemes continued to be established in the first half of the 19th century, and they gained importance throughout that century.118 Their income was generated by entrance fees, periodical contributions, and fines which workers had to pay when they infringed any provision of their contract.119 The fact that these schemes were financed also through fines paid by workers resembles older guild traditions. And the statutes of such health insurance funds ___________ 112

Karsten (n. 111), 312; Hake (n. 106), 186. August Breithaupt, Die Bergstadt Freiberg im Königreich Sachsen (2nd edn., 1847), 267. 114 See the discussions of Schmidt, vol. 2 (n. 106), 104–106; Breithaupt (n. 113), 267 f.; Franz Xaver Schneider, Lehrbuch des Bergrechtes (1867), 334 f.; Gerhard Jordan, Die Geschichte des Knappschaftswesens im Mansfelder Bergrevier (1905), 23, 27; Bülow (n. 78), 46 f.; Hake (n. 106), 185 f.; Karsten (n. 111), 312; Richter, vol. 1 (n. 111), 103. 115 Reisel (n. 108), 23; Michael Fessner, Steinkohlebergbau, in: idem (n. 51), 176–184, 180 f. 116 Compare Bülow (n. 78), 63. 117 See, e.g., Frevert (n. 98), 185–219. 118 See, e.g., Frevert (n. 98), 194, 271; Schwenger (n. 90), 17–30; Anonymous, 150 Jahre Betriebskrankenkasse der Firma M. Dumont Schauberg (1966), 7 f. Compare also the analysis by Günther Schulz, Betriebliche Sozialpolitik in Deutschland seit 1850, in: Hans Pohl (ed.), Staatliche, städtische, betriebliche und kirchliche Sozialpolitik vom Mittelalter bis zur Gegenwart (1991), 137–176. 119 See also the source reproduced in Konrad von Zwehl, Quellen zur Wirtschafts- und Sozialgeschichte Bayerns vom ausgehenden 18. Jahrhundert bis zur Mitte des 19. Jahrhunderts (1985), 199 f. (Mechanische Baumwoll-Spinnerei und Weberei, Augsburg, 1838). 113

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made recourse to older guild traditions, too.120 Starting in the second half of the 19th century, legislators followed this path and started to align the position of factory workers to that of journeymen. In Prussia, the General Trade Act (Allgemeine Gewerbeordnung) of 1845, for example, held in § 144:121 ‘Den Gesellen und Gehülfen ist die Beibehaltung der zur gegenseitigen Unterstützung vorhandenen besonderen Verbindungen und Kassen gestattet; […].’ ‘Journeymen and servants are permitted to keep existing special associations and boxes for their mutual support; […]’.

And § 145 simply stated that § 144 also applied to factory workers. § 1 of the Prussian Act concerning Support Boxes for the Trade (Gesetz, betreffend die gewerblichen Unterstützungskassen) of 1854 then extended the possibility to introduce compulsory membership also to factory workers:122 ‘Durch Ortsstatuten (§§. 168. ff. der Allgemeinen Gewerbe-Ordnung vom 17. Januar 1845.) kann für Gesellen, Gehülfen und Fabrikarbeiter die Verpflichtung festgesetzt werden, Kassen und Verbindungen zu gegenseitiger Unterstützung zu bilden, oder bereits bestehende Einrichtungen dieser Art beizutreten.’ ‘Municipal legislation (§§ 168 ff. of the General Trade Act of 17 January 1845) may introduce the obligation for journeymen, servants and factory workers to form a fund and association for mutual support or to join existing institutions of that kind.’

IV. Poor relief and municipal health insurance funds There is a final facet of 19th-century health insurance: as part of poor relief, municipalities were obliged to cover the medical expenses for poor members of their communities. In Bavaria, this was, for example, regulated in Art. 10 of the Act concerning Poor Relief and the Care for the Sick (Gesetz die öffentliche Armen- und Kranken-Pflege betreffend) of 1869.123 A municipality was also responsible for covering the medical expenses of those servants, journeymen, apprentices, factory workers, and (all) other workers who were employed within the municipality (Art. 11). To finance these medical expenses, municipalities were allowed to raise a contribution from these employees towards a health insurance fund (Art. 20). The employers were held liable for the correct payment of these contributions. Friedrich Kleeis looks upon such funds as bridging the ___________ 120 See, e.g., the 1824 statutes for the support scheme of Johann Peter Bachem’s printing company in Cologne, reproduced in Karl Bachem, Josef Bachem, vol. 1 (1912), 353–355. 121 (1845) Gesetz-Sammlung für die Königlich Preußischen Staaten 41–78. 122 (1854) Gesetz-Sammlung für die Königlich Preußischen Staaten 138 f. See also § 58 of the Verordnung, betreffend die Errichtung von Gewerberäthen und verschiedenen Abänderungen der allgemeinen Gewerbeordnung, (1849) Gesetz-Sammlung für die Königlich Preußischen Staaten 93–110. 123 (1869) Gesetzblatt für das Königreich Bayern 1093–1126.

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gap between poor relief and health insurance, and according to him such municipal health insurance funds existed predominantly in the southern parts of Germany.124 Furthermore, Art. 21 of the same Act allowed municipalities to oblige factory owners to pay for the medical expenses of their workers; in turn, factory owners were allowed to establish health insurance funds to that end and to collect contributions towards these funds from their employees. V. Conclusion 19th-century Germany had inherited a multitude of different support schemes for the benefit of journeymen and miners. Starting in the 18th-century, support schemes for the benefit of factory workers had been established, imitating those schemes of the mining sector. Furthermore, in the crafts these schemes went through fundamental changes starting in the second half of the 17th century and then foremost in the 18th century. The process of transformation was driven mostly by public actors: the legislators of the different German states, the public mining administration of the different mining districts, and the different municipalities. Even though the different support schemes still clearly exhibited their heritage in guild traditions, the uncoordinated developments and reforms at the state or even municipal level resulted in a number of problems.125 Some funds covered, for example, full medical expenses; others offered only a pre-defined sum as sick pay. These predefined sums may have turned out insufficient to cover the costs of a hospital.126 Consequently, municipal poor relief had to step in. The fragmented system also caused further problems. For some professions and territories support schemes had been established, for others not. This left many journeymen and factory workers without any support in the event of need. Some schemes were compulsory, others were based on voluntary membership. And as poor relief, too, was regulated differently across Germany, it apparently occurred that sick journeymen without coverage migrated, or were transferred, to towns where they received treatment as part of poor relief, thereby overburdening these towns financially.127 Furthermore, each scheme may have calculated the contri-

___________ 124 Friedrich Kleeis, Die Geschichte der sozialen Versicherung in Deutschland (1928), 74. See also Florian Tennstedt, Die Errichtung von Krankenkassen in deutschen Städten nach dem Gesetz betr. die Krankenversicherung der Arbeiter vom 15. Juni 1883, (1983) 29 Zeitschrift für Sozialreform 297–338, 298. 125 See in detail Tennstedt (n. 124), 302–309. 126 See, e.g., J.F.H. Dannenberg, Das deutsche Handwerk und die sociale Frage (1872), 68–70. 127 Frevert (n. 98), 158; Gerhard Deter, Zwischen Gilde und Gewerbefreiheit, vol. 2 (2015), 360.

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butions towards the fund, as well as the benefits which the scheme offered, differently. This led to problems of coordination.128 In some territories, it was the home municipality which was responsible for poor relief. A travelling journeyman, however, usually joined a support scheme where he had his current domicile. Consequently, a municipality which had introduced compulsory support schemes still had to care – via poor relief – for journeymen who originated from this municipality, but who now lived in a municipality with insufficient support schemes. And more fundamentally, a fragmented system as it had developed in Germany until the middle of the 19th century hindered the mobility of workers. This was especially the case in areas that had introduced schemes featuring voluntary membership and restrictive entrance requirements. Finally, small support funds proved to be financially unsound. However, forming larger funds proved to be problematic as well. For example, the traditional mechanism of collective control as to whether a member was indeed ill did not function in larger funds.129 The system of support schemes was in great need of reform. VI. Bismarck’s social security legislation Against this background, it is possible to assess to what extent Bismarck’s social security legislation drew on guild support as a model. The Act Concerning the Health Insurance of Workers (Gesetz, betreffend die Krankenversicherung der Arbeiter) was enacted in 1883.130 In his analysis of the 1883 Act Michael Stolleis correctly observes:131 ‘In keinem anderen Zweig der Sozialversicherung reichte die Tradition genossenschaftlicher Selbsthilfe so weit zurück wie in der Krankenversicherung. Die traditionellen “Kranken-, Hülfs- und Sterbekassen” der Gilden, Innungen, Bruderschaften, Zünfte, Gewerkschaften und Knappschaften bestanden immer noch, wenn auch verändert […].’ ‘In no other branch of social security do the traditions of corporate self-help reach further back than in health insurance. The traditional “health funds, help funds and death funds” of guilds, confraternities, unions, and miners’ guilds continued to exist, albeit in a modified form […].’

However, continuities go beyond the mere observation that the 1883 Act relied on existing institutions like professional guild funds: (1) The 1883 Act did not introduce compulsory insurance in general. It made insurance compulsory only for workers who were employed in certain professions. It thereby followed the fundamental design of guild boxes which, similarly, were compulsory only ___________ 128

Rauert (n. 45), 83. Dannenberg (n. 126), 70 f. 130 (1883) Deutsches Reichsgesetzblatt 73–104. 131 Michael Stolleis, Geschichte des Sozialrechts in Deutschland (2003), 76. 129

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for those employers who worked in a specific profession. Furthermore, those who were unemployed were not eligible to participate in guild support schemes, and they were also not subjected to compulsory insurance under the 1883 Act. However, just like the 1786 health insurance scheme in Würzburg, the 1883 Act also adopted voluntary membership in health insurance schemes for those employers who belonged to a profession which was not subjected to compulsory insurance. (2) The general legislative approach first adopted in the mining sector in the 16th century, and which since the 18th century had also been made use of in the craft sector, was also adopted by the 1883 Act. The 1883 Act defined only the framework for individual health insurance schemes. It defined the minimum and maximum contributions which employers and employees had to make. And it defined the minimum and maximum health benefits which they could offer to members. The individual health insurance funds were then allowed to specify the details in their statutes. However, the fact the general framework was defined in the 1883 Act at the imperial level ensured resolution of the problems resulting from the patchwork legal regimes as they existed until the 1883 Act. (3) The individual health insurance funds were under the supervision of public authorities, a system which has been implemented in the mining sector since the 16th century and which had been extended to the crafts since the 18th century. (4) The individual health insurance funds were non-profit entities. They were governed by the principle of mutuality as was common in the crafts since the Middle Ages. (5) § 4 of the Act distinguished between different health insurance funds: Ortskrankenkassen, Betriebskrankenkassen, Fabrikkrankenkassen, Innungskrankenkassen, Knappschaftskassen, and Gemeindekrankenversicherung. The Knappschaftskassen were nothing but miners’ guild health insurance schemes, and Innungskrankenkassen were nothing but craft guild health insurance schemes. Neither were recognized any longer as poly-functional institutions. They were reduced to the single function of offering health insurance to members. The Fabrikkrankenkassen were successors to those factory health insurance schemes which had been modelled after miners’ guilds since the early 18th century. The Ortskrankenkassen were successors to those schemes which had been established in towns since the late 18th century, imitating the support schemes offered by craft guilds, but going beyond the single crafts, and offering support schemes for all journeymen of a town. An example was the 1786 fund in the city of Würzburg. Finally, the Gemeindekrankenkassenversicherung, which stepped in only subsidiarily, seems to have been a recent invention. It was modelled after those funds which were established in the 19th century, for example in Bavaria on the basis of the Act concerning Poor Relief and the Care for the Sick (Gesetz die öffentliche Armen- und Kranken-Pflege betreffend) of 1869.132 They were an instrument of poor relief. In all, health insurance remained organized ___________ 132

Tennstedt (n. 124), 315.

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mostly on a local level, as it had been in the crafts since the Middle Ages and as in the mining sector since the 16th century. (6) Finally, the 1883 Act reflected older traditions also in terms of substance. According to § 20, the different health insurance schemes had to offer the same health benefits which had been offered by miners’ guilds since the 16th century. The contributions which members had to pay were still deducted from their salaries, and the employer paid them directly into the fund, a mechanism which had been common in the mining sector since the 16th century and which had first appeared in the crafts in the 17th century. Finally, employers, too, had to contribute to the funds. In all, the 1883 Act was deeply rooted in guild traditions. And at the same time, it reacted to – and solved – the many problems which had been experienced in the fragmented system found prior to the 1883 Act. By contrast, the Work Accident Insurance Act (Unfallversicherungsgesetz) of 1884133 and the Workers’ Invalidity and Pension Insurance Act (Gesetz, betreffend der Invaliditäts- und Altersversicherung) of 1889134 do not show any resemblance to older guild traditions.

E. Guild support and modern insurance? But what about the lasting impact which medieval guild support supposedly had on modern insurance? I am not able to identify any direct impact which guild support could have had on modern insurance. And I do not see any direct impact on modern insurance law. Voluntary widows’ and orphans’ assurances and voluntary support boxes, which had been established primarily in the 18th century, may have influenced the development of modern insurance and modern insurance law. And such voluntary funds were inspired by traditional guild welfare. However, they were established in the greater context of an emerging ‘insurance thinking’. And they were established at a time when guild support itself experienced a process of transformation under the influence of this blossoming ‘insurance thinking’. Thus, there is, at the most, an indirect link between early modern guild welfare and modern insurance. However, the possible link between both practices – voluntary widows’ and orphans’ assurances as well as voluntary support boxes – are in need of further research.

___________ 133 134

(1884) Deutsches Reichsgesetzblatt 69–111. (1889) Deutsches Reichsgesetzblatt 97–114.

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F. Conclusion The overall conclusion of the present chapter is that modern literature is correct in holding that Germany’s social security is rooted in guild support. However, it was not medieval guild support that was a model for Germany’s social security legislation. Medieval guild support had to progress through two phases of transformation in the early modern period before it was apt to be a model for Bismarck’s social security legislation, especially the 1883 Act Concerning the Health Insurance of Workers (Gesetz, betreffend die Krankenversicherung der Arbeiter). By contrast, support offered by professional guilds had no direct impact on modern insurance.

Chapter 5: Guilds and Mutual Aid in England By Patrick Wallis* A. Introduction .............................................................................................................. 99  B. Guilds and mutual insurance .................................................................................. 103  C. Guilds and charity................................................................................................... 109  D. Guilds and friendly societies .................................................................................. 113  E. Conclusion .............................................................................................................. 118  Appendix: London guild ordinances............................................................................ 120

A. Introduction To what extent did Europe’s guilds construct a system of cooperative mutual protection for their members that justifies their identification as the authors of an early chapter in the history of insurance? In Germany, Hellwege identifies a distinct – possibly artificial, given the political background against which it was composed – history that emphasises the role of guilds in the genesis of insurance.1 The link between guilds and mutual insurance has been even more strongly stated in the Dutch context. Marcel van der Linden identifies guilds as one of the six possible sources for establishing autonomous working-class insurance, suggesting that the perpetuation of ‘an older tradition’ occurred ‘in countries where journeymen associations and guilds had existed if segments of the working class could still remember them, or if traces of these associations remained’.2 Marco van Leeuwen and Sandra Bos have shown convincingly that

___________ * I am grateful to Eilish Gregory for her assistance with this project and the participants at the Third Conference on a Comparative History of Insurance Law in Europe: ‘Guilds’ at Augsburg in February 2018 for a rich and useful discussion. 1 Phillip Hellwege, A Comparative History of Insurance Law in Europe, (2016) 56 American Journal of Legal History 66–75, 67 f. 2 Marcel van der Linden, Introduction, in: idem (ed.), Social Security Mutualism. The Comparative History of Mutual Benefit Societies (1996), 11–38, quote 17.

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many larger guilds in the Northern Netherlands offered insurance schemes covering burial, sickness, old age or widowhood.3 Similar funds existed in the Southern Netherlands.4 These observations for Germany and the Low Countries raise the question of the extent to which this form of provision was a common, even universal, role for guilds? In this chapter, I examine whether early modern English guilds offered similar kinds of mutual aid for their members in cases of disaster, unemployment or illness. And if so, did they have any connection to developments in mutual insurance from the later 17th century onwards, particularly the emergence of largescale mutual protection through the friendly societies? The form that craft and trade guilds took in England is well known and shares much with equivalent corporate organisations elsewhere in Europe. England’s guilds were largely urban organisations that exerted control over various occupations, limiting full economic participation in specific sectors to their members, regulating product quality and market access, raising funds for city and crown, resolving disputes, registering apprenticeships and forming a social, convivial and spiritual thread in the lives of (at least some of) their members.5 As geographically limited, medium-sized and occupationally-focused groups, with a strong pre-existing institutional, fraternal and social collective identity, most guilds possessed a set of characteristics that would have helped them to overcome some of the problems of information asymmetry, adverse selection and fraud that can beset mutual insurance schemes, should they have chosen to undertake them.6

___________ 3 Marco van Leeuwen, Guilds and middle-class welfare 1550–1800: provisions for burial, sickness, old age, and widowhood, (2012) 65 Economic History Review 61–90; idem, Mutual Insurance 1550–2015. From Guild Welfare and Friendly Societies to Contemporary Micro-Insurers (2016); Sandra Bos, A tradition of giving and receiving: mutual aid within the guild system, in: Maarten Prak et al. (eds.), Craft guilds in the early modern Low Countries. Work, power, and representation (2006), 174–193. 4 Karel-Peter Companje, R.H.M. Hendriks, Karel Veraghtert and Brigitte Widdershoven, Two centuries of solidarity: German, Belgian and Dutch social health care insurance 1770–2008 (2009), 33–35. 5 Ian Gadd and Patrick Wallis, Reaching beyond the City Wall: London Guilds and National Regulation, 1500–1700, in: Stephan R. Epstein and Maarten Prak (eds.), Guilds, Innovation and the Economy in Europe, 1400–1800 (2008), 288–316; Jan Lucassen, Tine De Moor and Jan Luiten van Zanden, The Return of the Guilds: Towards a Global History of the Guilds in Pre-industrial Times, (2008) 53 International Review of Social History (Supplement) 5–18. 6 Van Leeuwen, Guilds (n. 3), 62; Humphrey Southall, Ni l’État, ni le Marché. Les premières prestations sociales en Grande-Bretagne, (1995) 18 Genèses. Sciences sociales et histoire 6–29, 22 f. Not all English guilds were occupationally homogenous in practice, but many did contain a core membership centred on a single main trade.

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Where the historical literature on corporatism has identified commonalities across Europe, scholarship on the development of insurance offers a more divided, cloudy origin narrative.7 English histories of insurance see maritime insurance, securely established in the 16th century, as the common root of later insurance; from this fire and life insurance grew, intermittently at first and then with vigour from the late 17th century. This narrative, chronological as much as it is analytical in form, is maintained across the literature, with ‘rakish, speculative’ entrepreneurs, in Trebilcock’s words, and chartered companies, not guilds, providing the drive for a series of dramatic expansions in the nature and scale of provision of insurance.8 Sharp distinctions are drawn with genealogies of insurance across the Channel. English forms of fire insurance ‘contrasted sharply’ with state, mutual or cooperative approaches common on the continent, Robin Pearson suggests.9 Even more extremely, life insurance, the focus of speculative ferment in England, had been outlawed almost everywhere else in Europe.10 In order to examine the role English guilds played in insurance, this chapter focuses on early modern craft and trade guilds between the 16th and 18th centuries. The choice of period reflects both the survival of records and the need to explore the crucial centuries in which we would expect guild insurance to be most important if it was to serve as a foundation stone for some of the forms of mutual insurance that became commonplace by the late 18th century. By looking across three centuries, we can also be reassured that our view of English guild’s activities is not being fogged by the effects of their decline, itself a much debated concept that seems best applied (though still only partially appropriate) to the 18th century.11 The identification of guild insurance functions is pursued through a two-fold approach. On the one hand, I seek to identify what if any formal requirements related to mutual insurance were written into guilds’ governing statutes and ordinances. On the other, I examine guild practice at several points

___________ 7

Hellwege, p. 9, above. Hugh Anthony Lewis Cockerell and Edwin Green, The British Insurance Business: A guide to its history and records (2nd edn., 1994); Clive Trebilcock, Phoenix Assurance and the Development of British Insurance (1985), 2–7, 30–36; Robin Pearson, Insuring the Industrial Revolution (2004), 15–21; Geoffrey Clark, Betting on Lives: the culture of life insurance in England, 1695–1775 (1999), 1 f., 72–105; Christopher Kingston, Marine insurance in Britain and America 1720–1844: A Comparative Institutional Analysis, (2007) 67 Journal of Economic History 379–409, 383–387. 9 Pearson (n. 8), 4. 10 Clark (n. 8), 8, 13–16. 11 Michael Berlin, Guilds in Decline? London Livery Companies and the Rise of a Liberal Economy, 1600–1800, in: Epstein and Prak (n. 5), 316–342; Ian Gadd and Patrick Wallis, Introduction, in: Ian Gadd and Patrick Wallis (eds.), Guilds, Society and Economy in London 1450–1800 (2002), 1–15. 8

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over the 16th to 18th centuries in order to spot any signs of insurance – collections, payments, disputes – being provided in reality. This approach is demanding in empirical terms. Fortunately, sources are abundant for guilds in London and exist in reasonable volumes for guilds in other cities. The survival of records is, we should note, a product of the institutional independence of guilds. It was those guilds that were chartered directly by the crown, and which have often survived into the present in some form, that possess the richest material. Most of these are found in the capital, which was disproportionately large in early modern England, whether judged on demographic, political or economic terms, compared to the primate cities of most European states. However, the great majority of English guilds, particularly those outside London, were established under the authority and supervision of the local borough government of the city in which they were based. They had no right to hold property, their existence was less durable and their records survive less frequently as a result. This does, however, point to a potential bias if the degree of formal recognition correlated with guilds’ engagement in mutual provision. Thus, we need to treat our findings with caution. Our best evidence is from the best resourced organisations. They possessed funding that may have allowed them to act in ways that not all guilds could. Certainly their feasts and buildings reflect a wealth and warm self-regard that was far beyond the dreams of an everyday provincial craft guild. Moreover, we should recognise a second, related issue. London guilds’ independent chartered existence meant that they were attractive destinations for individuals seeking to establish philanthropic initiatives. As trustees and managers of charitable resources, guilds had an additional element to their activities that came to predominate in the 19th and 20th centuries. We need therefore to be careful to distinguish between guilds’ distribution of charitable funds that were supplied by others and any mutual benefits that they provided to members in need. Here, as is obvious, I regard mutual insurance as being, by definition, funded collectively, although we do not need to define restrictively the mechanism by which funds were raised. The second question of the link between guild behaviour and mutual insurance is harder to pin down. In the English context, it forces us to consider a set of relatively poorly understood organisations for mutual support that emerged in the 17th and 18th centuries. The prime case for a guild connection is in the form of journeymen’s box clubs. But friendly societies also had other roots as we will see. The nature of the relationship needs also to be specified: is it sufficient that guilds and insurance systems shared some common aims, such as alleviating need? Or should we expect a more precise connection, for example a common mechanism, such as entitlements to assistance in specific circumstances, through which such aims could be pursued? I will argue for the latter in this chapter.

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B. Guilds and mutual insurance It is important to begin any discussion of English guilds and mutual insurance by making explicit a fundamental distinction between charity and insurance that is easily lost in the search for institutional ancestry. Many guilds engaged in charitable works. Often some of the beneficiaries were their own members. Charity was also a central element of the mixed economy of welfare.12 However, guild members had no right to demand relief from charitable funds. The guild’s officials who distributed it would have accepted no constraint – whether based on the length of membership or the maintenance of contributions to any collective funds – on their judgement about who should be a recipient. Longevity and participation did surely matter in guild decision making over pensions and relief, but they were elements of a compelling argument for assistance, not the basis of an individual’s rights. Whether mutual or not, insurance, I would suggest, implies a clear quid pro quo. It is only discretionary to the extent that the insurer is able to question whether a claimant meets a set of mutually recognised terms under which disbursements should be made. Contributions are tied to the accumulation of rights. And benefits are pre-defined, either relatively or absolutely, and depersonalised. The question, then, is the extent to which guild membership carried with it rights to some form of insurance, as was seen in early unions or journeymen’s associations. Insurance, if it existed, should have left several types of traces: regulations about contributions and entitlements; petitions and disputes over rights; financial records of capital stocks and payments; and the paperwork from city or state responses to crises and collapses of funds. In his study of Dutch guilds, this is the material that van Leeuwen was able to examine. From it, he could identify participation rates, benefit levels and mechanisms to deal with moral hazard and adverse selection. If English guilds offered mutual insurance, then surely they too should possess similar signs among their records. Simply put, they do not. We can demonstrate this absence in two ways. First, by exploring the ordinances (rules) that guilds wrote for themselves. Second, by looking at their financial and administrative records, to identify what they did in practice.

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This distinction is obviously not relevant to estimates of the overall scale of relief, as in Bas van Bavel and Auke Rijpma, How important were formalized charity and social spending before the rise of the welfare state? A long-run analysis of selected Western European cases, 1400–1850, (2016) 69 The Economic History Review, 159–187, 161.

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The rules of early modern English guilds survive in relatively large numbers. Under English law, guilds had to have their ordinances approved by legal officials. For independent guilds that operated under a charter from the Crown, this meant having ordinances signed off by some of the country’s senior judges and crown officials. For guilds operating under license of a town or city, the local government had to accept their rules at a meeting of its governing body, which usually possessed the power to pass regulations under its own charter from the crown. One consequence of this vetting procedure is that ordinances survive in guild, city and state archives. In order to assess the degree to which mutual insurance mechanisms were written into guild rules I surveyed a cross section of ordinances for London and provincial guilds. For London, I evaluated 38 sets of ordinances drawn up by 21 guilds (see Appendix). Six sets of rules are from the 15th century, ten from the 16th, sixteen are from the 17th and six from the 18th century. The guilds range from the largest and wealthiest mercantile bodies, such as the merchant taylors and grocers, to smaller craft groupings, such as the curriers, founders and horners. They include some of the oldest and most durable, such as the bakers, and some ‘new’ guilds that were formed in the 17th century, such as the gold and silver wire drawers and framework knitters. For provincial guilds, I reviewed a smaller sample covering six guilds from four towns and cities.13 The locations that this modest survey covers include important expanding cities, such as Bristol and Newcastle, as well as smaller and more stable communities, such as Shrewsbury and Salisbury. Most ordinances survive from the 17th and early 18th centuries. The main conclusion from this exercise is simple: rules that provide for any element of mutual insurance are conspicuous by their absence. English guilds did not create formal systems for the mutual insurance of their membership. However, there were two partial exceptions to this rule. These show that some form of more organised contribution to relief was not unthinkable. First, the London butchers’ company in 1685 added an ordinance requiring everyone to pay towards the relief and maintenance of the guilds’ ‘poor widows … & other poore members fallen to decay’. Members of the livery (the senior members of the guild) were to pay 6d every quarter day, while the yeomanry ___________ 13 Newcastle upon Tyne Coopers’ Guild (1674), Newcastle and Tyne Archives, GU CO/2/2 (1662), https://www.dur.ac.uk/resources/imems/Cities/Governing/GoverningOrdinancesoftheNewcastlecoopers.pdf (accessed 29.11.2017); Shrewsbury Glovers Guild (1614), Shropshire Archives, Shrewsbury, SBA, 6001/4275; Shrewsbury Tailors’ Guild (1610), SRS 6001/5837; Shrewsbury Tanners’ Guild (1640), SRS 6001/5837; Salisbury Merchant Guild (1675), in: Charles Haskins, The Ancient Trade Guilds and Companies of Salisbury (1912), 52–54; Bristol Soapmakers (c. 1720), in: Harold Matthews, Proceedings Minutes And Enrolments Of The Company Of Soapmakers, 1562–1642 (1940), 225–240.

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(ordinary freemen) were to pay 3d. This is a solitary instance of formalising welfare contributions among guild rules. The sums involved were relatively small: to set them in context, these contributions were only twice the size of the charges that members were required to contribute to the guild’s barge, used in processions on the Thames.14 More important is that the rule is closer in nature to the English poor law than insurance: the Butchers essentially imposed a tax on their members. They did not create a fund. They wrote no rules on eligibility or access that gave rights to relief to their members. Second, around 70 years previously, the London merchant taylors’ company wrote into their ordinances a rule setting out the process for admission to a place among the company’s almsmen. The company owned almshouses containing a set number of rooms which were offered to members who had ‘fallen into Poverty, so it bee not through Ryott, wanton or lavish Expences, his owne negligence or other misdemeanure’ as they became available. Freemen qualified if they had made full contributions to the charges facing the guild. Alongside a place in the almshouse, these company paupers were to receive 26s a quarter, a share of coals left under legacies by members and the cost of their burial – at which the Master and Wardens were to appear. Almsmen were to appear at service every week, and drunkards, those ‘of unchast life’ and any who married could be displaced.15 Access to housing, fuel and a pension amounts to a substantial element of support for those in need. However, this provision was tightly rationed by the number of places in the almshouses. The almshouses were not themselves constructed by the guild from its collective resources, but were founded through charitable legacies from wealthy members. In short, this rule was created to define the terms of access to an important set of philanthropic resources managed by the guild, not to provide a mechanism to distribute mutual resources. These two metropolitan examples illustrate that guilds had the organisational capacity and concern for members’ welfare that might have motivated them to establish a mutual insurance system. They also possessed the instinct for bureaucratic regulation that would have led to such systems being articulated in their regulations. In the case of England’s guilds, it strongly suggests that the absence of evidence is, at least in the case of mutual insurance, evidence of absence. Still, rules are not reality, as a generation or more of guild historians have repeatedly noted. It may be that we are not seeing rules for mutual insurance within guild ordinances for a reason. Perhaps guilds operated mutual insurance systems in parallel with their legally defined rights and responsibilities. Perhaps ___________ 14 Guildhall Library, MS 06460 (1.10.1685). This had disappeared by the time of the 1752 ordinances (Guildhall Library, MS 06463). 15 C.M. Clode, Memorials of the Guild of Merchant Taylors of the Fraternity of St. John the Baptist in the City of London (1875), 207 f. See Matthew Davies and Ann Saunders, The History of the Merchant Taylors’ Company (2004).

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they deliberately kept the rules for these systems outside their ordinances. It is hard to imagine why this should be so, given the importance of regulation in maintaining the credibility of mutual schemes. Insurance and mutual provision involves contracts that are necessarily incomplete and contributions and benefits that are separated by substantial periods of time. Rules are useful devices in such situations. Yet the possibility exists. To explore whether English guilds were providing mutual insurance in practice, even if this was not in their rules, I surveyed the records of a selection of guilds, hunting for any traces of mutual insurance. For London, I worked through three-year long samples of the main governing Court records for the clothworkers’, the pewterers’, the carpenters’ and the apothecaries’ guilds.16 Wherever possible, I reviewed a sequence of periods at intervals a century apart from the 16th to the 18th centuries in order to identify any changes over time. These guilds offer a broad range of occupations and political positions. The clothworkers was one of the ‘Great Twelve’ guilds that contained the governors of the city and included both rich merchants and modest artisans in its membership. On the other hand, the pewterers, carpenters and apothecaries were smaller, less powerful but potentially more cohesive organizations with artisanal and middling sort members. For provincial guilds, I examined the records of the Newcastle’s barber surgeons,17 Shrewsbury’s tailors18 and Bristol’s soapmakers. These too form a deliberately heterogeneous sample of guilds, with a mix of types of work, wealth and geography. If guilds were often acting as insurers, we would anticipate identifying at least some sign of this in the papers and records of some of these seven guilds. Guild’s records are less simple to use than ordinances. Most survive in the form of turgid Minute Books kept by clerks during the meetings of its governing ___________ 16 Clothworkers: The Clothworkers’ Company Archive, CL/B/1/3 (1581–1583), CL/B/1/10, 536–606 (1680–1682), CL/B/1/15, 45–67 (1780–1782). Pewterers: Wardens Accounts, Guildhall Library, MS 7086/3 (1581–1582), MS 22188/1 (1685–1686), MS 22188/2 (1686–1687), MS 22188/79 (1783–1784), MS 22188/80 (1784–1785); Court Minutes, MS 07090/3 (1581–1583), MS 07090/7 (1681–1683), MS 07090/11 (1783– 1785). Carpenters: Bower Marsh (ed.), Records of the Worshipful Company of Carpenters, vol. 4: Wardens account book 1546–1571 (1916); Bower Marsh and John Ainsworth (ed.), Records of the Worshipful Company of Carpenters, vol. 5: Wardens account book 1571–1591 (1937); Guildhall Library, MS 4329/3 (1680–1683). Apothecaries: Guildhall Library, MS 8200/1 (1630–1633), MS 8200/6 (1730–1733), MS 4329/3. 17 Dennis Embleton, The incorporated company of barber-surgeons and wax and tallow-chandlers of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, (1892) 15 Archaeologia Aeliana 228–269; The Ancient Ordinary of the Barber-Surgeons of York, A.D., 1486, as revised and augmented A.D., 1592, in: Frederick Furnivall and Percy Furnivall (eds.), The Anatomie of The Bodie of Man (1888), 269–288. 18 Shrewsbury Weavers’ Records: Shropshire Archives, SBR 6001/3359 (1580–1609), SBR 6001/3360, 1–15r, 110–119v, 175r–184 (1609–1614, 1664–1673, 1725–1758).

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body – usually styled the ‘Court of Assistants’ – in which significant items of business were recorded for posterity. These Minute Books vary greatly in the level of detail they contain. However, they have a strong bias towards including records of events that could affect the future of the guild. For this reason, financial and membership matters, such as the admissions of apprentices and freemen, usually dominate, as they do in the financial records that are the guilds other main series of primary sources. Insurance, if it existed, would surely fall into the category of events that we would expect to appear on these pages, given that it touched on both these categories. Yet there is no sign of insurance or mutual protection within the pages of these guilds’ Court Minute Books. When we turn to guilds’ financial records, we find the same. They list charitable disbursements, alms and gifts, but never mention payments made under a mutual or insurance system. Perhaps the most compelling evidence of this comes from the way in which guild membership dues operated in this period. Guilds expected to receive regular payments from their members, usually styled quarterage. These were not large sums, often a few pence to be paid every three months. If any aspect of these guild’s activities was to be adapted into a de facto mutual insurance scheme it would be quarterage, as it offered the revenue stream required to fund benefits. If this were to happen, then the incentive for guild members to pay their dues would be transformed, with the right to benefits tied to their maintenance of regular contributions – a universal requirement among early mutual insurance systems. This does not seem to have been the case. In fact, it is clear that in many guilds contributions to quarterage were widely neglected. For example, the drapers were struggling in the 1640s to collect quarterage, with many of the poorer members ceasing to pay, and contributions restricted to those who were binding or freeing apprentices – paying off one’s debt to the guild was often a condition for an apprentice being registered.19 This kind of behaviour is the opposite of the effect we might expect to see if contributions were linked to the right to claim benefits of some kind. The negative findings of our search for signs of mutual protection in the business records of English guilds echo the absence of rules for its provision within their ordinances. England’s craft guilds seem not to have provided mechanisms for mutual insurance in the 16th to 18th centuries. English guilds were not ignoring other aspects of mutuality. They feasted and processed, built halls to house their discussions and hold their records and possessions, and gathered the paraphernalia to foster collective identity. They did not neglect other aspects of the moments of stress that mutual insurance would later help resolve. In particular, a number of guilds came together to honour their ___________ 19 Arthur Johnson, The History of the Worshipful Company of the Drapers of London, vol. 3 (1914), 194 f.

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members at their burials. The London founders’ guild expected its members to attend the burials of liverymen. The London butchers’ guild similarly favoured liverymen, ordering that when any liveryman died, the master, wardens and other liverymen were to attend the corpse.20 The London brewers in the early 17th century list money received at the burial of the dead in their accounts.21 We could go on, but the point is clear: mutuality and solidarity were not missing from English guilds, just mutual insurance. There was no reason for English guilds not to offer insurance. Many occupational organisations have done so, including trade unions. In the 18th century, Malcolm Chase concluded that ‘“Trade Union” and “Sick Club” represented the two ends of an organizational continuity which cannot be easily divided’.22 Fire insurance was often organised on a mutual basis in late 17th-century London, and many of the founders of early firms had ties to the city’s guilds.23 In 1698, the London mercers’ company, one of the most prominent of London’s guilds, even undertook the management of a reversionary annuity scheme designed to assist the widows and orphans of clergymen that Geoffrey Clark categorises among the early forms of life insurance. This experiment was to end badly, with the guild eventually driven into bankruptcy in 1748 by the burden of paying out.24 As noteworthy, however, is that the participants in the scheme were largely clergy, medical practitioners and legal personnel. This was not an innovation intended for the guilds’ own membership.25 Guilds existed cheek by jowl with mutual insurance. Yet they refrained from it themselves. There is an unavoidable note of uncertainty about this conclusion, given the chance that we may be missing evidence of mutual protection because of the constraints on the historical sources that remain available to us today. Most of the evidence that survives concerns the doings of the main guild; it is this that we have surveyed above. But organisations of journeymen and small masters – commonly known as the yeomanry – also existed. Indeed, George Unwin (1870– 1925) famously suggested that tensions between the yeomanry and the guild were one of the major dynamics of this period.26 We know little of what services ___________ 20

Guy Pearce, The History of the Butchers’ Company (1929), 238. Guildhall Library, MS 542/6 (1618). 22 Malcolm Chase, Early Trade Unionism: Fraternity, skill and the politics of labour (2000), 22. See also C.R. Dobson, Masters and Journeymen: A prehistory of industrial relations, 1717–1800 (1980), 45 f; John Rule, The Experience of Labour in eighteenthcentury Industry (1981), 150 f., 180 f. 23 Pearson (n. 8), 62–64; idem, Mutuality tested: The Rise and Fall of Mutual Fire Insurance Offices in Eighteenth-Century London, (2002) 44 Business History 1–28. 24 Clark (n. 8), 134–144. 25 Clark (n. 8), 162–164. 26 George Unwin, The Gilds and Companies of London (1908). 21

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yeomanry organisations provided to their members, even when we are aware of their existence. These organisations tended to exist in larger guilds, such as the clothworkers, merchant taylors, drapers and bakers. However, their records no longer exist and we only know of the organisation through references to their accounts being examined by the guild.27 Tantalisingly, the yeomanry of the bakers was granted a set of rights by the guild in 1538 that included a chest, implying the right to hold stock and documents of their own.28 Yet if they did provide mutual welfare, this was not to appear among the many sources of controversy between the journeymen and the guild in the 1620s, which instead turned on bakers employing outside journeymen to cut wages. Similarly, the clothworkers’ yeomanry were protesting against their company’s failure to suppress workers from other trades entering clothfinishing, while the merchant taylors’ yeomanry complained against unfree tailors in the 1670s.29 Problems with mutual insurance did not number among their grievances. Moreover, yeomanry organisations generally disappeared – or were abolished – during the 17th century, weakening any possible link between their activities and the emergence of later provision in the form of friendly societies.

C. Guilds and charity The limited signs of any engagement with mutual insurance among early modern English craft guilds needs to be set against the very significant volumes of charitable activity that was collectively provided by London’s guilds and, to a lesser extent, by their provincial brethren. The volume of guild charity grew over the 16th to 18th century. As Ian Archer has charted, the first half of the 17th century saw a peak in charity, followed by a collapse after the Great Fire of 1666, while destroyed property was restored.30 The 18th century saw charity growing again, following this period of retrenchment. Indeed, disasters aside, gifts tended to accumulate over time as they were usually given in the form of money, stock or property from which the interest

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The Clothworkers’ Company Archive, CL/B/1/10, 537 (1680). Guildhall Library, MS 5117/1 (5.12.1538). 29 Guildhall Library, MS 5195; GL, MS 5117/4, 60v–61v (31.7.1623); Thomas Girtin, Golden Ram: A Narrative History of the Clothworkers’ Company (1958), 112 f.; Davies and Saunders (n. 15), 220. 30 Ian Archer, The Charity of Early Modern Londoners, (2002) 12 Transactions of the Royal Historical Society 223–244. See also Steve Rappaport, Worlds within worlds: structures of life in sixteenth-century London (1989), 195–198. 28

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was to be expended, but not the capital.31 As guilds’ other expenses on regulation and litigation dwindled, a larger share remained available for distribution, with much funding devoted to maintaining almshouses to lodge dependent poor, paying regular pensions to nominated paupers and more limited sums distributed in ad hoc general doles or disbursements. The forms of guild charity, in short, parallel those taken by public and private provision in England and elsewhere in Europe. If we compare the activities of the London clothworkers’ company, one of the city’s larger and wealthiest guilds, over three centuries we can discern the outlines of this shift. In 1581/1582, the company recorded only three charitable distributions. The first occurred on 29 August when gowns, shirts, smocks and shoes were given to twelve poor men and twelve poor women (of whom six were described as widows) under the terms of William Lamb’s bequest, a legacy agreed 13 years earlier that also funded four sermons a year at the church of St. James in the Wall. Lamb did not specify whether the recipients of clothing were to be members of the guild, just that they were to be ‘impotent and lame’ – and to attend the four sermons.32 Many of the recipients bore common names, but five of the twelve had names that do not appear in the list of freemen entering the guild since 1545, suggesting that charity and membership were not tightly linked in this case.33 The second was a similarly indiscriminate gift of £4 to the poor of the parish of St. Sepulchre on 13 December.34 Finally, the third was the gift of an annual pension of £6 13s 4d made ‘To Philip Bolde for his greate povertie and necessitie’, which was made at the insistence of Sir Rowland Haywarde, who was a leading city merchant, former Lord Mayor and Alderman of the city, Member of Parliament and one of the guild’s most powerful members.35 Why Bold deserved such a pension is unclear, but he does not appear to have been one of the guild’s freemen. The growth of the scale and inward-orientation of guild charity can be seen if we contrast this with the guild’s activities a century later. By 1680/1681, Lamb’s charity had been joined with other clothing funds from Midlemore and Lute.36 In ___________ 31 The cumulative impact of charity in England is discussed in Wilbur Jordan, Philanthropy in England 1480–1660. A Study of the Changing Pattern of English Social Aspirations (1959); John Hadwin, Deflating philanthropy, (1978) 31 Economic History Review 105–117. 32 The Clothworkers’ Company Archive, CL/B/1/3 (1581–1605), f. 2; City of London Livery Companies Commission, Report, vol. 4 (1884), 572–599. 33 Livery Companies Commission (n. 32), 572–599. 34 The Clothworkers’ Company Archive, CL/B/1/3, 2v. 35 P.W. Hasler (ed.), The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1558–1603 (1981), ‘Rowland Hayward’. 36 The Clothworkers’ Company Archive, CL/B/1/10, 557; Livery Companies Commission (n. 32), 572–599.

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addition, John Heath had left a legacy of £1,000 in 1635 that funded a sermon and clothing, shoes and stockings for 30 poor men and women. Heath, unlike Lamb, favoured his fellow freemen: 26 of the 30 were to be freemen or freemen’s widows, and the other four were to be from the parish in which he was buried.37 In addition, the company managed almshouses in Whitefriars and Islington, which they used to support poor members, such as Symon White a poor artisan clothworker, who was given a place in the Islington almshouse on 4 May 1680 ‘for his good behaviour’.38 John Frewen, the son of another freeman, Ambrose Frewen, was given 20s on 30 November 1680, ‘being very sick and weeke [sic] and poore’, although the guild noted that this should not be a precedent.39 In 1680, the experience of Jane, the widow of Edward Hane, who was given £5, having been left ‘in a very poor and miserable condition’, points to an interesting aspect of the development in guild charity. Her large payment (equivalent to two months’ wages for a building labourer) reflected a shift in company thinking on members’ contributions, for the payment was justified by a note recording that her ‘Husband in his life time had not received back his livery money’. Livery money was the fee that freemen paid on promotion into the ‘livery’ of the guild, a tier of well-to-do members with additional rights and status, including the gowns that gave them their name and the privilege of voting for London’s Members of Parliament. In 1697, the government of London was to limit promotion to the livery in the largest guilds to those individuals who were worth at least £1,000. To fall from this level of wealth to poverty implies that Jane Hane was the victim of a catastrophic transformation in her fortunes. And in such circumstances, the guild had now started to treat livery fines as a deposit that could be recovered by members who fell on hard times. The clothworkers are not alone in this. The merchant taylors, at least, did the same, despite making an order against this in 1680, when they cut the livery fine from £30 to £20, which specified that livery fees needed to be paid ‘without expectation of any of the said Twenty pounds is to be returned to any person whatsoever in case of misfortune or miscarriage in the world’.40 There is perhaps an element of insurance here, albeit a modest one. If we move forward another century, the trend towards focusing charity on guild members had continued. The sums spent on the distressed poor of the guild ___________ 37 The Clothworkers’ Company Archive, CL/B/1/10, 588; Livery Companies Commission (n. 32), 572–599. 38 The Clothworkers’ Company Archive, CL/B/1/10, 541. On almshouses see Nigel Goose, Accommodating the elderly poor: almshouses and the mixed economy of welfare in England in the second millennium, (2014) 62 Scandinavian Economic History Review 33–57. 39 The Clothworkers’ Company Archive, CL/B/1/10, 556. Frewen senior had been freed in 1647. 40 Guildhall Library, MS 34010/10, 74, 82.

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by the later 18th century had grown to more than £160 a year. Of the 40 named recipients of aid, 23 were the widows of freemen, three were freemen, one was a liveryman. The remaining 13 (mostly women) were probably not linked, but were nominated for pensions by someone within the guild. We can see much the same trajectory in the London pewterers’ company. In 1581, they relieved one sick man in August and distributed charity in December. A century later in 1681, the year began with the Court giving 10s to William Mabbot ‘being sick’. In March they distributed 20s among the poor. In June the court received petitions from Thomas Williams, widow Johnson, Thomas Cooper and Peter Brothersby for relief. In response, the Warden was ordered to give 10s to widow Johnson from Colonel Jackson’s gift, and 5s to Brothersby and Cooper. That month, a further 2s 6d went to Thomas Curtis senior and the widows Vernon and Kendall, while 5s went to Robert Weely. The poor box was distributed in September, at which time it contained £3 7s 8d. Finally, that December another £2 5s 0d was given to the poor. Moving forward another century, in 1780 poor distribution had become more organised, with payments from legacies allocated to various recipients. Indeed, in that year the resources available to the guild grew substantially, with another £600 left by John Jones to provide for nine poor men and nine poor women of the company, £100 left by Mr. Norfolk to be invested to support eight poor of the company, and an annuity of £30 given by Thomas Swanson for the company’s poor. Aside from these long-term charitable funds, the poor box remained an active system, with almost 50 poor men and women receiving 2s 6d each in September. Not all charity was confined to the guild’s members. Guild almshouses accepted other paupers. Funding was given to distressed Huguenots who were now in England in the 1680s, while in the 1780s £400 was sent to relieve those suffering in Jamaica, St. Vincent, Barbados and Dominica.41 Guilds managed substantial charitable bequests that benefited outsiders, including many schools across the country. Guilds were intertwined with charity in other ways. Half of the fines collected by the Newcastle coopers’ for non-members using their trade in the town were to be paid to the charity house for the relief of poor children.42 In summary, guild charity in London was large and growing over the 16th to 18th century, providing a significant source of support to guild members that was rooted in inter-generational mutuality. Legacies from past members provided an increasingly generous cushion for those within the guild who fell into poverty. Charity that had once been broadly focused on the needy of the city was now ___________ 41 Guildhall Library, MS 34010/10, 558 f., 573. The company also distributed small funds from a poor box, but we cannot tell if the recipients were connected to the guild or not. The grocers made a similar contribution to Jamaica and Barbados: Guildhall Library, MS 11588/8, 48. 42 Newcastle and Tyne Archives, GU CO/2/2.

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more concentrated on those with a direct tie to the guild. Philanthropy thus potentially stood in for more formalised forms of mutuality in this specific, urban and middling context.

D. Guilds and friendly societies How can we explain the history of English friendly societies – exemplars of mutual protection – in light of the inactivity of the guilds? This is a pressing issue because friendly societies offer a type of mutual insurance that has often been identified as a successor to earlier guilds. They are the obvious candidate by which guilds and insurance can be linked. Friendly societies collected regular payments from members and offered a set of predictable benefits, such as payments during sickness, old-age or disability, and relief for widows and children in return.43 The early history of friendly societies is not well understood, in part because of the loss of records, in part because adopting a patina of antiquity was itself an appealing strategy to societies seeking to convince members of their durability.44 However, the broad pattern appears to be as follows. A few societies emerged in the 17th century, and in the later 18th century they grew enormously in number and membership. A very large number were founded at the time a bill was passed to encourage and regulate friendly societies in 1793, with the aim of reducing demand for poor relief by giving greater security to the societies’ funds.45 In towns and industry, friendly societies might be organised around occupational identities, as guilds had been, such as the Benevolent Society of Coachmakers (est. 1816), although many were structured on other models.46 By 1801, Sir Frederick Eden estimated that membership was in the order of 648,000, while the Poor Law Return of 1803 contained reports of a total of 704,000 members in 9,672 societies.47 Nearly a century later, in 1870, membership was thought to have exceeded four million people, with more than eleven million pounds in

___________ 43 Susannah Ottaway, The Decline of Life: Old Age in Eighteenth-Century England (2008), 58, 78 f. 44 Peter Gosden, Self-help: voluntary associations in 19th century Britain (1974), 3. 45 Ottaway (n. 43), 77. 46 Iorwerth Prothero, Artisans and Politics in Early Nineteenth-Century London: John Gast and his Times (1979), 36. 47 Peter Gosden, The Friendly Societies in England, 1815–1875 (1961), 5. See also Martin Gorsky, The growth and distribution of English friendly Societies in the early nineteenth century, (1998) 51 Economic History Review 489–511.

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funds.48 At this level, more than half of adult males in Britain belonged to a society. Explanations for the growth of friendly societies over the 18th and 19th centuries vary. The expansion of industrial employment, the needs of the ballooning cohorts of industrial workers, a shift from paternalism to individual responsibility and the formalisation of trade societies have all been cited.49 Susannah Ottaway suggests there was a growing cultural recognition in the 18th century of an ‘agebased need for formal assistance’ outside the poor law alongside a culture of selfhelp.50 There is little chance of disentangling these different explanations. We can, however, note that most appear to be pointing to developments that occurred after, or towards the end of, the period in which guilds were most visible in English society and economy. Were friendly societies perhaps the offspring or a substitute for England’s dwindling guilds? That the pattern of friendly societies was derived from earlier guilds has been widely asserted. No less than the secretary to the Royal Commission on Friendly Societies, John Malcolm Ludlow (1821–1911), wrote in 1873 that: ‘I feel convinced that there is no historical gap between the gild of old times and the modern friendly society; that if we knew all, we could trace the actual passage from one to the other’.51 Ludlow’s argument was derived from the positive view he possessed of medieval guilds: it was, it is important to note, pre-reformation guilds and confraternities that he had in mind. It was these which he considered to have essentially the same spirit and motive force as the friendly societies, to the extent that he claimed that the aims of the 1793 Act for regulating Friendly Societies were ‘all included in those commonly aimed at by the old gilds’.52 More recently, historians have continued to suggest variations on this theme. Simon Cordery, for example, suggests that societies emerged in order to ‘replace’ reliance upon

___________ 48

Gosden (n. 47), 14; this contemporary estimate attempts to account for societies that did not report to the registrar. Reporting societies contained around 1.4 million members. See also James C. Riley, Sick, not Dead: The Health of the British Workingmen during the Mortality Decline (1997), 28–30. 49 Gosden (n. 47), 2; Simon Cordery, British Friendly Societies, 1750–1914 (2003), 1; David Neave, Friendly Societies in Great Britain, in: Van der Linden (n. 2), 41–64, 47 f.; Prothero (n. 46), 35 f. 50 Ottaway (n. 43), 13, 75. 51 John Malcolm Ludlow, Gilds and Friendly Societies, (1873) 21 The Contemporary Review 737. See also Gosden (n. 47), 1 f.; Dermot Morrah, A History of Industrial Life Assurance (1955), 11–18; Daniel Weinbren, The Oddfellows, 1810–2010: 200 years of making friends and helping people (2010), 1. 52 Ludlow (n. 51), 744. Similar views appear in other late 19th-century studies, see Cordery (n. 49), 17.

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guilds and customary assistance.53 Echoing Ludlow, he assumes that friendly societies were taking on some of the services that guilds had provided, and that they ‘copied guild models’.54 Identifying shared aims (collective self-help), a shared culture (of collective assembly) and shared functions (supporting members unable to work through disaster or age, honouring the dead, assisting the needy), Daniel Weinbren makes the same claim: ‘medieval and early-modern religious and craft guilds can be seen as the parents of both Friendly Societies and charities’.55 Certainly, 19th-century friendly societies appear to have believed they were adopting guild characteristics in the mock-Tudor rituals and paraphernalia they adopted to strengthen mutuality via processions, feasts and ceremony. Whether seen as the offspring or substitutes, societies appear in this literature as the functional heirs of guilds. Evidence for any direct connection between friendly societies and guilds is negligible, however. The earliest known friendly societies date from the late 17th century. In England, the Friendly Benefit Society of Bethnal Green, based at the Norfolk Arms in Bethnal Green, claimed to have been established in 1687 and survived in 1883 with 61 members and £1,236 in funds. The next oldest surviving society dated from 1703 (the Norman Friendly Society, also in London, on St. Peter Street, Hackney Road).56 But only another 73 of the societies then extant pre-dated 1780, and none had any identifiable link to a craft or trade guild. In fact, the great majority of older societies (70%) had been founded a few decades, not centuries, before 1780, with most established between 1761 and 1780. Several sea towns in Scotland had box clubs that did date from the early 17th century. These took the form of common funds to pay for sickness, widows, orphans and so on, and they were funded by head taxes on sailings or the profits of voyages.57 Another early source of friendly societies lay in the Huguenot immigrants who arrived after the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685.58 Clearly, at least some early friendly societies were active in the same period in which craft ___________ 53 Cordery (n. 49), 13. See also Neave (n. 49), 46; Antony Black, Guilds and Civil Society in European Political Thought from the Twelfth Century to the Present (1984), 174, 176; Dorothy George, London Life in the Eighteenth Century (1964), 302. 54 Cordery (n. 49), 14–20, 17; Weinbren (n. 51), 38 f. 55 Daniel Weinbren, Supporting self-help: charity, mutuality and reciprocity in nineteenth-century Britain, in: Bernard Harris and Paul Brigden (eds.), Charity and Mutual Aid in Europe and North America since 1800 (2007), 67–88, 68. 56 Annual Report of the Chief Registrar of Friendly Societies, vol. 67 (1883), 9. The oldest surviving Scottish Friendly Society in 1883 dated from 1679 in Lithlingow: ibid., 14. 57 Gosden (n. 44), 6. 58 Gosden (n. 44), 6 f. The Norman Club was one consequence of this.

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guilds remained indisputably alive. Yet was there more than chronological propinquity to their relationship? In fact, contrary to Ludlow, Cordery and other historians’ beliefs, early friendly societies were markedly different from craft guilds in several important ways. Where English guilds were primarily urban, friendly societies encompassed rural communities, small villages and towns. Where guilds were in essence associations of employers, friendly societies incorporated labourers and poor artisans; they funded tramping journeymen not resident masters.59 Where guilds were formed by those able to win the support of town governors to support and enforce their powers over an economic sector, early friendly societies arose among marginal groups – migrants, sailors, suburban workers – whose access to formal systems of welfare may well have been compromised by a lack of settlement or religious differences. Even the geography of friendly societies was markedly different to the distribution of guilds, in being concentrated in the industrial North West. By the 1880s, the largest concentration of societies (17% of the total) was in Lancashire; the next largest density was in neighbouring Yorkshire.60 These were counties with relatively few incorporated towns and thus, we can infer, few guilds. What then of the functional similarities between guilds and societies? This is a somewhat abstract test of the relationship, in that many of the mechanisms by which organisations reinforce cohesion are relatively generic and exist across a wide range of societies and periods. That guilds and societies behaved alike in some regards should be unsurprising to us. Even setting aside that caveat, the parallel here seems weak. As we saw earlier, the density of services provided to the poor and desperate by early modern guilds was relatively thin. Recipients of charitable relief were largely selected by the discretion of guild elites. Even the degree to which early modern guilds anticipated the broader conviviality of 19th century societies is questionable: in 17th-century London, feasting and processions tended to be the preserve of the governing elite of guilds, not the everyday freeman master. The root cause of this mistaken identification between guilds and friendly societies appears to be a vagueness about the distinction between philanthropy and insurance. This is evident, for example, in Robert Leeson’s study of tramping, which elides any difference between the medieval guilds provision for ‘the poor, the sick and the aged’ and the box clubs and friendly societies of the late 17th and 18th centuries. Leeson suggests that their emergence was a response to masters ___________ 59 Edward Palmer Thompson, The Making of the English Working Class (1963), 241, 421; Gosden (n. 47), 74–76; Cordery (n. 49), 24; Weinbren (n. 51), 70; Gorsky (n. 47), 493–499. Cf. on journeyman tramping Weinbren (n. 55), 70, where he suggests guilds did fund tramping. 60 Annual Report (n. 56), 17.

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retreating from supporting poor working members, ignoring the key difference between the two forms of organisation – let alone the lack of any evidence of a retreat from charity on the part of the guilds, which were, if anything, engaging in more rather than less charitable provision.61 To be fair, some historians of friendly societies were clearly uncertain about what type of guild they were considering. Dermot Morrah, for example, saw the tie as a conceptual rather than an organisational one, because it was the pre-reformation guilds that he saw as the forerunners of friendly societies.62 In drawing this parallel, he was on safer ground. Medieval parish guilds, or confraternities, as they are now often styled, were largely stripped of their assets and legitimacy with the Reformation. But until then, the number and geographical distribution of confraternities was closer to that of the later friendly societies.63 Moreover, some confraternities did offer support to their poor or sick members on terms that were comparable to the mutual insurance activities of Dutch guilds.64 In this, they clearly differed from the provisions made by later English craft guilds. The guild of Our Lady’s Nativity at Wymondham, Norfolk, offered a penny a day in relief to members who fell sick. The guild of St. Anne’s in London offered an allowance, but restricted it to those with five years of membership, thus addressing adverse selection issues.65 In Kingston upon Hull, all three of the confraternities for which rules survive had some form of mutual protection. In the guild of St. John the Baptist, for example, any of the members who became ‘infirm, bowed, blind, dumb, deaf, maimed or sick, whether … lasting or only temporary’ were to be paid a sum of money each week, so long as they live – with their membership fees deducted if they could not afford them. They were also given 5s at Martinmas to get a garment. The other two guilds set payments at 7d and 14d a week respectively, generous amounts for that period.66 Guilds in York, Lincoln and Chesterfield also made some form of provision to relieve members who fell into poverty.67 Certainly, ___________ 61

Robert Leeson, Travelling Brothers: The six centuries’ road from craft fellowship to trade unionism (1979), 25, 77 f. 62 Morrah (n. 51), 11–18. 63 Gervase Rosser, The Art of Solidarity in the Middle Ages: Guilds in England 1250– 1550 (2015), 50, 82–84; Virginia Bainbridge, Gilds in the Medieval Countryside: Social and religious Change in Cambridgeshire c. 1350–1558 (1996); Ken Farnhill, Guilds and the Parish Community in Late Medieval East Anglia, c. 1470–1550 (2001); David Crouch, Piety, Fraternity, and Power: Religious Gilds in Late Medieval Yorkshire, 1389– 1547 (2000). 64 For an overview of the scale of this contribution see Van Bavel and Rijpma (n. 12), 162–164. 65 Rosser (n. 63), 83 f. 66 Lucy Toulmin Smith (ed.), English Gilds (1870), 155–162. 67 Toulmin Smith (n. 66), 138, 179, 182, 165–169.

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even if the main purpose of confraternities was not mutual protection, a substantial number of those for which ordinances survive did envisage this as part of their work.68 In sum, there is no evidence for any direct or indirect link between the craft guilds of the 16th to 18th century and friendly societies in England. An exception to this rule may appear in future research. However, the general pattern – and with it the sharp contrast to the functions of guilds in the Netherlands – seems unassailable. Where there is a link between friendly societies and guilds it is to medieval guilds, or confraternities. This link takes the form of a functional parallel, not an institutional tie or some form of substitution or replacement, given the long break between the heydays of the two types of organisation. English guilds before the Reformation did, at least at times, create some forms of mutual assistance, albeit that they do not appear to have developed many, if any, of the more advanced features that would appear later. Their early-modern successors in the crafts and trades did not. The two centuries between the Reformation and the upsurge of friendly societies formed a profound break in the link of corporative behaviour and mutual insurance in English history.

E. Conclusion To conclude, English early modern craft guilds provided no mutual insurance for their members. This is a stark contrast with Dutch guilds and indicates the need to qualify Van der Linden’s hypothesis about the relationship between guilds and mutual insurance. Despite the beliefs of several generations of historians and commentators, friendly societies had no direct relationship to craft guilds. Any indirect relationship is also unclear: they were not substituting for guilds, given that guilds did not provide mutual insurance; nor were they building from communities formed within guilds, at least so far as we can see. Some exceptions to this may yet turn up. But the connection of friendly society and guild appears to be an imagined heritage, not an actual bloodline, one of many legitimating echoes of the Middle Ages that were sewn into Victorian social and political origin stories. Given that guilds in other parts of Europe did come to manage mutual insurance schemes, it seems reasonable to ask why this did not occur in England? Precursors of mutual insurance existed among pre-Reformation confraternities. Yet this left no traces in the occupationally-focused craft and trade guilds of the 16th to 18th century. We can do no more than speculate, but several factors may well explain this. First, the Reformation itself stripped confraternities of their ___________ 68 See Derek Keene, English Urban Guilds, c. 900–1300, in: Gadd and Wallis (n. 11), 3–26, 9 f.

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property and right to exist unless they were narrowly reconceived as occupational monopolies with a focus on craft regulation.69 This set the tone for England’s later craft guilds, and the purity of that tone was monitored and secured through their dependency on local or national permission to operate. Simply put, English guilds would have needed both the will to act and the ability to obtain a license from some branch of the state if they were to create a mutual insurance system. However, the Reformation and state supervision alone seem insufficient in themselves to explain the failure to reinvent mutual insurance over the subsequent centuries. England was influenced in many ways by immigrants who would have experienced mutual welfare systems in their home countries. In the 16th and 17th centuries, Dutch, Flemish and French migrants joined or cooperated with English guilds, although often under some constraints. The idea of mutual insurance surely reached English cities. So why was there no cross-fertilization? For this, the introduction of the English poor law, with the uniquely strong ties between parish and welfare that it created, surely mattered, in offering a means to survive the worst of shocks and a clear tax-based funding system.70 Guild freemen contributed – and possessed rights to – parish poor relief. Many must have been involved in its administration too. But poor relief need not drive out civil society, and, as Paul Slack has convincingly shown, the later 17th and 18th centuries saw an undoubted ‘renaissance’ in private interest and investment in public welfare in England.71 Mutual insurance was a more generous lower middle-class alternative to poor relief in the Northern Netherlands. And this points us to other possible reasons, at least in London, which as the largest urban centre might have been the natural point for the creation of mutual insurance: the scale of charitable relief offered by guilds may well have attenuated the need for a mutual system. Indeed, charity seems a convincing reason for the lack of action in the 18th century, when most of London’s guilds withdrew (or were driven from) economic regulation and instead served principally as the governing bodies for large charitable endowments, at least part of which was specifically dedicated to preserving the wellbeing of their memberships.

___________ 69 Note, however, that without a detailed history of mutual provision by confraternities, we cannot be sure about the vitality of the system at the time of the Reformation. In the Netherlands, the formalisation of guild welfare predated and bridged the Reformation: Van Leeuwen, Guilds (n. 3), 80–81. 70 After the Great Fire of 1666, parishes in London were also required to provide fire engines and equipment: Pearson (n. 8), 83. 71 Paul Slack, From Reformation to Improvement: Public Welfare in Early Modern England (1999), 148 f.

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Appendix: London guild ordinances Guild Bakers Bakers Brewers

Date 1507, 1746 1582 1406

Brewers Brewers Brewers Butchers Butchers Carpenters

1579 1639 1739 1607 1685 1486/1487

Carpenters

1607

Clothworkers

1532

Clothworkers

1587

Clothworkers

1693

Coopers Coopers

1507 1741

Curriers

1605

Drapers

1418

Drapers Drapers Drapers Farriers

1455/1456 1541/1560 1576 1678

Founders

1489

Founders Framework Knitters

1615 1664 1725

Source Guildhall Library, MS 5197A. Guildhall Library, MS 5197. Mia Ball, The worshipful company of brewers: a short history (1977), 59–61. Guildhall Library, MS 5496. Guildhall Library, MS 5497. Guildhall Library, MS 5501. Guy Pearce, History of the Butchers (1929), 201–239. Guildhall Library, MS 6460. Edward Jupp, An Historical Account of the Worshipful Company of Carpenters of the City of London, (2nd edn., 1887), 346–350. Bower Marsh (ed.), Records of the Worshipful Company of Carpenters, vol. 1 (1913), 5–13. Thomas Girtin, Golden Ram: A Narrative History of the Clothworkers Company (1958), Appendix A. The ordinances of the Clothworkers company, together with those of the ancient guilds of Fullers and Shearmen (1881), 37–96. The ordinances of the Clothworkers company, together with those of the ancient guilds of Fullers and Shearmen (1881), 97–114. Guildhall Library, MS 5633B. George Elkington, The Worshipful Company of Coopers. With notes and recollections, 1873–1930 (1930). Edward Mayer and Donald Adamson, The Curriers Company: a modern history (2000), 182; GL, MS 6117. Arthur Johnson, The History of the Worshipful Company of the Drapers of London, vol. 1 (1914), Appendix 9. Johnson, Drapers, vol. 1, appendix 10. Johnson, Drapers, vol. 2, 284–292. Johnson, Drapers, vol. 2, 304–324. Leonard Robson, The Farriers of London (1949), 34–49. William Hibbert, History of the Worshipful Company of Founders (1925), 289 f. Guy Hadley, Citizens and Founders (1976), 183 f. Sheila Mason, The History of the Worshipful Company of Framework Knitters (2000), 232 f. Mason, History, 234–236.

Chapter 5: England Girdlers

1682

Glass-Sellers

1664

Glaziers

1749

Gold and Silver Wyre-Drawers

1700

Goldsmiths

1478

Glovers

1684

Grocers Horners

1687 1638

Merchant Taylors Merchant Taylors

1507

Pewterers Pewterers

1564 1607

1613

121

T.C. Barker, The Girdlers Company, a second history (1967), 89–93. Alexander Howard, The Worshipful Company of Glass Sellers (1940), 124–141. Charles Ashdown, History of the Worshipful Company of Glaziers of the City of London (1919), 130–146. Horace Stewart, History of the Worshipful Company of Gold And Silver Wyre-Drawers (1891), 67–73. Thomas Reddaway and Lorna Walker, The early history of the Goldsmiths Company (1975), 210–274. Ralph Wagget, History of the Glovers (2000), 103– 108. Guildhall Library, MS 11639. F.J. Fisher, Short history of the Worshipful Company of Horners (1936), 100–112. Guildhall Library, MS 34003. C.M. Clode, Memorials of the Guild of Merchant Taylors of the Fraternity of St. John the Baptist in the City of London (1875), 202–222. Guildhall Library, MS 07115, 2v–8v. Guildhall Library, MS 07117.

Chapter 6: Scandinavia By Martin Sunnqvist A. Introduction ............................................................................................................ 123 I. Merchants’ and craft guilds ............................................................................. 123 II. The transfer of guilds to Scandinavia .............................................................. 124 B. Fire insurance ......................................................................................................... 125 I. Guilds of St. Canute and St. Eric .................................................................... 125 II. Craft guilds ..................................................................................................... 126 III. Guilds in the countryside ................................................................................ 127 C. Maritime insurance ................................................................................................. 127 I. Guilds of St. Canute ........................................................................................ 127 II. Specific maritime insutrance ........................................................................... 128 1. Skippers’ guilds ......................................................................................... 128 2. The maritime insurance of the skippers’ guild in Flensburg ...................... 129 D. Poverty and funeral insurance ................................................................................ 129 I. Denmark-Norway ........................................................................................... 129 II. Sweden ............................................................................................................ 131 E. Concluding remarks................................................................................................ 131

A. Introduction I. Merchants’ and craft guilds In Scandinavia, as in Germany, a distinction is often made between craft guilds, Zünfte, and merchant guilds, Gilden, as different but similar organizations for, respectively, craftsmen and merchants in towns; at the least this differentiation was made from the 14th or 15th century onwards. The difference between these two categories should not be exaggerated, however, especially as the two concepts were not dominant in the Middle Ages, when several other concepts were used besides these.1 In Sweden, Zünfte and Gilden are today called skrån and gillen, respectively, but the word skrå originally meant the charter of the organization. Craft guilds were called ämbete, a word having the same origin and meaning as the German

___________ 1 Christoph Anz, Gilden im mittelalterlichen Skandinavien (1998) 9, 19, 24, 57–82, 205. See furthermore, Hellwege, p. 15, above.

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word Amt, which was used also for the craft guilds in, for example, Bergen, Norway. Craft guilds are commonly called lav in Denmark and laug in Norway. II. The transfer of guilds to Scandinavia In the Nordic countries, some authors have suggested that the first guilds developed in the countryside in the time before Christianisation. The charters of some early guilds exhibit pre-Christian elements, such as the duty of revenge. In recent German and Nordic research, however, the evidence for such a conclusion has been questioned. Christoph Anz and Håkon Haugland have convincingly argued that the first guilds were established after Christianisation in the towns, probably through foreign merchants.2 The literature on Nordic insurance history, which I have discussed in an earlier article,3 was, as regards the time period during which the guilds were of importance for insurance, written in the 1930s.4 For the Swedish part, Tom Söderberg (1900–1991) followed the old theory that the guilds had developed in the countryside in the time before Christianisation.5 As regards Denmark, J.O. Bro Jørgensen (1902–1988) had a surprisingly modern view on the matter. He wrote that organisation in guilds was perhaps first done abroad and then brought to Danish towns by foreign merchants, even though the duty of members of a guild to help other members, according to Jørgensen, had its roots in peasant culture.6 For Norway, K. Lorange (1879–1947) held the view that nothing was known about the guilds of the 13th century and that the new guilds of the 16th century had German guilds as their model.7 Regrettably, the importance of guilds for the development of insurance has not been discussed in recent Nordic literature. Christoph Anz only mentions insurance when he discusses the general duty of guild members to help each other,8 and Håkon Haugland does not mention insurance at all. ___________ 2 Anz (n. 1), passim, with a summary on 293–296; Håkon Haugland, Fellesskap og brorskap. En komparativ undersøkelse av gildenes sosiale, religiøse og rettslige rolle i et utvalg nordiske byer fra midten av 1200-tallet til reformasjonen (2012), 39–70. 3 Martin Sunnqvist, Scandinavia, in: Phillip Hellwege (ed.), A Comparative History of Insurance Law in Europe. A Research Agenda (2018), 199–222, 200–202. 4 J.O. Bro Jørgensen, Forsikringsvæsenets historie i Danmark indtil det 19. aarhundrede (1935); Tom Söderberg, Försäkringsväsendets historia i Sverige intill Karl Johanstiden (1935); K. Lorange, Forsikringsvesenets historie i Norge inntil 1814 (1935). 5 Söderberg (n. 4), 79. 6 Jørgensen (n. 4), 52. 7 Lorange (n. 4), 305. 8 Anz (n. 1), 92 f., 135, 138, 146, 205 f., 209 f., 230.

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I wrote in the beginning of this text that the craft guilds came to be separated from the merchants’ guilds in the 14th or 15th century. Before that, the difference between different kinds of guilds was less clear. According to Jørgensen, the development leading to this distinction was due to a combination of changes: The power of the state and the administration of justice grew stronger at that time, which meant that the task of members of a guild to protect other members against violence and to help with revenge grew less important. At the same time, there was a societal differentiation whereby merchants became a higher class and craftsmen a lower class in the towns. Therefore, different types of guilds developed. Differentiation among guilds furthermore can be seen in skippers establishing their own guilds; the skippers’ guild in Flensburg was, for example, founded in the 16th century. There were also guilds for the clergy, kalentegilden, and even for peasants.9

B. Fire insurance I. Guilds of St. Canute and St. Eric In 1256, there was a meeting in Skanör, at that time in Denmark, now in Sweden, between 18 aldermen of different merchants’ guilds in the Danish kingdom.10 They met to draft some common rules for the charters of their guilds. One grouping of these rules concerned mutual insurance for fire, shipwreck, and captivity. Among the guilds whose aldermen met were the guilds of St. Canute in Malmö (now in Sweden) and Store Heddinge (in Denmark) and the guild of St. Eric in Kallehave (in Denmark, now Kalvehave). At this meeting, a rule on ‘fire help’ was drafted, which was then introduced in the charters of the guilds of St. Canute in Malmö and Store Heddinge and the guild of St. Eric in Kallehave. According to this rule, if a member of the guild suffered losses through fire in his kitchen, room, or barn with grain in the house where he lived, all other members should help by paying him three pennies each.11 According to a copy from 1671 of the original charter of the guild of St. Canute in Malmö from 1256, § 25 read:12 ‘Conviva vero, cujus anterior pars domus, id est coqvina vel stupa aut horreum cum annona in illa curia, in qva residentiam facit, combusta fuerit, dent ei omnes fratres stud, sc[ilicet] tres denarios.’

___________ 9

Jørgensen (n. 4) 57, 60 f., 77. Anz (n. 1), 237–239. 11 Jørgensen (n. 4), 54. 12 C. Nyrop, Danmarks gilde- og lavsskraaer fra middelalderen, vol. 1 (1899– 1900/1977), 40. Cf. ibid., 51 (Store Heddinge, § 25) and 64 (Kalvehave, § 28). 10

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In the charter of the guild of St. Canute in Malmö from about 1350, the rule was less detailed.13 If a member of the guild suffered losses from fire in the house where he lived, each brother should pay him three pennies each.14 The amount of money was at this time called brandstod, fire-help. The probable reason for the use of the word brandstod is, according to Söderberg, an influence from the countryside of the surrounding province of Scania.15 There, fire-help was an established legal phenomenon from at least about 1200. It meant that the other inhabitants of the rural district would have to contribute a penny, a bushel of grain, or two bushels of oats to a house owner whose house had burnt down.16 In later charters of guilds of St. Canute, the rules were less detailed and less insurance-like. According to the 1586 charter of the guild of St. Canute in Lund, a member who suffered losses from fire and demanded help from the other members did not have the right to receive a specific amount of money (§ 19). Rather, at the next meeting of the guild the members were to decide on the amount of the loss and how much each member should pay in contribution.17 II. Craft guilds There are only a few known charters of Danish craft guilds which mention fire insurance. In the charters of the guilds of smiths in Roskilde and Copenhagen, from 1491 and 1512 respectively, it says that if the house of a brother or sister burns down by accident, each brother and sister is to give the owner of the house a grot. In the charter of the shoemakers’ guild in Sønderborg, there is a similar rule, but the brothers and sisters should give the owner of the house a certain amount of sheaves, 20 laths, and two days’ work.18 According to the charter of the barber-surgeons in Stockholm, from 1571, the members should each Sunday give at least an ortig to the treasury of the guild. If a member was impoverished or suffered from fire, these contributions were to be used to help the member in need. There is also an example from another craft guild, the pot founders in Stockholm, that a member who had suffered from fire received an insurance-like payment from the treasury of the guild. Such payments could, however, just as well be described as help towards impoverished ___________ 13

Jørgensen (n. 4), 54. Nyrop (n. 12), 97 (§ 33). 15 Söderberg (n. 4), 38. 16 See Sunnqvist (n. 3), 204 f. 17 Anders Bruzelius (ed.), S:t Knuts gille i Lund. 1586 års skrå (1986), 26. 18 Jørgensen (n. 4), 77 f.; C. Nyrop, Danmarks gilde- og lavsskraaer fra middelalderen, vol. 2 (1895–1904/1977), 211 (§ 39), 332 (§ 20), 195 (§ 9). 14

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members outside the realm of insurance and based on the obligation for guild members to help each other.19 III. Guilds in the countryside In Norway, there was a guild for the peasants of Sunnhordland in western Norway, near Bergen. In a charter, which probably relates to that guild, the members promised to help each other to rebuild burnt down houses and to replace burnt grain.20 There is also an example from 1314 of an organisation similar to a guild in the countryside of Sweden. The clergy in the districts of Västanstång and Kinda in the diocese of Linköping agreed on mutual help in the form of a fixed sum of money in the event of fire.21

C. Maritime insurance I. Guilds of St. Canute The early charters of the guilds of St. Canute were not limited to fire insurance. Also captivity and shipwreck were mentioned in the common charter of 1256. If a member was captive or lost his freedom, the other members of the guild in the bishopric should give him three pennies each.22 If a member suffered shipwreck and lost his goods and if he had no goods of a higher value than one mark left, he should take an oath, call witnesses and then receive three pennies from each member of the guild in the bishopric.23 That all members of the guild in the bishopric had to help meant, according to Jørgensen, that it was not only the personally acquainted members of the guild in the same town that had to provide assistance. This is explained by the (relatively large) amount of money needed for ransom if a member of the guild was held captive by pirates.24

___________ 19

Söderberg (n. 4), 76 f. Lorange (n. 4), 186–189. Cf. Haugland (n. 2) 43. 21 Söderberg (n. 4), 40 f. 22 Nyrop (n. 12), 42 (§ 35), cf. 53 (Store Heddinge, § 35) and 61 (Kalvehave, § 8). 23 Nyrop (n. 12), 42 (§ 37), cf. 53 (Store Heddinge, § 37) and 61 (Kalvehave, § 10). 24 Jørgensen (n. 4), 54 f. 20

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II. Specific maritime insurance 1. Skippers’ guilds Just as the craft guilds came to be separated from the merchants’ guilds in the 14th or 15th century, the skippers established their own guilds. The skippers’ guild in Aalborg is presumed to have been established in 1348, and the guild in Flensburg was established before 1581.25 In the skippers’ guild of Copenhagen, established in 1634 by the mayor and magistrates, there were detailed rules about payments that were to be made to the guild by the members. This money was to be used to help members who had been taken as hostage by Turks or ‘enemies of religion’ so that they could pay ransom, to support members who were ill or suffered from shipwreck and foreign persons who had been shipwrecked in Copenhagen. This is, as Jørgensen writes, a mix of different types of insurance in the modern sense, but it is on the other hand complete and comprehensive vis-à-vis the needs of a skipper. It is also interesting to note, in comparison to, for example, the rules on fire insurance in the charters of the guilds of St. Canute, that payments were made to the guild, which then paid the money to members in need; the latter did not have to collect the money from the other members.26 In 1685, the part of this insurance related to assistance for members who had been taken as hostage was segregated from the other parts and also broadened. Skippers and seamen sailing from Copenhagen had to pay a certain amount of money, which was deducted from their wages, so that ransom could be paid. They had to pay regardless of whether they were sailing so far away that they themselves risked being taken hostage. The insurance was still administered by the skippers’ guild, which in 1708 refused to pay for captured seamen from Bergen, Norway, who had not been sailing from Copenhagen and who had not been required to contribute to the insurance. At this time, also the money used for helping shipwrecked members was segregated from the other money of the guild. Two different amounts of payment were introduced, three marks a year for skippers sailing within Denmark, to Norway, and to the Baltic Sea, and 1½ marks a year for skippers sailing to Spain, France, England, Iceland, the Faro Islands, and further away. This money should only be used to help members who suffered shipwreck. The guild soon realised that the money was insufficient, and in 1710 different fees – from 1½ to 6 marks a year – were introduced, depending on the size of the ships. The result was not, however, that shipwrecked skippers could count on substantial compensation. In the late 18th century, the compensation ___________ 25 26

Jørgensen (n. 4), 60 f., 76. Jørgensen (n. 4), 62–64.

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developed into insurance for the skipper’s loss of clothes, books, and other personal artefacts that he had brought with him on the ship.27 In 1715, the bishop of Zealand, Christen Worm (1672–1737), made a proposal towards the establishment of a treasury which could be used to pay ransom for captured sailors. For all ships from Denmark, Norway, Schleswig, and Holstein sailing to Holland, France, England, Portugal, and Spain, a fee was to be paid, and the revenue was to be supplemented by collections from the churches. Prior to the establishment of this fund, Danish and Norwegian sailors had already been captured in Algiers, Tunis, Tripoli, and Morocco who were subsequently released through the fund. The treasury, Slavekassen, was active until the end of the 18th century.28 2. The maritime insurance of the skippers’ guild in Flensburg The skippers’ guild in Flensburg had as its custom to help shipwrecked members. In 1710, the guild set up an insurance company. The compensation was to be related to the value of the skipper’s loss, and the payments to the company were to be paid as a share of the wages of the skipper, six pennies per one mark lybsk. The company lasted until sometime between 1724 and 1731. The reason for its failure was probably that the payments to the company were insufficient and that many ships suffered damage from the war with Sweden.29

D. Poverty and funeral insurance I. Denmark-Norway In many guilds, there were general rules in the charters that the brothers and sisters should support and help each other, for example in the charter of 1444 for the merchants’ guild of St. Anna in Svendborg, Denmark,30 for the craft guilds of the tailors of Copenhagen from 1592,31 and for the goldsmiths and bakers in Bergen, Norway, from 1568 and 1641 respectively.32 Such rules do not qualify as insurance. Closer to insurance are rules such as those found in the charter of the Trinity Guild in Odense, granted by King Hans ___________ 27

Jørgensen (n. 4), 64–69. Jørgensen (n. 4), 159–167; Lorange (n. 4), 71–74. 29 Jørgensen (n. 4), 71–73. 30 Jørgensen (n. 4), 58; Nyrop (n. 12) 710 (§ 22). 31 Jørgensen (n. 4), 78. 32 Lorange (n. 4), 306. 28

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in 1496, saying that the members of the guild should help a member who had become poor so that he could keep up his trade. If it was impossible for the member to come back to his trade, the other members should, in honour of the Holy Trinity, give the poor member a meal a day.33 Even though the charter of the skippers’ guild of Copenhagen, established in 1634, did not mention it, Jørgensen has concluded that widows, orphans, and old skippers probably already from the beginning were supported by the guild. There are examples from the 18th century that such help was granted, and in 1769 the custom was formalised that different amounts were paid by skippers depending on how far they were sailing. At roughly the same time, the guild had started to pay pensions to all widows regardless of need, but in 1803 the amount of pensions paid was restricted and was to depend on need.34 Also in craft guilds, such as the bakers’ guild in Slagelse (charter of 1471) and the tailors’ guild in Odense (charter of 1492), the rules were similar.35 Around 1648, the Danish state tried to harmonise the charters of the craft guilds. Apprentices needed help if they were ill, and if they died, their funeral had to be paid for; and the masters should retain four shillings of the wages each month and give it to the poor box of the guild. The money should be used for apprentices who were ill (they were expected to pay back the money afterwards) or for their funerals. Also the masters had the right to funeral assistance. For example, the tailors’ guild of Copenhagen arranged for an insurance company for this purpose in 1737.36 The principles were the same in the Norwegian part of the kingdom, and Lorange briefly discussed the rule that the apprentices had to pay back the money afterwards. He concluded that this is an international rule, probably first known in England, and that it can be explained in that it gave an incentive for the apprentice to go back to work as quickly as possible. If the illness ended with death, no money had to be paid back.37 In Norway, there were also payments of a sum in cash to the survivors of a deceased member of a guild. Such money was kept separate from the other money of the guild. The first example of this type of insurance is from 1635 and found in the shoemakers’ guild in Bergen, which was one of the largest guilds in Norway and thus could run such an insurance.38

___________ 33

Jørgensen (n. 4), 58; Nyrop (n. 12) 779 (§ 32). Jørgensen (n. 4), 63–70. 35 Jørgensen (n. 4), 79; Nyrop (n. 18), 178 f. (§ 17), 229 f. (§ 52). 36 Jørgensen (n. 4), 80–84. 37 Lorange (n. 4), 306 f. 38 Lorange (n. 4), 307–309. 34

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II. Sweden If we turn to Sweden, the charters of the early guilds have similar rules as the Danish-Norwegian counterparts. In the charter from about 1300 of the guild of St. Per (Peter) in Uppsala, there was no organised economic assistance but only help with care of the ill and with funerals. In a guild of St. Eric, there were similar rules, and in the charter of a guild of St. Mary, probably in Uppland, there was a rule that each brother and sister should give four pennies to a brother or sister who was ill and could not support him- or herself. The same goes for the charter of the guild of saddlers’ apprentices from 1437. Some craft guilds, such as those of the skinners or furriers, according to the charter of 1589, explicitly stated that poverty help was a loan, whilst others treated it as a gift.39 In the 18th century, insurance companies were established separately from but in close connection with the craft guilds. The first one is the insurance, established in 1734, for illness and funerals for the craftsmen at the Royal Palace in Stockholm. Other crafts established similar insurances. Especially in Scania, there were pallbearer guilds. One of them was established in 1729 by the glovemakers’ guild in Malmö. It was probably inspired by the guilds of St. Canute in Malmö and Lund that had survived the Reformation and continued working as pallbearer guilds.40

E. Concluding remarks During the Reformation, in the first half of the 16th century, most merchants’ guilds were dissolved. In the mid-19th century, freedom of trade was established in the Nordic countries, and the craft guilds were dissolved or transformed into craft and trade societies. One observation is that it is difficult to draw a clear line between insurance and other types of mutual help. Within a guild, the members had a duty to help other members that were in need. Membership in a guild could in that way provide a sense of social and economic safety, but not necessarily in the form of insurance, if we restrict that word to contracts where a fee is paid and where there is correspondingly a right acquired to a certain amount of compensation if a welldefined type of accident occurs. As regards fire insurance, we see clearly how the 1256 common charter of the guilds of St. Canute provided a rule on fire insurance. If a member of the guild suffered losses through defined types of fire, he had the right to receive three ___________ 39 40

Söderberg (n. 4), 79–84. Söderberg (n. 4), 86–87.

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pennies from all other members. There were, later on, similar rules in the charters of craft guilds. There were similar rules about shipwrecks, but in for example the skippers’ guild of Copenhagen from 1634, money for the insurance was paid into a specific treasury. That the member suffering a loss did not have to collect the money from the fellow members but could obtain a payment from the treasury brings the arrangement even closer to insurance in the modern sense. The skippers’ guild in Flensburg set up an insurance company, which was the last step in the establishment of insurance in the modern sense. The difficulty with the different concepts such as insurance and the like becomes evident when we look at the type of poverty help where the member who had received help had to pay the money back, unless he died. This is not insurance in the strict sense but rather a loan, even if it was arranged to help an impoverished member of the guild.

Chapter 7: Guilds, Confraternities and Mutual Assistance in France By David Deroussin A. Introduction ............................................................................................................ 133 B. Methodological observations .................................................................................. 136 I. Guilds, confraternities, and three resulting methodological problems ............ 136 II. The lack of primary sources ............................................................................ 138 III. Professional and religious confraternities ....................................................... 139 IV. The relationship between guilds and confraternities ....................................... 140 C. Forms of support, covered risks, and the requirements for support ........................ 143 I. Support relating to the religious dimensions of confraternities ....................... 144 II. Support in the case of illness and poverty ....................................................... 145 III. Support in other cases ..................................................................................... 148 IV. Four final remarks ........................................................................................... 149 1. The problem of moral hazard ..................................................................... 149 2. The practical importance of support granted by confraternities ................. 149 3. Risks related to professional activities ....................................................... 150 4. Parallels to 19th-century mutual benefit societies ....................................... 151 D. Financing the support schemes ............................................................................... 151 I. Fines and penalties .......................................................................................... 152 II. Admission fees ................................................................................................ 153 III. Periodical contributions .................................................................................. 154 IV. Summary ......................................................................................................... 156 E. Charity, assistance, or insurance? ........................................................................... 157 I. Differences between modern insurance and confraternity support with respect to the finances ............................................................................. 158 II. Differences between modern insurance and confraternity support with respect to beneficiaries of support ........................................................... 159 III. Financial support granted in form of a loan .................................................... 161 F. Conclusion .............................................................................................................. 162

A. Introduction The French Revolution saw the end of those corporations1 that restricted freedom of contract and freedom of trade, and it thus saw especially the end of guilds. It was the act of 2/17 March 1791, more commonly known as the Décret d’Allarde, which marked the paradigm shift. The Décret d’Allarde thereby accomplished what Anne Robert Jacques Turgot (1727–1781) had failed to achieve in ___________ 1

On terminological issues concerning the word corporation, see n. 13, below.

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1776. In 1776, Turgot lacked the support of the King and thus had to restore such corporations. However, in some cities they were re-established without the confrèries, which usually existed alongside professional corporations such as guilds. For the city of Lyon, for example, an edict of 1777 restored such corporations; it imposed on those who wanted to join them the obligation to pay 24 livres to the Hotel-Dieu, at the time the most important hospital and social institution in Lyon, and it abolished all ‘confréries, congrégations & associations formées dans les Communautés d’arts & métiers, qui subsistent dans notre ville de Lyon’.2 As a consequence of the Décret d’Allarde of 1791 – and this was the paradigm shift – assistance to the poor and sick was no longer left to family solidarity or to the solidarity within professional corporations. It was less left still to charity. Assistance to the poor and sick was now looked upon as being in the public domain, a public responsibility.3 Article 21 of the Déclaration des droits de l’an I, also known as the Déclaration des Droits de l'homme et du citoyen of 24 June 1793, even spoke of a dette, which can be translated as a debt, obligation, or liability: ‘Les secours publics sont une dette sacrée. La société doit la subsistance aux citoyens malheureux, soit en leur procurant du travail, soit en assurant les moyens d’exister à ceux qui sont hors d’état de travailler’ (‘Public support is a sacred obligation. Society owes support to unfortunate citizens, either by giving work to them or by assuring the means of existence for those who are unable to work’). Yet the Déclaration left it an unresolved question whether this obligation corresponded to an individual right of a citizen in need against the state for support. The subsequent mutualist movement experienced a continuous development throughout the 19th century.4 Sociétés de secours mutuels (mutual benefit societies) were founded as early as the late 18th and the beginning of the 19th centuries. In Paris, for example, 193 such societies were formed between 1791 and 1830.5 They continued to function despite the supervision which was exercised by the state. They were usually established for specific industry sectors or trades. Workers had to pay an entrance fee and monthly contributions. For example, in 1828 the canuts of Lyon formed a Société du devoir mutual and had to pay an entrance fee of three francs and a monthly fee of one franc.6 A decree of 26 March

___________ 2 Art. 4 and Art. 28 of the Édit portant règlement pour les communautés d‘arts et métiers de la ville de Lyon, 24 January 1777. 3 Bernard Gibaud, Mutualité, Assurances (1998), IX. 4 See Gérard Aubin, Yann Delbrel and Bernard Gallinato-Contino, Assistance et assurance: heurs et malheurs de la protection sociale en France (2008). 5 Jean Bennet, La mutualité française à travers sept siècles d’Histoire (1975), 191. 6 Jean Bron, Histoire du mouvement ouvrier français, vol. 1 (1968), 51.

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18527 and an act of 1 April 1898 (known as the Charte de la mutualité) liberalized the state supervision of the administration of such mutual societies. This, in turn, even accelerated their development. The development only came to a halt with the adoption of the act for the introduction of workers’ and farmers’ pensions on 5 April 1910 and with the introduction of social insurance and social security schemes at the end of World War II. At the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, economic and legal literature began to analyse in detail the 19th-century development of the mutualist movement. It identified three essential elements, which allegedly characterized the development: (1) collective provision against (2) risk in order to render (3) assistance and relief. Some authors, as well as some of the statutes of such sociétés,8 tried to establish a link between this mutualist movement and older practices which existed prior to the French Revolution, in particular the mutual aid provided by trades and their confrèries.9 This raised the complex question as to what extent these earlier institutions and practices had contributed to the formation of the mutual benefit societies of the 19th century. It was first framed by Émile Laurent in 1865, but he noted that the state of research of his time did not allow reaching a definitive answer.10 The present contribution will revisit this question, and it will try to develop a more precise answer. It will do so not by providing a detailed analysis of how the mutual aid schemes offered by the ancient guilds via their confrèries actually functioned – such an analysis would need to have a clear local focus – but by giving a general overview of these schemes in France. Even if so limited in its scope and purpose, the present contribution raises methodological questions that need to be addressed first (below B).11 Only then will it be possible to analyse

___________ 7 See Patrick Fridenson, Le conflit social, in: André Burguière and Jacques Revel (eds.), Histoire de la France: l’Etat et les conflits, vol. 3 (1990), 402. 8 See, e.g., the Règlement de la Société de secours mutuels des fabricants de bas et de tulle de la ville de Lyon, established in 1804: ‘de temps immémorial, dans l’usage de faire des cueillettes entre eux pour secourir leurs confrères qui étaient incapables de travailler, pour cause de maladie, de vieillesse ou d’infirmités’, cited by Gustave Hubbard, De l’organisation des sociétés de prévoyance ou de secours mutuels et des bases scientifiques sur lesquelles elles doivent être établies (1852), 6. 9 A similar link is also established by modern historians, e.g., by Marcel van der Linden, Introduction, in: idem (ed.), Social Security Mutualism (1996), 11–38. 10 Émile Laurent, Le paupérisme et les associations de prévoyance, vol. 1 (1865), 260. 11 Simon Cordery, British Friendly Societies, 1750–1914 (2003), 1 f., recalls that there are different perspectives in analysing such associations: a social historian will tend to see them as an aspect of working-class life whereas a political historian will focus on their role in political life.

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the different practices of mutual assistance as developed in medieval12 and modern France within guilds. In doing so the focus of the present contributions will be on two aspects. First to be analysed will be the different forms of mutual support provided by guilds via their confrèries as well as the risks covered and the requirements for support (below C). Then, the financing of these support schemes will be discussed (below D). In a final step it will be possible to answer the question in what ways these early support schemes relate to the emergence of 19th-century mutualism and insurance (below E).

B. Methodological observations Studying the support schemes which guilds offered via their confraternities in medieval France in order to contrast them to 19th century mutualism and modern insurance raises several difficulties. I. Guilds, confraternities, and three resulting methodological problems Mutual protection was more often organized by professional confrèries (confraternities) which were established alongside guilds rather than by the guilds13 themselves. As the French legal historian Paul Violet (1840–1914) said, confraternities were like the heart of guilds because it was especially in the meetings of the confraternities that craftsmen organized and consulted each other.14 Consequently, political authorities usually attacked professional confraternities whenever they came into conflict with guilds and with a profession. However, it has to be remembered that guilds and professional confrèries did not necessarily appear at the same times. In all, the history of confraternities appears to have been turbulent from the 13th century onwards. For Paris, Etienne Boileau (1200–1270) mentions the existence of confraternities in connection with certain guilds in Livre des métiers ___________ 12 The time frame chosen here is broader than the one which Marco H.D. van Leeuwen, Mutual insurance 1550–2015 (2016) defines as ‘the era of the guilds’, i.e. 1550 to 1800. The broader approach taken in the present contribution reflects the developments in France. 13 French literature usually uses the term ‘corporation’. However, this term is problematic. Émile Coornaert, Les Corporations en France avant 1789 (1968), pointed out that the word is borrowed from the English. It was first used to designate trade organizations in France in the middle of the 18th century. Consequently, Pierre Chaunu and Richard Gascon, L’État et la Ville, 1450–1660 (1977), 244, claim that the term should not be used. For the Middle Ages, the phrase ‘métiers jurés’ seems more suitable. 14 Paul Viollet, Histoire des institutions politiques et administratives de la France, vol. 3 (1903), 165.

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(‘Book of guilds’), which appeared in 1268.15 Subsequently they were suppressed by Philippe IV le Bel at the beginning of the 14th century and then restored again by his successors. In April 1320, Philippe V le Long, for example, authorized the pelletiers of Paris to re-establish their brotherhood.16 The ordinance of Philip VI of 8 November 1343 then again banned confraternities,17 but the ban seems to have had relative little effect. In Languedoc, confraternities appeared at the end of the 13th century, right after guilds had been established.18 Especially from the 15th century onwards, lay authorities followed ecclesiastical authorities in the attempt to monitor the activities of confraternities and, at times, to prohibit them. In a judgment of 25 May 1535, which is exemplary for the approach taken by the Parliament in Paris in the 16th century, the Parliament prohibited master craftsmen and free merchants from meeting in confrairies in Paris and other cities of its territorial jurisdiction. And in the famous Ordonnance de Villers-Cotterêts of 15 August 1539, François I attempted to forbid ‘toutes confrairies de gens de mestier et artisans par-tout notre royaume’ (Art. 185) and to confiscate their property (Art. 186) – again without much success. By letters patent of 19 April 1541, the confraternity of the clothiers obtained an exemption from the provisions of the ordinance. It successfully argued that it had had a chapel at the Église des Saints-Innocents already for several centuries. Other confraternities obtained similar exemptions. Letters patent of 5 February 1562 and the Édit de Moulins of 1566 reiterated the prohibition laid down by the Ordonnance de Villers-Cotterêts, especially in Lyon – again a failure.19 In any event, these confraternities have always been viewed with suspicion and in the 17th century they needed the authorization of the King. This short account allows the highlighting of three methodological problems.

___________ 15 Etienne Boileau, Livre des métiers (ed. by René de Lespinasse and François Bonnardot, 1879). 16 Trésor des Chartes, reg. 60, pièce 92, reproduced in Gustave Fagniez, Études sur l’industrie et la classe industrielle à Paris au XIIIè et au XIVè siècles (1877), 281. 17 Reproduced in Decrusy and Isambert, Recueil des anciennes ordonnances des rois de France, vol. 4 (1823), 477. 18 André Gouron, La réglementation des métiers en Languedoc au Moyen âge (1958), passim. 19 Henri Hauser, Ouvriers du temps passé: XVe–XVIe siècles (5th edn., 1927), 168.

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II. The lack of primary sources Given the fact that professional confrèries are old – the oldest dates back to the 12th century20 – and were widespread, it may come as a surprise that there are only few surviving sources. Of course, many guild statutes have survived and have been edited, especially in the 19th century. However, the statutes of professional confrèries have often disappeared. An explanation for this lack of documentation, or even the total absence of sources,21 is that mutual assistance practices rarely originated in a decision of the public authorities.22 Even if the statutes of the confraternities were sometimes recognized or encouraged by such authorities – the first statutes of the confraternity of the Parisian painters and image cutters were, for example, drafted on 13 August 1391 by the provost of the merchants of Paris and confirmed by letters patent of Charles V le Sage (1338–1380), Henri III (1551–1589), and Louis XIII (1601–1643) – they are more often the spontaneous response to specific needs and appear as a bottom-up phenomenon. Historical research in other countries faced similar problems, but there modern literature was able to bridge the resulting gaps23 – not so in France, except for the works of Steven L. Kaplan and Philippe Minard.24 Furthermore, the French research of the late 19th century and the inter-war period, especially that by François Olivier-Martin (1879–1952),25 must be treated with caution, as these authors sympathized with an economic system which, at the time, was presented as an alternative to capitalism and socialism and which was inspired by historical guilds and confraternities or, with respect to the protection of the weakest in medieval confraternities, by Christianity, as these authors were anxious to highlight.

___________ 20 The confraternity of the marchands de l’eau of Paris (attached to the church Sainte Marie Madeleine) is without doubt the first. Others followed, e.g., around 1188 we encounter the confraternity of the clothiers of Paris (attached to the chapel Sainte-Marie l'Égyptienne), see Ordonnances des Rois de France, vol. 3 (Paris 1732), 582. 21 The statutes of the guilds show that rules on mutual support were common, even if they were not very developed. 22 Jean-Auguste Brutails, Note sur les anciennes confréries et l’assistance mutuelle dans le Sud-Ouest, (1903) Revue philomathique de Bordeaux et du Sud-Ouest 402–409. 23 See the references in Bert de Munck, La qualité du corporatisme, (2007) 54 Revue d’histoire moderne et contemporaine 116–144. There is in recent French historiography nothing comparable to, e.g., Marco H.D. van Leeuwen, Guilds and middle-class welfare 1550–1800, (2012) 65 Economic History Review 61–90; idem (n. 12); Sandra Bos, A tradition of giving and receiving, in: Maarten Prak et al. (eds.), Craft guilds in the early modern Low Countries (2006), 174–193. 24 See Steven L. Kaplan and Philippe Minard (eds.), La France, malade du corporatisme? XVIIIe-XXe siècles (2004). 25 François Olivier-Martin, L’organisation corporative de la France d’Ancien Régime (1939).

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III. Professional and religious confraternities Guilds usually did not directly provide assistance and support to members in need. This function was often delegated to confrèries. Often guilds established such confraternities especially to serve religious purposes. Consequently, and this is the second methodological problem, these professional confraternities have to be studied in the broader context of medieval brotherhoods because confraternities existed also, or even predominantly, outside the professional context. The study of medieval confraternities has often been linked to the history of spirituality and religious behaviour.26 Professional and non-professional confraternities had in the Middle Ages the same concerns and developed the same activities. Catherine Vincent identifies three essential elements shared by all confraternities, regardless of whether they were professional or non-professional confraternities:27 the choice of a patron saint and the celebration of a regular Mass; the exercise of charity; a collective organization. With respect to the charity element, relief – material and spiritual – was granted to members and neighbours, especially at the time of a funeral. Confraternities organized proper funeral ceremonies and ensured decent burials.28 Furthermore, often a certain number of poor people were invited to the annual banquet. And confraternities distributed food to poor people. With respect to the collective organization, all confraternities followed similar patterns and shared, for example, comparable schemes for the management of funds which were to be allocated to the celebration of worship. This is why the question may be raised whether confrairies as a whole can be considered as a step towards modern mutualism, but this question is especially pressing when such confraternities were linked to certain trades, as was for example the case with the Saint-Anne’s confraternity in Paris. It was created in 1690 and originally had the name Confrérie et Société hospitalière des compagnons menuisier et habitants du Temple. In the 18th century, it had 68 members and was some manner of a friendly society. In September 1792, it abandoned its religious heritage, it was reduced to about 30 members, and it changed its name to Société fraternelle de secours.29 The Confrairie de la conception de la Sainte Vierge, established in Bordeaux on 20 June 1627, and the Confrairie du glorieux ___________ 26 This observation corresponds to the fact that French jurists of the 17th and 18th centuries used the words ‘confrairie’ and ‘confrèrie’ only in the context of pious organizations attached to the church, see e.g., Claude-Josph de Ferrière, Dictionnaire de droit et de pratique, vol. 1 (Paris 1762), ‘Confrairie’. On religious brotherhoods see Sylvie CrogiezPétrequin (ed.), Dieu(x) et hommes (2005); Marie-Hélène Froeschlé-Chopard, Dieu pour tous et Dieu pour soi (2006). 27 Catherine Vincent, Les confréries médiévales dans le royaume de France (1994). 28 Catherine Vincent, Des charités bien ordonnées (1988), 32. 29 Michel Dreyfus, L’avantage de partager. Histoire des mutuelles cogérées (1996).

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Saint-Jean Baptiste, established in Cadillac in 1609, offer further examples: relief is of the same type as that offered by professional confrèries and the funding arrangements are similar, too.30 The present contribution does not examine non-professional confraternities, and it will in particular disregard the so-called compagnonages. Furthermore, with respect to the confrèries de métiers, the present contribution will focus especially on their non-religious functions.31 IV. The relationship between guilds and confraternities The third difficulty concerns the relationship between guilds and confrèries. On the one hand, it must be kept in mind that, particularly in medieval France, a confrèrie could bring together individuals who were engaged in different trades or even exercising a free trade (métier libre).32 In fact the oldest professional confrèries had been open to members from outside the respective trades to which they were related.33 For example, the confraternity of St. Véronique in Paris, established at the church of Saint-Eustache, included cloth merchants located near Les Halles and also individuals who did not belong to the cloth trade.34 There are many other examples: the confrairie of the carpenters of Bordeaux admitted individuals who did not belong to the trade, but who paid their contributions and then also received the benefits of membership.35 In 14th-century Normandy all masters of the same profession were automatically members of the same confraternity, so that the professional links were strengthened by religious ties, but the reverse was not true: the members of a professional brotherhood did not necessarily share the same professional activity. Similar was the situation in Arles in the Middle Ages36 and in Marseille, at least until the 14th century. In Marseille, it was for the first time in 1385 that a confrairie brought together only those ___________ 30

The statutes of these confraternities are reproduced in Laurent (n. 10), 164. On these, see Agostino Paravicini Bagliani, Présentation, in: idem (ed.), Le mouvement confraternel au Moyen Âge (1987), 1–7, 5; Roberto Greci, Economia, religiosità, política. Le solidarietà delle corporazioni medievali nell’Italia del Nord, in: Confradías, gremios y solidaridades en la Europa medieval (XIX Semana de Estudios Medievales de Estella) (1993), 75–99; idem, Corporazioni e mondo del lavoro nell’Italia padana medievale (1988); Richard Mackenney, The guilds of Venice, (1997) 34 Studi veneziani 15–43. 32 Hauser (n. 19), 161. 33 Vincent (n. 28), 36. 34 See Fagniez (n. 16), 34. Similarly the Parisian drapiers, whose statutes specify moreover that ‘le confrère, qui ne marchandera, doit chascun an huit soulz’: Ordonnances des Rois de France, vol. 3 (n. 20), 583. 35 Laurent (n. 10), 154. 36 Louis Stouff, Confrérie et confréries à Arles, (1997) 187 Provence historique 13–24, 20, who points out that the statutes of the medieval brotherhoods of Arles have been lost. 31

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craftsmen of one and the same profession (masters and valets).37 In the modern age it then became common that, if a confraternity was linked to a certain guild and profession, only the members of this guild and profession were also members of the respective confraternity. However, both in medieval and modern France, not every trade or guild established its own confrèrie. According to Le livre des métiers, the statutes of cuisiniers in Paris did not mention any separate fund, any separate box, nor any confraternity. It was the guild itself that organized charitable help.38 According to the statutes of the guild of the poisonniers d’eau douce, certain fines had to be used for the ‘commun profist de tout le mestier’.39 And according to the statutes of the guild of the poulaillers, fines benefited the poor or sick at the Hôtel-Dieu or the prisoners at the Châtelet.40 In fact, in the 13th century only a small number of Parisian guild statutes mentioned the existence of a separate confraternity: those of the orfèvres, batteurs d’or, tisseurs de soie, imagiers, tailleurs de robes, épingliers, boursiers, selliers, courroyers, chapeliers de feutre, cordouanisers, gantiers, poisonniers, patenôtriers de coraile et de coquille, crystalliers, and of the braliers.41 And according to the statutes of the guild of the tabletiers, it was mandatory to be a member of the confraternity for those who wanted to practise the craft.42 Similarly, in the 14th century only a small number of guild statutes mentioned a separate confraternity. The statutes of the guild of the merciers of 7 March 1324, for example, did not mention any confrèrie.43 A similar situation seems to have existed in Dijon: in 1469 several municipal ordinances regulated the most important guilds of the city and insisted on the payment of entrance fees, and these ordinances mention neither any separate funds for financing mutual assistance nor any confraternities. According to Art. 3 of a municipal ordinance of 1469, a baker who wanted to be admitted to the profession had to pay 60 sols tournois, and it was simply stated that the amount was to be used for the activities and the needs of the profession.44 Similar provisions existed in the municipal ordinance of 23 March 1469 for the profession of pastry ___________ 37 Joseph Billioud, De la confrérie à la corporation, (1929) 6 Mémoires de l’Institut historique de Provence 235–271, 243. 38 Le livre des métiers (n. 15), I.69.14: ‘que le tiers des amandes qui seront levées, afferans a la porcion des maistres dudit mestier pour les causes dessus dictes, soient pour soustenir les povres vielles gens dudit mestier qui seront decheyz par fait de marchandise ou de viellece’. 39 Le livre des métiers (n. 15), I.100.2. 40 Le livre des métiers (n. 15), I.70.11. 41 Le livre des métiers (n. 15), I.55.5, I.60.12, I.91, I.88.13, I.100, and I.28. 42 Le livre des métiers (n. 15), I.58.4 f. 43 Gustave Fagniez, Documents relatifs à l‘histoire de l'industrie et du commerce en France, vol. 2 (1900), 58. 44 Albert V. Chapuis, Les anciennes Corporations dijonnaises (1906), 42.

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chefs and in an ordinance of 29 January 1469 for the profession of butchers, yet they had to pay different amounts. In other professions it seems that entrance fees were paid to the benefit of, for example, the city aldermen, as was the case in an ordinance of 1490 on apothecaries. It is only from the end of the Middle Ages that belonging to a professional confrèrie seemed to have become more common, and sometimes even mandatory. The 1440 statutes of the boursiers aiguilletiers in Toulouse, for example, forced both masters and apprentices to belong to the St. Catherine confraternity.45 In Marseille, it was for the first time at the end of the 14th century, more exactly in 1385, that a confrèrie brought together the masters and valets of a complete guild. In addition to the preceding observations, two further points need to be stressed. On the one hand, not all economic activities were organized in entities such as guilds in ancient France. On the other hand, the corporatist model sometimes went beyond the field of economic activities in crafts and commerce and extended to activities of a different type. There were, for example, guilds of arquebus marksmen, archers, and crossbowmen that developed in certain cities at the end of the Middle Ages or at the beginning of the modern era. And these guilds, too, granted financial support for the burial of a deceased member who did not leave his heirs enough money to pay for it.46 In conclusion, this complex relationship between guilds on the one hand and confraternities on the other hand proves that the existence of confrèries de métiers cannot be interpreted simply as the affirmation of ‘the growth of independent working-class culture and institutions’.47 Instead, guilds and confraternities have to be placed in a broader context. Another element of complexity stems from the fact that, when guilds and confraternities existed side by side, their administration did not necessarily run parallel. In Rouen, for example, the confrèries elected their leaders separately.48 And in Paris, the deed of sale by which the silversmiths’ confraternity of Saint-Eloi acquired the site of construction of its future house mentioned both the masters of the confraternity and the guild masters.49 However, there are examples where ___________ 45 Antoine Du Bourg, Les Corporations ouvrières de la ville de Toulouse du XIIIe au XVe siècle (1884), 8. 46 See, e.g., the 1389 statutes of the crossbowmen’s guild of La Bassée, reproduced in Victor Fouqué, Recherches historiques sur les corporations des archers, des arbalétriers et d’arquebusiers (1852), 42. 47 As it has been said for England by Edward P. Thompson, The Making of the English Working Class (1963), 421. 48 Charles Ouin-Lacroix, Histoire des anciennes corporations d‘arts et métiers et des confréries religieuses de la capitale de la Normandie (1850), 411. 49 See Fagniez (n. 16), 42.

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the administration of the guild and the confrèrie was intertwined. This was primarily the case in southern France, where the leaders of confrèries, the so-called bayles, were most often at the same time the guild masters, the so-called gardes du metier. This was perhaps because in the Middle Ages a confraternity was considered in the south of France ‘par elle-même un tout’ and not as in northern France as ‘la partie d’un tout’.50 In any event, guilds and confraternities maintained close ties, even if they existed side by side: confraternities did not exclusively serve religious functions but were also concerned with the professional relations between the guild members; and guilds did not exclusively focus on the regulation of economic activities.51 Finally, it was often not only the master craftsmen who were involved in the administration of the guilds and confraternities, but also the journeymen (compagnon). In Toulouse, for example, guilds were often led by bayles journeymen and bayles master craftsmen. Both the bayles journeymen and the representatives of the masters each had one of the keys to the box. Again in Toulouse, master craftsmen and journeymen may have established different guilds and confraternities. This was, for example, the case with barber surgeons and bakers. Nevertheless, in some cases the master craftsmen were obliged to contribute to the box maintained by the journeymen’s guild or confraternity.52 Against the background of these preliminary remarks, it is now possible to analyse, in a first step, the different forms of mutual support provided by the various guilds and confraternities, the covered risks, and the requirements for support.

C. Forms of support, covered risks, and the requirements for support When in 1791 the Loi Le Chapelier was being debated – it was promulgated on 14 June 1791 and it continued with the reforms which had been initiated by the aforementioned Décret d’Allarde of 2/17 March 1791 – representatives of several professions demanded in the Assemblée constituante to maintain guilds

___________ 50 Billioud (n. 36), 253. See also Thierry Hamon, La solidarité professionnelle au sein des communautés de métier dans la Bretagne d’Ancien Régime, in: Gérard Aubin and Bernard Gallinato (ed.), Les espaces locaux de la protection sociale: Études offertes au Professeur Pierre Guillaume (2004), 187–208, 189. 51 Hamon (n. 50), 189. 52 See Antoine Du Bourg, Tableau de l’ancienne organisation du travail dans le Midi de la France Organisation (1885), 21.

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and confrèries, on the ground that they rendered important services to their members. Isaac René Guy Le Chapelier (1754–1794) replied:53 ‘Les assemblées dont il s’agit ont présenté, pour obtenir l’autorisation de la municipalité, des motifs spécieux. Elles se sont dites destinées à procurer des secours aux ouvriers de même profession malades ou sans travail. Ces caisses de secours ont paru utiles, mais qu’on ne se méprenne pas sur cette assertion: c’est à la Nation, c’est aux officiers publics en son nom, à fournir des travaux à ceux qui en ont besoin pour leur existence, et des secours aux infirmes. [...] Elles [les corporations] exigent la réunion fréquente des individus d’une même profession, la nomination de syndics et autres officiers, la formation de règlemens, l’exclusion de ceux qui ne se soumettraient pas à ces règlemens: c’est ainsi que renaîtraient les privilèges, les maîtrises, etc., etc.’ ‘These associations have presented specific reasons for obtaining municipal authorization. They have claimed that they were intended to provide relief to sick or unemployed workers of the same profession. They seem helpful but let us not be mistaken: it falls upon the state and the public office holders acting in its name to provide work to those who need it for their living as well as support to the infirm. […] They [the guilds] demand the right to have regular meetings of individuals of the same profession, to appoint administrators and other office holders, to pass statutes, to exclude those who are not willing to submit to these statutes: this would be the rebirth of privileges, of masters, etc., etc.’

Thus, according to Le Chapelier, it was the state’s duty to cover the costs of assistance and support. However, what forms of support were the representatives of the different professions referring to? I. Support relating to the religious dimensions of confraternities The most frequent forms of support related to the religious dimensions of confrèries. Some confraternities provided candles (torches) for the baptism of a master’s child. According to its 1408 statutes, the confrèrie of the bakers in Amiens contributed, for example, four candles.54 With other confraternities the fellow members had to accompany a confrère who was getting married to Church and make offerings. Otherwise, they had to pay a fine. This was, for example, the case according to Art. 10 of the 1444 statutes of the confraternity of the cordonniers in Lannion.55 However, it was especially at a member’s death that the spirit of confraternities manifested itself most. The tabletiers in Paris, for example, had to accompany the mortal remains of a deceased member in the funeral procession. Failing ___________ 53 Cited from Ludovic de Contenson, Les sociétés de secours mutuels, (1903) 16 Revue des deux mondes 118–151, 121 f. 54 Reproduced in (1853) 2 Recueil des monuments inédits de l’histoire du Tiers-État 48. 55 Yves Briand, Statuts de la confrérie du Saint Sacrement de Lannion, (1960) 88 Bulletin de la Société d’émulation des Côtes-du-Nord 45.

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that, they had to find a substitute from their household or they had to pay a fine.56 The funeral rituals of the confraternity of the crieurs de vin in Paris have been documented most precisely and complete.57 More generally, the members of a professional confrèrie were expected to pay for masses and services and they had to organize processions. In addition, it was not uncommon that confraternities supported deceased members’ heirs financially if they were unable to pay for an appropriate funeral. According to the 14th-century statutes of the Confrèrie SaintNicolas des parcheminiers in Lamballe, for example, the confraternity could claim in such a case four denars from each members.58 These forms of support reappeared in the statutes of confraternities up to the 18th century. And they were at times the only means of assistance which confraternities would grant to their members. For example, the 1401 statutes of the confraternity of the fèvres in Caen59 and the 1446 statutes of the confraternity of the barbers-surgeons in Châlons sur Saône60 did not mention any further forms of support or any other charitable activities.61 The only mission of these confraternities seems to have been to organize religious services and, in addition, to discuss common affairs. II. Support in the case of illness and poverty However, more often the activities of the confraternities were not restricted to these religious services. Guilds granted via their confrèries also other forms of mutual support and assistance to members who were sick, who had fallen into poverty, or who were for some other reason in need. Yet it has to be stressed that these further forms of support were not necessarily restricted to members but could extend to non-members; then it was a form of charity. The eight livre which had to be paid by the pourpointiers in Paris served in part to help the poor of the ___________ 56 Bibliothèque Nationale de France, MS Fr. 24069, fol. 145v. See also Fagniez (n. 15), 35. 57 See Coornaert (n. 13), 228. 58 Archives départementales des Côtes-d’Armor, 20 G 139. See also Charles Quernest, Notions historiques et archéologiques sur la ville de Lamballe (1887), 154 ff. For another example, see Ordonnances des rois de France, vol. 7 (Paris 1745), 397; the 15th-century statutes of the drapers’ confraternity in Provence, Art. 11 (obligation, in the event of death, to administer the sacraments). See Joseph Billioud, Statuts des Merciers de Provence, (1925) 7 Mémoires de l’Institut historique de Provence 154–165. 59 The statutes are reproduced in Michel de Boüard, De la confrérie pieuse au métier organisé, (1957) 7 Annales de Normandie 165–177. 60 The statutes are reproduced in Just Berland, Les statuts de la communauté des barbiers-chirurgiens de Châlons (1909), 9, 19. 61 See also the statutes of confraternities in Rouen reproduced in: Recueil des anciennes et nouvelles statuts, lettres patentes, divers arrests du Conseil et de la cour de Parlement, sentence et ordonnance de police, concernant l’état du corps des marchands bonnetiers de la Ville, Fauxbourg et banlieuë de Rouen (Rouen 1740), 3, 55.

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profession; the other part financed two beds at the St. Catherine hospital for sick members.62 Again in Paris, the confraternity of the master craftsmen of the silversmiths’ profession gave each year a sum of money to the Hôtel-Dieu so that sick masters were cared for.63 In addition, the same confraternity even established in 1399 a hospital to accommodate the elderly, the infirm, and widows of the profession.64 Similarly, the 1482 statutes of the drapers in Provence indicate that the confraternity had the obligation to provide for sick members as well as members who had fallen into poverty:65 (1) every draper had to join the confraternity; (2) all collected moneys were kept in a guild chest; and (3) these moneys were used not only for fulfilling the confraternity’s religious functions but also to fund the support of members in cases of ‘malladie, pouvreté ou necessité’ – a triad often found in confraternity and guild statutes. Articles 4 f. of the statutes specify that even those sick members who had been imprisoned for debt had to be visited. In the 17th and 18th centuries, some statutes further specified that only a member of a guild or a confraternity (either a master, servant, apprentice, or a master’s widow) was eligible to receive support.66 In principle the money needed to grant support to a member in need was taken from the confraternity’s funds. However, it may also have happened that the other members had to supplement the confraternity’s support. According to the 1435 statutes of the confrèrie of the mariniers and of the gabariers in St. Michel in Bordeaux, for example, help was granted in the form of a weekly payment of one cent paid from the confraternity’s box, supplemented by two pennies paid by each member.67 According to Art. 23 of the 1463 statutes of the confraternity of the barber-surgeons in Reims, master craftsmen may have been asked to pay a moderate and reasonable sum to a fellow master in need each month or week.68 ___________ 62

See Ordonnances des rois de France, vol. 9 (Paris 1755), 167. Compare also Fagniez (n. 15) 39. 64 Alexandre Monnier, Histoire de l’assistance dans les temps anciens et modernes (1856), 270. 65 Billioud (n. 36). See also Archives municipales de Lyon, HH 489, 1; reproduced in Fagniez (n. 16), 284. 66 See, e.g., the 1656 statutes of the confraternity of glovers in Paris: ‘aider aux pauvres indigents et malades qui n’auront de quoi subsister et qui seront du corps, soit Maîtres ou Veuves, serviteurs ou apprentis’ (Art. 3); the Statuts de la communauté des marchands gantiers, poudriers, parfumeurs de la ville, fauxbourgs et banlieue de Paris (Paris 1772), 9. See also Transaction et articles passés entre les prieurs et confrères de la confrérie de Saint-Esloy, Chambéry, 28 June 1638, reproduced in Laurent Morand, Les anciennes corporations des arts et métiers de Chambéry et de quelques autres localités de Savoie (1892), 173. 67 Brutails (n. 22), 407. 68 Ordonnances des barbiers-chirurgiens de la ville de Reims, in: Pierre Varin (ed.), Archives législatives de la ville de Reims, Collection de pièces inédites, vol. 1/2 (1844), 986: ‘s’il advenait que aucun maistre, ouvrier dudit mestier, cheist en telle povreté et indigence qu’il ne peust bonnement avoir sa vie pour l’exercice dudit mestier, les maistres 63

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Often the contributions of the members of a confraternity were not given for a specific purpose. They were paid into a general fund. And the support for sick members, for members who had fallen into poverty, or – more rarely – for a widow were paid out of this general fund. And the decision how to use these general funds and whether to use them for financing the support of members in need was without doubt left to the discretion of the confraternity’s officers. Nevertheless, there are examples showing that confraternity statutes sometimes specified a special purpose for which specific payments had to be used: according to the 13th-century statutes of the confraternity of the boucliers de fer in Paris, an apprentice had to pay five cents to the jurors upon the conclusion of the contract of apprenticeship. And this amount was intended to finance the assistance for poor children and to ensure the protection of the rights of apprentices against their masters.69 In any event, the forms of support varied. Sometimes sick members were cared for at home, sometimes they were treated in a hospital – especially when the confrèrie paid for beds in the hospital – or the confraternity cared for sick (and also for old) members in the confraternity house.70 And sometimes a monthly payment was made for a period of time that was specified in the statutes,71 for the duration of the illness, or up to a maximum amount; or the payments were left to the discretion of officers of the confraternity. And even other times we find a combination of the aforementioned possibilities. The confraternity of the bonnetiers in Bordeaux, for example, offered 50 shillings as support, and, if this sum was not enough, it relied on what the bayles thought to be necessary.72 Furthermore, sometimes these payments took the form of an interest-free loan.73 Finally, there were differences in the details as to the procedure followed when a member fell sick. In the brotherhood of the printers in Paris, for example, the other members circulated a paper stating the sick member’s incapacity to work, and on the presentation of this document each one paid a sum of ___________ jurez d’icellui mestier pourront, s’il leur semble que bon soit, en dire et ordonner que chacun maistre tenant ouvroir baille et dellivre au necessiteux aucune petite somme moderée et raisonnable par chascun mois ou par chascune sepmainne, ouquel cas lesdits maistres ouvriers seront tenus de fournir et accomplir l’ordonnance desdits maistres jurez sur peine d’amende de xii d. parisis pour chascun deffault, à applicquer au proffit de ladicte communauté.’ 69 Le livre des métiers (n. 15), I.20.5. 70 See Fagniez (n. 16), 39, with reference to the goldsmiths in Paris. 71 This was the case with the confraternity of the savetiers in Bordeaux: a maximum period of 30 days. See Anciens et nouveaux statuts de la ville et cité de Bordeaux (Bordeaux 1701), quoted by Duranthon (n. 80), 44. 72 See Anciens et nouveaux statuts (n. 71). 73 For more details, see Paul Hubert-Valleroux, Les corporations de métiers et les syndicats professionnels (1885), 68.

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money.74 And finally, some statutes were rather restrictive as to those eligible for support. For instance, in 13th-century Paris, only the poorest of cooks were entitled to relief.75 III. Support in other cases Thus, the risks covered by most guilds via their confrèries were poverty and illness. Only exceptionally, other risks were covered. According to its 15th-century statutes, a member of the drapers’ confrèrie from Provence was, for example, entitled to five sous parisis if his horse had been stolen or if he was deprived of it by any other means.76 However, it is unclear whether the sum was paid either by all members or by the closest companion. At the same time, the statutes of the confraternity of the drapers in Blois included a similar provision and went even further: if necessary, each member had to contribute five cents to support a member who had lost his belongings from fire or flood.77 According to the 13th-century statutes of the guild of the batteurs d’archal in Paris, members had to make a five-cent contribution. Where an apprentice was not able to complete his apprenticeship because his master had died, these moneys were to be used to ensure that the apprentice could complete his apprenticeship with another master. Some authors have argued that this was an early form of unemployment insurance.78 However, it could also be argued that the provision simply ensured the continuity of the apprentice’s vocational training. Understood in this way, this provision links to another rule commonly found in the statutes of guilds and confraternities. The 13th-century statutes of the confraternity of the courroyer in Paris may serve as an example:79 if a deceased member left an orphan son behind, a master of the profession had to accept him as apprentice; the costs of the apprenticeship were covered by the confraternity. Even more exceptionally, professional confrèries covered the risk of excommunication. That was the case with the confraternity of the cousturiers in Bordeaux.80 ___________ 74

See Laurent (n. 10), 202. Le livre des métiers (n. 15), I.69.14. 76 See Billioud (n. 58), 154. 77 See Billioud (n. 58), 154 ff. 78 Étienne Martin Saint-Léon, Histoire des corporations de métiers depuis leurs origines jusqu’à leur suppression en 1791 (3rd edn., 1922), 94. 79 Le livre des métiers (n. 15), I.87.7: ‘Se aucun orphelin est povres et il ait esté enfes d’aucun Corroier, et il voille apprendre le mestier de corroierie, li mestre du mestier le font apprendre et le porvoieent ; et pour ce ont li mestre les III s. d’entrée [et les V s. de l’aprentiz].’ 80 Jean Duranthon, Du rôle des associations professionnelles ouvrières et des syndicats agricoles dans les institutions de prévoyance (1899), 42: ‘Item est estably que si aulcun gfraires ou gfrairesses mourent excommuniés et naient de quoy se pouuoir faire asouldre, 75

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IV. Four final remarks This brief overview of the different forms of support and the risks covered calls for four final remarks. 1. The problem of moral hazard Some statutes show a concern for moral hazards and thus for ‘any behaviour that increases the occurrence of the risk’.81 Support may have been offered only if certain requirements were met, requirements which addressed the problem of moral hazard. Most often support was offered only if the member in need had not caused the situation in which he found himself. In Toulouse, for example, confraternities offered support to a master only if he had become poor ‘par mauvaise fortune’ and if he was ‘de bonne vie et d’honnête conversation’. Similar requirements applied to journeymen. They must have served faithfully and a sufficiently long time for one or more masters of the confraternity, and the amount of relief was then determined by the bayles and masters.82 These requirements somehow echo the requirements for being admitted to a profession and a guild: applicants had to be honest and must have had a certain moral standing. And the numerous references to the bona fama, good reputation, required from confraternity members may be interpreted as a reaction to the possibility of deviant behaviour of other members which could put the viability of these support schemes at risk. 2. The practical importance of support granted by confraternities It must be emphasized that it is almost impossible to assess the importance of these support schemes in practices. On the one hand, the confraternity statutes most often did not determine the exact sums which a member in need was to receive. It seems that it was regularly left to the discretion of the office holders of the confraternity to determine this sum.83 On the other hand, a study of the very few accounts of professional confrèries that have survived reveals that the ___________ la confrairie le doibt faire sortir descomange iusque ad vingt soulz bordalois et donner le drap en quoy il soit ensepueli.’ See also Laurent (n. 9), 160. 81 Van Leeuwen (n. 12), 6. 82 See Du Bourg (n. 52), 21. 83 See, e.g., Billioud (n. 58), 154: according to Art. 11 of the late 15th-century statutes of the merciers in Provence, there was an obligation to provide for the subsistence of a sick companion at least once a day. However, Art. 11 did not specify what form the subsistence took, whether it was a sum of money, and what amount was given.

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overall sums given were rather small, especially when compared with the expenses for the diverse religious functions of the confraternity.84 And the support given in each case, in the form of money or benefits in kind, appears to have been rather modest, too, especially if compared to the wages of the least qualified workers of the time. However, even if the support was modest, it seems to have correlated to the contributions which each member had to pay. In the city of Lannion, for example, sick shoemakers received six deniers a week, and this sum corresponds to their annual contribution.85 Nevertheless, the Six corps de métiers de Paris, which represented the most important corporations, claimed in the debates leading to the abolition of corporations that the confraternity of the merciers distributed more than 20,000 livres as support and aid.86 3. Risks related to professional activities Cases in which the covered risk is clearly related to the professional activity are rare. The most interesting example is the order by the guard of the provotship of Paris, dated 10 February 1319, for the benefit of the fourreurs de vair in Paris.87 It set up an institution that can be described as a mutual aid fund. The order itself, however, used the term ‘alms’. The fund was administered by six men from the profession together with a clerk. They were annually elected by all members of the profession and accountable to the trade’s masters. The order makes explicit that the fund was set up at the request of the furriers: they tended to be inflicted by work-related (‘grant travail de leur mestier’), serious, and long illnesses (‘grieives et longues maladies’). Consequently they were exposed to the risk of being incapacitated for longer periods of time, of falling into poverty, and of being reduced to begging for their bread (‘quérir leur pain et mourir de mesaise’). Members had to pay an entrance fee of ten sous and a weekly contribution of one denarius. And as long as they were not in default with their contributions, they were eligible for support. In cases of sickness or incapacity (‘impotens’), a member received three sous parisis per week ‘pour soy vivre’, and he was paid another three sous parisis once he was cured (‘quand il relevera de celle maladie ou impotence’). However, he received these payments only in cases of ___________ 84 See Catherine Vincent, Pratiques de l’assistance dans la vie associative professionnelle médiévales, in: André Gueslin and Pierre Guillaume (ed.), De la charité médiévale à la sécurité sociale (1992), 23–30, 27. 85 See Briand (n. 54). 86 See Mémoire à consulter sur l’existence des six corps, et la conservation de leurs privilèges, et reflexions des six corps de la Ville de Paris, sur la suppression des Jurandes (Paris 1776), 73 f. 87 The text is published in Fagniez (n. 15), 290. Another example is the statutes of the roofers in Paris, as confirmed by Charles IX in 1566: fines levied in the event of offences had to be used to provide help for ‘poor roofers who usually fall off roofs’.

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accidental illness or incapacity and thus, for example, not if any injuries were incurred in a brawl: ‘et est leur intencion que ce soit de maladie ou impotence d’aventure, et non pas de bleceures qui leur fussent faites par leur diversité’. It seems that the purpose of the fund was not simply to support old or all ill members of the profession. The fund seems to have specifically addressed the problem of a dangerous professional activity and to have protected the members of the profession against resulting harm. 4. Parallels to 19th-century mutual benefit societies The support schemes set up by guilds via their professional confrèries very much resemble the activities of 19th-century mutual benefit societies. Even a quick glance at the statutes of these mutual benefit societies reveals a remarkable continuity in terms of the risks covered. Modern mutualism also aims at supporting sick members with payments for the duration of the illness and at contributing to funeral costs. Furthermore, it offers a retirement pension.88

D. Financing the support schemes Professional confrèries were universitates enjoying legal personality. Thus, they were able to receive gifts inter vivos as well as mortis causa and they could acquire real estate which they could utilize to generate profits. At times, donations and gifts were expected from members. According to the 13th-century statutes of the tailors’ fraternity of Saint-Paul in Paris, for example, a member was expected to make a donation when becoming a master craftsman. The amount to be donated was left to his discretion, but the jurors only gave him a receipt when they considered the gift as sufficient: ‘ou cas … que lesd. jurez soient contenz et satisfaiz du don qu’il aura fait à lad. confrarie’.89 Unfortunately, it is unknown what happened when the donation was considered insufficient. As far as the receipt is concerned, it is possible that it served useful when later the donator himself requested help. Even though donations were at times expected from members, they did not guarantee the steady stream of income which was needed to finance the different functions of confraternities. Three further categories of income proved to be of great importance.

___________ 88 According to Art. 6 of an act of 26 March 1852, the aim of mutual benefit societies is ‘assurer des secours temporaires aux sociétaires malades, blessés ou infirmes, et de pourvoir à leurs frais funéraires’. 89 Cited from Fagniez (n. 15), 40.

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I. Fines and penalties First, there were fines and penalties that were levied against members who were in breach of the statutes of the profession. Some confrèries were exclusively funded by such fines and penalties. This was, for example, still the case with the confraternity of the drapiers in Provence at the end of the 15th century.90 If a profession had no confrèrie, the fine was either due to the King or it could be shared between the King and guild officers. The portion which went to them and which went to the King varied greatly. The 13th-century statutes of the confraternity of the gantiers in Paris, for example, stated:91 ‘Li preud’oume qui garderont le mestier desus dit auront ii s. de parisis de l’amende des v s. pour les povres de leur conflarie soutenir, toutes les foiz que l’amende le Roy il sera.‘ ‘Whenever a fine is paid to the king, the prud’hommes in charge of the profession will take 2 s. out of this fine, to help the members of the brotherhood.’

Here no reference is made to a common fund or box: the fine did not benefit the confraternity itself but went directly to the prud’hommes of the guild. Often, part of the fine directly benefited, in accordance with the statutes of the guild, a charitable institution. According to the 13th-century statutes of the tapissiers in Paris, for example, fines directly benefited the ‘pauvres de Saint Innocent’.92 When a confrèrie existed, either the confraternity took the share due to the guild or the fine was divided in three parts – one for the King, one for the guild, and the third for the confrèrie – and again the apportionment differed greatly. For 13th-century Paris, Le livre des métiers offers many examples. The statutes of the confraternity of the patenôtriers de corail, for example, stated:93 ‘se aucunz s’en va de Paris par fraude … il cherra en iiii livres parisis d’amende: c’est a savoir lx s. au roy et xx s. a la conflarrie du metier.’ ‘anyone from the brotherhood who leaves Paris without authorization will have to pay a fine of four pounds, of which 20 s. will be paid to the brotherhood.’

According to the statutes of the confraternity of the maçons, fines had to be paid to the chapel of St. Blaise, where their confraternity was located.94 According to the statutes of the confraternity of the ouvrières en tissus de soie, out of an eight-shilling fine, five shillings went to the King, the confraternity received twelve pennies, and the remainder went to the officers of the guild; and according ___________ 90

See Billioud (n. 58), 154 ff. Le livre des métiers (n. 15), I.88.13 92 Le livre des métiers (n. 15), I. 51.13. See also the statutes of the confraternity of the tailleurs de robe, ibid., I.56.5. 93 Le livre des métiers (n. 15), I.28.7. 94 Le livre des métiers (n. 15), I.48.2. 91

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to those of the tailleurs de robes, two shillings of a five-shilling fine went to the guild’s prud’hommes ‘pour les povres de leur mestier soustenir’.95 II. Admission fees The second important source of income was admission fees. A journeyman had to pay such fee when being admitted to the trade as master craftsman. In 13th-century Paris a chaussier, for example, had to pay 20 shillings, of which 15 shillings went to the King and five shillings to the confrèrie.96 A son of a master craftsman of that guild was exempted from the fee. And it is perhaps due to the fact that the confraternity benefited from the entrance fees that the statutes do not suggest that it received a portion of fines; these were shared between the King and the officers of the guild.97 However, the charging of admission fees to the benefit of confraternities, of course, did not necessarily exclude confraternities from participating also in the fines.98 And admission fees also existed in the modern period: in 18th-century Paris, a journeyman in the butchers trade had to pay twelve pounds to the confraternity if, after having accomplished his masterpiece, he wanted to settle as master craftsman.99 An apprentice also often had to pay an admission fee. After all, taking up an apprenticeship was the first step in entering a profession. According to the 13th-century statutes of the courroyers in Paris, for example, five sous of the apprentice’s dues benefited the confraternity.100 Similar provisions applied to the tabletiers (two sous went to the confraternity) and the potiers de terre (five sous went to both the King and the confraternity).101 Here again, the sons, and at times even the nephews, of master craftsmen may have been exempted from these fees.102 Some statutes made explicit that a payment to the confrèrie was due even if the master had accepted the apprentice for free, yet the amount might have been smaller in this case, as was the case with the chapeliers de feutre in 13th-century Paris.103 Often, the amount which was due to the confraternity was ___________ 95

Le livre des métiers (n. 15), I.38.8, I.56.5. See also ibid., I.60.20. Le livre des métiers (n. 15), I.55.6. 97 Le livre des métiers (n. 15), I.55.7 f. 98 See Statuts de la communauté des marchands gantiers, poudriers, parfumeurs de Paris (Paris 1772), 9. 99 Nouveaux statuts de la communauté des maîtres et marchands chaircuitiers de la ville et fauxbourgs de Paris (Paris 1755), tit. 6 art. 1. 100 Le livre des métiers (n. 15), I.87.4. 101 Le livre des métiers (n. 15), I.68.4 f., I.74,10. See also ibid., I.30, I.72, I.91, I.79. 102 Le livre des métiers (n. 15), I.74,10. 103 Le livre des métiers (n. 15), I.91.3, 5, and 11. See also Statuts de la communauté des maîtres vanniers-quinquailliers of 24 June 1467, in: Statuts, ordonnances et règlemens 96

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equally divided between the apprentice and the master craftsman.104 For example, according to the 13th-century statutes of the selliers in Paris, five cents each were paid by the master and by the apprentice;105 the blasoniers also paid contributions to the confraternity of the selliers, and again the ten cents due were equally divided between the master and the apprentice.106 These admission fees allowed the confraternities to fulfil their religious and charitable functions as well as their function of supporting members in need with respect to apprentices. However, not all guilds opted for confraternities as intermediaries to support apprentices. With the courroyers in Paris, for example, the admission fee and the portion of the apprentices’ dues, which were usually intended for the confraternity’s box, were paid by the guild to a master craftsman when he agreed to take in the son of a deceased fellow master.107 The modalities of financing the support schemes were usually included in the statutes of the guild or the confraternity. And often the craftsmen had the right to autonomously draft and enact these statutes. However, at times the municipal authorities intervened. This was, for example, the case with the cordonniers in the 15th century in Amiens: it was the aldermen forming the municipal Council who decided that apprentices admitted to the profession would have to pay an admission fee.108 Again in the 15th century, the pelletiers in Lyon asked the archbishop, the Count of Lyon, to introduce admission fees.109 III. Periodical contributions Finally, some professions set up an even more refined financing scheme for their confraternities and introduced periodical contributions. According to the 13th-century statutes of the pourpointiers in Paris, for example, eight denarii were collected weekly from each worker starting at the end of his first week of work for the benefit of the solidarity fund,110 and the 13th-century statutes of the épingliers in Paris introduced a weekly contribution, too: ‘que chascun du mestier, mestres, vallet, mette chascune semaine en la boite I d. por garder les profiz ___________ de la communauté des maitres quinquailliers de la ville et fauxbourgs de Paris (Paris 1767), 1 f. 104 Martin Saint-Léon (n. 78), 94. 105 Le livre des métiers (n. 15), I.78.27. 106 Le livre des métiers (n. 15), I.80.5. 107 Le livre des métiers (n. 15), I.87.7. For two examples from the modern era, see Anciens et nouveaux statuts (n. 71), 272, 401. 108 Archives municipales d’Amiens, reg. AA. 13, fol. 12v, reproduced in Fagniez, (n. 43), 275. 109 Archives municipales de Lyon, HH 303, liasse 1, reproduced in Fagniez, (n. 43), 279. 110 Ordonnances des rois de France, vol. 9 (n. 62), 167.

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du mestier’.111 Similarly, several statutes from the 16th and 17th centuries contain an obligation to make annual contributions. According to the 1663 statutes of the cooks in Paris, for example, 20 shillings had to be paid as annual contributions for the benefit of the confraternity.112 It was not uncommon that guilds or their confrèries required both an entry fee and a periodic contribution. This was the case with the guild of the corroyeurs de vair in Paris, the confraternity of SaintBrieuc (twelve denarii as admission fee, plus a subscription which was due at the feast of the confraternity), and the tailors’ confraternity of Saint-Paul in Paris (admission fee, annual contribution, plus a donation when becoming a master craftsman).113 Most professional confrèries whose statutes have survived indeed collected periodic payments from members and offered a set of benefits to members, such as payments during sickness, old age, and disability, as well as relief for widows and masters’ children. But how was the obligation to pay these contributions enforced? The officers of the guild or confraternity collected the dues and organized, if necessary, the personal appearance of defaulters. Sometimes the nonpayment of contributions was registered. And sometimes the statutes allowed exclusion of defaulters from the profession. This was the case with the 1472 statutes of the overseas merchants of Vitré: a member who did not pay the contribution for three consecutive years was excluded (Art. 4).114 A similar provision can be found in the 1437 statutes of the drapers’ confraternity in Rennes, which allowed exclusion when a member did not pay the contributions for two consecutive years, yet the provision was rarely enforced.115 Other statutes did not go so far as excluding a defaulter from the confraternity, guild, or profession, but simply ordered that a defaulter was excluded from receiving support under the confraternity’s mutual aid scheme. This was, for example, the case according to an order of February 1319 by the provost of Paris concerning fur-workers: a

___________ 111

Le livre des métiers (n. 15), I.60.12. See for further examples Statuts des maîtres et marchands cordonniers de la ville et fauxbourgs de Lyon (Lyon 1769), tit. 1, art. 11; Statuts de la communauté des maîtres et marchands grainiers, maîtresses et marchandes grainières, de la ville, fauxbourgs, et banlieue de Paris (Paris 1750), 36; Nouveaux statuts de la communauté des maîtres et marchands chaircuitiers de la ville et fauxbourgs de Paris (Paris 1755), tit. 9; Jean-Baptiste Bouillet, Les corporations d’arts et métiers en Auvergne (1850), 309; Laurent (n. 9), 161. 113 See the text corresponding to and the reference in n. 89. 114 The statutes are published in Paul Paris-Jallobert, Journal historique de Vitré ou documents ou notes pour servir à l’histoire de cette ville (1880), xxxi. 115 In 1460 the statutes were changed and a period of three years was required, see Jean Pierre Leguay, La confrérie des merciers de Rennes au XVè siècle, (1976) 3 Francia. Forschung zur westeuropäischen Geschichte 147–220, 184. 112

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member who had not paid his contribution for at least six weeks was only able to claim support if he had made up the arrears.116 IV. Summary The resources of confraternities for funding support for members in need differed greatly, but in general they seem to have been slight. The average annual income of (not only professional) confraternities in the Middle Ages amounted to a few dozen pounds, but it ranged from a few pounds a year for one confraternity to several hundred pounds with other confraternities. Furthermore, a single confraternity may have experienced significant variations in its annual income. The drapers’ confraternity in Rennes, for example, had a budget of 450 pounds in 1462 and one of only 80 pounds in 1489.117 Such variations may partially be explainable on the basis of difficulties experienced in collecting contributions or the nature of the sources of funding: fines and penalties as well as donations and legacies were hardly predictable sources of income. Furthermore, from the 16th and 17th centuries onward, confraternities faced, especially in the most important cities, competition from hospitals, which developed a greater importance and consequently attracted donations, legacies, and other sources of income that would have otherwise benefited confraternities. In Lyon, for example, the admission fees which a journeyman had to pay when being admitted as master craftsman to the shoemakers’ guild benefited the Hôpital de la Charité which was created in 1614.118 This example also illustrates a more general phenomenon of that time: hospitals and other municipal institutions took over poor relief and the care of the sick.

___________ 116 See Fagniez (n. 16), Appendice 12, 291: ‘et qui y devra plus de sis deniers d’areraigez, il sera débouté dou bienfait d’icel aumonsne, jusques à tant qu’il ait paié’. 117 Leguay (n. 115), 165. 118 Statuts des maîtres et marchands cordonniers de la ville et fauxbourgs de Lyon (Lyon 1769), tit. 3, art. 6 f. The relationship between hospitals on the one hand and guilds and confraternities on the other hand was at times problematic, as shown by the letters patent given by Louis XV to the Hôpital de la Trinité in Paris: Statuts de la communauté des maîtres et marchands grainiers, maîtresses et marchandes grainières, de la ville, fauxbourgs, et banlieue de Paris (Paris 1750, 448). See also Règlemens et statuts des maistres tondeurs de draps, presseurs, retendeurs, & lustreurs de toutes sortes d’étoffes tissues de laine, de la ville de Lyon (Lyon 1754), Art. XXV.

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E. Charity, assistance, or insurance? French historiography has hardly ever argued that the support provided by guilds via their confrèries could be considered as one of the origins of insurance. It rather argued that the development of insurance was conditioned upon moveable property beginning to play a more significant economic role – as François Ewald wrote, insurance was ‘la fille du capital’.119 In an economy based on property in land and in a society with individuals relying on family or professional solidarity, insurance was not needed. The emergence of modern notions of insurance was not inspired by older forms of solidarity. It finds its causes rather in the desire for protection in an increasingly individualistic society and in the dissolution of old forms of solidarity. Accordingly, marine insurance is looked upon as the first type of insurance, with life insurance and other types of non-marine insurance to follow. However, is this narrative perhaps based on a notion of insurance which is too narrow for a historical analysis? Does the narrative focus on private insurance, at the expense of social insurance? Would things appear in a different light if we move away from the paradigm of the private insurance contract and also include the establishment of autonomous insurance schemes for the working-class?120 Methods of financing, forms of support in case of sickness or old age, participation in funerals, establishment of accounts, the possibility of exclusion – almost every aspect of the support schemes of professional confraternities finds a parallel in the mutual aid societies which were created after the French Revolution. Yet, can one identify a continuity between these two forms of protection? Mutual aid organized by professional confrèries has a characteristic feature: except when it appears in the form of charity towards the poor or the sick in general, it is the members of these confraternities that come together to amass what may be regarded as common savings, the purpose of which is to help those who come to need it. In this respect, these practices may have contributed to the development of the idea of insurance. With confraternities, too, the consequences of certain, predefined risks were pooled. As with modern insurance, in a confraternity too, a risk was transferred from a single individual to all members based on the principle of mutuality. However, an insurance scholar will immediately point out that mutual aid is not, unlike modern insurance, undertaken for profit. Furthermore, it would be futile to expect to discover in any guild or confraternity statutes or in their archives any traces of insurance mechanisms based on any ___________ 119 François Ewald, Histoire de l’Etat providence: les origines de la solidarité (1996), 300. Ewald relies on Jean Halpérin, Le rôle des assurances dans les débuts du capitalisme moderne (1945); idem, Les assurances en Suisse et dans le monde, leur rôle dans l'évolution économique et sociale (1946). 120 In a similar direction van der Linden (n. 9), 11–38.

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kind of insurance mathematics, not least because the mutual aid granted by these confraternities was based on their religious foundations. But is this enough to refuse to see in these practices one possible factor influencing the development of insurance in France? And have marine and life insurance not also made their first appearance before actuarial science emerged?121 I. Differences between modern insurance and confraternity support with respect to the finances There are a number of differences between modern insurance and the mutual support schemes established by professional confraternities. The first of these differences exists with regard to the finances: the contributions paid by members and the monetary support granted to members in need. The contributions were the same for everyone, whatever the age or the state of health. Thus, the contributions did not reflect the individual risks of each member. They did not correlate to the probability of loss and the estimated costs of loss. Furthermore, it is only in very exceptional cases that contributions were calculated on the basis of income, and these cases date from the late 18th century.122 Usually, the contributions were the same for all members of a given confraternity, and the only distinction which existed was between master craftsmen, journeymen, and apprentices. Turning to the side of the monetary support, modern insurance allows the insured to obtain either an indemnity that is not determined in advance, as it will correspond to the damage suffered, or a fixed sum as is the case in life insurance. With professional confraternities the amount of support was usually predetermined in the statutes. But how was this amount calculated? It is difficult to reach a definite answer. In the city of Lannion, sick shoemakers, for example, received six deniers a week, and this sum corresponded to their annual contribution.123 It was not a great sum. The contributions collected from members of a support scheme based on the principle of mutuality and the sums being paid out have to correlate: if the risks and obligations of such a scheme increase, so should the contributions of its members. Nevertheless, the admission fees, periodic contributions, and fines were usually fixed in the statutes without any adjustment mechanisms. And in fact contributions were never adjusted. At times confraternity statutes left the ___________ 121

See Ewald (n. 119). See the 1782 statutes of a confraternity in Lyon, quoted by Émile Laurent, Le paupérisme et les associations de prévoyance. Nouvelles études sur les sociétés de secours mutuels (1860), 157, note 5. 123 See the references in n. 85, above. 122

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amount of contributions to the discretion of the parties.124 But it seems that there were no attempts to balance out the contributions and expenditure, and there are no signs that the discretion was used to align the contributions to the risks. When admission fees were increased in the process of revising old confraternity statutes, these increases were rather aimed at limiting access to confraternities and the professions. Master craftsmen wanted to keep potential competitors out.125 The increases were, thus, based on political, not economic considerations.126 II. Differences between modern insurance and confraternity support with respect to beneficiaries of support The second difference between modern insurance and the mutual support schemes established by professional confraternities relates to the beneficiaries of the respective schemes. Even if in principle it was primarily the members who benefited from the support schemes of the professional confraternities, with the additional requirement that a member must have respected his confraternity duties in order to benefit from them,127 the list of beneficiaries sometimes also included non-members. The confraternity of the drapiers in Paris, for example, hosted for its annual banquet the poor and the women of the Hôtel-Dieu who had just given birth, and it served a meal to the prisoners of the Châtelet.128 In the 13th century, the meuniers of the Grand Pont in Paris had to swear to help their neighbours who needed assistance.129 According to the 15th-century statutes of the confraternity of the tisserands in Marseille, the confraternity had the duty to distribute food to the poor of the hospital where it held its annual banquet ___________ 124 See Art. 29 of the 1619 statutes of the confraternity of the tailors in Paris, reproduced in Pierre Varin (ed.), Archives législatives de la ville de Reims, vol. 2/2 (1847), 513: the masters and companions ‘mettront et seront tenus de mettre selon leur bonne volonté et courtoisie donner et non contraints’. 125 Denis Schneider, Peut-on modéliser la question des confréries professionnelles? Étude à partir d’un cas lorrain, (1996) 598 Revue Historique 281–298, 293. 126 These defects had already been identified by Claude-Humbert Piarron de Chamousset (1717–1783) in his project of a Maison d’association, which he presented to the Six corps des marchands of Paris. He suggested that the contributions should be fixed according to the age of members, the probable number of diseases per year, and the average duration of each disease. See Œuvres complètes de M. de Chamousset, vol. 1 (Paris 1783), 21. The Maison d’association would have been a free association, but the project did not materialize, despite a favourable resolution of the Six corps des marchands of July 1754. 127 The millers in Aix-en-Provence, e.g., reserved mutual help for those who had been ‘obedient to the luminaire’, i.e., those who took part in the liturgical meetings organized by the confrèrie; see Billioud (n. 37), 249. 128 Fagniez (n. 16), 38. The duty to host the poor was terminated in 1407: René de Lespinasse, Les métiers et corporations de la ville de Paris, vol. 2 (1892), 135. For a further example see Le livre des métiers (n. 15), I.11.8; Fagniez (n. 16), 33. 129 Le livre des métiers (n. 15), I.2.

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(Art. 12) (and where, in addition, it maintained a bed with a mattress and linen (Art. 13) which was reserved for sick members).130 Some statutes simply stated in a very general fashion that the poor and the sick had to be assisted without specifying whether the support was limited to members. According to the 1599 statutes of the confrèrie St. Jean in Carpentras, for example, the confraternity had to maintain a bed for the poor in the hospital without it being made explicit that this bed should benefit only (or primarily) its members; and in Avignon, the Aumône Notre-Dame de la Fusterie, a confraternity that brought together members of the woodworking professions and whose origins date back to the 13th century, was an institution of charity which distributed alms to the poor as well as to the sick and which helped poor girls to build up dowries.131 And the 1569 statutes of the boulangiers in Saint-Jean-d’Angély stated:132 ‘tous les dits maitres boulangiers, soient hommes ou femmes et veuves usant du dit mestier, chacun an, jour et feste de Pasques, seront tenues de mettre chacun un sol entre les mains de celuy d’entr’eux qu’ils aviseront, pour estre incontinent ausmosné et donné aux pauvres et invalides de la dite ville en présence de l’un des officiers de la ditte ville.’ ‘all these master bakers – men and women as well as widows making use of the profession – will each be required to pay every year on the day and feast of Easter one sol to the one they have chosen for this purpose, so that these sums are, without delay, considered as alms, in order to be distributed to the poor and the disabled of the said city in the presence of one of the officers of the said city.’

In 1320, Philippe V le Long forced the confraternity of the merciers in Paris to hold their meetings in the Hôpital des Quinze-Vingts, the hospital for the blind, and to pay all alms and offerings to its benefit.133 When the funds of confraternities were used to finance relief for non-members, they clearly went beyond the sphere of insurance or mutual support and entered the sphere of charity. They come close to religious confraternities.134 In the south of France, this practice even had a special name: la passade. And it extended into the modern era. In the

___________ 130

Billioud (n. 36). Anne-Marie Hayez, Une aumône avignonnaise de quartier: l’Aumône de la Petite Fusterie (XIVe siècle), in: Fondations et œuvres charitables au Moyen Âge. Actes du 121e Congrès national des sociétés historiques et scientifiques, section histoire médiévale et philologie (1999), 175–184. 132 Louis-Claude Saudau, Corporations, maitrises ou jurandes de la Saintonge et de l’Aunis (1905), 8. 133 Fagniez (n. 16), 282. 134 See Marie-Hélène Froeschle-Chopard, Confréries de dévotion et protection sociale aux XVIIè siècle, in: Gueslin and Guillaume (n. 84), 41–50, 42. 131

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region of the Comtat Venaissin, for example, the 1537 statutes of the confraternity Saint-Joseph de Vaison stated:135 ‘S’il arrive dans la présente cité de Vaison quelque ouvrier ou artisan d’un métier du bois ou du fer, forgeron ou tailleur de pierres, pour travailler dans on art, les bailes de la confrérie l’aideront à obtenir des ressources auprès de la ville et de ses habitants ; ou si c’est un pauvre ouvrier n’ayant pas de quoi poursuivre son chemin, ils lui verseront douze deniers pour son passage, à prendre sur l’argent de la confrérie […].’ ‘If a worker or craftsman of a wood or iron working craft, blacksmith or stonecutter arrives in the present city of Vaison looking for work in his profession, the bayles of the brotherhood will help him obtain resources near the city and from its inhabitants; if he is poor and if he does not have enough to continue his journey, they will pay him twelve deniers for his journey, they will take this from the brotherhood funds […].’

A similar obligation is found in the Anciens et nouveaux statuts de la ville et cité de Bordeaux, which contains all statutes of guilds and confraternities that were still in force in the 18th century:136 ‘Si un compagnon étranger d’aucun métier était venu en ladite ville, pour besoigner, et était dépourvû tellement, qu’il ne peut trouver Maistre ou besoigne, seront tenus les Maistres des métiers, chacun en son endroit, luy bailler à besoigner par l’espace de huit jours, pour le secourir à gaigner sa vie.’ ‘If a foreign journeyman of any profession comes to the said city looking for work and if he is so deprived, that he cannot find a master or work, the masters have to, each in his place, lend him work for eight days to rescue him from losing his life.’

III. Financial support granted in the form of a loan The third and without a doubt most important difference is that some statutes imposed an obligation to repay on those who had received financial support from the confraternity. Thus, financial support was granted in the form of a loan. According to Art. 6 of the 1466 statutes of the chaussetiers in Marseille, the master craftsmen were obliged to feed and maintain at the expense of the confraternity the journeymen and apprentices who were not in a condition to work due to an illness. However, the journeymen and apprentices had to repay the sums which they received after having come to health again.137 Identical provisions can be found for the Middle Ages in the 1341 statutes of the manoeuvriers in Avignon,

___________ 135 Cited from Marc Venard, Les confréries de métier dans le Comtat Venaissin au XVIè siècle, (1976) 26 Provence historique 65–80, 76. 136 Anciens et nouveaux statuts (n. 71), 401. 137 See Billioud (n. 58), 160.

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in the 1444 statutes of the tailors in Bordeaux, and in Art. 7 of the 1480 statutes of the confraternity of St. Roch.138 In the modern era, it remained common in the south of France to grant support in the form of a loan. In Carpentras, the 1515 statutes of the confraternity of St. Jean provided a florin to a master or servant who was sick or in need under the condition that the sum was to be refunded, and the statutes of the confraternity of St. Anne offered a florin to sick master craftsmen and six sous to sick workers, which they had to refund after recovery.139 According to the 1563 statutes of the confraternity of the millers in Aix, the support which a journeyman had received was deducted from his wages after he had come to health again.140 And yet another example comes from Bordeaux.141 Usually, what had been received needed to be repaid only if the member had recovered. Sometimes the obligation to repay applied to all cases of support and sometimes only to some of the cases: Art. 11 of the 14th-century statutes of the confraternity of the drapers in Provence, for example, introduced the obligation to repay only for funeral costs. Finally, the obligation to repay may explain a different kind of provision found in confraternity statutes: according to the 1453 statutes of the confraternity of tailors in Aix and the 1481 statutes of the confraternity of shoemakers in Tarascon, a master craftsman had to take a sick journeyman back into work after the latter had recovered or he had to find another master craftsman for him. Prima facie, this obligation was imposed to protect journeymen. However, at the same time it secured that the journeyman was in a financial position to repay the financial support which he had received during his sick leave.142

F. Conclusion In conclusion, it seems that the support schemes of professional confraternities protecting against the risks of sickness, old age, and poverty were, unlike the support granted by mutual aid societies of the 19th century, rooted in the religious

___________ 138 See Pierre Pansier, Œuvres charitables d’Avignon en 1433, (1912) Annales d’Avignon et du Comtat 219–242, 227; Émile Laurent, Étude sur les sociétés de prévoyance (1856). 139 Bibliothèque Inguimbertine, MS 1357, fol. 511v and MS 1363, fol. 431 (cited by Venard (n. 135), 76). 140 See Billioud (n. 37), 247. 141 See Duranthon (n. 80), 42–44. 142 Billioud (n. 37), 266.

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dimension of these associations as well as in the ideas of solidarity and loyalty.143 And unlike with mutual aid societies, support was not the sole purpose of professional confrèries. This may explain many of the differences which these support schemes have as compared to modern-day insurance. Rather, the support schemes of professional confraternities were just one further aspect of the tendency to regulate a profession in an all-embracing fashion: guilds limited the access to a profession; at the same time they ensured that the business of no member could grow at the expense of the other businesses in that guild. And these other aspects exhibit the ideas of solidarity, too.144 Furthermore, mutual support was a means to hold a community together. It was an aspect of the socalled être-ensemble145 and reflected an awareness of common interests. Despite the hierarchy of master craftsmen, journeymen, and apprentices, it was based on horizontal links,146 and it does not have to be interpreted as a form of institutional domination. Ultimately, the religious dimension only needed to fade away, thereby clearing the path which led to the mutual aid societies of the 19th century as described by authors such as Frédéric Bastiat (1801–1850).147

___________ 143 See Michel Dreyfus, Les grands jalons de l’histoire mutualiste, (2008) 4 Vie sociale 11–26, 14. 144 Louis Legrand, Étude historique sur les corporations d’arts et métiers (1872), 201. 145 Julia Conesa Soriano and Julie Pilorget, Faire communauté: introduction, (2016) 32 Questes 15–22. 146 See André Gueslin and Pierre Guillaume, Introduction, in: Gueslin and Guillaume (n. 84), 13–20, 17. 147 Frédéric Bastiat, Harmonies économiques, in: Œuvres complètes, vol. 6 (1854), 413.

Chapter 8: Guilds and Mutual Support in Medieval Italy By Marina Gazzini A. Introduction ............................................................................................................ 165 B. Terminological observations and geographical limitations .................................... 167 C. The need for security: an aspiration long neglected by historians .......................... 173 D. Mutual support in medieval Italian guilds and confraternities ................................ 175 I. Legal, economic and political risks in urban and rural contexts...................... 177 II. The financial risk of old age............................................................................ 181 III. Confraternities for disabled people – disability and infirmity in medieval society.............................................................................................. 182 IV. Guilds and medieval hospitals ........................................................................ 184 E. Mututal support, crypto-insurance and charity ....................................................... 187 F. Towards the modern age – between continuity and discontinuity .......................... 189

A. Introduction The following contribution examines Italian medieval guilds. It specifically focuses on the question whether it is possible to analyse the many activities undertaken for the support and assistance of guild members in terms of risk protection and welfare.1 For that purpose, it is first necessary to make some terminological observations and to define the geographical limits of the present analysis (below B). Professional, solidary, religious and other associations will be included in these reflections. Then, the historiography on the intersections between guilds, assistance, welfare and insurance in the Middle Ages will be summarised (below C). After that, the different forms of protection offered by corporate associations against occupational and everyday life risks will be examined in detail and the beneficiaries of these forms of support and assistance will be identified (below D), in order to assess their significance in the professional context (below E). Finally, the present paper will address aspects of continuity and discontinuity in the transition from the Middle Ages to the modern age (below F).2 ___________ 1 See on the German context, Phillip Hellwege, A Comparative History of Insurance Law in Europe, (2016) 56 American Journal of Legal History 66–75. 2 The analysis offered here is based on research conducted within the PRIN (Progetti di Rilevante Interesse Nazionale) 2015 funded research project: Alle origini del welfare (XIII–XVI secolo). Radici medievali e moderne della cultura europea dell’assistenza e delle forme di protezione sociale e credito solidale; PI: Gabriella Piccinni.

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Although the present contribution is, thus, not limited to the Middle Ages, it will focus on them. The reason for this focus is simple. In Italy, professional, solidary, religious and other associations had, in terms of proliferation, their zenith during the Middle Ages. It was at that time that they were thriving both in quantity and in quality if all forms of associations and if all complex aspects which they gave rise to are taken into consideration. There were professional corporations and colleges, religious confraternities, parish associations, political associations, associations of arms, associations of milites and further forms of corporations. Each of them played a different role in medieval society, but they had a common denominator: internal solidarity.3 However, it is not possible to reduce these associations to their common denominator and to say that they served primarily the function of mutual solidarity. Their other functions were of great importance, too. In certain Italian cities, such as Florence, Bologna, Perugia and Parma, guilds came, for example, to govern the city and to control its political institutions for periods of various lengths. Here, the political function of guilds was of utmost importance. And here, only those who were guild members had access to public offices. Apart from these historical reasons for focusing on the Middle Ages, there are also historiographic ones: Italy has seen phases of intense research into guilds and related corporations, but also long periods of disregard:4 In recent years, Italian medievalists have not shown much appreciation for economic history; and ___________ 3 On the problems of comparing these different associations see Enrico Artifoni, Tensioni sociali e istituzioni nel mondo comunale, in: Nicola Tranfaglia and Mario Firpo (eds.), La Storia. I grandi problemi dal medioevo all’età contemporanea, vol. 2 (1986), 461–491; idem, Corporazioni e società di ‘popolo’: un problema della politica comunale nel secolo XIII, in: Enrico Menestò and Giancarlo Pellegrini (eds.), Itinerarium: università, corporazioni e mutualismo ottocentesco. Fonti e percorsi storici (1994), 17–40. 4 In the 19th and 20th centuries, corporations attracted great interest from differently connoted historiographies, such as that of the Risorgimento or that of the fascist period. Their research was marked by their political agenda. After World War II, scholars turned away from guilds as research in that area was perceived as dated and compromised. Until the 1970s the following works were the main points of reference: Pier Silverio Leicht, Corporazioni romane e arti medievali (1937); Franco Valsecchi, Le corporazioni nell’organismo politico del Medioevo (1935); Gennaro Maria Monti, Le corporazioni nell’evo antico e nell’alto medio evo. Lineamenti e ricerche (1934); Filippo Carli, Nuovi studi sul problema della continuità storica delle corporazioni, (1936) 7 Archivio di studi corporativi 327–365. Subsequently, international research, such as that of Bronisław Geremek, Salariati e artigiani nella Parigi medievale (1975; original Polish edn., 1962; French edn., 1968), produced a revival of interest: Lelia Cracco Ruggini, Le associazioni professionali nel mondo romano-bizantino, in: Artigianato e tecnica nella società dell’Alto medioevo occidentale (1971), 59–193; Viktor I. Rutenburg, Arti e corporazioni, in: Storia d’Italia, vol. 5/1 (1975), 613–642; Antonio I. Pini, Città, comuni e corporazioni nel Medioevo italiano (1986); Roberto Greci, Corporazioni e mondo del lavoro nell’Italia padana medievale (1988). The late 1990s have again seen a decline of interest in guilds. This links to a general trend of a decreasing interest of medieval studies in economic history. See Marino Berengo, Presentazione al lettore italiano, in: Geremek, op.cit.; Enrico Artifoni, Forme

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economic historians, for their part, have been less and less attracted by the Middle Ages and in general by the pre-industrial age.5 When looking into guilds in Italy, the Middle Ages therefore appear deserving of particular attention and in need of a detailed analysis.

B. Terminological observations and geographical limitations  Before proceeding with an analysis of the different forms of support and assistance offered by medieval Italian professional and religious associations, there is need for terminological clarifications. Furthermore, it is necessary to work out the geographical boundaries of the present contribution.  The term ‘guild’, which had been widespread in the Germanic territories since the Carolingian period,6 was not used in Italy. The general concept in medieval Italy was schola, both in the original Latin and the vulgarisation scola. It referred to devotional and professional associations as examples from Venice prove.7 ___________ del potere e organizzazione corporativa in età comunale: un percorso storiografico, in: Cesare Mozzarelli (ed.), Economia e corporazioni. Il governo degli interessi nella storia d’Italia dal medioevo all’Italia contemporanea (1988), 9–40; Greci, op.cit., 11–43; Elisa Occhipinti, Quarant’anni di studi italiani sulle corporazioni medievali tra storiografia e ideologia, (1990) 74 Nuova Rivista Storica 101–174; Centro italiano di studi di storia e d’arte (ed.), Tra economia e politica: le corporazioni nell’Europa medievale (2007); Denise Bezzina, Organizzazione corporativa e artigiani nell’Italia medievale, (2013) 14 Reti medievali Rivista 351–374; Franco Franceschi, Il mondo della produzione urbana: artigiani, salariati, Corporazioni, in: idem (ed.), Storia del lavoro in Italia. Il Medioevo. Dalla dipendenza personale al lavoro contrattato (2017), 374–420. 5 As illustrated and explained by Franco Franceschi, Lavoro, reddito, consumi. Lo storico del medioevo di fronte alla vita economica, in: Pensare la storia oggi. Ideali politici e civili nella storiografia degli ultimi decenni (2014), 47–53. See also Francesco Ammannati (ed.), Dove va la storia economica? Metodi e prospettive (2011). 6 E.g., the famous Capitulary of Herstal of 779 spoke of gildonia: ‘De sacramentis per gildonia invicem coniurantibus, ut nemo facere praesumat. Alio vera modo de illorum elemosinis aut de incendio aut de naufragio, quamvis convenentias faciant, nemo in hoc iure praesumat’ (Alfred Boretius (ed.), Capitularia Regum Francorum, vol. 1 (1883), 51). The term may be interpreted to include confraternities; see Hincmar of Reims in the year 852: ‘Ut de collectis quas geldonias vel confratrias vulgo vocant’ (Rudolf Pokorny and Martina Stratmann (eds.), Capitula Episcoporum, vol. 2 (1995), 43 f.). 7 Giovanni Monticolo (ed.), I capitolari delle arti veneziane sottoposte alla Giustizia e poi alla Giustizia vecchia, dalle origini al MCCCCXXX, 3 vols. (1896–1914; vol. 3 ed. by Giovanni Monticolo and Enrico Besta); Lia Sbriziolo, Per la storia delle confraternite veneziane: dalle deliberazioni miste (1310–1476) del Consiglio dei Dieci. ‘Scolae comunes’, artigiane e nazionali, in: Atti dell’Istituto veneto di scienze, lettere ed arti, vol. 126 (1967–1968), 405–442; idem, Per la storia delle confraternite veneziane: dalle deliberazioni miste (1310–1476) del Consiglio dei Dieci. Le scuole dei battuti, in: Miscellanea G.G. Meersseman, vol. 2 (1970), 715–763; Richard S. Mackenney, Arti e Stato a Venezia tra il tardo Medioevo e il ‘600, (1981) 5 Studi Veneziani 127–143; idem, Tradesmen and

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However, the term schola was not as all-embracing as the concept of guilds as defined in the 1980s by the German historian Otto Gerhard Oexle. According to Oexle, a guild had the following attributes: (1) it was a social group (2) marked by voluntary membership and (3) equality among its members; (4) it enjoyed legal autonomy; (5) it was joined by promissory oath; and (6) its members had the obligation to attend social banquets.8 Oexle included not only Merovingian and Carolingian clerical associations, local and mutual aid guilds, merchant guilds, religious brotherhoods, workers’ corporations, trade associations and universities, but also rural communities and urban municipalities.9 In the present contribution, the term guild will be used for reasons of maintaining uniformity with the other chapters in this book. However, the present contribution will use this term in the meaning of the Italian schola, thus referring to the merchant, craftsmen’s and religious guilds, but not in the broad understanding as framed by Oexle. Conversely, the modern Italian term corporazione, although it has ancient origins – it comes from the classical Latin corpus and corporatio and was used to indicate various forms of associations10 – only rarely appears in medieval sources. One of these rare examples is found in Bologna, where the assembly of guilds was called corporale.11 Instead, Italian medieval sources use a great number of different terms, the most recurrent being societas, ars, paraticum, universitas, fratalea, consortium, ministerium, misterium, collegium, officium and, as

___________ Traders. The World of the Guilds in Venice and Europe, c. 1250–c. 1650 (1987); Francesca Ortalli, Per salute delle anime e delli corpi. Scuole piccole a Venezia nel tardo Medioevo (2001). 8 Otto G. Oexle, Die mittelalterlichen Gilden: ihre Selbstdeutung und ihr Beitrag zur Formung sozialer Strukturen, in: Albert Zimmermann (ed.), Soziale Ordnungen im Selbstverständnis des Mittelalters, vol. 1 (1979), 203–226; idem, Gilden als soziale Gruppen in der Karolingerzeit, in: Herbert Jankuhn et al. (ed.), Das Handwerk in vor- und frühgeschichtlicher Zeit, vol. 1 (1981), 284–354. On the Germanic guilds see Otto von Gierke, Das deutsche Genossenschaftsrecht, 3 vol. (1868–1881). 9 However, Oexle’s approach was contested by legal historians: Gerhard Dilcher, Die genossenschaftliche Struktur von Gilden und Zünften, in: Berent Schwineköper (ed.), Gilden und Zünfte. Kaufmännische und gewerbliche Genossenschaften im frühen und hohen Mittelalter (1985), 71–111. For a more recent clarification on the German corporate vocabulary, see Knut Schulz, Le città tedesche: lo sviluppo dalle confraternite e corporazioni alle ‘politische Zünfte’. Campanilismo contro migrazione, in: Tra economia e politica (n. 4), 229–256. 10 However, since the 2nd century (and, thus, since the age of the Severan dynasty) the term used to refer to associations was collegium, a word that emphasised the link between its members: Jonathan S. Perry, The Roman collegia. The Modern Evolution of an Ancient Concept (2006). 11 Roberto Greci, Le corporazioni. Associazioni di mestiere nell’Italia del Medioevo, (1995) 99 Storia e dossier 71–97.

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already noted, schola.12 These terms are not synonymous with the modern concept of a corporation. Ars as well as the other medieval Latin and vernacular terms refers to trades and professions. They relate to professions that formed guilds, but also to professions that did not – either because the number of the members of the trade was too small to form a guild or because it was expressly forbidden by other corporations or the authorities of, for example, the bishopric, the city or the seignorial and royal court to establish such a guild. The present contribution does not cover all territories of today’s Italy. Professional and political associations, and to a lesser extent also religious associations, developed differently in the various parts of the Italian peninsula, leaving behind a heterogeneous legacy of evidence. This diversity is explainable on the basis of political factors. The particularism of central and northern Italy encouraged, starting in the 11th century, the development of city autonomy. At the same time, this development was also the background for guilds acquiring a certain freedom and autonomy. A stronger central power, such as that of the Normans and later Swabians and Angevins in southern Italy, would have suppressed these developments. A provision by Roger II dating back to 1140, just after the Norman kingdom of Sicily was formed, forbade, for example, any form of corporate organisation.13 Frederick II restricted trade associations in both the Italian and German territories to increase the centralistic aspects of his power.14 It was only in the Angevin and the Aragon ages (14th and 15th centuries) that there would have been the possibility for a corporate system to establish itself, but its role in political society is in any event subject to discussion.15 These observations do not suggest ___________ 12

The same is true for the modern age. Corporazione was not in use as a generic term, but many different terms appear in the sources: chamber, university, art, guild or abbey. See Giuseppe De Luca, Mercanti imprenditori, élite artigiane e organizzazioni produttive: la definizione del sistema corporativo milanese (1568–1627), in: Alberto Guenzi et al. (eds.), Corporazioni e gruppi professionali nell’Italia moderna (1999), 79–116, 108. 13 Francesco Brandileone, Il diritto romano nelle leggi normanni e sveve del regno di Sicilia (1884), 121. 14 Salvatore Tramontana and Maria Carmela Rugolo, Le città dell’Italia meridionale, in: Tra economia e politica: le Corporazioni nell’Europa medievale (2007), 81–109, 97; Raffaele Licinio, L’artigiano, in: Condizione umana e ruoli sociali nel Mezzogiorno normanno-svevo (1991), 153–185, 182 f. 15 See Gennaro Maria Monti, Le Corporazioni nel Mezzogiorno d’Italia prima del 1347, in: Antonio Ambrosini (ed.), Studi in onore di Federico Cammeo, vol. 2 (1933), 121–148; Mario Del Treppo, Stranieri nel Regno di Napoli. Le élites finanziarie e la strutturazione dello spazio economico e politico, in: Gabriella Rossetti (ed.), Dentro la città. Stranieri e realtà urbane nell’Europa dei secoli XII–XVI (1989), 193–251; Greci (n. 4), 22; Donata Degrassi, L’economia artigiana nell’Italia medievale (1996), 133; Ennio I. Mineo, State, Orders and Social Distinction, in: Andrea Gamberini and Isabella Lazzarini (eds.), The Italian Renaissance State (2012), 323–344; Pierluigi Terenzi, L’Aquila nel Regno. I rapporti politici fra città e monarchia nel Mezzogiorno tardomedievale (2016), 69 f.; Alessandra Mastrodonato, La norma inefficace. Le corporazioni napoletane tra teoria e prassi nei secoli dell’età moderna (2016), 17–20; Giovanni Vitolo, I tedeschi nella

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a dualism between the centre-north and the south of Italy – a dualism that is, according to modern research, outdated. In fact, trade associations did not even develop throughout central and northern Italy. Public authorities and bishops – in a phase of imperial weakness between the 10th and 11th centuries, cities had acknowledged the latter as their political representatives16 – had, for example, forbidden those who offered services which were considered to be of common interest, such as firefighting, from organising themselves in corporations.17 Thus, government interests could clash with those of corporations. Milan may serve as an example. It was among the four major cities of medieval Europe18 and an economic centre of primary importance.19 Nevertheless, from a political perspective craftsmen paratici20 and merchant universitates were of only little relevance. These guilds had at first supported the Credenza di Sant’Ambrogio and the Motta, the two entities into which, since 1198, the Popolo (i.e. the ‘bourgeoisie’ and lower nobility) of Milan was divided. Consequently, guilds had later been subordinated by the seigniorial and ducal powers: from the middle of the 13th century they were subjected to political control and heavy taxing.21 However, their number was not limited. To the contrary, from the late 15th century

___________ Napoli del Rinascimento. La confraternita dei fornai, in: Victor Rivera Magos and Francesco Violante (eds.), Apprendere ciò che vive. Studi offerti a Raffaele Licinio (2017), 567–578; Franceschi (n. 4), 387–390. See furthermore Antonio Petino, Origine e forme di previdenza nelle corporazioni siciliane dei secoli XV-XVII (1944). 16 The relationship between bishops and cities is one of the crucial issues of the historiography on medieval Europe. For Italy see only Sergio Mochi Onory, Vescovi e città (secoli IV–VI) (1933, reprinted 2010); Giovanni Tabacco, La sintesi istituzionale di vescovo e città in Italia e il suo superamento nella ‘res publica’ comunale, in: idem (ed.), Egemonie sociali e strutture del potere nel medioevo italiano (1979), 397–427; Michele Pellegrini, Vescovo e città. Una relazione nel Medioevo italiano (secoli II–XIV) (2012). 17 Pini (n. 4), 241. 18 Together with Florence, Venice and Paris: Maria Ginatempo, Gerarchie demiche e ‘sistemi urbani’ nell’Italia bassomedievale: una discussione, (1996) 29 Società e storia 347–383. 19 Patrizia Mainoni, Economia e politica nella Lombardia medievale. Da Bergamo a Milano fra XIII e XV secolo (1994); Roberto Bellosta, La vita economica a Milano e in Lombardia (secoli XI–XV), in: Giorgio Rumi et al. (eds.), Milano capitale (2003), 109–130. 20 The term derived from the tax known as the parata, initially to be paid to the bishop: Pini (n. 4), 266. 21 Giuseppe Martini, L’Universitas mercatorum di Milano e i suoi rapporti con il potere politico, secoli XIII–XV, in: Studi di storia medievale e moderna per Ernesto Sestan, vol. 1 (1980), 219–258; Patrizia Mainoni, La camera dei mercanti di Milano tra economia e politica alla fine del medioevo, in: Mozzarelli (n. 4), 57–78; Marina Gazzini, Confraternite/corporazioni: i volti molteplici della ‘schola’ medievale, in: Danilo Zardin (ed.), Corpi, ‘fraternità’, mestieri nella storia della società europea (1998), 51–71 (idem, Confraternite e società cittadina nel medioevo italiano (2006), 59–81).

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guilds experienced a phase of strong development. It was even thought that Milan was among the cities in Europe with the greatest number of trade associations.22 In Ferrara the affirmation of seigniorial powers led to the disappearance of corporate bodies. In 1287, the Este family suppressed all guilds, and it is no coincidence that they started with that of the boatmen whose activity was fundamental for the economic life of a city depending on river transport.23 When guilds reappeared in the 14th century, they were not able to develop any meaningful political powers. And even though guilds were widespread in Venice, they did not have any political function as they had in Florence, Bologna and Perugia. In Venice, they were confined by the merchant oligarchy that was in power to an economic and social role.24 Finally, corporations were inexistent in Friuli, a region devoid of urban centres and subjected to princely and ecclesiastical power, that of the Patriarchate of Aquileia. In Friuli, professional associations took the form of confraternities to which the mutualistic tasks were delegated.25 In conclusion, as a result of the political-territorial fragmentation that began in the 6th century with the Lombard conquest of parts of the peninsula’s territory, the development of professional associations such as guilds was not homogenous throughout Italy. And with respect to these developments, Italy did not only fall into two parts, but there were numerous regional and local differences and variations. These lasted until the 19th century, when the process of national unification was completed. However, the complete absence of professional corporations such as guilds in some parts of the Italian peninsula and their political insignificance in other parts should not be misinterpreted as a sign of economic underdevelopment. The inability to form a professional association did not necessarily result in a disadvantage. In Milan, for example, the political weakness of professional associations meant that they were not burdened with certain public duties26 – in other ___________ 22 For instance, in the 16th century, the Englishman Thomas Coryat defined Milan as the richest Italian city of ‘manual arts, appreciated here no less than in any city of the whole Christian world’ (Angelo Moioli, Il mutato ruolo delle corporazioni nella riorganizzazione dell’economia milanese del XVII secolo, in: Guenzi et al. (n. 12), 44–78, 46); an envoy of the Republic of Venice defined Milan as the ‘workshop of the manual arts’ and the Milanese historian Paolo Morigia noted that ‘very few cities not only in Italy, but also throughout Europe [have] more trades than Milan has’ (De Luca (n. 12), 80, 99). On the significance of the increase in the number of associations and on the fact that this did not coincide with political influence, see pp. 189 ff., below. 23 Greci (n. 4), 136. 24 Mackenney, Tradesmen (n. 7), 23–36; Elisabeth Crouzet-Pavan, Problématiques des Arts à Venise à la fin du Moyen Âge, in: Tra economia e politica (n. 14), 39–60, 41. 25 Degrassi (n. 15), passim. 26 They may, for example, have had to pay special taxes to the city or the seigniory, or they may have had to bring offers to churches while marching in procession with the guild

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regions, guilds were compensated for being burdened with such duties and obligations by having political influence. Furthermore, there is a noticeable general absence of women in guilds. This finding contrasts with the wide involvement of women in all medieval trades and at all levels, from menial labour to entrepreneurship. The absence of women in guilds was considered not only an indication of gender exclusion,27 but also as a manifestation of women’s desire for freedom: women did not want to end up caged-in under the control of corporate leaders and city authorities.28 Indeed, where we find evidence of women in such corporations, as in Venice, we see them subject to the interests of male colleagues.29 However, it has to be stressed that professional associations existed also outside strict corporate institutional forms. Further, one needs to recall that corporations and confraternities were contiguous entities, in some periods indistinguishable and in other periods existing side by side.30 Accordingly, the (too) often-formulated conception of how medieval work was organised needs to be softened such that the supposed dichotomy existing between corporate and non-corporate work is toned down for the Italian Middle Ages.31 With respect to associations, medieval Italy was, therefore, anything but homogeneous, and associations were characterised at times by informal and at times by more formal hierarchies. Guilds were usually divided into the categories of ‘major’ and ‘minor’ according to the different levels of prestige and power they held. The hierarchies between the different guilds varied, however, again locally and regionally.32 Apothecaries and doctors, for example, were placed at the top ___________ banner. Patrizia Mainoni, Arti, mestieri, corporazioni, in: Franco Della Peruta (ed.), Storia illustrata di Milano, vol. 2 (1992), 461–480. 27 Angela Groppi, Il lavoro delle donne: un questionario da arricchire, in: Simona Cavaciocchi (ed.), La donna nell’economia, secc. XIII–XVIII (1990), 143–154, 145; Roberto Greci, Donne e lavoro: la fluidità di un rapporto, in: Angela Groppi (ed.), Il lavoro delle donne (1996), 71–91. 28 Maria Paola Zanoboni, Donne al lavoro nell’Italia e nell’Europa medievali (secoli XIII–XV) (2016). 29 Amleto Spicciani, Solidarietà, previdenza e assistenza per gli artigiani nell’Italia medioevale (secoli XII–XV), in: Artigiani e salariati. Il mondo del lavoro nell’Italia dei secoli XII–XV (1984), 293–343, 318. 30 Gazzini, Confraternite/corporazioni (n. 21), passim. 31 This holds equally true for the modern era: Francesca Trivellato, Fondamenta dei vetrai. Lavoro, tecnologia e mercato a Venezia fra Sei e Settecento (2000), 173–186. 32 In assessing the hierarchies between the different guilds for the different towns, it is useful to analyse the order in which they took part in, for example, religious processions. Often, first came notaries, judges, merchants and bankers, followed by metallurgists and leathermakers; then came carpenters, masons, cobblers, barbers, painters, victuallers and out-of-town transport workers, and finally there were gardeners, porters, innkeepers, kiln men and glaziers: Pini (n. 4), 263, 272.

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in Florence, but they enjoyed far less prestige elsewhere, most probably because they were linked to the taboo of blood and were therefore included among the infamous trades.33 For similar reasons butchers, even though they could be in an excellent economic position, enjoyed social prestige in only a handful of northern Italian towns, namely Como, Reggio Emilia and Modena, and it was in even fewer cities, for example in Parma and Bologna, that they had access to the highest levels of offices in the town.34 In summary, although the Italian regions were united by the same solidary culture of Romano-Germanic and Christian origin, the development of the respective associations took very different paths.35 In the remainder of the present contribution, I will include professional associations in the strict sense and also religious associations. However, I will include the latter only when they were mainly composed of professionals.

C. The need for security: an aspiration long neglected by historians Social and economic historians have largely neglected the questions of provision, mutual or supplementary support, and assistance in medieval Italy. Thus, at a recent conference on medieval studies, the question of whether there existed social safety nets and mechanisms of support for those who were in a situation of need through no fault of their own (injury, illness, disability, old age, unemployment or death of a spouse) was not considered to be relevant for explaining economic growth and decline in medieval Italy. Instead, climatic, political, technological, productive and financial factors were examined.36 And even if legal historians have not ignored the link between the support for economically vulnerable people and social welfare37 (and the same is true for scholars who have researched professional and religious associations38 as well as for those who have ___________ 33 Jacques Le Goff, Mestieri leciti e mestieri illeciti nell’Occidente medievale, in: idem, Tempo della Chiesa e tempo del mercante. E altri saggi sul lavoro e la cultura nel Medioevo (1977), 53–71. 34 The lack of political and social recognition provoked, for instance, a rebellion of the butchers in Siena: Valentina Costantini, Carni in rivolta. Macellai a Siena nel medioevo (2018). 35 For an overview see Franco Franceschi, ‘E saremo tutti ricchi’. Lavoro, mobilità sociale e conflitti nelle città dell’Italia medievale (2012). 36 La crescita economica dell’Occidente medievale. Un tema storico non ancora esaurito (2017). 37 Giovanni Cassandro, Assicurazione. Premessa storica, in: Enciclopedia del Diritto, vol. 111 (1958), 419–428; Antonio La Torre, Assicurazione, in: Annali dell’Enciclopedia del diritto, vol. 1 (2007), 74–131. 38 Spicciani (n. 29); Duccio Balestracci, I lavoratori poveri e i ‘disciplinati’ senesi. Una forma di assistenza alla fine del Quattrocento, in: Artigiani e salariati (n. 29), 345–368; Roberto Greci, Economia, religiosità, politica. Le solidarietà delle corporazioni medievali

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studied welfare systems in late medieval society39), it has in general been accepted that there is a substantial otherness between forms of medieval welfare as compared to modern insurance.40 The only insurance in the modern sense which had already emerged in the Middle Ages was that related to transport or life, but the latter often took the form of gambling. Yet as early as 1956, Lucien Febvre, in a short comment on the history of insurance in Switzerland, pointed to the need for security that envelops man; in this essay he contended that this need (or rather the sense of it and the aspiration to security) relates to the spiritual sphere (the afterlife), health (protection against illness and disability) and the whole temporal world (transport, fire, theft).41 Febvre’s sensitivity to a ‘full insurance’ approach has not generally been adopted by medievalists. This is perhaps because Febvre himself denied that his analysis applied to the Middle Ages. He did not equate the forms of mutual support and assistance with insurance. Two years later, Armando Sapori returned to the same issue in a lecture entitled Per la storia dei sentimenti. Divagazioni sulle assicurazioni (The History of feelings. An Excursus on Insurance), and he was inspired, as he openly admitted, by Febvre’s ideas, which he referred to as ‘brilliant’.42 Sapori had incorporated these ideas into his previous research on the early days of social security.43 Sapori stressed that there are fundamental differences between the past and the present, and he underlined the importance of not confusing the concepts of insurance, charitable assistance, workplace benefits and social security. Furthermore, he recalled that proper insurance requires a combination of the need for security and an incentive for profit. Nevertheless, Sapori recognised that instances of public and private insurance possibly intersected already in the Middle Ages and that ___________ nell’Italia del Nord, in: José Ángel Sesma Muñoz (ed.), Cofradías, gremios, solidaridades en la Europa Medieval (1993), 75–111. 39 Giuliana Albini, Carità e governo delle povertà (secoli XII–XV) (2002); Gabriella Piccinni, Il banco dell’ospedale di Santa Maria della Scala e il mercato del denaro nella Siena del Trecento (2012). 40 Enrico Bensa, Il contratto di assicurazione nel Medio Evo. Studi e ricerche (1884); Federigo Melis, Origini e sviluppi delle assicurazioni in Italia (secoli XIV–XVI) (1975); Giovanni Ceccarelli, Un mercato del rischio. Assicurare e farsi assicurare nella Firenze rinascimentale (2012), 14. Similarly, there is no trace of different perspectives of analysis in the recent study of Ezio C. Pia, ‘Dal cielo alla terra’: gli sviluppi dell’assicurazione, (2018) 19/1 Reti Medievali Rivista 177–186. 41 Lucien Febvre, Pour l’histoire d’un sentiment: le besoin de sécurité, (1956) 11 Annales. Économies, Sociétés, Civilisations 244–247. 42 Armando Sapori, Per la storia dei sentimenti. Divagazioni sulle assicurazioni, in: idem, Studi di storia economica, vol. 3 (1967), 135–148, 135 (originally published in: (1958) 25 Assicurazioni 3–17). 43 Armando Sapori, I precedenti della previdenza sociale nel medioevo, (1939) 20 Assicurazioni Sociali 18–31 (reprinted in: idem, Studi (n. 42), vol. 1 (1955), 427–441).

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these may have affected later developments in the field of social security. Private profit is a clear advantage of private insurance; furthermore, support and assistance in general benefited society as such as a result of the sense of security for all. Consequently, Sapori wanted to look upon guilds and confraternities as institutions which, in addition to their religious and market-regulating functions, were cooperative forms of support and assistance serving the idea of social protection – functionally equivalent to modern institutions of social security. Such an analysis was only possible if any voluntary payments by guilds, such as almsgiving, had been transformed into a right enjoyed by guild members to receive support and assistance as was calculated and predefined on the basis of members’ periodic payments to guilds. Another important issue related to the separation of funds intended to finance the support and assistance mechanisms in the event of illness, accident or death. These funds came from entrance fees, annual subscriptions, donations, fines, investments in property and land as well as from other financial activities.44 Unlike in the 1950s when Febvre and Sapori were writing, l’histoire des sentiments, a history of feelings, is today no longer muette.45 In the following section of the present contribution, the different fragments of information which have survived on the need for security will be analysed, and it will be assessed whether and how this need was addressed in professional and other associations. The perspective taken will be that of a social historian.

D. Mutual support in medieval Italian guilds and confraternities Every society and every social cosmos, regardless of whether it is a micro cosmos or a macro cosmos, will develop some mechanisms of support, assistance or aid for those in need, even if these mechanisms at times escape the eyes of an external observer. The mechanisms can take fundamentally different forms: the people of a given society may simply care for each other, they may associate for that purpose, they may buy protection on the market or it may be the state which provides for protection. The latter form is today called social insurance. Articles 1882 ff. Codice civile cover the contract of insurance; however, according to Art. 1886, social insurance is regulated by special legislation, with the provisions of the Codice civile only being applicable if this special legislation is silent. ___________ 44 A good example of the funding of medieval charitable institutions is found in the financial details of hospitals run by confraternities and guilds; see the contributions in Marina Gazzini and Antonio Olivieri (eds.), L’ospedale, il denaro e altre ricchezze. Scritture e pratiche economiche dell’assistenza in Italia nel tardo Medioevo, (2016) 17/1 Reti Medievali Rivista 107–366. 45 Febvre (n. 41), 247. On the research of the past decades, see Barbara H. Rosenwein, Generations of Feelings: A History of Emotions 600–1700 (2015).

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Furthermore, Art. 38 Costituzione della Repubblica Italiana gives each citizen a right to social welfare:46 ‘Ogni cittadino inabile al lavoro e sprovvisto dei mezzi necessari per vivere ha diritto al mantenimento e all’assistenza sociale. I lavoratori hanno diritto che siano preveduti ed assicurati mezzi adeguati alle loro esigenze di vita in caso di infortunio, malattia, invalidità e vecchiaia, disoccupazione involontaria. Gli inabili ed i minorati hanno diritto all’educazione e all’avviamento professionale. Ai compiti previsti in questo articolo provvedono organi ed istituti predisposti o integrati dallo Stato. L’assistenza privata è libera.’ ‘Every citizen unable to work and without the resources necessary to live has a right to social maintenance and assistance. Workers have the right to be provided with and assured adequate means for their needs and necessities in cases of accidents, illness, disability and old age, and involuntary unemployment. Disabled and handicapped persons have the right to education and vocational training. The duties laid down in this Article are provided for by organs and institutions established by or supplemented by the State. Private assistance is free.’

Modern social insurance is either mandatory or voluntary. Compulsory social insurance functions without capital cover. It is financed through compulsory contributions and, in the event of a deficit, transfers from general taxation. Voluntary schemes are funded solely by members’ contributions. In the Middle Ages, welfare worked in a different way and, strictly speaking, it cannot even be called welfare. Men and women, children and the elderly, the working population, inhabitants of towns and of the countryside – they all were in cases of need supported and assisted by various entities: confraternities, guilds or hospitals, with hospitals often being managed by the former two.47 The character of these entities differed: guilds were primarily of a non-religious nature, while confraternities and hospitals had a strong religious character.48 These associations provided ___________ 46 Translation by Carlo Casonato and Jens Woelk, The Constitution of the Italian Republic (2008): http://www.jus.unitn.it/dsg/pubblicazioni/costituzione/costituzione%20 genn 2008eng.pdf (last accessed 9 February 2019). 47 See on these institutions Antonio Rumeu de Armas, Historia de la previsión social en España. Cofradías, Gremios, Hermandades, Montepíos (1944). 48 The historiography on hospitals and confraternities is abundant. For two tools for finding digital and bibliographic resources see Marina Gazzini, Bibliografia medievistica di storia confraternale, (2004) 4/1 Reti Medievali Rivista; idem, Ospedali nell’Italia medievale, (2012) 12 Reti Medievali Rivista 211–237.

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their members with means of support in the event of unforeseeable events, a support which was of course most welcomed by those who had dangerous but not particularly profitable professions and by those who were for other reasons exposed to great risks.49 I. Legal, economic and political risks in urban and rural contexts At the beginning of the 11th century, at a time when confraternities and guilds often overlapped, in a valley of the Florentine countryside a group of people joined together for the purpose of their spiritual elevation as well as to help each other in case of need: they established the confraternity of Sant’Appiano di Valdelsa, the oldest confraternity in Italy, the statutes of which have survived.50 In addition to the various forms of – both material and spiritual – mutual support and assistance normally offered by confraternities such as meals, visits to the sick, funerals and prayers for the living and the dead, this confraternity stood out because its members promised mutual help for each other whenever one of them had legal problems.51 In fact, many joined a confraternity for the very reason that they did not belong to the circle of potentes and therefore did not enjoy the social prestige and economic strength that would have helped them to, among other things, face the law.52 It is also known that costly court proceedings and the resulting poverty and vulnerability were among the common causes of imprisonment in the Middle Ages.53 Being part of an association remedied the risk of a precarious life, resulting from not belonging to the elite, and therefore of having ___________ 49 The statutes of the most powerful guilds did not, however, explicitly mention support mechanisms, see Spicciani (n. 29), 315. 50 This confraternity has been the object of numerous studies: Gennaro Maria Monti, Le confraternite medievali dell’alta e media Italia, vol. 2 (1927), 140–143; Gilles G. Meersseman, Ordo fraternitatis. Confraternite e pietà dei laici nel Medioevo, vol. 1 (1977), 60–64; Massimo D. Papi, Devozione laicale e forme associative nel territorio valdelsano: la confraternita di Sant’Appiano, in: Religiosità e società in Valdelsa nel basso medioevo (1980), 101–112; Charles M. de La Roncière, La place des confréries dans l’encadrement religieux du contado florentin au XIVe s., (1973) 85 Mélanges de l’École Française de Rome. Moyen-Age, Temps Modernes 633–671; Neslihan Şenocak, Twelfthcentury Italian confraternities as institutions of pastoral care, (2016) 42 Journal of Medieval History 202–225. 51 ‘Si quis angustiatus fuerit sive in placito sive ubicumque eis necessitas fuerit in ipsa civitate, aut guadiam eis recipiant aut prebeant ei adiutorium’ (cited from Meersseman (n. 50), vol. 1, 63, capitolo XI). 52 In the Middle Ages, the pauper was the counterpoint to the potens (those in power) not the dives (rich): Karl Bosl, Potens und Pauper. Begriffsgeschichtliche Studien zur gesellschaftlichen Differenzierung im frühen Mittelalter und zum ‘Pauperismus’ des Hochmittelalters, in: idem, Frühformen der Gesellschaft im mittelalterlichen Europa (1964), 106–134. 53 Marina Gazzini, Storie di vita e di malavita. Criminali, poveri e altri miserabili nelle carceri di Milano alla fine del Medioevo (2017).

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no guarantee of security. The statutes of these associations, thus, guaranteed social peace and justice to its members, and at the same time they regulated the internal affairs of the association in such a way as to keep it strong and cohesive.54 In 1112 the shoemakers of Ferrara – at the time their association was still a confraternity and not yet a guild – promised each other assistance in the event of illness, including covering the costs of transport if a member fell ill away from home.55 Such a promise was no exception. Provisions concerning help for ill members and those who lacked resources while away from home soon entered the statutes of many confraternities and guilds. The geographical coverage, in which confraternities and guilds offered help to members who fell ill away from home, was variable, but it seems to have been progressively extended. The confraternity of Saint Leonardo in Viterbo extended it in the 1140s from a day’s walking to two.56 In Imola, a confraternity of citizens united by the pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela calculated the coverage in 1160 as ten miles (around 16 kilometres).57 Finally, in 1244, the Modena blacksmiths – who at that point of time had formed a guild – made reference to a territory between the mountain range of the Apennines and the river Po, an area of more than 50 square kilometres. Furthermore, in cases of death confraternities and guilds were committed to liquidating the business of the deceased guild brother and paying off heirs.58 Foreign workers in Bologna (mainly Lombards and Tuscans), Trento (mainly Germans) and Florence (various nationalities) were guaranteed a burial and assistance in the event of illness.59 The mobility of people in the Middle Ages was higher than we are led to believe today, and it did not depend on religious motivations alone, as in the case of pilgrimages. Economic migration was frequent and brought with it the need to offer support to those away from their home, a condition which in the Middle

___________ 54 Marina Gazzini, I Disciplinati, la milizia dei frati Gaudenti, il comune di Bologna e la pace cittadina: statuti a confronto (1261–1265), (2004) 101 Bollettino della Deputazione di storia patria per l’Umbria 419–437. 55 The foundation charter stated: ‘Promittimus unumquemque de fratribus nostris visitare si infirmus fuerit’. See Luigi Simeoni, Il documento ferrarese del 1112 della fondazione dell’arte dei callegari, in: Rendiconto delle Sessioni della R. Accademia delle Scienze dell’Istituto di Bologna. Classe di Scienze Morali, vol 7 (1932–1933), 3–18, 5; Greci (n. 38), 84. 56 See the two statutes completed a few years later: Meersseman (n. 50), vol. 1, 144–149. 57 Meersseman (n. 50), vol. 1, 66. 58 Pier Silverio Leicht (ed.), Statuto della corporazione dei fabbri di Modena, Storia del diritto italiano. Le fonti (1966), 336 f. 59 Greci (n. 38), 84.

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Ages included those who simply found themselves outside their own city.60 Foreigners without citizenship were certainly in a vulnerable position and would have felt the need to protect themselves. Merchant guilds were careful to protect their members from risks specifically related to activities carried out away from their home towns. Whether acting as private organisations or when dealing with public authorities, they were committed to ensuring safety on trade routes. The mercatores utentes stratis of Milan – the guild uniting the most prominent and wealthiest merchants, exporters and importers of goods and artefacts which dominated the local Universitas mercatorum since the mid-14th century61 – had long had control of the roads, a task that only in 1346 became the specific competence of public administration, subject to the seigniorial power of the Visconti dynasty.62 The task of, first, the merchants and, subsidiary, public officials, was to check which roads were safe: a merchant venturing on unapproved roads who fell victim to theft was not eligible for aid from the Chamber of Merchants.63 Similar rules existed in Pavia, another important commercial hub in northern Italy. The statutes of the Pavia merchants, amended in 1295 and 1346, focused on protecting certain land and river routes and on requiring their use. Safety on these routes was financed through the payments of members and of all those who used them within the territory of Pavia. The statutes also required the town magistrate to punish robbers (robatores stratarum) for committing crimes on these routes against merchants.64 Furthermore, conventions guaranteeing freedom and

___________ 60 Ermanno Orlando, Migrazioni mediterranee. Migranti, minoranze e matrimoni a Venezia nel basso medioevo (2014); Anna Esposito, Le minoranze indesiderate (corsi, slavi e albanesi) e il processo di integrazione nella società romana nel corso del Quattrocento, in: Beatrice Del Bo (ed.), Cittadinanza e mestieri. Radicamento urbano e integrazione nelle città bassomedievali (secc. XIII–XVI) (2014), 283–297. 61 Before 1330, the group of merchants in the wool sector (mercatores facientes laborare lanam subtilem) had distanced itself from the Universitas mercatorum, see Ettore Verga, La Camera dei Mercanti di Milano nei secoli passati (1914; new ed., 1974), 11. 62 As far back as 1216, the merchants’ right to control the roads of Milan was defined as ‘ancient’: Enrico Besta and Gian Luigi Barni (eds.), Liber consuetudinum Mediolani anni 1216 (1949), 132. 63 Maria Franca Baroni, Il consolato dei mercanti a Milano nel periodo comunale, (1975) 59 Nuova Rivista Storica 257–287, 266. 64 Mario Chiri (ed.), Il Breve della Mercanzia dei mercanti di Pavia, (1906) 6 Bollettino della Società Pavese di Storia Patria capitoli II, III, LVII. See also Renata Crotti Pasi and Carla Maria Cantù (eds.), Breve mercadantie mercatorum Papie. La più antica legislazione mercantile pavese (1295) (1995).

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security of transit were drawn up with the noble families who controlled neighbouring territories, such as the Malaspina family, which previously had committed acts of extortion on those who ventured onto their lands.65 In an era of great conflict, such as those conflicts resulting from the process of urbanisation in feudal Italy, protection was also needed from political persecution. In the early 14th century, confraternity statutes from Piacenza and Parma included provisions on material aid not only for cases of illness, but also in the event of political persecution suffered by members. Furthermore, these statutes included provisions on prayers for the souls of all pilgrims, merchants and travellers, be they Christians, Saracens, Pagans or Jews.66 And, all members of the confraternity had to help if another member was harassed by a municipality: they had to visit him and had to do anything that would help him to be relieved from the situation.67 These findings are hardly surprising: the Middles Ages were a period marked by factional struggles, banishment and ostracism. And the consequences of exclusion were dramatic: it meant losing one’s property and civil rights.68 Literature on mutual support and assistance offered by guilds and confraternities often discusses only the urban context. Indeed, most primary sources that have survived were situated in this context. However, inhabitants of the countryside were exposed to similar risks as those who lived in towns, and the latter may have invested in agriculture or agroforestry. In Arzignano, the rural centre of the Vicenza region, the 14th-century statutes of the confraternita della Vergine – its members were artisans and small landowners – extended mutual aid to cover the risk of loss of livestock if, for example, it was stolen from the lands of a member.69 Furthermore, there are examples in which support and assistance was no longer mutual, but in which confraternities bought insurance coverage from third ___________ 65 Giacomo Gorrini (ed.), Documenti sulle relazioni fra Voghera e Genova (960–1325) (1908), docs. CCXVIII (18 December 1259), CCCXLIII (21 January 1276), CCCCV, CCCCVI, CCCCVII (13 April 1284). 66 The confraternity would have had to pray ‘per zaschauna creatura raxonevole, como zude, pagan, saraxin … per zaschaduna anima christiana … per piligrim, per merchatanti e per viandanti, chi sum per mare e per terra’ (Candido Mesini, Statuti piacentini-parmensi dei Disciplinati, (1960) 12 Archivio storico per le province parmensi 43–70, 67). 67 ‘Porro si contigerit fratrem aliquem dicti consortii, per Comune vel aliter molestari, condoleat et cum patientes ad eius consolationem et deliberationem, minister et omnes fratres dent et prestare debeant suum auxilium et favorem visitando sociando eundo et efficaciter operando que noverint ad bonum et utilitatem fratris in omnibus expedire et altissimus de tali angustia proximum liberabit, interveniente suffragia sociorum’ (Mesini (n. 66), 65). 68 Giuliano Milani, L’esclusione dal comune. Conflitti e bandi politici a Bologna e in altre città italiane tra XII e XIV secolo (2003). 69 Giovanni Mantese, Gli statuti della confraternita della Vergine di Arzignano (Vicenza), 1366, (1960) 14 Rivista di Storia della Chiesa in Italia 443–449.

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parties. As early as 1196, the 170 members of the confraternity of the farm labourers of Viterbo reached an agreement with the rector of the church of Santa Maria Maddalena. The members of the confraternity had to make regular payments, and in return the rector made certain rooms available where guild members could store their grain and where sick confreres could stay.70 The agreement also ensured the funeral of at least three deceased members a year, and it included provisions on social banquets with lamb and wine. The reciprocal obligations were well defined and not left to chance: regular and constant payment of money in exchange for certain forms of assistance. It thus seems that the confraternity had a title to the promised forms of assistance and that they could not be offered by the rector at his discretion. The individual was not insured, but the group to which the individual belonged was: for a long time in the Middle Ages individuality was far less important than belonging to a group.71 II. The financial risk of old age Venice offers an often cited, special example of social security policies ante litteram. This concerns the caulkers’ schola, an important guild as it was active in a sector that was strategic for the Venetian maritime-based economy: caulkers waterproofed the hulls of ships. It was an intricate profession requiring many years of training. The statutes of the guild included about 50 provisions relating to the relationships between young or mature workers on the one hand and the elderly (the so-called ‘veterans’) on the other hand. These provisions were a prelude to modern pension provisions, stimulated by awareness of both the social value of workers as such and the wealth of knowledge and experience acquired during their working years.72  In 1437, it was established that, in proportion to the number of workers, a specified number of such elderly masters, who at that point were no longer able to keep up with their younger colleagues, had to be employed. Initially, a business had to have one veteran for every five young masters, later for every three young masters and again later two maistri vetrani for every seven lavoradori.73 Veterans covered by the provision were selected on the basis of their poverty, but neither the economic threshold nor the age at which they would qualify were specified. What is indicated is the salary of veterans. At first it was equal to that of young masters. Later it was half of a full salary if a veteran was incapacitated, ___________ 70

Monti (n. 50), vol. 1, 78 f.; Sapori (n. 43), 429; Spicciani (n. 29), 301. Otto G. Oexle, Les groupes sociaux du Moyen Age et les débuts de la sociologie contemporaine, (1992) 47 Annales. Économies, Sociétés, Civilisations 751–765. 72 Monticolo (n. 7), vol. 2, ch. XL–LXXXXIV (624–662). 73 Monticolo (n. 7), vol. 2, ch. LV, LVIII, LXIII. 71

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and it remained a full salary if the veteran was still able to work.74 The salary of veterans, even though it was dependant on the level of their physical condition and their skills, thus constituted a form of pension. The scheme was on the one hand based on piety and justice (‘per inductu de pietà e de giustitia’).75 On the other hand it guaranteed that the business benefited from the experience of older workers. However, it seems that the guild avoided the risk that productivity criteria would, as utilitarian aspects, trump aspects of social welfare: eligible veterans were simply chosen by a draw.76  It needs to be remembered in the present context that the statutes of Venetian guilds were largely dictated by public officials, the Giustizieri or members of the Office of Justice, which was from 1261 known as the Giustizia Vecchia. For that reason it is hard to say whether the scheme was a private initiative or a public pension scheme. Venetian guilds were controlled by the public authorities and dominated by a mercantile oligarchy. The latter used guilds as a vehicle to advance its own social policy, yet at the same time the oligarchy was careful to confine the activities of guilds to economic matters.77 The modern private-public dichotomy that is often inapt to explain phenomena in legal history is thus also in the present context only of limited value.  III. Confraternities for disabled people – disability and infirmity in medieval society Infirm and disabled persons and people who were for other reasons in need of support may have established their own guilds. Brotherhoods of the blind, the crippled and the lame existed in all major towns of the peninsula, such as Venice, and they were strictly staffed by, for example, beggars and the injured.78 In Milan the guild of the blind, the lame, the crippled, the poor and the sick was established in 1471 at the Church of San Salvatore in Senodochio. It was dedicated to Saint Christopher. It was open to all, even though the majority of its members were indeed disabled, including all of its officers, some of whom did not come from precarious social backgrounds. The guild raised funds by begging in the city. In fact, the city authorities had acknowledged the guild’s right to beg, distinguishing its members from other unauthorised beggars. The guild managed real estate and ___________ 74

Monticolo (n. 7), vol. 2, ch. LX, LXXII. Monticolo (n. 7), vol. 2, ch. LX, LXXII. 76 Monticolo (n. 7), vol. 2, ch. LXII. 77 Brian Pullan, Good Government and Christian Charity in Early Modern Italy, in: Donald T. Critchlow and Charles H. Parker (eds.), With us always: a history of private and public welfare (1998), 77–98. 78 Ortalli (n. 7), 94–96. 75

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land and distributed the returns as alms to the disabled; further, also non-members may have received payments.79 These brotherhoods have traditionally been analysed as measures taken by late-medieval governments against the phenomena of begging and vagrancy. Yet the characteristics of the Milanese guild suggest that the role of invalids and the disabled in these guilds was not just a passive one and that the purpose of these guilds went beyond containment of these phenomena. These guilds also provided forms of self-protection. The authorities of minor as well as major settlements did not take responsibility for the disabled. In medieval legislation and late medieval literature, the problem of disability was not very visible, and when it was discussed it was done so for reasons of control and decorum: the aim was to prevent incapacitated people who were unable to work from begging or becoming vagabonds.80 Overall, municipal legislators addressed the problem on three levels. First, they introduced on the basis of classical and late Roman imperial law legal custodianship for the infirm and disabled; they thereby progressively replaced similar rights, which were again based on the Corpus iuris civilis, exercised by the bishop. Secondly, they aimed at the protection of institutions whose objective was the assistance of the poor and sick; this form of legislative intervention increased between the 13th and 15th centuries, and this trend may be interpreted as a sign of the progressive establishment of health policies in late-medieval welfare politics, although these policies were not always well defined. Thirdly, publicly available doctors were established to treat the disabled.81 Economic problems resulting from a – perhaps only temporary – infirmity preventing work could not only afflict craftsmen, merchants and soldiers, but also high-level professionals such as public officials. An article on the duties of the podestà and capitano del Popolo and their respective salaries included in the 1342 statutes of the municipality of Perugia established that, in the event that the podestà or the capitano fell ill during his period of office, the municipality would ___________ 79 Danilo Zardin, Carità e mutua assistenza nelle confraternite milanesi agli inizi dell’età moderna, in: Maria Pia Alberzoni and Onorato Grassi (eds.), La carità a Milano nei secoli XII–XV (1989), 281–300. 79 Gian Maria Varanini, Imperfezioni fisiche, esenzioni dagli obblighi militari, segnali di identità. Tipologie documentarie e popolazione maschile (Italia, secc. XIV–XV), in: idem (ed.), Deformità fisica e identità della persona tra medioevo ed età moderna (2015), 93–118. 80 Within medieval history, disabilities have only recently been introduced as an object of research: Irina Metzler, Disability in Medieval Europe. Thinking about physical impairment during the high Middle Ages, c. 1100–1400 (2006). See also the contributions in Cordula Nolte et al. (eds.), Dis / ability History der Vormoderne. Ein Handbuch – Premodern dis / ability History. A companion (2017). 81 Pietro Silanos, Homo debilis in civitate. Infermità fisiche e mentali nello spettro della legislazione statutaria dei comuni cittadini italiani, in: Varanini (n. 79), 31–91, 54.

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make ‘niuno pagamento del salario overo per cagione del salario overo per espese overo altra cagione’ (‘no payment of the salary, in lieu of the salary, for expenses or for any other reason’).82 IV. Guilds and medieval hospitals Since the 13th century, many guilds and confraternities established hospitals for sick members.83 The examples are numerous, but the best-known examples certainly come from Florence. Here, all the major local hospitals ended up being governed by guilds and confraternities. Already at the end of the 13th century, the hospital of San Gallo was subjected to the supervision of various guilds, such as the guilds of the bankers, wool merchants, cloth merchants, doctors, apothecaries, fur merchants and silk merchants. At the end of the 14th century, the hospitals of San Matteo and Bonifazio were founded and were controlled by the guilds of the bankers and the cloth merchants. In 1403, the hospital of San Paolo in Santa Maria Novella was placed by the municipality under the control of the guild of the judges and notaries. In the first half of the 15th century, the hospital of the Innocenti was founded, thanks to funds coming from the great merchant of Prato, Francesco di Marco Datini. He entrusted the guild of Por Santa Maria, established by the weavers and silk spinners, with its construction and instituted the guild as its patron.84 The silk merchants’ guild also created a form of mutual health insurance through its own hospital.85 In all of these examples, the assistance was not limited to guild and confraternity members, but the hospitals ensured a minimum of protection to the population, often in the form of alms, and even to the lower classes of the population from which the guilds often recruited their salaried labour. Florence was a special case because, as already mentioned, the government of the city was from the 13th to the 15th century in the hands of the guilds. It is, thus, hardly surprising that, like the main offices of the city, the executive positions in hospitals were also primarily in the hands of members of guilds, in particular those of the cloth merchants and bankers as well as the silk and wool merchants. ___________ 82

Statuto del comune e del popolo di Perugia del 1342 in volgare, vol. 1, lib. I, cap. 4.16 (Silanos (n. 81), 47). 83 Pericle Di Pietro, L’assistenza sanitaria nelle corporazioni medievali d’arti e mestieri, in: Atti del primo Congresso europeo di storia ospedaliera (1962), 450–460. 84 Lucia Sandri, Aspetti dell’assistenza ospedaliera a Firenze nel XV secolo, in: Città e servizi sociali nell’Italia dei secoli XII–XV (1990), 237–257; John Henderson, Piety and Charity in Late Medieval Florence (1994). On Francesco di Marco Datini’s foundation see Paolo Nanni. L’ultime impresa di Francesco Datini: progettualità e realizzazione del ‘Ceppo pe’ poveri di Cristo’, in: Gazzini/Olivieri (n. 44), 281–307. 85 Degrassi (n. 15), passim.

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These professions had the greatest influence within the city government, and their activities in public welfare were considered as proof of their political and economic power. Furthermore, their activities seem to have been a response to the disappearance of the traditional mechanisms of mutual support within guilds at the end of the 13th century, a point to which I will return further below. Hospitals were run by guilds also in those towns where their political weight was not as strong as in Florence, or at least where it lasted not as long. In the 14th and 15th centuries, hospitals for merchants abroad were established on the initiative of the consulate of the Milanese merchants in Genoa and Venice.86 Other hospitals were mainly for local merchants and other professions. In the 13th and 14th centuries the cities of the Emilia-Romagna, which went from a phase of great economic expansion to one of heavy recession,87 saw the birth of numerous hospitals established and managed by guilds: e.g. in Piacenza the tailors’ hospital of San Macario and the millers’ hospital of San Lazzaro, in Modena the merchants’ hospital and the innkeepers’ hospital,88 and in Parma l’Ospedale di Frate Alberto and the hospital of the Quattro Mestieri (the four crafts). The two examples from Parma are particularly interesting. They show the many religious, secular, political and economic facets of guild assistance. The hospital of friar Alberto was founded in 1279 by the municipality and by all guilds of Parma, following the death of Alberto da Bergamo. He was originally from Villa d’Ogna, a village in the Bergamo area. In his life he became a brente carrier (brente being a term for wine or water containers). After a life of pilgrimages and charitable works he died near Cremona. Following his death he became an object of veneration. In Parma the cult around his person centred at places where the guilds were located and active, such as the church of San Pietro. Here a painting of Alberto attracted a crowd of especially ill citizens. They set up a camp, waiting, under tents and pavilions erected on the town hall square overlooked by the church, for a miracle. It was also here that the brentatori gathered when town authorities ordered them to bring water to extinguish fires that broke out in the city. The temporary shelters in front of San Pietro were soon replaced by a stone building. A piece of land in the Santo Stefano district, located next to the town hall square and opposite of San Pietro, was requisitioned from the old aristocratic ruling class. On it a hospital was built with money donated by the guilds. It was then placed under the power of the municipality and the Popolo di ___________ 86 Verga (n. 61), 46–54; Martina Saltamacchia, A Funeral Procession from Venice to Milan: Meanings of a Late-Medieval Merchant’s Death Rituals, in: Thea Cervone (ed.), Dealing with The Dead: Mortality and Community in the Middle Ages (2018), 201–220. 87 Giuliana Albini, Un problema dimenticato: carestie ed epidemie nei secoli XI–XIII. Il caso emiliano, in: Rinaldo Comba and Irma Naso (eds.), Demografia e società nell'Italia medievale. Secoli IX–XIV (1994), 47–68. 88 Greci (n. 38), 87.

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Parma, but at the time the Popolo di Parma and the guilds ruled the city together.89 In contrast, the hospital of the Quattro Mestieri had a more secular appearance. It was founded in 1322 by the judge Ugolino da Neviano. Unlike the other hospitals in Parma that were dedicated to religious persons, the hospital was specifically named after the guild of the four trades – those of shoemakers, furriers, smiths and butchers – who had access to power in Parma between the 13th and 14th centuries, and it was dedicated to its founder, a legal professional, who was very close to the institutions of the municipality of the Popolo.90 Medieval hospitals did not only provide assistance. They were rather communities of mutual assistance. The roles of those who assisted (the fratres and sorores) and of those who were assisted (the poor, the elderly, the sick, and orphaned as well as abandoned children) were often interchangeable. These communities, thus, exhibited traces of a crypto-insurance. By becoming frater or soror, one’s own future was secured. By donating part or all of one’s assets to the hospital, one joined the community and was guaranteed in return food, lodging and other forms of assistance. In addition, medieval hospitals participated in the economic life of their towns: in Siena, Florence, Treviso, Vercelli and Naples, hospitals granted, for example, loans. In some cases, hospitals were active in the banking business. This was, for example, the case with the hospital of Santa Maria della Scala in Siena.91 Other hospitals, such as the hospital of Sant’Andrea in Vercelli, carried out their financial activities in a more informal way, but they still played a central role in the city’s credit system. The hospital of Sant’Andrea was founded in the 13th century by Cardinal Guala Bicchieri. Right from the start it developed an intense financial and commercial relationship with the craftsmen of Vercelli. They turned to the hospital to borrow money and to rent houses or shops. And the hospital was known to be a lenient creditor. In the case of default, the hospital reacted in a more cooperative way than other private money lenders did. And the craftsmen were often allowed to pay their debts with services or artefacts.92 The activities of hospitals in the financial sector may be interpreted ___________ 89 On Alberto di Villa d’Ogna see André Vauchez, Holiness in the Middle Ages (1989), 159; Antonio I. Pini, La santità nel medioevo (1989), 159; idem, Miracoli del vino e santi bevitori nell’Italia d’età comunale, in: La vite e il vino. Storia e diritto (secoli XI–XIX), vol. 1 (2000), 367–382. 90 On the two hospitals see Marina Gazzini, Memoria ‘religiosa’ e memoria ‘laica’: sulle origini di ospedali di area padana (secoli XII–XIV), in: La mémoire des origines dans les institutions médiévales, Mélanges de l’école Française de Rome – Moyen Âge, vol 115/1 (2003), 361–384. 91 Piccinni (n. 39), passim. 92 Beatrice Del Bo, Gli artigiani vercellesi del ‘300 fra ‘credito di categoria’ e relazioni con l’ospedale di Sant’Andrea, in: Mauro Carboni and Maria Giuseppina Muzzarelli (eds.), Reti di credito. Circuiti informali, impropri, nascosti (secoli XIII–XIX) (2014), 67–90.

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as a means to fight usury – a problem often addressed in guild statutes. Furthermore, these activities were an important antecedent of Monti di Pietà.

E. Mututal support, crypto-insurance and charity To belong to a guild meant to be protected from various risks. Guild members received help in cases of infirmity and accident and obtained cash benefits, medical-pharmaceutical assistance and hospitalisation. Furthermore, they could receive compensation for work-related damages. They were protected against the financial risks of unemployment and old age. Guilds took care of the body and the soul of deceased members. Finally, guild members may have been helped in extreme cases of deprivation of liberty: guilds may have paid ransom to pirates as well as bandits, and they may have helped in cases of economic and political imprisonment. However, in most cases guild members did not acquire a legally enforceable right to help. They simply developed a reasonable expectation of receiving it. In his writings, Sapori identified two conditions that had to be met for an institution to count as a form of insurance: (1) there had to a legal right to assistance rather than its being an act of discretion; (2) there had to be special funds established for covering the costs of such assistance. Indeed, there are examples that meet these conditions. In addition to the aforementioned examples, the Florentine guild of the oliandoli and pizzicagnoli – retailers of oil, cold meats, cheeses and other foodstuffs – may be mentioned. In 1345, the guild established a separate societas that managed a fund explicitly destined for the support of sick, poor or deceased members: all guild members had to join this society, and there was an obligatory payment of 24 denari.93 The political-territorial fragmentation was, however, an obstacle to achieving clearly institutionalised mutual insurance schemes across Italy. The consequence of this fragmentation was that a variety of different corporate patterns developed. Thus, the value of the aforementioned examples is, for the purpose of the present contribution, equivocal. In some cases, it is indeed possible to speak of crypto-insurance: in return for membership fees, donations and testamentary dispositions, or even in return for labour, members gained a sense of security, namely that they could count on help in the event they and their families were in need.94 Even fines, which members had to pay if they had not fulfilled their duties and obligations as members of the guild, were at times used towards this end. In Venice, for example, fines were, at least partly, used to benefit poor and sick ___________ 93

Spicciani (n. 29), 322. However, aid was not transferable to dependants. No statute extended the aid to, for instance the widow or the orphans of the deceased member: Spicciani (n. 29), 314. 94

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members. A third of fines was used for this purpose, while the rest was divided between Giustizieri and Sovrastanti. The former were holders of a public office; the latter were responsible for guilds.95 In other cities, the use of fines for the purpose of financing assistance was not specified. It is clear that in Florence half of the fines went to the town and the other half to the guild. In Pistoia, a third went to the town, a third to the guild and the remaining third to the cathedral’s building authority. However, it is possible that the institutions participating in the fines reallocated them to members in need of the same guild from which the money had been collected. Further research into the accounts of these entities, if available, could clarify this open question. Assistance was also offered to non-members. Then it was a form of charity, as these individuals had not financially contributed to the respective support schemes. Usually the beneficiaries of such acts of charity were, however, not complete strangers. In many cases they included members of the fallen nobility and former members of the urban wealth oligarchy: bankrupt merchant as well as sick and impoverished craftsmen.96 Or else they belonged to the class of workers whose salary was kept low by the same elite who financed the charity of guilds and their hospitals. In this context, it needs to be remembered that charity has always been an instrument of power, aimed at increasing the prestige of those in power and their control over pauperes and miserabiles personae.97 The charity of professional and devotional guilds was therefore a means of creating bonds and personal dependencies. This occurred in a phase, the late Middle Ages, featuring a progressive oligarchic grip on the civic and seigniorial authorities; a ‘give’ and ‘take’ typical of the mentality of economic leaders of the time who were well aware of the spiritual and social value of charitable acts.98 In those towns where guilds also played a political function, the assistance provided through hospitals that they controlled covered the needs of the entire society of the town and therefore expressed a vision of the government in which assistance, with all its various meanings, played an important role in the name of the ‘common good’.99 ___________ 95

Spicciani (n. 29), 319. Giovanni Ricci, Povertà, vergogna, superbia. I declassati fra Medioevo ed età moderna (1996). 97 Gazzini (n. 53), 112. 98 Roberto Rusconi, Da Costanza al Laterano: la ‘calcolata devozione’ del ceto mercantile-borghese dell’Italia del Quattrocento, in: Gabriele De Rosa et al. (eds.), Storia dell’Italia religiosa, vol. 1 (1993), 505–536. 99 From the vast Italian and international bibliography on the concept and practices of the ‘common good’ in the late Middle Ages, see Élodie Lecuppre-Desjardine and Anne Laure Van Bruaene (eds.), De Bono Communi. The Discourse and Practice of the Common Good in the European City (13th–16th c.) – Discours et pratique du Bien Commun dans les villes d’Europe (XIIIe au XVIe siècle) (2009). 96

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F. Towards the modern age – between continuity and discontinuity The historical setting for guild support and assistance was anything but static. It follows that the examples discussed in the present contribution and all observations made with respect to them are valid for their time and place. However, the examples may have been subject to change. At the end of the Middle Ages, for example, guilds and confraternities experienced in some places an evolution towards forced inclusion. This was the case in Venice, where enrolment in the guild became compulsory for anyone wishing to practise a profession.100 In other places the development was towards exclusion from social participation. In 15th-century Milan, some large scholae expelled members, who consequently lost their identity as confrater as well as all material and spiritual benefits connected to membership.101 Furthermore, it has been noted that provisions on mutual aid in the statutes of Italian medieval guilds progressively decreased until they disappeared.102 This development occurred parallel to the process of transformation of guilds as a result of the changing economic, political and social conditions. Within guilds, a closed elitism came to the fore and became a distinguishing feature of late medieval society. Master craftsmen closed their ranks, blocking the rise of those below them. They wanted to present themselves as a class rather than as an open group of workers. The confraternities benefited from this development. They remained privileged spaces of solidarity – a solidarity which extended to members’ families and which even went beyond the families of members. Members’ families were largely excluded from the benefits granted by guilds. The confraternity of Spirito Santo of Piacenza may serve as an example. Since its foundation in the second half of the 13th century, it mainly housed women, who were not admitted

___________ 100

See Monticolo (n. 7), passim. The tendency towards closed circles, found mainly at the top of charitable organisations, was a consequence of the increasing interest shown by the higher social classes in the control of assistance. Such control went along with economic power, social prestige and influence in city authorities. This was a general trend. For Milan see Giuliana Albini, Assistenza sanitaria e pubblici poteri a Milano alla fine del Quattrocento, in: Milano nell’età di Ludovico il Moro, vol. 1 (1983), 129–146 (also in: idem, Città e ospedali nella Lombardia medievale (1993), 184–208); Gazzini, Confraternite e società cittadina, (n. 21), 257–277. See furthermore Antonio Noto, Origini del luogo pio della Carità nella crisi sociale di Milano quattrocentesca (1962). 102 Greci (n. 38), 87; Spicciani (n. 29), 320; Degrassi (n. 15), 144. This does not mean that there were no exceptions: Venetian guilds, which were subject to strong state intervention, continued to implement such mechanisms for the benefit of their members. 101

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to guilds, and those who wanted to escape the constraints of guilds.103 Furthermore, new ideas on support and assistance implemented by both public and private actors developed. Guild welfare contributed greatly to the development of these new ideas, as the examples of Florence and Naples prove; however, here they developed only since the 16th century.104 Even when, from the 15th century onwards, there was a vigorous expansion of corporate associations, though stripped of their political prerogatives, these would no longer correspond to a ‘Weltanschauung saldamente ancorata a un concetto di giustizia e di equità’ (‘Weltanschauung firmly anchored to a concept of justice and equity’).105 In the guild statutes of the 16th and 17th centuries, one finds many rules concerning compulsory membership and numerous provisions on the obligations between merchants and craftsmen and between apprentices and masters. Further, there emerge other labour regulations as well as rules on the election, duration, and jurisdiction of internal offices. This trend changed completely in the late 17th and then especially in the 18 centuries when the guild statutes found in the entire peninsula exhibited once again a marked increase in welfare standards. At a time when guilds were in decline across Europe106 as a result of their being suppressed by public authorities for political and ideological reasons,107 their support schemes were actually the most important argument in favour of keeping them. This trend in the last century of their existence in Italy brought them again closer to their medieval confraternal origins.108 In the end, this renaissance of guild welfare did not prevent them from being abolished. From an economic point of view they were still vital, but from political and institutional perspectives they became simply outdated. The newly th

___________ 103 Marina Gazzini, Donne e uomini in confraternita. La matricola del Consorzio dello Spirito Santo di Piacenza (1268), (2000) 52 Archivio Storico per le Province Parmensi 253–274 (extended version: idem, Confraternite e società cittadina (n. 21), 157–196). 104 Florentine hospitals supported by guilds have been mentioned above. With respect to Naples, it has to be kept in mind that it was the capital of a state that since the 15th century was a province of a kingdom based outside Italy. Here guilds had since the 16th century been involved in welfare through the establishment of institutions dependent on them, the Monti. On payment of a weekly or monthly fee, these institutions of aid provided assistance in the event of sickness, disability, old age, widowhood or imprisonment, and to daughters who were married or became nuns, see Giovanni Muto, Forme e contenuti economici dell’assistenza nel Mezzogiorno moderno: il caso di: il caso di Napoli, in: Timore e carità. I poveri nell’Italia moderna (1982), 237–258. 105 Paola Lanaro, Gli Statuti delle Arti in età moderna tra norma e pratiche. Primi appunti sul caso veneto, in: Guenzi et al. (n. 12), 327–344, 339. 106 Luigi Dal Pane, Il tramonto delle corporazioni in Italia (secoli XVIII e XIX) (1940). 107 Luca Mocarelli, Le attività manifatturiere a Milano tra continuità dell’apparato corporativo e il suo superamento (1713–1787), in: Guenzi et al. (n. 12), 131–170. 108 Luigi Mascilli Migliorini, Confraternite e corporazioni a Napoli. Devozione religiosa e tutela del mestiere, in: Guenzi et al. (n. 12), 575–588.

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established Camere di commercio (Chambers of Commerce) did not inherit all the functions previously performed by guilds. Especially with respect to their welfare schemes, their abolition left gaps behind. Hence, there was a need to establish new institutions filling these gaps, such as mutual aid societies.109 In conclusion, the legacy of guilds is not lost. The ethical value of many of their standards proved to have a lasting impact on the statutory laws of the urban centres.110 The main reason for this impact is that these standards were not restricted to guilds alone, but were instead representative and characteristic of the society of the whole ancien régime.

___________ 109 They were established in the 19th century: Renata Allìo, Assistenza e previdenza in Piemonte tra corporazioni e società di mutuo soccorso, in: Guenzi et al. (n. 12), 613–627; Luigi Trezzi, Sopravvivenze corporative nel mutualismo artigiano ed operaio a Milano durante la prima metà del XIX secolo, in: Guenzi et al. (n. 12), 628–642. 110 Lanaro (n. 105), 329.

Chapter 9: Guilds, Confraternities and Mutual Support in Medieval and Early Modern Spain By José A. Nieto Sánchez and Victoria López Barahona* A. Introduction ............................................................................................................ 193 B. Professional confraternities from the Middle Ages to the 16th century ................... 195 C. Guilds and confraternities in the early modern period ............................................ 200 D. Mutual aid brotherhoods in the early modern period .............................................. 207 E. The reform of confraternities .................................................................................. 211 F. Conclusions ............................................................................................................ 214

A. Introduction In 1848, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels observed that the advancement of capitalism in Europe caused the disintegration of the working-class family and community bonds that once characterized pre-capitalist society.1 Not long before, confraternities and mutual aid brotherhoods had begun to give way to new forms of protection. Yet, in many European regions, traditional confraternities continued to exist, and they were simply transformed into social security schemes, to a considerable extent retaining the heritage of the Ancien régime. It is these traditions which will be analysed in the present chapter covering Spain – a country where capitalist transformations occurred later than elsewhere in Europe – with a focus on mutual support in professional contexts in the kingdoms of Castile and Aragon from the Middle Ages to the early 19th century. It is generally thought that social provisioning in pre-modern societies was closely linked to guilds, as indeed has been demonstrated for Germany and the

___________ * This study is part of the following research projects: Nuevas perspectivas en la Historia Social en la ciudad de Madrid y sus áreas de influencia en época moderna (HAR2014-53298-C2-2-P); Nuevas perspectivas de Historia Social en los territorios del Mediterráneo occidental en la Edad Moderna (HAR2014-53298-C2-1-P) (both within the framework of the Plan Nacional I+d+i, 2014–2018); Red de Estudios Históricos del Trabajo Latinoamericano y Español, wich belongs to the Proyecto de cooperación interuniversitaria UAM-Santander con América Latina 2107–18 (CEAL-AL/2017-15). 1 James Casey, La invención de la comunidad y la historia social, (2003) 23 Revista Pedralbes 779–796, 779.

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Low Countries.2 The same cannot be so firmly claimed for Spain, and our findings will be more nuanced. In principle, Spanish guild statutes did not include clauses that regulated mutual support in cases of sickness, widowhood, poverty, or unemployment. Instead, mutual support was offered by confraternities, which guilds maintained. There was a division of responsibilities between guilds and confraternities. The former focused on trade issues. The latter were in charge of religious, charitable, and ceremonial concerns. Moreover, from the 17th century onwards a new type of mutual aid association, linked to certain trades, but not necessarily to guilds, experienced a remarkable growth. In sum, the relationship between guilds and mutual support was an indirect rather than a direct one. The different forms of associations which will be discussed in the present chapter require some terminological clarification. First, there are the terms cofradía (confraternity) and hermandad (brotherhood and sisterhood). Both terms derive from the Latin word fraternitas, and both were used to denominate religious and charitable associations. Such associations were affiliated on the one hand with ecclesiastical entities, such as parishes, convents, hermitages, or congregations, and on the other hand with certain trades and professions. The present chapter will concentrate on the latter only. Secondly, there was a conceptual difference between Aragon and Castile. The Castilian language has two distinct terms: cofradía and gremio. Cofradía translates as confraternity, and gremio is the Castilian term for guild. By contrast, the Aragonese language only knows a single word, confraria, to refer to both kinds of associations. Thus, in Aragon the term confraria brought together all functions (occupational, ceremonial, charitable, etc.) performed by oficis and collegis (trades and colleges). This terminological divergence remained in place at least until 1715, when, in the aftermath of the War of the Spanish Succession, the new Bourbon monarchy imposed the Castilian model in Aragon through the Ley de Nueva Planta (Law of New Foundation). For the present study we have consulted primary sources such as guild statutes and their financial accounts as well as modern literature available on pre-modern forms of mutual support in the different regions of Spain. While research on both the Middle Ages and the modern era has made remarkable progress in recent years, a gap remains for the early modern period. Spanish historians have paid much attention to church and state-sponsored charity and to poor relief implemented between the 16th and the 18th centuries, but very little to forms of mutual

___________ 2 Marcel van der Linden, Social Security Mutualism. The Comparative History of Mutual Benefit Societies (1996); Marco van Leeuwen, Guilds and middle-class welfare, 1550–1800: provisions for burial, sickness, old age, and widowhood, (2012) 65 The Economic History Review 61–90.

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aid offered by professional associations.3 The only monograph on the topic was published in 1944.4 In the absence of further studies, it continued to be a reference work for a long time. Fresh research on professional confraternities in early modern Spain began to appear in the 1980s and 1990s.5 Moreover, in 2009 the Spanish Asociación de Historia Social published the minutes of its biannual congress, which was dedicated to the topic.6 In the following analysis, we will first describe the situation of professional confraternities from the Middle Ages to the 16th century in Castile and Aragon. Secondly, we will explore a number of guild statutes in order to assess the extent to which they included aspects of social provisioning. In a third step, we will focus on the mutual support schemes in early modern trades, paying special attention to craft guilds. Finally, we will discuss the reform of confraternities initiated by the state during the second half of the 18th century, and we will analyse the effects which this reform had on the mutual support offered by professional confraternities to their members. In all, the present chapter will offer a comprehensive analysis of the long-term evolution of Spanish pre-modern mutual support schemes, which will facilitate comparisons with other European regions.

B. Professional confraternities from the Middle Ages to the 16th century In the Christian kingdoms of the Iberian Peninsula, mutual aid schemes in professional contexts were established later than in central and northern Europe due to the so-called Reconquista, which had different rhythms in Aragon and Castile. It was not until the 15th century that professional associations appeared in southern Castile, while in Aragon they date back to the High Middle Ages. Moreover, as already explained, the Kingdom of Aragon united in just one or___________ 3 This historiographical gap becomes more striking considering that some recent studies on modern mutuality contend that the Spanish system was pioneering in Europe: Margarita Vilar, La cobertura social a través de los socorros mutuos obreros, 1839–1935 ¿Una alternativa al Estado para afrontar los fallos del mercado?, in: Jerònia Pons Pons et al. (eds.), Los orígenes del Estado del Bienestar en España, 1900–1945: los seguros de accidentes, vejez, desempleo y enfermedad (2010), 85–122. 4 Antonio Rumeu de Armas, Historia de la Previsión Social en España. Cofradías, gremios, hermandades, montepíos (1944). This monograph answered the newly established fascist regime’s interest in the pre-modern corporate model as a social security scheme to be reintroduced in Spain. 5 Worth mentioning, Elena Sánchez Madariaga, De la ‘caridad fraternal’ al ‘socorro mutuo’: las hermandades de socorro de Madrid en el siglo xviii, in: Santiago Castillo (ed.), Solidaridad desde abajo (1994), 31–50. 6 Santiago Castillo et al. (eds.), La previsión social en la Historia (2009).

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ganization – named confraria – all functions performed by professional associations, while in Castile these functions were divided into two distinct – albeit closely related – entities: confraternities and guilds. Professional confraternities provided religious assistance, they organized processions and feasts, they were in charge of all the paraphernalia that fostered collective identity, and they offered support to members in need as well as to their spouses. This latter aspect was initially understood as caridad fraternal (fraternal charity) and was later conceived as socorro mutuo (mutual aid), a concept with less religious overtones.7 A quantitative approach to confraternities in Castile and Aragon has been carried out for the period between 1122 and 1521. Germán Navarro Espinach identified 436 confraternities. 245 of these (56%) belonged to trades: 144 in Aragon and 101 in Castile. Cities show the highest numbers. Standing out prominently in Aragon are Barcelona with 22 professional confraternities, Saragossa with 37, and Valencia with 52. In Castile, Burgos had 19 such confraternities, whereas in Seville only 8 out of 91 confraternities were linked to trades. The graph below shows the diverging chronology in the foundation of trade confraternities in each kingdom. In Aragon, it gathered momentum in the later part of the 14th century, while in Castile it did so a century later, in the decade of 1480. The sample includes a diversity of trades, although crafts are the majority in both kingdoms.8

___________ 7 A discussion of the terminological problems is found in José Angel Sesma et al., Cofradías, gremios y solidaridades en la Europa medieval, XIX Semana de Estudios Medievales (1993). 8 Germán Navarro Espinach, Las cofradías medievales en España, (2014) 396/1 Historia 107–133.

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Evolution of professional confraternities in Aragon and Castile, 1120–1521 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0

Aragon

Castile

Professional confraternities were dedicated to a local saint, a virgin, or the patron saint of the trade. In Castile, guild masters were obliged to join the guild’s confraternity. The latter required a high degree of organization and cohesion in order to perform the periodical religious ceremonies such as masses or processions which were dedicated to the confraternity’s saint or saints as well as to furnish the support to members in need. Support was generally provided in cases of sickness and death. Confraternities were funded by their members’ regular fees, but they could also benefit from special levies of the respective guild or from external donations. Notwithstanding their horizontal structure in relation to funding, as equal fees were paid by all members, confraternities were vertical, hierarchical organizations given that important decisions were made by a board of confraternity officials (called mayordomos). Confraternities’ resources were usually scarce, but most confraternities guaranteed a decent burial to their members, something that was as costly as symbolically relevant. They provided coffins, graves, candles, prayers, requiems, and periodical mass services on deceased members’ anniversaries of death. However, confraternities of those trades that faced greater risks usually also offered a wider range of benefits which were oriented to meeting members’ individual needs. Confraternities of seafarers and the land transport sector were pioneers in this respect.

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The statutes of the majority of medieval fishermen’s confraternities, for example, offered support which went beyond guaranteeing a decent funeral. The 1456 and 1490 statutes of the fishermen of San Vicente de la Barquera and those of Luarca (1468) and Lequeitio (1483), all located on the Bay of Biscay, stipulated that sick fishermen who were unable to get on board should receive a share of the gains. In addition, if a fisherman had suffered from a work accident, the confraternity provided alms in the form of shelter, food, and care. The regulations of the transport trades followed similar patterns. For example, the muleteers of Atienza (Soria) agreed in the 12th and 13th centuries that sick brothers should have their brethren stay by their bedside.9 Maritime and land transport trades were also pioneering in aiding the elderly. Between 1319 and 1331, the fishermen of San Vicente de la Barquera (Santander) obliged the confraternity’s masters to give employment to the eldest brothers, and if the latter were unfit to go on board, they had to be provided for ashore. The fishermen in Bermeo (Biscay) in 1353 and those in San Pedro de Fuenterrabía (Guipúzcoa) in 1418 agreed that a portion of the catch of all ships was to be collected in order to support the elderly and the disabled. Similar measures were taken by the fishermen of Luarca (Asturias) in 1468 and San Pedro de Lequeitio (Biscay) in 1483.10 In the crafts, the first references to mutual aid date back to the 12th century. However, there are only a small number of examples, and they seem to have had no lasting impact and seem not to have been widespread in Castile. In 1162, the tailors’ confraternity of Betanzos (Galicia) dedicated to the Holy Trinity was prepared to give alms to impoverished brothers, to arrange funerals for deceased brothers, and to care for sick members. It obtained the funds that it needed to that end from selling wax, which new members had to supply when entering the confraternity. Moreover, it supported brothers who were blind or impaired and, thus, unable to work. In general, it was financed by the guild via periodical contributions, entry as well as examination fees, and fines imposed on those infringing the statutes. Women were also members of the confraternity if they practised the tailoring craft, a case that seems unique given that in other confraternities only brothers’ widows were admitted, albeit out of charity.11 Another case that seems singular is that of the tailors’ confraternity of Oviedo (Asturias) in 1450, which also admitted men and women. Their statutes stipulated that sick or imprisoned members should be visited by their brethren and ___________ 9

C.f. also Francisco Layna Serrano, Historia de la villa de Atienza (1945), 490. On what follows see José Damián González Arce, Análisis comparativo de las cofradías de pescadores de Castilla (siglos XIII–XV), (2011) 38 Historia. Instituciones. Documentos 141–217. 11 César Vaamonde Lores, La cofradía de los sastres de Betanzos. Año 1162, (1911) 46 Boletín de la Real Academia Galega 244–251. 10

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given certain amounts of wine. In case of illness, shifts to stand by the sickbed were taken. Some years earlier, in 1423, the silversmiths of Toledo also agreed to give support to their sick brothers. And in 1489, all blacksmiths in Murcia, Muslims and Jews included, were obliged to join the confraternity. Its statutes stipulated that members had to attend the funerals of their deceased brothers and give alms to those who went to ruin.12 Aragon witnessed mutual aid schemes in professional confraternities, too. Just as in Castile, confraternities linked to the seafaring sector stand out. The statutes of the boatmen (1380), caulkers (1392), and maritime porters (1459) of Barcelona as well as those of the sailors, fishermen, and caulkers (all 1392) of Valencia guaranteed burials. However, confraternities in Aragon were more progressive concerning some other aspects of support. For example, the caulkers of Barcelona stipulated that, if a member fell ill or into poverty, the confraternity should use its funds to provide them with food, medical care, and other necessary items. The statutes of the fishermen’s confraternity of San Andrés in Valencia and of the maritime porters in Barcelona introduced a similar system. Furthermore, they arranged a system of visits and shifts by the sickbed so that the bedfast member was never left alone. Valencia’s sailors in 1392 used the confraternity’s entry fees and annual payments to grant relief to impoverished brothers and to cover ransom for those who were captured by pirates. The latter provision was also common in the confraternity’s statutes of the caulkers, sailors, and fishermen of Tortosa and Barcelona.13 The 15th century witnessed significant variations in support schemes. The boatmen of Barcelona used the confraternity’s funds to pay regular wages to sick or disabled brothers who could demonstrate that their ailments were work-related until they were fully recovered. However, they had to remain in Barcelona and they had to agree to regular overseers’ visits. Furthermore, the benefit was not to be given if the same illness was contracted a second time. Elderly and disabled brothers received their full regular wages because it was generally assumed that they had been dedicating their whole life to the trade.14 A similar provision is included in the statutes of Valencia’s confraternity of fishermen. Moreover, the boatmen of Barcelona created a fund that was distributed equally among the brothers. ___________ 12 José Damián González Arce, Las corporaciones laborales como órganos de previsión social. Castilla, siglos XII–XV, IX Congreso de Historia Económica (2000), unpublished. 13 José Damián González Arce, Las cofradías del mar en la Corona de Aragón (siglos XIII–XV), (2008) 21 Espacio, Tiempo y Forma (serie III, Historia Medieval) 285–310. 14 Pierre Bonnassie, La organización del trabajo en Barcelona a fines del siglo XV (1975), 130 f.

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Artisans in Valencia and Barcelona seem to have been more active in mutual support than their peers in Castile. The dagger-makers of Barcelona, who were a point of reference for other professional confraternities, also stood by the beds of sick brothers and paid for the funerals of deceased members. Cash payments to ailing brothers were offered only by the silversmiths and dyers. Relief to impoverished brothers was more common through what was known as almoyes secretes (secret alms) provided by wealthier brethren. Just like the seafaring profession and other trades, also the dagger-makers, silversmiths, and furriers of Barcelona contrived ways to rescue members who were caught by Muslim pirates and to give dowries to brothers’ daughters. Moreover, tailors and potters included journeymen as beneficiaries of their mutual support schemes. One of the clauses of their statutes even prefigures an unemployment benefit: in moments of shrinking labour demand, journeymen were given a certain amount of money for them to leave the city and seek work elsewhere. At the end of the 15th century, this kind of benefit was also stipulated by the shearers and ribbon-makers of the same city.15

C. Guilds and confraternities in the early modern period In early modern Spain, guilds were abundant in cities and many rural districts, although not all trades established such a corporate association.16 In the industrial sector, guilds were institutions formed by masters of the same craft who were competent in regulating their activity in a given town and sometimes the town’s near surroundings, too. Guilds obtained from public authorities the privilege to practise their craft in a specific location, to control the quantity and quality of the output, to fix prices and wages, to select the recruitment of new members, and to organize the labour markets. Guild masters appreciated the regular availability of raw materials as well as the joint collection of taxes owed to the royal or municipal treasury, the coverage of the costs of litigations, and the promise of certain forms of support. In a world with a high risk of falling into poverty, guilds aimed at levelling differences in wealth among masters by ensuring that all of them obtained enough income to make ends meet. Consequently, preference was given to poorer masters in the distribution of raw materials, guilds and confraternities stored provisions for times of scarcity, and wealthier members were burdened with a greater share when paying taxes jointly. Mutual support was offered by the guilds’ confraternities. Thus, guild statutes do not include any clauses on support offered to members, as has been proven by ___________ 15

Bonnassie (n. 14), 129–138. For a general overview for Europe see James Farr, Artisans in Europe, 1300–1914 (2000). For Madrid see José A. Nieto Sánchez, Artesanos y mercaderes. Una historia social y económica de Madrid, 1450–1850 (2006). 16

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research on guild statutes carried out for Castile and Aragon covering a time span from the late Middle Ages to the early modern era. A sample of 309 statutes was analysed, out of which 124 are dated to the 15th century and 154 to the 16th century. Forty-two of these statutes belonged to guilds in Aragon. In addition, we have consulted literature available for the 17th and 18th centuries together with guild statutes from Valencia, Barcelona, Seville, Murcia, and Madrid. For the period from 1251 to 1600, only 228 of 4,901 clauses (4.6%) address aspects related to mutual support; this corresponds to only 14 guild statutes, the majority of which come from the Kingdom of Aragon. Most of these clauses relate to burials and sick brothers.17 An analysis of statutes of guilds in Madrid covering the period from 1500 to 1650 confirms this finding: in altogether 467 clauses, no reference to questions of mutual support is found. Of the seven statutes examined for the period from 1650 to 1699, only one – that of the passementerie guild enacted in 1677 – stipulates that a portion of the examination fees should go to cover the funeral cost of impoverished masters as well as journeymen and to assist those imprisoned.18 By contrast, in Seville, nine out of 18 statutes dating from the 17th century regulate different aspects of mutual aid.19 Conversely, in Valencia, only 21 out of 690 clauses from 71 guild statutes refer to aspects of mutual help.20 This trend continues into the 18th century, as guild statutes from Murcia, Barcelona, and Valencia prove. Madrid shows some significant exceptions. For example, the third clause of the 1753 statutes of the tailors’ guild deals with the confraternity’s annual limosnas (alms) to the poor, to widows, and to female orphans. These alms amounted to 12,000 reales – a substantial sum. And the 1775 statutes of the shoemakers’ guild required that everyone should pay a weekly contribution of 0.5 reales to finance the costs for physicians, medicines, candles, and burials.21 ___________ 17 Antonio Collantes de Terán, Los poderes públicos y las ordenanzas de oficios, en la manufactura urbana i el menestrals (ss. XIII–XVI), in: IX Jornades d’Estudis Històrics locals (1991), 357–371, 362. 18 On guilds between 1500 and 1650 see Juan Carlos Zofío, Gremios y artesanos en Madrid, 1550–1650. La sociedad del trabajo en una ciudad cortesana preindustrial (2005), 292–298. The statutes of the passementerie guild can be found in the Archivo General de Simancas, Consejo Supremo de Hacienca, leg. 330, exp. 30. 19 Antonio Miguel Bernal, Antonio Collantes and Antonio García Baquero, Sevilla, de los gremios a la industrialización, (1978) 5–6 Estudios de Historia Social 7–307, 86. 20 Isabel Amparo Baixauli Juan, Els artesans de la València del segle XVII. Capítols dels oficis i col∙legis (2001). 21 Archivo Histórico Nacional, Consejos, leg. 490; Archivo de la Villa de Madrid, Corregimietno, 1-211-21; Juan García Abellán, Organización de los gremios en la Murcia del siglo XVIII (1976); Fernando Díez, Viles y mecánicos. Trabajo y sociedad en la Valencia preindustrial (1989); Bernal, Collantes and García Baquro (n. 19).

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José A. Nieto Sánchez and Victoria López Barahona Table 1: Guild statutes with references to mutual support in five Spanish cities22 Cities

Number of statutes

Number of clauses

Clauses concerning support

Percentage

Madrid

22

781

14

1.7

Seville

29

163

11

6.7

Murcia

14

457

6

1.3

Barcelona

5

139

3

2.1

Valencia

13

769

28

3.6

Total

83

2,309

62

2.5

Although guild statutes show only little evidence of activities in mutual support, it should be noted that guilds sponsored hospitals in the late Middle Ages and in the early modern period, as did the shoemakers of Valencia in 1300 and several guilds in 16th-century Seville. In addition, all guilds financed their own confraternities.23 In Madrid, the examination fees that journeymen paid to become masters were in part destined to the confraternity, especially from the decade of 1660 onwards, as we can see in Table 2.

___________ 22 For Madrid, Barcelona and Valencia, ordinances have been consulted in municipal archives; for Seville see Bernal, Collantes and García Baquero (n. 19), 95; for Murcia see García Abellán (n. 21). 23 On Valencia, Leopoldo Piles Ros, Estudio sobre el gremio de zapateros (1959); Luis Tramoyeres Blasco, Instituciones gremiales. Su origen y organización en Valencia (1889); Bernal, Collantes and García Baquero (n. 19). Some masters individually engaged in acts of solidarity, like the silversmith Lucas Díaz from Madrid, who donated two bedsteads at the hospital of La Pasión for ailing widows and children of his brethren, see María Jiménez Salas, Historia de la asistencia social en España en la Edad Moderna (1958), 173.

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Table 2: Examination fees paid by new masters in Madrid, 1630–1749 Portion going to the confraternity

Date of guild statutes

Examination fees in reales

Total

%

Cobblers

1633

10

2

20

New clothiers

1637

16

0

0

Turners

1654

26

4

15.3

Arquebusiers

1654

16

0

0

Hemp-makers

1655

11

0

0

Turners

1664

60

11

18.3

Carpenters

1668

22

22

100

Passementeriers

1677

33

33

100

Mead-makers

1687

64

0

0

Saddle-makers

1719

10

0

0

Linen weavers

1741

257.5

220

85.4

Confectioners

1742

220

220

100

Cabinet-makers

1748

137

122

89

Old clothes dealers

1748

100

0

0

Guild

Likewise, in 18th-century Murcia the confectioners’ guild transferred examination fees to its confraternity so that it could attend to ‘urgencias y gastos del oficio’ (‘emergencies and trade expenses’) and ‘socorrer si alguno de los maestros u oficiales viniese a suma pobreza o enfermedad’ (‘assist masters or journeymen if falling in deep poverty or illness’). The espadrille-makers, too, used examination fees for the ‘socorro de maestros infelices’ (‘assistance of masters falling into decay’). And the silk-twister masters made explicit that the guild’s funds should be reserved for ‘el alivio y socorro de dicho gremio o de sus maestros en las necesidades que en común o particular se les ofrecieren’ (‘the relief and aid of the guild or its masters in necessity which may arise collectively or individually’). In all of these cases, the guilds’ office holders were responsible for judging and deciding who was entitled to support.24 The evidence suggests that there was a clear division of responsibilities between guilds and confraternities. Guild statutes dealt in principle only with aspects related to the trade itself. Confraternities were in charge of ceremonial, religious, and charitable activities. Virtually all confraternities covered the costs of deceased brothers’ burials and often those of their spouses and children, too. Furthermore, they granted some form of support in times in which a member experienced distress. It is probable that the forms and scope of support correlated to ___________ 24

García Abellán (n. 21), 138.

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the size of the different trades as well as the size of their guilds and confraternities. For example, the shoemakers’ guild in Madrid, the second largest guild in the city, had in total six confraternities, some of which were only subsidiaries to the main confraternity. They were dedicated to the two patron saints of the profession and to Todas las Ánimas (All Souls). All of them provided support to their members. One of these confraternities, called Nuestra Señora de las Nieves (Our Lady of the Snow), was committed since the 16th century to assisting ailing brothers and sisters, and it even hired doctors and apothecaries to this end. Moreover, two of these confraternities were open to people from other trades. Their membership grew so much that its 1612 statutes tightened its entrance requirements. In addition, the guild itself kept a dowry fund for orphan girls.25 The composition of members in such confraternities was diverse. Sometimes they admitted masters only. Others admitted only journeymen. Again others allowed both masters and journeymen. And some confraternities admitted people from other professions. Journeymen’s confraternities were usually a matter of concern to local authorities and guilds. They were first established in the 15th century in cities like Barcelona, Saragossa, Valencia, and Castellon. In Madrid, there is evidence of 12 journeymen’s confraternities since 1583. These confraternities, too, initiated mutual support schemes. However, sometimes they also had strike funds, as was the case with the confraternity of San Antonio de Padua (Saint Anthony of Padova) of the tailor journeymen in 1607.26 By contrast, apprentices did not organize mutual support through confraternities. Their masters were usually obliged under the contract of apprenticeship, which they concluded with the apprentices’ legal representatives, to care for them if they suffered from something other than a sexually transmitted disease and if the illness lasted only a limited period of time.

___________ 25 On this ‘orphan box’, see Antonio Manuel Moral Roncal, Gremios e Ilustración en Madrid (1775–1836) (1998). 26 Archivo Histórico Nacional, Consejos, leg. 490; Nieto Sánchez (n. 16), 173.

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Table 3: Journeymen’s confraternities in five Spanish cities (according to their dates of foundation)27 15th century

16th century

17th century

18th century

Madrid

0

4

2

6

Valladolid

0

0

0

5

Barcelona

2

0

1

8

Valencia

0

0

1

5

Saragossa

0

0

8

4

There were some exceptions to the clear division of responsibilities between guilds and confraternities. One such exception is the cobblers’ guild in Madrid, another large guild in the city. Its 1633 statutes stipulate that medical care should be provided to all members, support to the poor masters, and benefits to masters’ orphans and journeymen’s children ‘entre otras caridades’ (‘alongside further charity’).28 However, here again, support was not granted by the guild itself, even though it was regulated in the guild statutes, but rather by its confraternities. In the 18th century, professional confraternities still played a crucial role in providing support. For example, the tailors’ confraternity in Madrid provided in 1772 medicines to ailing brothers, and it organized funerals and memorial services with all their paraphernalia for the dead. It also distributed alms to widows and orphans three times a year (on Easter, Christmas, and Whitsun), and it supported brothers who had to travel to a health resort (usually a bathing resort) or who were imprisoned ‘por causas no deshonrosas’ (‘for reasons not dishonest’). Moreover, the confraternity organized charity lotteries for the benefit of young daughters’ dowries and provisioned extra funds for unexpected mishaps.29 The accounting books of some guilds in Madrid reveal further significant aspects of the relationship between guilds and their confraternities. During the first half of the 18th century, the tailors’ guild used its confraternity of Nuestra Señora de la Natividad y San Antonio de Padua (Our Lady of the Nativity and Saint Anthony of Padua) as a financial source. It even pledged the confraternity hall as security for its credits. It ended up throttling the confraternity economically. Then, in the second half of the 18th century, money transfers from the guild to ___________ 27 For Barcelona see Pedro Molas Ribalta, Los gremios barceloneses del siglo XVIII (1970), 53 f., 58, 69, 101, 105 f., 112 f., 254–256; for Valencia Fernando Díez, Viles y mecánicos. Trabajo y sociedad en la Valencia preindustrial (1990), 92; Elena Sánchez de Madariaga, Cofradías y sociabilidad en el Madrid de la Edad moderna (1996), Appendix; for Saragossa Antonio Peiró, Jornaleros y mancebos. Identidad, organización y conflicto en los trabajadores del Antiguo Régimen (2002), table 13, 124. 28 Chapter I of the ordinances of master cobblers, in: Archivo de la Villa de Madrid, Corregimiento, 1-211-21. 29 Cited in the accounting book of the guild: Archivo Histórico Nacional, Delegación de Hacienda, Fondo Histórico, libro 42.

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the confraternity became frequent. Sometimes accounting books do not indicate the reason for these transfers, as is the case with the sums of 1,000, 111, and 1,530 reales that were paid over in 1754, 1762, and 1772. By contrast, the reasons for other transfers were made explicit. For example, the guild paid 400 and 800 reales to the confraternity for public Easter ceremonies. Then from 1773 onwards, the guild accounts include expenses for the funerals of masters, memorial services, candles, and coffins. Alms to impoverished masters were exceptional. In 1786, the guild donated 60 reales to a master who was in an ‘estado miserable’ (‘decaying state’), and it gave the same sum to another master in the following year. In 1789, the financial difficulties of the guild were so acute that cutbacks had to be made on funding the funerals of masters’ children, limiting contributions foremost to the expenses for coffins.30 During the 18th century, the accounting books of the silversmiths’ guild in Valencia reflect a series of gifts given to sick or disabled masters, which were increased in the event of festivities and celebrations, as well as ‘bienes de almas’ consisting of donations to deceased masters’ next of kin and benefits to their orphan daughters. Furthermore, the silversmiths’ guild acted as trustee of funds bequeathed to masters’ orphan girls.31 Indeed, the support of orphan girls was a main concern of guilds. In Madrid, the shoemakers had so-called cajas de huérfanas (orphan girls’ boxes) which paid 550 reales towards dowries after the submission of a marriage certificate. The examination fees of new masters were used to build up these funds. Between 1777 and 1785, 17 orphan girls received dowries, amounting to 9,350 reales. Madrid’s silversmiths observed a similar practice. However, they used not only guild revenues to finance these forms of support, but also individual donations.32 In Valencia, the shoemakers had been taking care of orphan girls since the Middle Ages, and in the 18th century the tanners, silk-weavers, clothiers, dyers, and silversmiths followed their example. Each of the respective guilds kept a fund, called a montepío, and well-off masters made bequests benefitting these funds.33 Guild solidarity could also take other forms. In Murcia, for example, the guild of silk-twisters exempted poor masters from paying their membership fees.34 In the early 19th century, the comb-makers of Madrid agreed that an impoverished master or his widow who could not afford the rent for a proper shop should be allowed to put up a stand wherever they considered it convenient. Furthermore, ___________ 30

Archivo Histórico Nacional, Delegación de Hacienda, Fondo Histórico, libro 42. Dolores García Cantús, El gremio de plateros de Valencia en los siglos XVIII y XIX (1985), 150. 32 Moral Roncal (n. 25), 130. 33 Tramoyeres (n. 23), 354. 34 García Abellán (n. 21), 138. 31

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benefits in cash to impoverished masters became more frequent. Sometimes such benefits were granted only in extraordinary circumstance. In 1647, for instance, when the city of Valencia was blighted by a virulent plague, the Arte Mayor de la Seda (Major Silk Art) borrowed 2,000 libras, which it distributed among its most needy members.35 And sometimes such gifts were made on special occasions. In 1750, for example, on the canonization of their patron – San Vicente Ferrer – the tailors of Valencia transferred 1,000 reales to their confraternity and gave alms of 200 reales to five poor masters. More frequently, such gifts were made at the main annual festivals, such as Christmas, Corpus Christi, and the festivity of the trade’s patron saint.36 In the statutes of Madrid’s tailors, reference is made to the ‘gran concurrencia de pobres mujeres’ (‘great concurrence of poor women’), mostly masters’ widows and daughters who gathered at the guild’s hall every year on Christmas, Easter, and Whitsun, with even some impoverished masters turning up to receive alms.37

D. Mutual aid brotherhoods in the early modern period The world of pre-modern Spanish confraternities was, thus, complex, as it surely was elsewhere in Europe. Even contemporaries could not make it all out. And today’s historians face methodological problems analysing it, given the variety of associations, the multifaceted composition of their members, and the various forms of support. Furthermore, it has been mentioned in the introduction that the terminology found in primary sources adds to the confusion: until the 16th and 17th centuries, professional associations offering support came under two names: cofradías and hermandades. Both terms stem from the Latin fatrernitas. Their functions and composition were often virtually alike. Differences may be found in their patronage, the ways they were funded, and with respect to the question of setting a maximum number of members. During the 16th century, external agents such as merchants became increasingly involved in industrial production. This development progressively eroded the independence of direct producers, and they in turn experienced a deterioration of their living conditions. This, among other factors, made professional confraternities with compulsory membership appear ever less efficient in fulfilling the needs of their members and in providing relief in times of hardship. In addition, real wages were beginning to stagnate or even decline, and the welfare ___________ 35

Tramoyeres (n. 23), 353 f. Ruth De la Puerta Escribano, Historia del gremio de sastres y modistas de Valencia del siglo XIII al siglo XX (1997), 160–170. 37 Archivo Histórico Nacional, Consejos, leg. 490. 36

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schemes and institutions sponsored by the state, such as hospitals, were insufficiently funded, inefficient, and unable to absorb the increasing demand of the needy, especially in urban settings. As a consequence, people began to look for new forms of health support that would spare them having to enter or even die in the ill-reputed public hospitals. This socio-economic context explains the rise of hermandades de socorro mutuo (mutual aid brotherhoods). They emerged in the second half of the 16th century (at least in Castile), became consolidated in the 17th century, and experienced a remarkable proliferation in the second half of the 18th century, in both Castile and Aragon.38 They share many characteristics with confraternities and at the same time evince some significant differences. They might have integrated people from different trades and occupational backgrounds, just like some guild confraternities did. However, unlike in guild confraternities, membership was voluntary and limited. And unlike guild confraternities, they were funded only by members’ regular fees. Yet, there were two important innovations which they brought. Although still devoted to – and usually named after – a saint, they reveal traits that bring them closer to a lay rather than religious character, and to the concept of solidarity rather than charity. And they introduced support that was more formalized, systematic, and thoroughly regulated in their statutes. As already mentioned, mutual aid brotherhoods increased in number in the course of the 18th century. Contemporary politicians defined them as ‘pequeñas asociaciones populares integradas por trabajadores y artesanos’ (‘small popular associations established for labourers and artisans’), even if there is also evidence of some that were formed by civil servants, professionals, and highly qualified artisans.39 Apparently, the majority of mutual aid brotherhoods had only male memberships, while others were mixed, and in Madrid we find those with an exclusively female membership, that is, sisterhoods. Regarding benefits, brotherhoods insured the sick on a daily basis, and if a sick brother died, a single payment was handed over to his widow or heirs. This suggests that a short-term perspective was still prevailing. Like traditional confraternities, mutual aid brotherhoods provided medical care, funerals, and memorial services, as well as benefits in case of imprisonment, accidents, and other contingencies. In 1702, the book-merchants’ mutual aid brotherhood of San Gerónimo in Madrid, for example, made allowances for travelling – an activity that was part of their trade.40 In addition, Madrid’s mutual aid sisterhoods stipulated benefits to sisters on giving birth or in the case of miscarriage. The sisterhoods’ ___________ 38

Genis Barnosell, Origens del sindicalisme català (1999). Sánchez de Madariaga (n. 5), 33. 40 Javier Paredes Alonso, Mercaderes de libros. Cuatro siglos de historia de la Hermandad de San Gerónimo (1988). 39

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statutes made also clear that if a sister’s death was caused by her husband’s mistreatment, he should not be endowed with the benefit reserved to widowers, with it to be given instead to her children or, if childless, invested in masses for her soul.41 Some other mutual aid brotherhoods went even further and contemplated an unemployment benefit, as did the wool-weavers of Barcelona in the mid18th century.42 Members were carefully selected. Entry in mutual aid brotherhoods was restricted to people who had a regular minimum income, who were under a certain age, often under 40 years, who had kept in good health and did not suffer from any chronic illness, and who observed ‘buena vida y costumbres’ (‘good behaviour and customs’). Mutual aid brotherhoods also stipulated that members were not entitled to any benefits during the first half year of their membership. In order to prevent fraud, ill brothers received support only if they had obtained medical certificates. Furthermore, members had to pay periodical, usually weekly or monthly, contributions. The failure to do so was fined and could lead to a loss of membership if a member was in default for several months. Some brotherhoods imposed supplementary levies when the funds were insufficient to meet the brotherhood’s obligations. These fees and levies were the only source of revenue for brotherhoods, as they did not possess any real estate or other assets. In terms of management, mutual aid brotherhoods were less hierarchical than confraternities. Their success lied in keeping healthy accounts that made them financially solvent. This allowed them to build a reserve fund to fall back upon in case of necessity. The fact that mutual aid brotherhoods relied solely on members’ fees to sustain themselves and the fact that membership was voluntary probably encouraged them to administer the revenues and benefits with meticulousness, which clearly differentiated them from hospitals and other public welfare institutions. This does not mean that brotherhoods were always safeguarded from adversity. In Valencia, for example, the mutual aid brotherhood of San Jerónimo, which had primarily journeymen as members, but which also included masters of the Arte Mayor de la Seda (Major Silk Art), was affected by the same difficulties which all urban silk industries faced at the end of the 18th century. Many members were not able to pay their contributions due to unemployment. Others terminated their membership. Consequently, the brotherhood’s revenue was reduced by a quarter between 1790 and 1808. By contrast, mutual aid brotherhoods with a more heterogeneous membership were able to cope with the difficulties of those years much better, as did the brotherhood of the Purísima Sangre

___________ 41 42

Archivo Histórico Nacional, Consejos, leg. 1689, exps. 16–24; leg. 1462, exp. 19. Molas (n. 27), 105 f.

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(‘Purest Blood’) in Valencia. A quarter to a third of its members were artisans of the various crafts.43 During the 18th century, 163 confraternities were established in Madrid. They represented all types of confraternities, but 79 (48.4%) were mutual aid brotherhoods. We do not know the composition of half of these 79 brotherhoods (52%). However, 32% of the 79 brotherhoods had members from various professions, 11% were composed of members of the same trade, and some 5% had only women as members, who were usually engaged in a variety of activities. For example, the sisterhood of Santa María de las Nieves y Jesús Nazareno (Saint Mary of the Snows and Jesus Nazarene) included shoemakers’ wives and foodmarket vendors. What they had in common is that their workplaces were in the same neighbourhood, the Plaza Mayor and surroundings. Even if the weekly fee that brothers and sisters had to pay was low compared to the average wage-rate in Madrid, mutual aid brotherhoods were nevertheless unaffordable for many. Only the better off could afford a permanent membership. The rest had, at best, to make do with joining those confraternities or brotherhoods that only covered burial and memorial services, whose fees were two to three folds lower, such as the confraternity of San Aniano run by the cobblers and that of San Benito de Palermo for black slaves and freed slaves. It was in these confraternities where precarious labourers crowded.44 In summary, mutual aid brotherhoods share many characteristics with confraternities. However, they also introduced important innovations: support was of a broader scope and it was regulated systematically, membership was voluntary, and mutual aid brotherhoods often brought together people from different trades. They were less shaped by the idea of ‘caridad fraternal’ (‘fraternal charity’) of the earlier confraternities, and they were closer to the notion of modern insurance. Some mutual aid brotherhoods went even further in providing labour benefits, as we saw in the case of the wool-weavers of Barcelona. All these peculiarities, some of them innovative in relation to traditional confraternities, became common elements of the sociedades de socorros mutuos (mutual aid societies) of later periods. It is evident that in the 18th century a transition was taking place from fraternal charity and mutuality to social security.45

___________ 43

Díez (n. 21), 119 f. On the lower fees of these confraternities, see Díez (n. 21), 122. 45 A thorough explanation of the aforementioned peculiarities is developed by Sánchez de Madariaga (n. 5). 44

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E. The reform of confraternities In the second half of the 18th century, confraternities underwent a fundamental reform. In 1767, just one year after riots – arising in opposition to the Italian born prime minister to Carlos III (Leopoldo de Gregorio, Marqués de Esquilache, also known as Marchese di Squillace) – had broken out in Madrid and spread to other towns, a royal edict suspended all confraternities and brotherhoods and ordered that their statutes be submitted to the Council of Castile for revision – culminating in a throng of appeals. In the aftermath, some confraternities and brotherhoods were legalized and reformed while others were banned. Meanwhile, a national census was carried out, which in 1771 recorded 25,939 associations. 19,024 were located in the Kingdom of Castile and 6,557 in Aragon. They put in circulation considerable sums of money via alms and the like. However, the number of 25,939 associations included mutual aid brotherhoods, diverse forms of confraternities, and even guilds, and it is impossible to break the number down into the different categories.46 However, the 1771 census reveals significant regional differences concerning the distribution of confraternities. The census was analysed by Maureen Flynn using her concept of a densidad cofradial-ratio (confraternity density-ratio): the number of confraternities per number of inhabitants. She concluded that the confraternity density was higher in Old Castile and León (especially in Zamora, Toro, Valladolid, and Palencia) and lower in southern Spain (Valencia, Seville, and the Extremadura region). Some northern regions such as Asturias, Biscay, and Catalonia show a low density, too.47 Flynn’s index is useful to grasp the general picture, but not so much to estimate the significance of guild confraternities in relation to the number of people employed in a given town. What happens, then, when we focus on the relation between guild confraternities and the number of artisans? Then the conclusions that Flynn draws from her analysis including all confraternities become inaccurate. Over a half of Barcelona’s confraternities where attached to the crafts, but only a quarter in Valencia. Unfortunately, data on the number of artisans who were assisted by these ___________ 46 See the figures in William J. Callahan, Las cofradías y hermandades en España y su papel social y religioso dentro de una sociedad de estamentos, in: María del Pilar Martínez López Cano et al. (eds.), Cofradías, capellanías y obras pías en la América colonial (1998), 17–34; Inmaculada Arias de Saavedra and Miguel Luis López-Guadalupe Muñoz, Cofradías y ciudad en la España del siglo XVIII, (1998) 19 Studia Historica, Historia Moderna 197–228; idem, Las cofradías españolas en la Edad Moderna desde una óptica social. Tres décadas de avance historiográfico, (2017) 27 Cuadernos de Estudios del Siglo XVIII 11–50. 47 Maureen Flynn, Sacred Charity: Confraternities and Social Welfare in Spain, 1400– 1700 (1989).

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confraternities is not available, but we know that in Burgos there was one confraternity for every 95 guild members, and in the extreme case of Valladolid, one for every 49. Thus, the artisans in various cities of Castile accounted for a high representation in confraternities, which guaranteed some support in the critical moments of their lives. However, in Valencia, the ratio of confraternities went up to one for every 150 guild members, which made assistance to their members more difficult to be fully delivered. The aforementioned ban or transformation of many confraternities linked to guilds started a new phase in the Spanish welfare system. Indeed, the 1770s witnessed the collaboration of guilds with the public authorities by – nolens volens – agreeing to measures that favoured the inmates of hospices and orphanages. In Barcelona, the Audiencia (Justice Tribunal) ordered that journeymen marrying orphan women as well as male orphans marrying masters’ daughters were exempted from paying examination fees. The statutes of the Real Casa de la Caridad (Royal Charity House) of Barcelona stipulated that any assisted boy willing to be apprenticed be exempted from guild jurisdiction. In times of hardships, such as that from 1796 to 1802 during the war with England, silversmiths stood out for generously distributing bowls of soup to the poor, and they did so again when a cholera plague broke out in 1834.48 In 1784, the Ley General de Reforma, Extinción y Arreglo de las Cofradías (General Law of Reform, Extinction, and Arrangement of Confraternities) was issued. It banned all confraternities and mutual aid brotherhoods which were linked to guilds, as well as those that had no previous governmental authorization or that had it granted by the church. Furthermore, all other confraternities were subjected to state jurisdiction, ordered to draft new statutes for governmental approval, compelled to lower their membership fees, required to reduce their entrance requirements, and forced to change their name from mutual aid brotherhoods to montepíos. Montepíos, which were secular and voluntary associations, had precedents. Since 1760, the state had been promoting their creation among civil servants. They offered pensions to widows and orphans, and to a lesser extent in cases of old age and disability. The example of the civil servants was followed by military personnel, employees of the postal service, and the members of many liberal professions, like Madrid’s solicitors, who founded their montepío in 1776. Some of the guilds began to comply with the requirements that had been set out by the Reales Sociedades Económicas de Amigos del País49 and formed their ___________ 48

Molas (n. 27), 108 f. The Reales Sociedades Económicas de Amigos del País were founded in the decade of 1770. Their members were noblemen and gentlemen. One of their objectives was to 49

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own montepíos. In 1782, the statutes of the braid-makers’ guild of Madrid, which had become a commercial company, included some clauses that related to the creation of a voluntary montepío to be financed through fees paid by their members, who could be both masters and journeymen. These fees were fixed at 150 reales on entry for the founding members and 600 reales for those entering thereafter. Fines which were imposed on those infringing the statutes also went to the montepío, together with the examination fees of journeymen and apprentices as well as the accrued interest from real estate owned by the guild’s confraternity. The montepío supported disabled masters and masters in need as well as their orphans and widows with four reales per day. Sick or impeded journeymen, their widows, and children received a daily benefit of only two reales.50 The botilleros (owners of botillerías, fashionable 18th-century coffee-shops which also served sorbets, ice-creams, and spirits) followed the example of the braid-makers. In 1797, the guild members agreed to create a montepío. Each member was to pay six reales as a monthly contribution. The montepío also benefited from the 120 reales that new masters paid on entering the guild as well as from fines and other contributions. The montepío gave two reales a day to deceased guild members’ widows and orphans. However, support would not start to be offered until the fund had accrued 15,000 reales. Guild members in poverty were exempted from contributions.51 Barcelona saw its first montepíos in the 1780s. The first was founded by the joves velers (journeymen veil-weavers) in 1783. They were followed in the next decade by the stocking-makers and the linen-printers, while the master tailors and carpenters organized their montepíos in 1803 and 1814 respectively.52 In conclusion, the 1784 Act came to answer religious, political, and economic concerns of the ruling classes. First, the reformers were enlightened Catholic politicians. They loathed the Baroque overtones still prevailing in confraternities’ religious practices, such as the public processions and intense devotional exercises, but also the feasts and other more profane ceremonies organized on festivals. They criticized guilds and confraternities for their alleged wealth and materialistic piety, and they intended to instil in them an austere religiousness, more in line with reformed Christianity, and, of course, overseen by ecclesiastical authorities. Secondly, by banning guild confraternities and brotherhoods, ___________ first reform and to subsequently abolish the guild system and the control it exerted over the industries and labour markets. 50 Ordenanzas de los cordoneros de la Corte, aprobadas en 26 de septiembre de 1782, in: Archivo de la Villa de Madrid, Secretaría, 2-244-2. 51 Ordenanzas de los botilleros de Madrid y su Monte Pío, aprobadas en el año 1797, in: Archivo General de Simancas, Consejo Supremo de Hacienca, leg. 326, exp. 38. 52 Molas (n. 27), 106 f.

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they tried to restrict spaces of autonomy which guilds, confraternities, and brotherhoods had enjoyed and which these had at times used to support strikes and other forms of protest. Finally, those mutual aid brotherhoods which were approved under the new legal regime had to lower their membership fees and their entrance requirements. The government, thereby, wanted to open these private welfare schemes to larger parts of the population, and it tried to make up for the dramatic shortcomings that public assistance evinced in hospices, hospitals, and the Juntas de Caridad (Charity Boards) created in every district in the aftermath of the 1766 riots. The 19th century brought about changes within these different forms of associations. In Barcelona, for example, the fund of faquines (maritime porters) developed into something closer to the sociedades de socorros mutuos (mutual aid societies) or even closer to a workers’ cooperative. They established a fondo de mejora (improvement fund). All maritime porters had to pay a monthly contribution. The fund covered extra expenses such as subsidies to disabled brothers, and in years with a surplus, as happened in 1832, the fund distributed money among all guild members.53

F. Conclusions Since the Middle Ages, professional associations in Spain arranged support for their members – support that gradually widened its scope and that over time became regulated in the statutes of these associations in a more precise and clear fashion. The transition from a concept of ‘fraternal charity’ to one of ‘mutual aid’ and the emergence of secular foundations which were closer to the ideas of modern social security constitute the most important elements of the development of mutual support in a professional context in the broad time frame which the present chapter has covered: the present chapter has described this evolution for the Kingdoms of Castile and Aragon, as far as primary sources allow, from the High Middle Ages to the early modern era. The data on professional confraternities appears earlier and more abundantly in Aragon than Castile, where we cannot trace them until the 16th century in its southern regions. Most such confraternities included among their functions the protection of members from two contingencies: death and ailments. Correspondingly, members were primarily entitled to funeral costs together with health care. Furthermore, the more perilous maritime trades as well as the land transporting trades stand out, from the Middle Ages onwards, for providing a wider scope of benefits and covering more risks: captivity, imprisonment, old age, and disability caused by illness or work accidents. ___________ 53 Detlev Ellmers and Juanjo Romero Marín, Los faquines de capçana y su supervivencia en la era liberal, (2007) 15 Drassana: Revista Del Museu Marítim 104–114.

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These trades may thus be considered to have been pioneers in social provisioning during this early period. In Castile, and in later periods also in Aragon, those trades which were organized in guilds delegated their welfare schemes to the confraternities which were attached to these guilds. Consequently, guild statutes usually did not address any questions concerning the support of members in need. For the Middle Ages as well as for later periods, we have pointed out some examples where a broad coverage similar to that offered in the maritime and land transporting sectors had also been granted in the crafts. The tailors in Betanzos (Galicia) and further professions in Aragon also extended support to imprisoned and disabled brothers as well as to journeymen, and they even established dowry funds for orphan girls. In 18th-century Madrid, we find three further examples in the shoemakers’, tailors’, and cobblers’ guilds. In summary, and considering all discussed examples of the whole period studied, confraternities and brotherhoods covered the risks of death, illness, disability, work accidents, unemployment, captivity, viduity, and of becoming an orphan. The forms of support addressed these risks and included, for example, funeral costs, participation in funerals, coverage of medical costs, care, and the payment of dowries, pensions, and ransom. With respect to the composition of their members three types of confraternities and brotherhoods can be distinguished: (1) those allowing only people of the same profession and the same status, for example only masters or only journeymen; (2) those allowing only people of the same trade, but allowing people of different status, such as masters, journeymen, and widows; (3) and finally those admitting people from different professions. Confraternities, which had only journeymen of the same profession as members, were also instrumental in demanding higher wages and better work conditions, and they often provided strike funds. During the early modern period, guilds continued to rely on their confraternities for welfare purposes. Consequently, there are only very few traces suggesting that guild statutes addressed these questions. However, the early modern period also saw some important developments: especially the proliferation of mutual aid brotherhoods in the 18th century, which, unlike guild confraternities, were voluntary associations with strict entry requirements, defined the different forms of support more carefully, and primarily relied on members’ regular fees as a source of income. Furthermore, these mutual aid brotherhoods had a secular character even if they were dedicated to, and named after, a patron saint. The most important transformation occurred in the second half of the 18th century, when, in the aftermath of the 1766 riots, the state banned many confraternities and brotherhoods and subjected the remaining such associations to state control. Furthermore, the state conducted a national census of confraternities.

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The 1784 Act then completed the process of transformation with the definitive ban of guild confraternities and brotherhoods; for those associations declared legal, there was an obligation to ease entry requirements, lower membership fees and change their names into montepíos, a name which, however, ultimately maintained the religious overtones. With these measures, the state pursued foremost two objectives. On the one hand, the state wanted to reform the population’s religious and social customs and erode the autonomy of professional associations. On the other hand, the state wanted to make use of mutual aid associations in order to remedy the shortcomings of an underfunded public welfare system that could not efficiently meet the population’s increasing needs.

Chapter 10: Guilds and Mutual Protection Schemes in Poland in the Medieval and Early Modern Periods By Jakub Pokoj A. Introduction ............................................................................................................ 217 B. Terminological observations .................................................................................. 217 C. The first guilds in Poland and their functions regarding mutual protection ............ 220 D. Guilds and mutual protection schemes in Poland ................................................... 224 I. The 1466 statutes of the weavers’ guild in Rymanów ..................................... 225 II. The 1613 statutes of the helmsmen’s guild in Toruń ...................................... 226 III. Other guilds in Toruń ...................................................................................... 227 IV. The 1580 statutes of the musicians’ guild in Lwów ........................................ 229 V. The 1689 statutes of the brewers’ guild in Bydgoszcz .................................... 231 VI. The 1601 statutes of the goldsmiths’ guild in Poznań ..................................... 232 E. Summary ................................................................................................................ 234

A. Introduction The present contribution will analyse the history of Polish guilds, especially with respect to their function of providing mutual assistance and protection to their members. However, at first, it will be necessary to make some terminological observations on the use and meaning of the Polish word cech as compared to that of the English term guild. Then, a brief history of the origin and beginning of guilds in Poland will be presented, and the boundaries of the present study, both chronological and territorial, will be defined. The main part of the present contribution will focus on the regulation of mutual protection within guilds in Poland. For that purpose, the analysis will be based on excerpts from various guild statutes. Thus, the account of how mutual protection within guilds in Poland functioned will be of an exemplary nature. Nevertheless, various forms of mutual assistance and protection will come to light, and their characteristic features will be described.

B. Terminological observations In Polish historiography, it is usually the English term guild that is associated with the Polish noun cech. The etymology of cech is German, and it derives from the word Zunft, which is again one possible translation of the term guild. According to a Polish-language dictionary of foreign origin words, cech is:

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‘stowarzyszenie samodzielnych rzemieślników miejskich jednej lub kilku (zwł. pokrewnych) specjalności, mające na celu obronę interesów rzemiosła oraz podniesienie jego poziomu, a także organizowanie samopomocy wśród członków.’1 ‘an association of independent craftsmen of one or a few (especially related) specializations, whose aim is to defend the interests of the craft and to improve its quality, and also to organize mutual assistance among its members.’

Indeed, the English term guild is often perceived as a synonym for the Polish word cech. However, in the history of Poland, the concept of a guild was broader than that of a cech, and there are other terms and concepts such as that of gildia or gilda. On a very general level, the Polish gildia or gilda was simply an association of people with identical, similar or at least approximating objectives. Consequently, a gildia could unite craftsmen of different professions, especially when the number of members of a certain profession was insufficient to form a separate organization or if, on the basis of the objectives of the association, the limitation to a certain profession would not make sense. Moreover, the term gildia also referred to associations of merchants. In this meaning, the term contrasts with craftsmen associations called cech. The composition of the members of such guilds could be very different. A general gildia gathered merchants of different specializations whereas specialized guilds could be composed of merchants trading only certain commodities or trading only in certain territories. For example, merchants trading with Flanders formed one gildia and those trading with the Novgorod Republic another.2 However, since guilds of merchants were not as prevalent as craftsmen guilds, the former will not be analysed in the present contribution. This contribution will rather focus on craftsmen guilds, and guilds of merchants will be reserved for an independent study in the future. Another form of association that needs to be mentioned in the present context was called bractwo czeladnicze. It translates as journeymen brotherhood.3 These were, just like craftsmen guilds, corporate entities. They were composed not of master craftsmen, but of journeymen. Journeymen were those who had successfully completed their primary professional training within a guild, but who were not yet allowed to set up their own business.4 They, as well as apprentices, were granted some rights within guilds, but they did not enjoy full guild rights. The rise of journeymen brotherhoods was closely linked to the process of guilds firmly restricting the access to becoming a master craftsman: the phenomenon became increasingly common that fully trained journeymen never acquired the ___________ 1

Jan Tokarski (ed.), Słownik wyrazów obcych (1980), 102. Henryk Samsonowicz, Encyklopedia gospodarcza Polski do 1945 roku, vol. 1 (1981), 199. 3 Jerzy Wyrozumski, Związki czeladnicze w Polsce średniowiecznej, (1977) 68/1 Przegląd Historyczny 1–15, 1–3. 4 Zofia Golińska, Miasta i cechy w dawnej Polsce (1906), 79. 2

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status of a master craftsman, meaning that they never acquired the right to set up their own business and that they never came into the position to enjoy the rights of a full guild member. Consequently, the interests of master craftsmen and those of journeymen were no longer coincident, but rather were conflicting. For that reason, journeymen set up their own associations. Customarily, journeymen brotherhoods functioned as a kind of extension to the corresponding cech, and often the former were directly connected to the latter. Initially, it was the master craftsman who was responsible for his journeymen and apprentices. As guilds evolved further, journeymen had to participate in the guilds’ mutual protection schemes and therefore also had to make financial contributions to them. In return, they received assistance in the event of misfortune such as illness or death.5 When journeymen brotherhoods appeared, these gradually took over from the master craftsmen and their guilds the function of granting support and assistance to fellow journeymen. Thereby, journeymen brotherhoods took over those functions which were at first primarily fulfilled by master craftsmen who were responsible for the journeymen under their supervision. It, thus, seems likely that, in the history of Poland, journeymen brotherhoods played an even greater role as organizations providing mutual protection than craftsmen guilds. After all, journeymen were people of a decidedly worse social position than master craftsmen.6 Therefore, journeymen had an even greater incentive than master craftsmen to coalesce and to create schemes whose aim was to guarantee mutual protection to its members. Nevertheless, the term guild will be used in the present contribution to refer to guilds in the first meaning, as associations of (master) craftsmen. The reason for this restriction is simple: the aim of the present paper is to analyse the functions of guilds as mutual schemes providing protection and assistance to its members, and it were these guilds which first set up such schemes. Other types of guilds will in the present paper also be referred to simply as guilds, but their character will then be specifically indicated. The above-cited definition of the term cech in the Polish-language dictionary of foreign origin words indicates that in Poland too, just like in other countries, guilds were multi-functional associations. The mutual protection provided to members is only the last function mentioned in that definition. However, it is this function that may be of importance for the history of insurance, and for this reason it is worth focusing upon.

___________ 5 6

Klemens Bąkowski, Dawne cechy krakowskie (1903), 64 f. Arthur J. Penty, Post-industrialism (2018), 121.

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C. The first guilds in Poland and their functions regarding mutual protection The origins of guilds in Poland are directly connected to the presence of colonists and settlers from Western Europe. In the early 13th century, colonists from Western Europe, for example from Flanders, Franconia or Saxony, started to come to Poland, and they brought with them several at the time modern ideas, including the concept of guilds.7 Consequently, the idea that craftsmen of a certain profession formed associations became firmly entrenched first in major cities and then spread to other towns. Thus, the early history of guilds in the Polish territory is closely linked to their non-native origins, experiences, conditions and traditions being transferred into a Polish context.8 The Magdeburg Law (Magdeburger Recht) and its numerous local variations was another important factor explaining the establishment of guilds in Poland.9 The Magdeburg Law was the town law and the town privileges of the German city of Magdeburg. It strongly influenced the legal history of Eastern-Central Europe. In Poland, it began to spread in the beginning of the 13th century.10 The popularity of the Magdeburg Law in Poland stemmed from its practicality, and further variants of it developed which were referred to as Weichbild magdeburski (Ius municipal magdeburgense),11 with the term Weichbild having its roots in Middle Low German and meaning in the present context simply town law. The process of adapting the Magdeburg Law to local needs began simultaneously with Western immigration to Poland. As Stanisław Płaza pointed out, the dissemination of the Magdeburg Law in Poland was based on the practice of imitating the laws of those settlements which had already existed, and which had been granted the Magdeburg Law. As a result, a network of ‘mother’ and ‘daughter’ towns developed.12 The original pattern was provided by the city of Magdeburg, and thus the most common term for these laws and regulations in all its variances remained the Magdeburg Law. Both the creation of new settlements in cruda radice as well as adopting the Magdeburg Law in already existing settlements resulted in the dissemination and ___________ 7

Andrzej Jezierski and Cecylia Leszczyńska, Historia gospodarcza Polski (1999), 26. Henryk Samsonowicz, Cechy rzemieślnicze w średniowiecznej Polsce: mity i rzeczywistość, (1984) 75/3 Przegląd Historyczny 75/3 (1984), 551–567, 552. 9 The most important were the ‘Prawo średzkie’ (Ius Novi Fori, Ius Sredense) from Środa Śląska in Lower Silesia and the Kulm Law (Ius Culmense) from Chełmno in the Chełmno Land. 10 Wacław Uruszczak, Historia państwa i prawa polskiego, vol. 1 (2010), 86. 11 Cf. Maciej Mikuła, Prawo miejskie magdeburskie (Ius Municipale Magdeburgense) w Polsce XIV–pocz. XVI w. Studium o ewolucji i adaptacji prawa (2nd edn., 2018), 31–73. 12 Stanisław Płaza, Historia prawa w Polsce na tle porównawczym, vol. 1 (1999), 114. 8

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popularization of legal concepts already present in Germany. As the colonists from Western Europe brought with them their legal traditions together with their culture, customs and crafts to Poland, the idea that craftsmen formed associations for the different professions took root in Poland, too. The rise of guilds in Poland was, thus, caused by external factors,13 and Polish guilds, their internal organization and also their by-laws were at first not based on local traditions and local economic patterns. Nonetheless, guilds were further developed. They started to be adapted to local conditions and were integrated into the constitution of Polish towns. However, it still remains an unresolved research question which aspects of Polish guilds remained in their original form as received from Western Europe and exactly to what extent guilds were modified under the influence of local Polish customs.14 Historians suggest that guilds were established mainly for economic reasons, particularly to protect craftsmen and their interests from competitors.15 Guilds were ruled predominantly by statutory law, including guild statutes and guild bylaws, autonomous town laws (wilkierze16) and the laws enacted by rulers of towns and state authorities.17 Customary law was of only subsidiary character. Statutory law is therefore the most relevant source for investigating guilds and their functions within medieval and early modern societies. Guild statutes had to be adopted by town councils, but modern research shows that in most cases town councils simply approved the statutes as drafted by guilds.18 Furthermore, guilds often had the autonomy to regulate their internal affairs. Even though guilds were corporate entities uniting craftsmen on the basis of their occupation, their statutes and regulations went far beyond regulating professional issues. Increasingly, the guild statutes and regulations addressed numerous aspects of their members’ lives, such as their social lives, as well as religious and charitable matters. Polish historiography usually distinguishes six functions, or categories of functions, which craftsmen guilds served, and these were reflected in the guild statutes and regulations. They concerned:

___________ 13

Jan Rutkowski, Historia gospodarcza Polski do 1864 r. (1953), 44. Samsonowicz (n. 2), 552. 15 Jezierski/Leszczyńska (n. 7), 26–28. 16 From the German term ‘Willkür’. Today it translates as arbitrariness; traditionally it was used in the meaning of freedom and referred to medieval town laws which were based on a town’s autonomy to pass such laws. 17 Ewa Borkowska-Bagieńska, Cechowe prawo gospodarcze w miastach wielkopolskich w XVII wieku (1977), 11. 18 Michał Schmidt, Sądownictwo cechów krakowskich w średniowieczu w świetle ksiąg cechowych, (2015) 142/1 Zeszyty Naukowe Uniwersytetu Jagiellońskiego. Prace Historyczne 61–77, 62. 14

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(1) the production of goods: guilds regulated the quantity and quality of produced goods as well as other aspects of the production, such as the purchase of raw materials and the distribution of end products; (2) professional training: guilds were responsible for the education of apprentices, for the further qualification of journeymen and for conducting the respective examinations; (3) the jurisdiction of guilds: guilds had the autonomy not only to enact statutes and regulations which were binding on their members, but also to enforce these statutes and regulations and to punish members when they were not acting in compliance with these statutes and regulations; (4) religious issues: guilds served in numerous ways religious functions, for example by collectively attending or holding services; (5) military questions: guilds were obliged to maintain certain parts of the city walls and to defend them in the event of danger; and finally (6) social aspects, including mutual assistance.19 These functions created strong bonds between guild members, going well beyond the economic sphere. For the purposes of the present contribution it is, of course, the last category that is most important. It included both strict social activities, such as the organization of feasts, as well as charitable activities. And what at first had been primarily occasional charitable activities developed over time into permanent institutions of mutual assistance and protection. Guilds experienced a gradual process of becoming closed.20 Guilds were able to suppress so-called partacz craftsmen,21 i.e. craftsmen setting up a business outside guilds. Setting up a business was restricted to members of the guild of that profession. At the same time, acquiring guild membership became harder and harder, but it was only through membership that one was able to participate in the guild’s social support scheme. This meant that the bonds between guild members became stronger and stronger.22 An analysis of the assistance and protection granted by guilds in Poland has to start with a clear distinction between mutual protection and charity. It may be assumed that the earlier cases of assistance and protection were understood as forms of charity. Being motivated by religious impulse, guilds often provided help to the ill and poor. This help was mainly offered to guild members, but it ___________ 19

Jan Szpak, Historia Gospodarcza Powszechna (1997), 56 f. Wojciech Morawski, Dzieje gospodarcze Polski (2010), 17. 21 From the Latin a parte paternitas – those out of guilds. 22 Samsonowicz (n. 2), 553. 20

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was not restricted to them.23 However, over time assistance and help was with growing frequency restricted to guild members. And assistance and help became increasingly formalized: the forms of, and the requirements for, help were defined in the guild statutes, their by-laws and in special resolutions. Editions of a limited number of Polish guild statutes have been published in the past. Maciej Mikuła has prepared a list of relevant publications in his paper on editions of sources of municipal law in Poland between the 14th and 16th centuries.24 As it is the main aim of the present contribution to analyse mutual aid schemes within Polish guilds, the forms of mutual assistance they provided, their occurrence and their features, the starting point of my discussion will be excerpts from statutes of various Polish guilds. The title of the present contribution already indicates its time frame: it will focus on the medieval and the early modern periods. It will start in the 13th century when the first guilds appeared in Poland, and it will end in 1795 with the Third Partition, when Poland was erased from maps for 123 years. In the period under examination, the territory of Poland changed significantly, and the present contribution will take into consideration only primary sources which originate from places which, at that point of time, belonged to the Polish state. A final matter requiring clarification concerns the concept of mutual protection. There is only little Polish legal-historical literature on the history of guilds and their functions. Yet, the analysis below clearly proves that there were measures present in guilds which a modern lawyer would refer to as mutual protection. Therefore, for the purposes of this paper it is necessary to define the concept of mutual protection. According to modern legal scholars working in the field of mutual insurance companies, the purpose of such companies is to enable their members to provide each other with protection.25 Hence, for the purpose of the present paper, mutual guild protection in its various forms is understood simply as assistance granted by a guild to its members or its members’ dependants in cases of misfortune or need.

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Jezierski/Leszczyńska (n. 7), 26–28. Maciej Mikuła, Edycje źródeł do dziejów prawa miejskiego w Polsce XIV–XVI w.: propozycja elektronicznej metaedycji źródeł normatywnych, (2016) 9/4 Krakowskie Studia z Historii Państwa i Prawa 487–508, 495–497. For a list of editions of sources regarding guilds and their statutes, see ibid., 496 n. 47. 25 Maciej Kamiński, Ubezpieczenia wzajemne a ubezpieczenia komercyjne, (2013) 15 Rozprawy Ubezpieczeniowe 97–109, 101. 24

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D. Guilds and mutual protection schemes in Poland In his study on craftsmen guilds and their role in medieval towns, Henryk Samsonowicz, one of the greatest Polish medievalists, asserted that providing insurance to members was already inherent in the first medieval guilds in Poland.26 However, his assertion seems to contrast with the view developed by modern legal historians, who show that the guilds’ function of mutual protection developed only over time. Some Polish scholars stress the close connection between the religious functions of guilds and their social and charitable activities.27 Based on donations made by members, guilds were able to formalize their social and charitable activities and to extend them gradually: starting with help provided to the poor and developing into mutual help schemes for injured or ill members as well as their widows and orphans. The idea that such schemes can be perceived as an early form of insurance has been present in Polish historical discourse since the first half of the 20th century. Jan Trembecki, for example, stated in 1948: ‘Wprawdzie główną podstawą i celem bractw były interesy gospodarcze, niemniej działalność ich obejmowała życie religijne i towarzyskie członków cechu oraz działalność społeczną w zakresie, który dziś nazwalibyśmy początkami “ubezpieczenia” pracownika zawodowego w ramach związku zawodowego.’28 ‘Despite the fact that the basis and aim of guilds were business affairs, their activities included also religious and social aspects regarding their members’ lives as well as those activities which could today be referred to as the beginnings of “insurance” for a professional worker within a trade union.’

Thus, some Polish scholars of the 20th century looked upon the activities of craftsmen’s guilds as a predecessor of insurance. Even though such a proposition seems to be unfounded in its generality, as it may imply a continuous development from the mutual protection offered by guilds to modern insurance, for the purpose of the present contribution it is nevertheless worth mentioning as it points to how widespread the idea of mutual assistance in Polish guilds was. The most important form of mutual protection in this respect was the help and assistance granted to the widows and orphans of deceased master craftsmen. The details of this kind of help and assistance varied locally as guild statutes reveal.

___________ 26

Samsonowicz (n. 2), 553. Kazimierz Dola, Opieka społeczna Kościoła, in: Historia Kościoła w Polsce, vol. 1/1 (1974), 434. 28 Jan Trembecki, Rzemiosło i cechy w dawnej i współczesnej Polsce (1948), 35. 27

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I. The 1466 statutes of the weavers’ guild in Rymanów Rymanów is a town situated at the foothills of the Carpathian Mountains, in what was called the Sanok Land. It was granted the Magdeburg Law in the second half of the 14th century. In the 15th century, the town was expanding, thanks to many privileges granted to it by consecutive rulers and by virtue of a notable involvement of colonists from the West. Like in other parts of Lesser Poland, the profession of weavers was particularly prosperous. Their products were exported to Hungary and further.29 However, information about their activities in Rymanów and about their guild was scarce until the statutes, which were originally written in Polish, were recently published for the first time.30 Particular provisions of these statutes concerned the help and assistance granted to different categories of people in cases of misfortune and need: ‘Item który mystrz umrze albo mystrzowa sczechu, thedy na pomocz mayą dacz phunth woszku. Item yeszly mystrzowy umrze dzyecze, thedy yemuy napomocz mayą dacz 4 phuntha. Item yeszli umrze uczeyn, thedy thysz 4 phuntha dacz woszku.’31 ‘Item if a master or master’s wife dies, then [the guild shall give] as aid one pound of wax. Item if a master craftsman’s child or his wife dies, then [the guild shall] give him four pounds [of wax]. Item if an apprentice dies, then [the guild shall] also give four pounds of wax.’

Help took the form of wax which was given to a master craftsman or his surviving dependants. The word woszek used in the original text is no longer in use. It is, however, obvious that it was a portion of wax, and it was offered in the event of death. However, help was not restricted to the case that a master craftsman or his direct dependants died; rather, it also covered the death of an apprentice. It may be assumed that the help reflected the economic loss which the master experienced as a consequence of the loss of these individuals: an apprentice, for example, was supposed not only to learn the profession, but also to help his master. The aid granted by the guild could thus be characterized as a form of assistance to cope with professional or economic uncertainty caused by death of the covered person, including apprentices, as their death could impede the master craftsman’s business. Another important observation is that the help came from a common fund of the guild, which consisted of members’ donations as well as fines and other revenue of the guild.

___________ 29

Ignacy Baranowski, Przemysł polski w XVI wieku (1919), 148 f. Feliks Kiryk, Statut Cechu Płócienniczego z 1466 roku w Rymanowie w języku polskim (2012), 17–27. 31 Kiryk (n. 30), 35. 30

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II. The 1613 statutes of the helmsmen’s guild in Toruń Toruń (Thorn) is a municipal centre located in the Chełmno Land (Kulmerland). It was granted the Magdeburg Law by the Deutsche Orden (Order of Brothers of the German House of Saint Mary in Jerusalem – Teutonic Order) already in the first half of the 13th century, on 28 December 1233, as one of the first two settlements to acquire this status.32 Under the rule of the Teutonic Order, Toruń developed into an important trading city. This development was intensified when Toruń joined the Hanseatic League in 1280. As Toruń became an important centre of trade in the State of the Teutonic Order, it attracted craftsmen and artisans. Therefore, the conditions for creating guilds were favourable, and at the turn of the 14th century Toruń counted already 41 guilds.33 Since Toruń had a well-developed network of guilds in the medieval and early modern periods, it is appropriate to analyse an example of the guild statutes from this city in detail: ‘O pożyczaniu pieniędzy ze skrzynki ubogiemu albo chorującemu bratu Gdyby niektóry brat potrzebnym był i o wspomożenie pieniądze ze skrzynki prosił, starsi i bracia z pilnością się o tym pytać mają, jeśli też tego godzien, a poznawszy że godzien służyć mu w tym mają, tym przecie sposobem, aby zastawę jaką dał albo dobremi ludźmi się zaręczył, że na pewny, mianowany czas te jemuż pożyczone pieniądze oddać chce, aby skrzynka z tego nie szkodowała.’34 ‘About lending money from the box to a poor or ill brother If a brother is in need and asks for help from the box, the elders and brothers shall diligently query about it, and if [he] deserves, they shall assist him so that he could establish a pledge or submit good men as guarantors, that after a certain time he will return the amount of money which was lent to him so that nothing misses from the box.’

The provision is cited from the 1613 statutes of the helmsmen’s guild, which was a journeymen brotherhood in the abovementioned meaning. The provision exemplifies that guilds granted interest-free loans to members. However, the brother in need had to provide a pledge or guarantee by ‘good people’. And the title of the provision suggests that this kind of help was given to a poor or ill brother. Although support was offered only in the form of a loan with no interest, the elders and other members still had to verify that the member asking for the loan was in a situation of need. After all, the loan came from the common fund of the guild box. And even though the money had to be repaid, it could positively influence the situation of the member in need. And finally, although help took ___________ 32

Toruń was among these territories which were annexed by Poland after the Treaty of Toruń in 1466, and therefore the statutes of the helmsmen’s guild in Toruń from 1613 can be analysed within the framework of this article. Cf. Feliks Kiryk and Jan Ryś, Wielka Historia Polski (1997), 160 f. 33 Janusz Tandecki, Cechy rzemieślnicze w Toruniu i Chełmnie. Zarys dziejów (1983), 11. 34 Tandecki (n. 33), 95 f.

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only the form of loan, it needs to be remembered that in 17th-century Poland a guild member in need would have had little chance to borrow money from somewhere else as a banking system was not developed at that point of time. Another detail that is worth mentioning is the guild box.35 It stood in the guild hall and contained the guild’s most important items: the statutes, the insignia, the books, the seal and the funds.36 The guild box was of particular importance for guilds; it was respected by all guild members, and all members were obliged to care for its condition, including its content of course. Loss of, or damage to, the guild box could lead to serious problems in the functioning of the guild, and in an extreme case it could even threaten the guild privileges. However, the statement that the box had its own legal capacity seems to be an exaggeration, at least in the case of Polish guilds and especially in the examples provided in the present contribution. Beyond all doubt, the box was of particular importance to the guild, but there is no evidence that it was treated individually and without reference to the guild. Therefore, it seems likely that claims for support had to be filed with the guild and not with the guild box. The box had a distinct and symbolic character. Yet it was part of the guild, and it was only the guild that had the status of a legal person. The guild members were responsible for the box, and they could be granted support from it if they met the requirements as defined in the guild statutes. In conclusion, the close connection between the support granted by guilds and the guild box seems to indicate that the guild’s function of mutual assistance was of great importance to the guild and its members: the guild box was the guild’s single most important piece of physical property, containing the statutes, the insignia, the books, the seal and the funds – and the moneys to be loaned to members in need came from these funds. Consequently, it seems likely that the decision to use these funds for the purpose of support was equally important. III. Other guilds in Toruń Toruń was an important trading centre in the State of the Teutonic Order and later in the Kingdom of Poland and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. It does not come as a surprise that Toruń guilds were thus in a position to further develop welfare schemes for their members. As the number of guilds in Toruń was significant throughout the Middle Ages and the early modern period, there are many more examples of provisions in guild statutes regulating the details of support and aid granted to members in need. Stasnisław Herbst, a professor of ___________ 35 36

In Polish ‘lada cechowa’ or ‘skrzynia cechowa’. Stanisław Herbst, Cechy rzemieślnicze (1948), 8.

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medieval history at the University of Warsaw who researched the history of Toruń craftsmen guilds, stated that: ‘Cech nietylko zabiegał o dobrobyt swych członków, ale też starał się zapewnić byt mistrzom chorym, starym, zubożałym i zapewnić przyszłość swym dzieciom. Choć kobiety nie miały prawa wykonywania rzemiosła, wdowom pozwalano prowadzić mężowski warsztat, jeśli ponownie nie wyszły zamąż. Mistrzowie sterani wiekiem i chorobami oraz wdowy, miały pierwszeństwo w uzyskaniu czeladnika. Gdy brakło nowych towarzyszy odbierano dla nich towarzysza najmłodszemu mistrzowi.’37 ‘A craftsmen guild not only took care of the well-being of its members but also tried to provide for ill, old or impoverished masters and to support their children. Despite the fact that women were not allowed to perform crafts, a widow was allowed to run her deceased husband’s business if she did not re-marry. Master craftsmen of age and ill master craftsmen as well as their widows had a priority in hiring a journeyman. If there were no new journeymen in a guild, the youngest master craftsman lost one journeyman to the old or ill master craftsman or a widow.’

Thus, guild support was not limited to ill and poor master craftsmen as the 1613 statutes of the helmsmen’s guild suggests. It was also offered to elderly master craftsmen and to their widows. Furthermore, support did not only take the form of a loan, but non-financial forms of support developed, too, and these forms of support aimed at mitigating the disadvantages of certain situations, including illness, impoverishment, old age or widowhood. The beneficiaries of these forms of support were able to secure their economic and social status – a status which may otherwise have been under threat – through approval of a special setting for continuing the established business. This non-financial form of support seems to be connected to the general idea of mutual guild protection, as its aim was to uphold the permanence of the level of life and the accessibility to basic goods. Thus, even though there were different forms of support, their general function was identical: guilds guaranteed the welfare of their members. Furthermore, support was not restricted to master craftsmen and their widows. With many professions, journeymen and apprentices, too, had to join the guild, and then they were also beneficiaries of guild support: ‘Chorego towarzysza, “wyiąwszy iaką nieuczciwą chorobę”, mistrz miał pielęgnować przez tydzień, a gdyby nie wyzdrowiał przez ten czas, a towarzysz nie miał pieniędzy na kurację, koszty choroby pokrywał cech albo bractwo czeladne.’38 ‘An ill journeyman, “except for some fraudulent illness”, was supposed to be nursed by a master craftsman for one week, and if the journeyman did not recover within that period of time, and the journeyman had not enough money for the treatment, the costs of the medication were to be covered by the guild or by the journeymen brotherhood.’

The development of the support offered to journeymen by master craftsmen, guilds and separate journeymen brotherhoods has been outlined in general terms ___________ 37 38

Stanisław Herbst, Toruńskie cechy rzemieślnicze (1933), 48. Herbst (n. 37), 48 f.

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already above.39 It seems that the emergence of one form of guild support created favourable conditions for the development of other forms of assistance. Yet it was only master craftsmen who benefited from all forms of support. The measures of aid granted to journeymen and apprentices were limited and furthermore restricted by numerous requirements that had to be met. And in some statutes mentioning journeymen, they were actually not those to be supported. For example, the 1738 statutes of the glaziers’ guild in Toruń stated that journeymen received preferential treatment if they married the widow or daughter of a deceased master craftsman.40 The preferential treatment aimed at benefiting not the journeyman but the widow or daughter who consequently was able to find a husband who supported her. IV. The 1580 statutes of the musicians’ guild in Lwów Lwów (Lviv, Lwiw, Lemberg) is the historical capital of the Lwów Land, nowadays located in Ukraine. The city was granted the Magdeburg Law by the Polish King Casimir III the Great in 1356, and it was an important centre of Poland until the First Partition in 1772 and again later in the interwar period (1918–1939). The boost of the economy of Lwów occurred after 1444 when it gained staple rights. Thanks to its location along the trade routes from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea, the city was an important trade centre and therefore offered favourable conditions for the development of crafts. Craftsmen guilds were present in Lwów at least since the first half of the 15th century.41 Guilds played a key role in the flowering of the city in the 16th and the first half of the 17th century. Owing to the productivity of guilds, the city developed into the second largest city in terms of population in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth after Gdańsk (Danzig). Therefore, the development of guilds in Lwów may be looked upon as representative of their development in Polish territories. For the purpose of the present contribution, an example from the 1580 statutes of the musicians’ guild is of particular interest. The statutes are found in a vidimus, or transsumpt, approved by King Władysław IV Vasa.42 The fact that the text known today comes from a transsumpt indicates that the text consists of two parts: the original document, and the description and footnotes added on the occasion of preparing the transsumpt.43 Both parts of the statutes – the original text and the additions – contain provisions on the issue of mutual assistance within ___________ 39

See p. 219, above. Herbst (n. 37), 49. 41 Djonizy Zubrzycki, Kronika miasta Lwowa (1844), 105 f. 42 Reign 1632–1648. 43 Stanisław Kętrzyński, Zarys nauki o dokumencie polskim wieków średnich (2008), 66. 40

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the guild. As both parts were drafted at different points of time, they document the development of guild support over a few decades at the turn of the 16th century. The original text reads: ‘Artykuł dziesiąty. Gdyby ktory z braciey w ubostwie umarł, grosza swego niezostawiwszy tak, zeby nie miano go skąd pochować, takowego maią bracia sami z brackiey skrzynki dać pochować, to iest pogrzeb jego groszy pietnascie a czterem, ktorzy ciało poniosą, po groszu zapłacić.’44 ‘Article ten. If any of the brothers dies in poverty, without leaving a proper amount of money so that there will not be enough funds to bury him, then the brothers shall give money from the guild box to bury him, which means that they shall give 15 groszy for his burial and one grosz to each man of the four who will carry his body.’

As the aforementioned examples already indicate, different forms of support were introduced for the benefit of impoverished guild members, and the present text addresses the problem of a guild member dying in poverty. If a guild member died leaving insufficient funds to cover the expenses of a proper burial ceremony, the guild stepped in with funds coming from the guild box. The amount was made explicit: 15 groszy45 and one grosz for each of the four men carrying the coffin. Thus, it is an example of a financial form of support. It remedied a religious and social problem (the danger of being buried without proper ceremony) born out of economic misfortune (poverty). Thus, the guild was not obliged to grant financial aid in every case of death, but only when it was combined with insufficient assets of the estate to meet the costs of a proper funeral. Furthermore, the risk of death in poverty was shared by all members of the guild, as the funds collected in the guild box belonged to the guild and as a guild was perceived as a self-governed corporate body constituted of its members.46 Thus, it was a clear example of mutual protection and assistance. Despite the fact that such expenditures from the guild box could threaten its economic balance, the later part of the document – i.e. the additions made on the occasion of the guild statutes confirmation by Władysław IV – reveals that the scope of protection was even extended. It reads: ‘Gdyby ktory z braci wubostwie umarł nic pieniędzy do pogrzebu nie maiąc, takowego maią bracia z skrzynki brakiej dać pochować sumpt dawszy taki, iakowy przynalezy

___________ 44 Łucja Charewiczowa, Lwowskie organizacje zawodowe za czasów Polski przedrozbiorowej (1929), 171. 45 A little silver coin. According to the Constitutions of the Sejm in Piotrków in 1525– 1526, the weight of 1 grosz was about 2 grams and it contained 0.8 grams of silver. Cf. Jezierski/Leszczyńska (n. 7), 62. 46 Kazimierz Bandarzewski, Samorząd gospodarczy w prawie polskim. Studium prawne (2014), 25 f.

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katholikowi, ktorego bracia czterey na marach powinni niesć, iako się zachowuie wnaszych bractwach.’47 ‘If any of the brothers dies in poverty without leaving any money for the burial, he shall be buried by brothers thanks to the money from the guild box, and they shall give such an amount of money which will be sufficient for a Catholic, who will be carried on biers by four brothers, as it happens in our guilds’.

In the original text, the expenses covered by the guild were fixed at 19 groszy in total. The additions in the transsumpt no longer fixed an amount that in effect limited the covered expenses. Instead, the costs of a sufficient ceremony for a person of the Catholic denomination were covered. It may be assumed that the guild thus covered expenses corresponding to the average costs of a Catholic funeral for a musician and that the covered costs were, therefore, adaptable. V. The 1689 statutes of the brewers’ guild in Bydgoszcz Bydgoszcz (Bromberg) is a city in the region of Kuyavia. It was founded as a Slavic settlement first mentioned around the year 1000. Later, a castle was built, and the city developed into an important centre of trade and for crafts thanks to its strategic location by the river Brda (Brahe) flowing into the river Wisła (Weichsel), close to the ancient Amber Road. The castle and the town were occupied by the Teutonic Knights between 1330 and 1337. In 1346, the Polish King Casimir III the Great granted the Magdeburg Law to the city – a milestone in the town’s development which enabled the local crafts to flourish.48 An economic boom occurred in the 16th century in what is called the Golden Age of the PolishLithuanian Commonwealth.49 The boom was based on grain trade along the Wisła. The grain trade increased after Poland had recovered control over the entire river as a consequence of the Second Peace of Toruń in 1466 which ended the Thirteen Years’ War of Poland, as allied with Lithuania, against the State of the Teutonic Order.50 This was the setting for Bydgoszcz developing into an important centre for the crafts with many craftsmen’s guilds. Due to its importance in the region of Kuyavia, the rules and regulations to be found in the statutes of the guilds in Bydgoszcz are representative of this particular part of Poland, and the 1689 statutes of the brewers’ guild may exemplify the approach of guilds in Bydgoszcz towards the question of mutual protection and assistance. The following text is an excerpt from a copy recorded in the town book of Bydgoszcz in 1725: ___________ 47

Charewiczowa (n. 44), 171. Marian Biskup (ed.), Historia Bydgoszczy (1991), 156–164. 49 Cf. Zbigniew Wójcik, Historia powszechna wiek XVI-XVII (12th edn., 2006), 234–236. 50 Tadeusz Manteuffel, Historia powszechna średniowiecza (16th edn., 2005), 355. 48

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‘Którybykolwiek cechowy brat złożony był chorobą, onegoż jeden brat cechowy nawiedzać powinien. Którego, jeżeliby się dla niedostatku swego nie chciał czym ratować, starsi bracia, na jego w cechu posłuszeństwo pamiętając, cechowymi z skrzynki pieniędzmi wspomagać powinni. Toż się rozumieć ma o zmarłym cechowym bracie, którego jeżeliby nie było za co schować dla ubóstwa jego, z miłosierdzia cechowym kosztem przystojnie pogrzebiony być powinien.’51 ‘If any of the guild’s brothers is ill, he shall be visited by his brothers. If the ill brother is in poverty, the elder brothers, having in mind his obedience, shall grant him aid using the guild’s money from the box. The same applies to a deceased brother, if his poverty does not allow his burial, on the basis of mercy he should be buried properly.’

Two different cases are discussed, and the common requirement for support appearing in both examples is that of poverty. First, help was granted in cases of illness. It is important to note that assistance was, apart from visiting the sick guild brother, not granted in the form of the personal services of guild members nor in any other non-financial form of support. The provision exclusively mentions a financial form of support that was granted to impoverished sick guild members. The second case again concerns a guild brother dying in poverty: the guild was obliged to provide the deceased with a funeral. And again, it was not enough to perform simply any kind of funeral. It had to be a proper funeral, and one may assume that the standard of comparison was an appropriate funeral for a brewer and that this standard was above average. The necessary means were taken in both cases from funds kept in the guild box to which all members had contributed, by for example paying fines or fees. The risk of misfortune suffered by a single guild member was thus shared by all guild members. VI. The 1601 statutes of the goldsmiths’ guild in Poznań Poznań (Posen) is the historic capital of the region of Greater Poland, and it is one of the most important cities in the history of the Polish state. It was one of the capitals of the Piast state in the 10th and 11th centuries, and it was granted the Magdeburg Law by Przemysł I, the Duke of Greater Poland, in 1253.52 Throughout the medieval and early modern periods, its status as a trade and craft centre of outstanding importance remained unaltered, and it developed into one of the most prominent administrative, cultural and economic centres of Poland. In the 1580s there were at least 846 workshops in Poznań run by master craftsmen,53 and the number probably further increased until the beginning of 17th century. ___________ 51 Tadeusz Esman and Zenon Guldon (eds.), Statuty i przywileje cechów bydgoskich z lat 1434–1770 (1963), 37 f. 52 Hanna Kóčka-Krenz, Najstarsze dzieje Poznania, in: idem (ed.), Tu się Polska zaczęła (2007), 16. 53 Jerzy Wisłocki, Organizacja prawna poznańskiego rzemiosła w XVI i XVII wieku (1953), 22 f.

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Accordingly, it had many guilds, too. Considering the importance of Poznań, an example coming from that city has to be included in the present contribution. One of the many guilds in Poznań was that of the goldsmiths. It was established in 1601, and the goldsmiths made a resolution defining their obligations to the guild. What is interesting is the fact that this example reflects not the primary stage of development of mutual protection, but a further level of development, when the goldsmiths already showed a willingness to give more money for specific purposes. ‘Roku Pańskiego 1601 było bractwo pospołu na kwartał św. Trójcy, którego dnia według zwyczaju starodawnego towarzysze wszyscy, obesłani będąc, stawili się. A iż to było w używaniu starodawnym między nimi, to jest między towarzyszami, że każdego kwartału odkładali do puszki swojej, po groszu każdy, na potrzebę któregożkolwiek towarzysza chorego, albo też in a pogrzeb, gdyby który miał ze świata zejść, albo też i dla tego, który by się przywędrował, z tej puszki bywało udzielano. A iż oni uważając to wszyscy między sobą, że to jest i był mały podatek po groszu, ponieważ iż się nie często dzieje ten składek, uznali to i uważyli między sobą wszyscy sami, dobrowolnie, nie z namowy ani przymusu żadnego, że dali wszyscy po 3 gr. do puszki towarzyskiej i chcą dawać po 3 gr. wiecznymi czasy, i żądali tego u panów starszych, jako i u braci wszystkich bractwa złotniczego, aby to ich zezwolenie było zapisane w księgach brackich. Co uznawszy i uważywszy panowie bracia wszyscy, że ich prośba i przedsięwzięcie było słuszne, dopuścili i rozkazali, aby to było w księgi brackie zapisano, gdzie ich imiona własne są podpisane towarzyszów tych którzy natenczas byli.’54 ‘Anno Domini 1601, the brotherhood on the day of the Holy Trinity, when, according to an old custom, all companions gather responding to the call. It is an old custom among them, so among the companions, that each quarter they put one grosz into the box each, and the funds from the box are to cover the needs of any of the companions who becomes ill, or even for a burial, if any of them dies, or for the one who would come from other locations. As they consider that it is and was a small tax in the amount of one grosz because it happens not often to pay the premium, they voluntarily establish between themselves, not being induced nor forced by anyone, that all of them give three groszy to the companions’ box and they want to pay three groszy for eternal time, and they demand that from the elders and from all the brothers from the goldsmiths’ guild so that this approval is written in the books. As all the brothers consider and state that their request and action is legitimate, they allow and order it to be written in the guild’s books, where the names of the present companions are written down.’

The resolution clearly proves the vitality and popularity which the idea of mutual protection still enjoyed within guilds in the beginning of the 17th century. The resolution indicates that it was adopted by journeymen of the goldsmith profession. It appears that paying a contribution of one grosz each quarter was an old custom among journeymen. And in order for a norm to be perceived as a custom with the consequence that it could be enforced, it had to be commonly accepted and consistent with a value system and especially with divine law, or at ___________ 54

Witold Maisel (ed.), Wilkierze poznańskie. Część III – organizacja cechowa (1969), 91.

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least it could not be contrary to it.55 Again, as at the beginning of the resolution the journeymen claimed that it was a common and old habit to pay the contribution of one grosz per head into the box four times a year, it seems clear that such a custom was still present among those who decided to adopt the resolution. And then they voluntarily agreed to increase the financial burden threefold. This proves that the idea of mutual protection was still active in 1601. According to the resolution, two kinds of misfortune were covered: illness and death. However, the resolution does not make explicit that a journeyman had to be or die impoverished in order to receive support, even though it hints that the journeyman had to be in need. What is more important is the observation that support was also offered to those journeymen coming to town. The resolution makes clear that help was granted to those who came back to their hometowns after having travelled in their journeymen years. The requirements of protection, thus, seem to have been adjusted to the needs of journeymen goldsmith.

E. Summary The idea of mutual protection was firmly established in Polish guilds. The respective schemes were first rooted in the charitable activities of guilds. These activities were formalized over time and came to be included in the guild statutes. Thereby, a practice of customary character changed into an entitlement of guild members and a corresponding obligation of guilds. The aforementioned examples suggest that whenever a guild member met the requirements of receiving help from the guild – he became ill or fell into poverty – he was entitled to such support. It became apparent that there were different forms of assistance and support. First, there were financial forms of support. Two clear examples of such financial forms of support come from the 1580 statutes of the musicians’ guild in Lwów and from the 1689 statutes of the brewers’ guild in Bydgoszcz. In the former example the guild paid for a proper funeral, and in the latter example the guild financially supported also an ill member.56 Guild finances require further studies. Nevertheless, it is clear that guilds collected money from their members in various ways, including fees and fines. Guilds kept their funds in guild boxes, and any costs for financial forms of aid were covered by these funds. These costs were expenses of the guild itself, but in essence they were, of course, shouldered by all guild members. It was a form of mutual protection. Secondly, there are examples which stand in-between financial and non-financial forms of support, ___________ 55 Grzegorz Maria Kowalski, Zwyczaj i prawo zwyczajowe w doktrynie prawa i praktyce sądów miejskich karnych w Polsce (XVI-XVIII w.) (2013), 34. 56 See pp. 230 and 232, above.

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as the 1613 statutes of the helmsmen’s guild in Toruń make clear: a guild member in need could ask for a loan.57 As money was provided, one could contend that it was a form of financial support. Yet the loan had to be repaid. Thus, whereas the guild helped a member by allowing the use of money, it can be argued that it was a non-financial form of support for the simple reason that the loan had to be repaid. In any event, granting a loan meant that the guild and its members bore inconveniences for the benefit of a member in need. The funds were temporarily not available to serve the guild’s other functions. And there was the risk that the member in need defaulted and never repaid the loan. Thirdly, and finally, there are clear cases of non-financial support, and an example comes from Toruń. Master craftsmen of age, ill master craftsmen and widows enjoyed a preferential position in the hiring of a journeyman.58 Thereby, they were able to secure their economic and social status. The corresponding disadvantages which other guild members may have experienced by not being able to hire a journeyman or by even losing one were significant: journeymen were the foundation of any workshop. There are further characteristics of guild protection which may be pointed out by way of conclusion. First, in all discussed examples, the support and assistance offered to a guild member in need corresponded to a substantial burden for the guild and its other members. Secondly, in all discussed examples, the support and assistance offered by a guild may be described as a form of mutual protection. Leaving aside examples of charity, support and assistance were on the one hand granted to guild members or their dependants: the status as guild member constituted the key to an entitlement to receive support and assistance in cases of need. On the other hand, forms of non-financial support were granted directly by the other guild members, and forms of financial support were covered by the guild’s common funds as collected in the guild box. Even though guilds can be described as legal persons, it was the guild members who contributed to these funds. Consequently, and applying modern insurance thinking, guilds ran mutual insurance schemes with all guild members being simultaneously insurers and the insured. Thirdly, two examples discussed in the present contribution – the 1580 statutes of the musicians’ guild in Lwów and the 1601 statutes of the goldsmiths’ guild in Poznań – suggest that the different forms of support and assistance were over time further developed and extended.59 Of course, one has to be cautious in inferring from two examples a general trend. Still, it is clear that from the 15th century onwards guilds offered forms of mutual protection in the Polish territories, that the different forms of mutual protection became increasingly popular until the Partitions and that numerous guilds adopted such schemes. It is for ___________ 57

See p. 226, above. See p. 228, above. 59 See pp. 231, 233 f., above. 58

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this reason that it is possible to speak of a general trend. Finally, these schemes addressed very different risks: dying in poverty (with the consequence that the means for a proper funeral were missing), widowhood, poverty, illness and, as discussed in one of the examples, unspecified cases of misfortune. Consequently, the range of protection offered by guilds varied considerably. Modern legal historians are searching for the historical roots of modern insurance and modern insurance law,60 and this leads to the final question to be addressed in the present contribution: is it possible to look upon the mutual protection offered by craftsmen guilds as a predecessor of mutual insurance in Poland? Today’s definition of mutual insurance is as follows. ‘Przystępując do ubezpieczenia wzajemnego, podmiot ubezpieczający przenosi ryzyko na ubezpieczyciela, którego jest członkiem, a w rezultacie przenosi również część ryzyka na własną osobę.’61 ‘By entering into a mutual insurance contract, the insured transfers the risk to the insuring entity he is a member, and as a result he also transfers a part of the risk onto himself.’

From a purely functional perspective, the parallels between the mutual protection offered by guilds and modern mutual insurance schemes are obvious, and it would thus be possible to analyse guild support in terms of mutual insurance. Of course, the risks which were covered by guilds on the one hand and by modern mutual insurance schemes on the other hand are not identical. Guilds were designed to address those risks which worried contemporaries the most: dying without a proper funeral; the financial risks of illness and old age; widowhood. And the benefits offered by guilds differed from modern mutual insurance schemes. However, apart from these differences, the functional parallels are striking. Nevertheless, one has to be careful in speaking of the mutual protection offered by guilds as being a predecessor to modern mutual insurance in Poland. It has to be stressed that the present contribution discussed, of course, only examples of guild statutes that explicitly referred to such mutual protection. Even though the examples discussed in the present paper were chosen as being representative for the different parts of Poland and for the various periods of its history between the beginnings of guilds in Poland in the 13th century and the Third Partition in 1795, it is nevertheless clear that not all Polish guilds provided their members with such kind of assistance. Despite the fact that Polish statehood ceased after the Third Partition in 1795, the heritage of Polish craftsmen guilds continued to influence the development of insurance on Polish soil. Their heritage enabled the development of Polish ___________ 60 Phillip Hellwege, A Comparative History of Insurance Law in Europe, (2016) 56 American Journal of Legal History 66–75, 70 f. 61 Kamiński (n. 25), 101.

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insurance institutions in the 19th century, specifically mutual insurance associations. The conditions for the development of mutual insurance institutions were particularly good in Greater Poland under Prussian occupation, but mutual insurance associations were present also in the other parts of Poland, as occupied by Austria and Russia.62 A short period of the Duchy of Warsaw (1807–1815) enabled further development of Polish insurance associations.63 It has to be underlined that mutual insurance can be said to have influenced the national insurance acts;64 furthermore, the disappearance of the Commonwealth in 1795 did not end the traditions of mutual insurance. The heritage of mutual insurance within guilds was present in Poland both before 1795 and after the Partitions, and it enabled the formation of mutual insurance associations as regulated by occupational powers.

___________ 62

Cf. Marian Szczęśniak, Historia ubezpieczeń na ziemiach polskich, in: idem (ed.), U progu trzeciego stulecia ubezpieczeń (1993), 15–25. 63 Lucjan Pokorzyński, Powstanie i rozwój ubezpieczeń na ziemiach polskich w latach 1803–1914, in: Ludwik Czerwiński (ed.), 150 lat ubezpieczeń w Polsce, vol. 1 (1958), 22–25. 64 Today, it is stressed that insurance ‘provided in the form of mutual insurance is sometimes explicitly mentioned as being subject to the national insurance contract act too […]; in most countries the rules on insurance contracts will be applied to mutual insurance by analogy.’ (Jürgen Basedow et al. (ed.), Principles of European Insurance Contract Law (PEICL) (2009), Art. 1:101 N2, 32). Nonetheless, one should distinguish today’s legal framework of mutual insurance from its idea, traditions, customs etc. After the Partitions of Poland, mutual insurance was not re-introduced by the occupying powers; rather, they simply rearranged its legal framework and adjusted it to the legislative changes.

Chapter 11: Guild Support in Hungary (1307–1872) By Balázs Rigó A. The state of research on guilds ............................................................................... 239  B. The state of research on poor relief, public welfare and social insurance ............... 242  C. The development of guilds in Hungary .................................................................. 243  D. Guild membership as a key to understanding guild support ................................... 246  I. The importance of parentage, honest conduct and marriage ........................... 247  II. The preferential treatment of sons of masters and of journeymen marrying widows and daughters of masters ................................ 253  III. Losing guild membership ................................................................................ 258  IV. Conclusion ...................................................................................................... 261  E. The beneficiaries, forms, and details of guild support ............................................ 261  F. Principles of guild support ...................................................................................... 267  G. Conclusion: marriage at any cost ............................................................................ 269

A. The state of research on guilds Although the literature on the history of guilds in Hungary could fill entire libraries, legal aspects have mostly been neglected in the history of guilds. István Lippay identified a corresponding lacuna in the works of two leading legal historians of their time, Ákos Timon and István Király.1 Lippay himself dedicated parts of his Commentary on the Act on Industrial Corporations to the legal history of guilds. The objective of his work was to describe the legal functions of guilds, especially their right to regulate and control the crafts, and to prove lines of continuity right up to the 1932 Act on Industrial Corporations. Questions of private or business law relating to guilds as well as their social, religious and economic dimensions were of only secondary importance to him. Nevertheless, his book remains the only legal-historical work on guilds. And even though it was written almost 90 years ago, it is – due to its detailed account, its method, its general approach and due to Lippay’s sensitivity to legal problems – still today essential reading for legal historians working on guilds.

___________ 1 István Lippay, Az ipartestületekről és az Ipartestületek Országos Központjáról (1932), 5 f.

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The authoritative work on guilds in Hungary has been authored by Lajos Szádeczky.2 It was published in two volumes in 1913 and is still today the starting point for any research into guilds. It deals mainly with their economic history, but it also contains relevant observations on their legal dimension. Furthermore, the second volume includes a valuable bibliography on guilds, and – even more importantly – it reproduces dozens of primary materials, such as charters and letters patent dating from 1307 to 1848. Since some of these documents have subsequently been lost, the second volume is of utmost value. Starting in the 1960s, research on guilds intensified. It was the research into the history of the county of Veszprém, and especially the works of Péter Nagybákay, that led to three decades of enduring in-depth research into the history of guilds.3 The example of Veszprém and of Nagybákay was followed by museums of local history in other counties and by local historians throughout the country. This research had an ethnographic and local-historic approach and considered to a large extent also unwritten sources on guilds. In this context, the monograph authored by Géza Eperjessy has to be highlighted.4 It refines and supplements Szádeczky’s register of guilds, and it discusses in detail the history of guilds in the Great Hungarian Plain and in Transdanubia. His research and that of Szádeczky cover, taken together, the regions of Upper Hungary and Transylvania. Their research may, thus, give insight into the development of guilds in Hungary as a whole. The merit of Eperjessy’s book is that it covers the period when the crafts controlled by guilds first flourished and when, at the same time, they fell into decay due to unique circumstances. For any research into the history of the guilds of Transylvania, the source books published by Pál Binder and Géza Kovách are indispensable.5 They contain 33 documents, as for example letters patent, together with an invaluable introductory essay. The sources complement those to be found in Szádeczky’s book; moreover, Binder and Kovách translated into Hungarian some of the documents from Szádeczky’s book, in which they had been reproduced mainly in German or Latin. From contemporary research, a series edited by Csilla Tuza and Zsuzsanna Vissi is outstanding.6 Altogether three volumes have been published, and they ___________ 2

Lajos Szádeczky, Iparfejlődés és a céhek története Magyarországon, 2 vol. (1913). See, e.g., Péter Nagybákay, Céhek, céhemlékek Veszprém megyében (1971); idem, Magyarországi céhbehívótáblák (1981); idem, A magyarországi céhes kézművesipar jelvényei (1995). 4 Géza Eperjessy, Mezővárosi és falusi céhek az Alföldön és a Dunántúlon. 1686–1848 (1967). 5 Pál Binder and Géza Kovách (eds.), A céhes élet Erdélyben (1981). 6 Csilla Tuza and Zsuzsanna Vissi, Az Mester Emberek jó rendtartása. Magyar nyelvű céhlevelek, 3 vol. (2000–2005). For the analysis of the regulation of the guilds see further Csilla Tuza, Állami céhszabályozás Magyarországon III. Károly és Mária Terézia 3

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reproduce letters patent and charters from 1525 to 1738. These documents are reproduced in their original Hungarian version, so they are also relevant for linguists. Furthermore, the Committee on Ethnography within the Hungarian Academy of Sciences has published a series on guild tariffs for different crafts, making it invaluable for economic historians. Since the 19th century, research into guilds has either followed a purely localhistorical approach (in which case it has dealt with all guilds in a specific town or region) or it has combined such a local-historical approach with a vertical approach (meaning it has additionally focused on specific crafts and professions in a town or region).7 Researchers following such a local-historical approach have consulted the written and unwritten sources found in the collections of local libraries, local museums and other local institutions as well as in local journals. The local-historical setting of this branch of research does not say anything about its scholarly value. It rather points to the need for synthetization, following the example of Nagybákay. Thus, research has to go beyond a purely local-historical and ethnographic approach. A horizontal approach needs to be added. Such research has the potential of revealing common characteristics of guilds in the whole of Hungary or in even greater geographical settings. The aim of the present contribution is to analyse how, in modern terminology, ideas of social security, social policy and social welfare were realized in the context of guilds before the development of modern social security schemes and before the development of modern insurance. Such an undertaking faces methodological challenges. Legal historians often oversimplify modern institutions in order to transfer the resulting images back to the past as a matrix for their analysis. Unsurprisingly, they are then able to identify continuities between the past and the present by linking an oversimplified analysis of the past back to modern times. In order to meet these methodological challenges, the present paper will speak of ‘support and assistance’. To speak of social security, social policy and social welfare is inapt. The use of these terms requires the development of the modern state as a prerequisite. Yet guilds have their origins in the Middle Ages. The aim of the present paper is to uncover how guilds addressed their members’ risks of death, accident, illness, disability, old age, widowhood or of becoming an orphan. In addition, as the present contribution is part of a legal-historical project, the question needs to be answered what kind of normative instruments were used to address these risks. ___________ uralkodása alatt – Zunftregulierung in Ungarn während der Regierungszeit von Karl III. und Maria Theresia (2018). 7 Béla Borsodi-Bevilaqua, A budai és pesti mészáros céhek ládáinak okiratai. 1270– 1872, 2 vol. (1931). For a modern edition of primary source, see, e.g., István Kenyeres (ed.), A budai mészárosok középkori céhkönyve és kiváltságlevelei – Zunftbuch und Privilegien der Fleischer zu Ofen aus dem Mittelalter (2008).

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B. The state of research on poor relief, public welfare and social insurance The aim of the present contribution is to analyse how guilds addressed the economic and other consequences of death, accident, illness, disability, old age, widowhood or becoming an orphan. This research question has to be contextualized: it has strong connections to poor relief in medieval societies, to what is usually referred to as poor law in early modern societies and to the development of social insurance schemes. From the respective literature published before World War II, Sándor Hanvai’s and Károly Pálos’s works have to be highlighted. Hanvai offers a profound analysis of contemporary measures of care, and he adds a valuable comparative perspective by referring to international developments.8 His focus is on what we today call administrative law and, thus, on the role of the state in the care for the poor. Pálos’s analysis is even more detailed, but he restricts himself to the local practices of Eger and Szombathely.9 Both authors emphasize the role of the church in the care for the poor. Before 1945, the then new academic field of social policy produced rich literature on care for children, the poor, orphans, war cripples etc. The works of Dénes Bikkal on social insurance are of special importance to legal historians because they include legal aspects.10 He provides his reader with the definitions and institutions of insurance law, he enlists all Hungarian then existing social insurance schemes and he includes short accounts of corresponding schemes in 23 countries. However, the historical perspective is underdeveloped in his work, and it is restricted to the developments in Hungary. Nevertheless, today his work is a valuable source for analysing social insurance thinking of the early 20th century. After World War II, sociology and social policy were regarded as bourgeois disciplines. Furthermore, the state denied the existence of any social problems. However, starting in the 1970s, an increasing number of studies on social policy as well as sociological and criminological works were published. The publications of Zsuzsa Ferge are worth mentioning.11 Still today, her books are authoritative on contemporary social policy and social insurance. Yet even though she claimed to write on the history of social policy of Hungary, her account started

___________ 8 Sándor Hanvai, A szegénygyámolításról (1925); idem, Az emberbaráti intézményekről (1925). 9 Károly Pálos, Szegénység, szegénygondozás (1934). 10 Dénes Bikkal, Társadalombiztosítástan. A társadalombiztosítás elmélete és politikája (1941). 11 Zsuzsa Ferge, Fejezetek a magyar szegénypolitika történetéből (1986).

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only in 1867 and did not include guilds. In the field of legal history, Andor Csizmadia’s work is widely cited, and he examines care for the poor from the perspective of administrative law.12 Contemporary literature sheds light on a number of aspects regarding the legal history of social care and social insurance. László Pomogyi, for example, focuses on administrative questions associated with poor law in the Hungarian counties.13 Mónika Kozári deals with the development of pension systems from Maria Teresia to World War II, and she puts her findings into comparative perspective.14 The most recent research has been carried out by Balázs Pálvölgyi.15 His field of study is the legal history of social policy and social insurance, with a special focus on medical care. However, he has not included guilds in his research. A new approach to the legal history of public welfare is presented in the coursebook on comparative legal history of the Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest.16 It has been edited by András Földi and includes two chapters discussing the legal history of the welfare state and social policy. Károly Kisteleki analyses the theoretical and constitutional foundations of the welfare state, especially of Bismarck’s welfare schemes.17 And Miklós Kelemen discusses the development of legal institutions for care from the late Roman Empire until Obamacare from comparative perspectives.18 Thus, today comparative legal history on care for the poor and on the development of the welfare state is, at least in the Eötvös Loránd University, an obligatory part of the curriculum.

C. The development of guilds in Hungary In Hungary, guilds first appeared in the Middle Ages.19 They were representative bodies of craftsmen, usually of the same craft. Their purpose was to protect the common goals of the craftsmen and the integrity of the craft. In this respect, they are comparable to modern trade unions. They had a monopoly to purchase ___________ 12

Andor Csizmadia, A szociális gondoskodás változásai Magyarországon (1977). László Pomogyi, Szegényügy és községi illetőség a polgári Magyarországon (2001). 14 Mónika Kozári, A nyugdíjrendszer Magyarországon Mária Teréziától a második világháborúig (2012). 15 Balázs Pálvölgyi, A magyar közegészségügyi igazgatás intézmény-rendszere. 1867– 1914 (2007). 16 András Földi (ed.), Összehasonlító Jogtörténet (4th edn., 2018). 17 Károly Kisteleki, Az alkotmánygondolat fejlődéstörténete, in: Földi (n. 16), 155– 190, 181–186. 18 Miklós Kelemen, A jóléti közszolgáltatások igazgatásának történetéből, in: Földi (n. 16), 277–294, 280–291. 19 This following overview is based on Lippay (n. 1), 12–25; Szádeczky (n. 2), vol. 1, 25–48; Nagybákay, 1971 (n. 3), 5–13; idem, 1981 (n. 3), 5–7; Eperjessy (n. 4), 13–33. 13

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raw materials for their members, to produce the products and to provide the services of the respective craft on the local market. Their monopoly was based on letters patent. With respect to their market-regulating functions, they furthermore controlled the quality of the products and services of the craft as well as the training of apprentices and journeymen, and they protected their members against the competition of free craftsmen, so-called dabblers (kontárok). From a political perspective, they were horizontal and corporative associations in medieval society. The guild system had emerged spontaneously, and it had built up more or less standardized structures throughout Europe lasting for a half a millennium without any central governance. The emergence of guilds is closely linked to the development of medieval towns: medieval urbanization and the development of guilds are inseparably interwoven, yet guilds were also of importance in those regions which were only slightly touched by urbanization. Both medieval towns and guilds were closed and mostly patriarchal organizations, though they also exhibited some democratic features. The majority of a medieval town’s male population were craftsmen. It follows that guilds developed into influential actors in these towns. Furthermore, guild membership resulted in, and was dependant on having, town citizenship: a foreign journeyman was allowed to apply to the magistrate for citizenship after having completed his masterpiece, and after acquiring citizenship the guild could convey upon him the status of a master craftsman and thereby allow him to become a full guild member. Moreover, members of wealthy guilds and of guilds representing the most respected professions could become magistrates and take other town offices. With respect to their religious functions, guilds often had their own altar, and the patron saint of their confraternity was usually identical to the patron saint of that altar. Furthermore, guild members were obliged to participate in religious ceremonies, and they faced rigorous sanctions if they did not. Of special importance was participation in a deceased member’s funeral. Guilds had a peculiar impact on the structure of medieval towns: craftsmen of the same guild and, thus, of the same profession or at least of related professions settled in the same street. Thereby, they also formed their own local community, and this furthered their common identity. This detail of the structure of a medieval town may also explain the guilds’ function in defending the town against enemies. Each guild was responsible for the defence of, and care for, certain parts of the city wall. All of these functions play a role in the different theories on the development of guilds. Some authors regard the religious function, others the social function and again others the military function as the prime cause for the emergence of guilds. However, it is impossible to identify any mono-causal link between any one of these functions and the appearance of guilds. The development of guilds in medieval towns was, of course, only possible because, as István Bibó put it,

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they were ‘little circles of liberty’ which had subverted the strict and hierarchical society of feudalism.20 The participation in the town’s defence was simply a question of elementary necessity in the Middle Ages. However, at the same time this function of guilds was linked to the theory of divine providence that pervaded all aspects of medieval life. Thus, all characteristic features and functions of guilds mirrored the entire medieval life. Furthermore, all institutionalized associations – regardless of whether they were of religious, professional or some other character – had to have funds, some kind of normativity, the capability of self-defence and an awareness of identity. It thus seems that the institutionalization of guilds simply implied that guilds had to fulfil all the functions which modern literature ascribes to them. These general observations also apply to the developments in Hungary. The development of the crafts in medieval Hungary started when the so-called hospes from Western Europe settled in Hungarian cities (Esztergom, Buda, Pest and Székesfehérvár) under the reign of Géza II (1141–1162). At the end of the 13th century, Italian (Venetian or Lombard), Saxon, Flemish, Lower Rhine or Westphalian hospes initiated the first Hungarian guilds in the Szepes and Saxon Region of Transylvania, in Upper-Hungary (Pozsony/Bratislava/Pressburg, Kassa/ Košice/Kaschau) and even in Debrecen. The first known letters patent are from those of the furriers’ guild of Kassa from 1307. Fully developed guilds emerged in the second half of the 14th century as a consequence of the economic reforms of the Angevins. Two letters patent have survived from that era, more exactly from 1376. The first letters patent are those of the united guilds of butchers, bakers and shoemakers of the city of Pozsony. They are of only little importance for the present purpose. They included rigorous provisions on food safety. The second, more significant letters patent were those of the united guilds of the Saxon sedes (literally ‘chairs’) of Transylvania. They governed all guilds of the seven Saxon sedes. The letters patent had a general part that applied to all guilds followed by special provisions for each of the guilds. From the perspectives of codification history and legislative methods, the letters patent were highly advanced. They included norms setting out the guilds’ liberties and their internal organization, such as rules on the election of members; they contained provisions on the guild members’ rights and duties and very detailed and precise rules on the individual crafts. In the 15th century, guilds flourished, yet in the 16th and 17th centuries they, as well as the crafts in general, faced a crisis and almost disappeared in one-third of the Hungarian territory due to the Ottoman occupation and the Kuruc wars. Guilds had their zenith in the territories exempt from wars, especially in Upper___________ 20 István Bibó, Az európai társadalomfejlődés értelme, in: idem, Válogatott tanulmányok, vol. 3 (1986), 5–124.

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Hungary and Transylvania. The letters patent dating back from the time before the Ottoman conquest were reissued, recertified or republished at the turn of the 17th to the 18th centuries. Then, in the 18th century, the Habsburg central government reorganized and restructured the Hungarian state, and it also intended to regulate guilds anew and harmonize them. To that purpose, it issued royal decrees instead of granting letters patent. The latter disappeared after 1738. This brought about a fundamentally different approach towards guilds: the liberties and privileges, which the letters patent had granted to them, disappeared. In the 18th and 19th centuries, Hungary then saw simultaneously two opposite trends. In the Great Hungarian Plain and in Transdanubia – the territories of the former Ottoman conquest – guilds were re-established. In the other parts of Hungary, guilds experienced, after a short period of flourishing, a slow and long-lasting decline. Their short period of flourishing in the 19th century is explainable on the basis of the socio-economic context which was unique to Hungary. Hungary had an underdeveloped industry and its economy was still mainly agrarian, but it was under the influence of a competitive Austrian industry and capitalism emerged. Feudalism was abolished in the revolution and the war of independence of 1848/49, and guilds, as a fossil from medieval society, entered their final stage of existence. The process of modernizing the Hungarian economy continued, and with it the fate of the guilds was sealed. After 1851, under the rule of Austrian neo-absolutism, guilds still formally survived; but on the grounds of free competition, which was the basis of the economic policy of Austrian neo-absolutism, their crisis was amplified. Finally, guilds were dissolved by an Act of 1872.

D. Guild membership as a key to understanding guild support Throughout their history, guilds (céh) were closed and patriarchal corporate bodies exhibiting some democratic elements. Their closed character meant that they were exclusionary: free craftsmen, so-called dabblers (kontárok) or bunglers (kontár), were banned from practising the craft if this conflicted with the privileges granted to a guild. In places where guilds existed, only their members had the right to exercise the craft. Guilds, thus, held a monopoly for their respective crafts. However, it may have happened that two guilds for the same profession coexisted for the different ethnicities in one place. Dabblers who violated the rights of a guild were prosecuted. They were a constant economic threat to guilds because they did not observe the strict market-regulating rules of guilds on, for example, the quality and quantity of the products. The patriarchal character of guilds in connection with their religious foundation meant unconditional obedience towards the master and his family, respect for an elder, honour for age and the primacy of experience – not only in the relationship between master craftsmen and journeymen, but even between master craftsmen. Their patriarchal character implied that guilds were looked upon as

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great families, where the members lived in mutual respect, appreciation and care. This explains the strict measures which were applied to admission to guilds as well as the steps taken in regard to termination of membership by death, funeral ceremonies and preserving the memory of the deceased. The democratic character of guilds, even if it was limited, manifested itself in the way guild assemblies were run, in the regular discussions of internal affairs, in the election of masters and other guild offices and in the fact that guild rules applied to every single guild member. In summary, guild membership was a key to social, economic and political participation in towns, and the rights differed for the different status groups: master craftsmen (céhmester), their families, journeymen (céhlegény) and apprentices (inas). They all were part of a guild. Yet, it was only master craftsmen – as well as their widows and children if they inherited their husbands’ or fathers’ rights – who had full guild rights and who especially had the right to run their own craft business. Consequently, becoming a master craftsman was the most important step for a guild member. The requirements were regulated in detail, especially those concerning the masterpiece (mestermunka, mesterremek, remek) and the great banquet (mesterasztal).21 In a nutshell, a journeyman had to prove his skills, he had to have served his apprenticeship and his journeymen years, he had to present his certificate of baptism and he had to prove good conduct.22 He had to be honourable and trustworthy, had to come from a legitimate family, he had to be born in wedlock and he was not allowed to have any criminal record. He had to acquire citizenship in order to be admitted to the guild.23 Finally, he had to host two banquets and pay the entrance fee. In Hungary, this fee was called a tax, but it had nothing to do with a tax in the modern sense. I. The importance of parentage, honest conduct and marriage Disregarding the many details and peculiarities of the different crafts, I will in the remainder of this part of the present contribution focus on the importance of personal status and marriage as requirements to be admitted to a guild. The reason for this focus is simple. It has become clear that guilds were patriarchal organizations in which the family and a trustworthy life were of special importance. Furthermore, in the period covered in the present contribution, family law, suc___________ 21

Mestarasztal literally translates as ‘master dish’ or ‘master table’.  Szádeczky (n. 2), vol. 1, 191–234; Nagybákay, 1971 (n. 3), 15–52; Eperjessy (n. 4), 93–110. 23 On this, see the earlier discussion at p. 243, above. 22

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cession law and legal questions regarding marital property were closely connected. Indeed they were inseparable. This is the context in which questions of support, assistance and care within guilds have to be placed. It is for this reason that birth in wedlock and parentage from an honourable family were of great significance. Moreover, birth, personal status, marriage and a virtuous life remained of importance even after a journeyman had become a master craftsman. In summary, questions of birth, personal status and marriage seem to have been of special importance. This special importance is also highlighted in the letters patent. It is not that these requirements were regulated in detail. It was rather the concise discussion and their inevitability which points to their importance. The 1376 letters patent of the Saxons in Szászváros (Orăștie, Broos), Transylvania, in today’s Romania, clarified that it was presumed that a foreign journeyman applying to be admitted to a guild led a honourable and trustworthy life: ‘Ha bárki bármely jövevény kézművest valami bűnnel vagy becstelenséggel vádolna s ezáltal őt a céhbe való felvételében megakadályozni akarná, a vádló azt a bűnt vagy becstelenséget a vádlott ellen tartozik bebizonyítani saját fáradságával és költségén; mit ha bebizonyítani nem tudna, akkor az ugyanazon bűnre vagy gyalázatra kiszabott büntetést szenvedje. Egy jövevény kézműves sem kényszerítendő arra, hogy becsületének és jó hírnevének kimutatása végett hazájába menjen vissza, hanem bármely kézműves, mind jövevény, mind bennszülött, ha a mi körünkben nincs megbélyegezve, saját mesterségének céhébe felvétetni tartozik.’24 ‘If a sojourner is accused by a member with a crime or other dishonest deed and if the sojourner is thereby hindered to be admitted, the accuser shall give evidence for that crime or dishonest deed at his own expenses and trouble. If he is not able to give evidence, he shall suffer the same punishment that is to be imposed for the same crime or dishonest deed. No sojourner is forced to return to his home to bring evidence for his credit and honour, but any craftsman, both a sojourner and a native from this town, shall have the right to be admitted to the guild of his own craft, if he is not stigmatized by any among us.’

The letters patent of the furriers’ guild of Beszterce (Bistrița, Bistritz), Transylvania, in today’s Romania, dating from c. 1500 made clear that the applicant had to prove his descent: ‘Aki a mesterek sorába kíván lépni, annak levele legyen születéséről és szüleiről, mi az apja és az anyja neve. A nemzetséglevélre legyen a város pecsétje ráütve.’25 ‘Any person that wants to be a master craftsman shall have a letter of his birth with the name of his parents. The letter shall have the seal of the city on it.’

___________ 24 25

Cited from Binder/Kovách (n. 5), 59. Cited from Binder/Kovách (n. 5), 68.

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The 1511 letters patent of the goldsmiths’ guild of Brassó (Brașov, Kronstadt), Transylvania, in today’s Romania, summarize the personal requirements to be admitted as a master craftsman: ‘Ne vegyenek fel senkit, aki nem tisztességes és igaz keresztény születésű, jámbor és becsületes.’26 ‘No man shall be enrolled who is not honourable, who is not of Christian birth and who is not pious and trustworthy.’

The 1561 letters patent of the goldsmiths’ guild of Kolozsvár (Cluj-Napoca, Klausenburg), Transylvania, in today’s Romania, contained a comparable provision: ‘Minden, az ki mesterré akar lenni, tisztességes atyától, anyától való legény, híre, neve és tisztessége vesztett ne legyen.’27 ‘Any person willing to be a master shall be a journeyman of honourable father and mother, and shall not have lost his credit, name and righteousness.’

Article 19 of the 1622 letters patent of the tailors’ guild of Nagyszombat (Trnava, Tyrnau), in today’s Slovakia, required that the journeyman also had to have had a pious and honest master craftsman: ‘Az czéhbe menetelben való szokás penig és törvény imez, hogy […] jámbor tökélletes mesternél tanúlta az ő mesterségét, és hogy az ó apró-esztendeit éppen és teljességesen jámborúl kitöltötte, és hogy mind nemzetségének, s mind penig atyának és anyjának tisztességbeli voltokat megbizonyítsa.’28 ‘The custom and rule concerning the admission to this guild is as follows, namely that [the applicant] has learned his profession with an entirely pious and perfect master, that he has completed his years of apprenticeship, that he is perfectly pious and that he testifies to both the honour of his kindred as well as of his father and mother.’

Article 3 of the 1716 letters patent of the cupmakers’ guild of Nagybánya (Baia Mare, Frauenbach/Groß-Neustadt/Neustadt) in today’s Romania described the respective entrance requirements in a similar way: ‘Az ki céhünkben bé akar állani, szükség, hogy jó és jámbor nemzet legyen, melyrűl producálja nemzetségi levelét, tanulólevelével együtt.’29 ‘For any person who wants to enrol into our guild, it is evident, that he shall have a fair and pious nature to which end he produces the letter of his kinship together with the letter of his apprenticeship.’

These requirements more or less remained unchanged until the early 19th century as the letters patent of the tailors’ guild of Kolozsvár prove: ___________ 26

Cited from Binder/Kovách (n. 5), 76. Cited from Szádeczky, vol. 2 (n. 2), 57. 28 Cited from Szádeczky, vol. 1 (n. 2), 219. 29 Cited from Binder/Kovách (n. 5), 236. 27

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‘Valamely becsületes szabó legény a nemez czéhban ajánlani akarja magát, tehát annak az ő erkölcsének és elméjének egyéb jóságai között három kiváltképpen való ékességei legyenek: 1mo Tudniillik: hogy tisztességbeli ágyból, azaz tisztességes atyáktól nemzetett és született légyen, melyet tartozzék hiteles levele által bizonyítani és hogy mesterségit czéhes helyen tanulta. 2do Hogy maga is tisztességes erkölcsű és józan életű ember légyen. 3tio Hogy az mesterségre is elégséges és 6 esztendeig vándorlott legény égyen.’30 ‘Any honest tailor journeyman who wants to recommend himself to the guild shall, in addition to his good morals and the kindness of his mind, fulfil three requirements: First, he shall be born in wedlock, i.e. descend from an honest father, which he shall testify by letter of authority, and he shall have learned his skills in a guild. Secondly, he shall have right morals and lead a humble life. Thirdly, he shall have travelled for six years and be ready and prepared for the practice of the craft.’

Thus, descent from a legitimate marriage was of utmost importance. The question whether the journeyman was already married or not when applying to be admitted as master craftsman to the guild was addressed in detail, and the provisions in letters patent regulate both cases. However, it seems to have been the typical scenario that a journeyman was still unmarried when being admitted to the guild as a full member. Then he ought to get married within a year, as Art. 15 of the 1525 letters patent of the tailors’ guild of Szatmár (Satu Mare, Sathmar), in today’s Romania, exemplifies: ‘Senki az szabómesterség közül egy esztendőnek fölötte az mesterség híre nélkül házastárs nélkül ne éljen, hanem ha erejében megfogyatkoznék.’31 ‘No man among the tailors shall practise his profession for more than one year as master without a spouse, unless he is lessened in his own power.’

Thus, a tailor was allowed to remain unmarried only in a case of grave illness and weakness. Article 21 of the 1649 letters patent of the guild of the tailors and baize cutters of Losonc (Lučenec, Lizenz), in today’s Slovakia, allowed a period of two years. However, already after one year the guild imposed sanctions on a journeyman who remained unmarried: ‘Az ky penigh keőzeőteők Hazas Tar[s] nelkűl lenne egy esztendeőnel touab, keőzeőteok ne lehessen, hanem meg hazasulion, elseő eztendeőbely bűntetesse egi forint, masik eztendeobely ket forint legien.’32 ‘Any person among yourselves who lives without a spouse for more than one year shall pay a fine of one forint after the first year, and two forints after the second year.’

___________ 30

Cited from Szádeczky, vol. 2 (n. 2), 201. Cited from Binder/Kovách (n. 5), 84. The provision was confirmed in 1640: Tuza/Vissi, vol. 1 (n. 6), 22. 32 Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 1 (n. 6), 33. 31

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However, financial sanctions seemed to have been insufficient. Article 26 of the 1649 letters patent of the belt and saddle makers’ guild of the same city threatened to exclude a guild brother who remained unmarried for more than one year from the guild house: ‘Az ky keőzuleok hazas Tars nelkűl lézen eztendeőnel touab, az ollyan keőzeőteők ne lakhasson, hanem megh haszasuljon.’33 ‘Any person among yourselves who is without a spouse for more than one year shall not live among yourselves until he gets married.’

Still, the most frequent sanction was a fine, as proven by Art. 22 of the 1674 letters patent of the tailors’ guild of Fülek (Fiľakovo, Fileck), in today’s Slovakia; Art. 21 of the 1676 letters patent of the tailors’ guild of Csáktornya (Čakovec, Csakathurn), in today’s Croatia; and Art. 21 of the 1690 letters patent of the tailors’ guild of Somorja (Šamorín, Sommerein), in today’s Slovakia. Article 22 of the 1674 letters patent of the tailors’ guild of Fülek reads: ‘Az mely Mester közöttek megh nem házasúlna esztendő alat, annak ket forjnt legien böntetésse.’34 ‘Any master who does not get married within a year shall pay two forints of fine.’

Another typical sanction was a ban on exercising the profession until the master craftsman married. Article 17 of the 1660 letters patent of the sword copers’, belt and shield makers’ guild of Pozsony, for example, stated: ‘Ha ualamelly Mester legenj maghának uallo Mestere lészen, fellesseghe nékj nem leuén, tehát eó nekj az eó réghi tőruennyek és szokassok szerént egyesztendeó engedttessék megh hazassulassára, és a’ mester asztalnak megh adassára, Hogy há pedigh egy esztendőnek forgássa alat megh nem hazassodnek, és áz Mester asztalt megh nem adná, tehát addigh Mesterseghet úzni, legenyeket és inassokat tartánj ne legyen szabad, Hanem ezek tólle megh tiltassanak.’35 ‘Any journeyman who becomes a master and has not obtained a wife shall have according to old customs and laws a one-year term to get married and to host the master banquet. And if he does not get married in a year and host the master banquet, he is not any longer free to exercise the craft and hire a journeyman and apprentices, rather, he is forbidden to do so.’

And Art. 20 of the 1692 letters patent of the tawers’ and tanners’ guild of Veszprém reads: ‘Minden iffiu Mestert az Ché Felességh nélköl az Chében tarthat Esztendeigh, de Esztendő mulván, ha megh nem házassodik, hanem csak Felleségh nélkül akarna élny, Mesterséghe annak eltéltassék mind adigh, mégh megh nem hazassodik.’36

___________ 33

Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 1 (n. 6), 37. Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 1 (n. 6), 122. For the other provisions, see ibid., 146, 31. 35 Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 1 (n. 6), 86. 36 Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 2 (n. 6), 43. See also Art. 3 of the 1713 letters patent of the tailors’ guild of Lébényszentmiklós, ibid., vol. 2, 84; Art. 5 of the 1719 letters patent 34

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‘Every young master craftsman may remain a member of the guild for one year without a wife, but after that year, if he does not get married and wants to live without a wife, then he shall be forbidden from exercising the craft until getting married.’

And a similar sanction even applied when a master craftsman left his wife, as Art. 26 of the 1733 letters patent of the tailors’ guild of Székesfehérvár exhibits: ‘Ha valamelly Szür Szabó Mester Ember maga hütves Társát elhadgya, mind addig nem Szabad néki Mesterséget űzni, valameddig maga Dolgát el-nem igazittya.’37 ‘Any tailor master who leaves his honourable spouse shall not exercise his craft, until he readjusts his own affairs.’

Many guild statutes did not explicitly mention the possibility that a married journeyman could be admitted as master craftsman to the guild. Thus, it is probable that these guilds admitted such journeyman. Other guilds expressly tolerated such a marriage. However, some guilds imposed a sanction on a journeyman under these circumstances. This was the case according to the 1561 letters patent of the goldsmiths’ guild of Kolozsvár: ‘Ha valaki penig efféle mesterremek megcsinálása előtt megházasulna, az céh szükségére négy forintot tartozik fizetni.’38 ‘If a journeyman married before making the masterpiece, he shall pay four forints for the needs of the guild.’

However, there were also guilds showing more sensibility for social needs, as Art. 12 of the 1674 letters patent of the tanners’ of Bő proves: ‘Ha valaki az Vargha Mesterek közűl vandorlana, s feleséghe uolna, és erre az városra jűnné, ki annak előtte Mesterséghet űszte, es valami szukelkedése miat Mesterséghet nem űszhetne, es illyent az mi Mesterink föl uennie, és mind egy szolgát nalok munkalkodni hadgyak.’39 ‘If a tanner master who travels like a journeyman and who has a wife comes to this town and if he had exercised the craft earlier, but now is unable to exercise it due to poverty, he is to be admitted to the guild and to have the right to take a servant to work with him.’

There are numerous guild statutes that do not include any provisions on the question of a journeyman being married or remaining unmarried. And most letters patent regulated only one of the many possible scenarios. It is likely that those guilds which did not explicitly address these questions tolerated any status ___________ of the tailors’ guild of Léva/Levice/Lewenz, ibid., vol. 2, 188.; Art. 4 of the 1724 letters patent of the tailors’ guild of Ürmény/Mojmírovce, ibid., vol. 3, 27 f.; Art. 15 of the 1724 letters patent of the locksmiths’ guild of Esztergom, ibid., vol. 3, 38; Art. 11 of the 1725 letters patent of the butchers’ guild of Esztergom, ibid., vol. 3, 57. 37 Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 3 (n. 6), 101. 38 Cited from Szádeczky, vol. 2 (n. 2), 57. 39 Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 1 (n. 6), 118. See also Art. 12 of the 1681 letters patent of the tanners’ guild of Szent Márton-Pannonhalma, ibid., vol. 1, 166.

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as the letters patent usually expressly banned unwanted conduct. However, one needs to remember that journeymen led a life of constant travel and work. It is thus likely that it was mostly unmarried journeymen who applied for admittance to a guild and for being promoted to master craftsman. II. The preferential treatment of sons of masters and of journeymen marrying widows and daughters of masters In two scenarios the requirements for becoming a master craftsman were modified. A journeyman could marry the daughter of a master craftsman of a guild. Or the son of a master craftsman could marry the daughter of a master craftsman of the same guild. Both were treated preferentially in the process of becoming a master craftsman as compared to a journeyman marrying a woman from outside the guild. And between the two, the son of a master craftsman marrying the daughter of another master craftsman of the same guild received again further preferential treatment. And if a journeyman from outside the guild married a master craftsman’s daughter from the guild, he received the same treatment as a journeyman from inside the guild. Similar rules applied when a journeyman married the widow of a deceased master craftsman. The guild statutes exhibit numerous nuances. Article 13 of the 1681 letters patent of the bootmakers’ guild of Nagymegyer (Veľký Meder, Groß-Magendorf), in today’s Slovakia, for example, stated: ‘Az melly Csizmazia Mester Embernek Fia Chehben adgya magát, csak fél anyni fizetéssel tartozik, mint mas idegen, azis hasonló képpen, a ki Csizmazia Mesternek Eözvegyét a vagy Leanyat veszi el.’40 ‘A son of a bootmaker master, who enrols himself to the guild shall pay only half of the sum which a stranger has to pay [as entrance fee], similarly to a person who marries the daughter or widow of a master craftsman.’

And Art. 43 of the 1712 letters patent of the merchants’ guild of Debrecen stated: ‘Valamelly becsületes Kereskedő Ember mind feleségestül megh-halvan, ha fiai maradnak, és azok kőzűl valamellyik a Kereskedést gyakorolni és a Tarsasagban beallani kivankoznanak, nem külömben a ki a Tarsasaghbéli Embernek Leannyat venne el, mind két rendbéliek a szokot be allasi Taxanak felét tartozzanak le-tenni.’41 ‘If an honourable merchant who dies together with his wife is survived by a son and if that son is willing to trade and wants to be admitted to the guild, or if a son of a merchant marries the daughter of a member of the guild, he shall have to pay only half of the customary tax [the entrance fee] for enrolment in any of these two cases.’

___________ 40 41

Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 1 (n. 6), 164. Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 2 (n. 6), 113 f.

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The preferential treatment concerned the banquet, the quantity of masterpieces and the entrance fees, as Art. 21 of the 1525 letters patent of the tailors’ guild of Szatmár, which was confirmed in 1640, show: ‘Ha valamely mester ember fia mas Szabo Mester leaniat maganak felesegheól el venne, es chiak köszeóneó Poharral tartozik, az az Fl. 2. //, két Bokor Színes kesztiüuel, es az Varos Birajanak Eotuen penz érő ajandekkal.’42 ‘A son of a master tailor marrying the daughter of another master shall give only a toast, two forints, two pairs of colour gloves and a present worth 50 coins to the magistrate of the town.’

However, there are also examples in which the privileged person was exempted from hosting the banquet or from paying the entrance fee but still had to produce the masterpiece. Thus, he only had to prove his professional skills. Article 25 of the 1673 letters patent of the furriers’ guild of Kálló, for example, provided: ‘Ha Szűts Legény Szütstül megh maradot Eozuegyét, auagy Leanyat annak eluenné gyermeke Masikét el uenné, tsak Remek tsinalásal tartozik.’43 ‘A son of a master furrier who marries the widow or daughter of another master shall only be obliged to produce the masterpiece.’

The following provision exhibits a threefold distinction between (1) a journeyman from outside the guild, (2) a journeyman marrying the widow or daughter of a master craftsman of the guild as well as the son of a master craftsman of the guild and (3) the son of a master craftsman of the guild marrying the widow or daughter of another master craftsman of the same guild. Only the first category of applicants had to pay the full entrance fee; the second category paid only half of the fee; and the third category of applicants was exempt from paying the fee, but they still had to produce the masterpiece and host a breakfast. Article 3 of the 1675 letters patent of the coat makers’ guild of Komárom (Komárno, Komorn) reads: ‘Ha valamely Legeny, mely az Czehben be allanna, és ollyan Özuegy Aszont venne el, mely az mi Czehünkbeli Mestertul maratt volna Özuegysegre, az Czeh fizetesenek feleuel tartozzék, hasonlokeppen ha Mester ember Leanyat venne elis. Es ha Mester ember fia allana beis, fele fizetessel tartozzek. Ha pedigh Mester ember fia ugyan Mester ember Leanyat venne el, semmiuelis egyebbel nem tartozik, hanem az Remeket chinallia megh, es adgyon egy Főlőstőkőmet.’44 ‘A journeyman who enrols into the guild and marries a widow of one of our masters shall pay only half of the right to the guild, similarly if he marries a daughter of a master. If a son of a master applies for enrolment, he shall equally pay half the sum. However, if a son of a master of the guild marries the daughter of a master of this same

___________ 42

Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 1 (n. 6), 22 f. Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 1 (n. 6), 112. 44 Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 1 (n. 6), 133. 43

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guild, he shall not be obliged to pay, but produce the masterpiece and host the breakfast dish.’

And Art. 6 of the 1675 letters patent of the tanners’ guild of Beregszász (Berehove/Beregovo), in today’s Ukraine, stated: ‘Az mely vargha mesternek fia ezen Chehbéli mesternek leanyat elveszi, az ollyan tartozik egy kőszőnyő pohárral, Ha penigh idegen mester Legény mester ember Leanyat ueszi el, fél mester asztallal tartozik.’45 ‘A son of a tanner master who marries the daughter of a master of this guild shall give only a toast. An external journeyman who marries the daughter of a master of this guild shall host a half banquet.’

It may be presumed that the exemption from hosting a banquet or paying its full value was the direct consequence of marrying the daughter of a master craftsman of the same guild, as a wedding involved substantial costs, too. Nevertheless, the applicant still had to pay the entrance fee and give wax to the guild as Art. 3 of the 1681 letters patent of the weavers’ guild of Rév-Komárom exemplifies: ‘Annak utána esztendőuel adgyon egy Mester asztalt, Ha pedigh pénzűl akaria adnj, harmincz hat forintot. Mindaz altal, ha Mester ember fia léend, azagy pedigh iedegen legény Mester ember leannyát venné el, feléuel tartozzék. Ha pedigh Mester ember fia léjend, és Mester ember leannyát venné el, ezen Mester Asztallal ne tartozzék, hannem csak egy magyar forintal, s egy font viaszal.’46 ‘After that, he shall host a banquet, however, if he wants to pay for it, he shall give 36 forints instead. Nonetheless, if he is the son of a master, or if an external journeyman marries the daughter of a master, he shall pay only half the sum. If he is the son of a master and marries the daughter of another master, he shall not host a banquet, but he has to pay only one forint and to give one pound of wax.’

Thus, those who applied to become a master craftsman in a guild fell into different categories: (1) journeymen coming from outside the guild, (2) journeymen coming from outside the guild, but marrying the widow or daughter of a master craftsman from the guild, as well as sons of a master craftsman, and (3) sons of master craftsman marrying the widow or daughter of another master craftsman. Applicants from the three categories were treated differently with respect to certain entrance requirements, especially with respect to the entrance fee and to hosting a banquet. These findings are confirmed by numerous other guild statutes. Article 13 of the 1681 letters patent of the bootmakers’ guild of Nagymegyer stated:

___________ 45 Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 1 (n. 6), 144. See also Art. 9 of the 1675 letters patent of the bootmakers‘ guild of Győr, ibid., vol. 1, 135 f. 46 Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 1 (n. 6), 149. See also Art. 6 of the 1681 letters patent of the bootmakers’ guild of Rév-Komárom, ibid., vol. 1, 159.

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‘Az melly Csizmazia Mester Embernek Fia Chehben adgya magát, csak fél anyni fizetéssel tartozik, mint mas idegen, azis hasonló képpen, a ki Csizmazia Mesternek Eörvegyét a vagy Leanyat veszi el.’47 ‘A son of a bootmaker master who enrols himself into the guild shall pay half of the sum paid by a stranger; similarly, anyone who marries the widow or daughter of the master.’

Article 10 of the 1683 letters patent of the weavers’ guild of Mihályfa reads: ‘Hogy ha valamely Mester ember avagy Mester legény masik mester léanyát avagy eőzvegyét el venné, tartozik az Czehnek fel igasságot megh adni.’48 ‘A master or journeyman who marries the daughter or widow of a master shall pay the half right to the guild.’

Article 4 of the 1686 letters patent of the furriers’ guild of Komárom provided: ‘Tovabba, ha tőrténendik, hogy valamely megh holt mesternek Eőzvegyen maradt feleseghe hazasagul menne valamely Szűcshőz, ki még mester nem volna, tehat az olyannak szintén azonképpen és szintén olyan tőrvényel élyenek, a miképpen a megh holt mesterek fiai élnek, az mint oda fől vagyon irva [azaz fél taksával].’49 ‘A widow of a master who marries a furrier who was not a master at that time shall live by the same rule as the son of a deceased master, as it is written above [i.e. only half of the entrance fee had to be paid].’

And Art. 4 of the 1690 letters patent of the buttonmakers’ guild of Pozsony confirms: ‘Mikor valaki a mesternek Eőzvegyét a vagy Leanyat házas-társúl veszi, és a mesterseget űzni akaria, tehat felliűl irt Summanak felét, úgy mint Tiz forintot tartozzék le tennj. Ha penigh Mesternek a fia, semmivel sem tartozzék, csak csupan az mester Remeket megh csinalni és mester Asztalt, a mint felliebb irva vagion, megh adni.’50 ‘When somebody marries the widow or daughter of a master and is willing to exercise the craft, he shall pay half the fee that is written above, i.e. ten forints. If that person is the son of a master, he shall not pay anything, nevertheless he has to produce his masterpiece and host the banquet as it is detailed above.’

Finally, Art. 9 of the 1712 letters patent of the bootmakers’ guild of Esztergom reads: ‘Ha valamelly Mester Ember, melly Mester Ember fia nem volt, Mester Ember Leányát vagy eőzvedgyet venné el, vagy pedig Mester Ember fia olly Leányt venné el, melly nem volna Mester Ember Leánya, a Czeh tőrvényének fele fizetésével tartozzék.

___________ 47

Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 1 (n. 6), 164. Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 2 (n. 6), 11. 49 Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 2 (n. 6), 14. See also Art. 8 of the 1724 letters patent of the furriers’ guild of Ürmény, ibid., vol. 3, 32. 50 Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 2 (n. 6), 20. See also Art. 3 of the 1690 letters patent of the duvet- and coatmakers’ guild of Győr, ibid., vol. 2, 27; Art. 11 of the 1736 letters patent of the barbers’ guild of Debrecen, ibid., vol. 3, 161. 48

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Ha pedig Mester Ember fia Mester Ember Leányát venné el, vagy pedig eőzvedgyet, egyébbel ne tartozzék, hanem a bé allo egész Arannyal, és nyolcz foréntokkal a probajat meh csinálván Mester Ember lehessen.’51 ‘A master, who is not the son of a master and who marries the daughter or widow of a master, as well as the son of a master, who marries a maiden who is not a daughter or widow of a master, shall pay only half the right to the guild. And the son of a master who marries the daughter or widow of a master shall not pay more but the one gold and eight forints for his admission and he shall produce his masterpiece.’

There are many further examples exhibiting similar distinctions.52 However, with some guilds it was even a strict requirement to marry the widow or daughter of a master craftsman if a journeyman from outside the town applied to become a master. This was, for example, the case according to Art. 6 of the 1732 letters patent of the furriers’ guild of Székesfehérvár: ‘Hogy ha Vedéki Szűcs Mester a vagy Szűcs Mester Legény el jőven, ha csak Czéhbéli Szűcs Mester Embernek Űzvegyét, a vagy Leányát el nem veszi, be nem veszik ezen Szűcs Czéhben, és ne légyen szabad néki az Szűcs Mesterséget ezen Szabad Kyralyi Városban mivelni, és mivelt Munkát arulni, és distrahálni, másskint abban tapasztaltatván, azon Joszagha contrabantaltatik.’53 ‘A furrier master or journeyman from the countryside who comes to town shall, unless he marries the widow or daughter of a furrier master, not be admitted to the guild, and shall not be free to exercise the furrier craft and recommend and sell his products in this free royal town, otherwise he shall be dispossessed of his articles.’

It seems that the reason for the preferential treatment extended to the son of a master craftsman or to his widow or daughter marrying a journeyman was that these individuals held a title in half of their deceased husband’s or father’s business. Art. 4 f. of the 1732 letters patent of the furriers’ guild of Székesfehérvár can be interpreted in this way, and they also address the problem of what happened if there were two children: ‘Ha pedighlen Szűcs Mester legény házás Társúl el veszi ollyantén Őzvegy Aszonyt, tehat fél Czéhet fog nyerni vele, és felét tartozik fizetni. Minden Czehbéli Szűcs mester Emberek Gyermekeinek fék Czéhnek Jussa légyen, hollot pedighlen két Czéhbéli Szűcs Mester Embernek Gyermeke őszue házasodnak, és az Czéhben akarjak magokat adni, tehat a Leánzó el veszti maga Jussát, a Ferje pedighlen Felét nyervén, Felét tartozik fizetni az Czéhnek.’54 ‘A furrier journeyman who marries a widow of the same craft shall receive the half right to the guild, and shall pay for the other half. Each child of a furrier master shall have the half right to the guild. However, if any two children of a furrier master of this

___________ 51 Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 2 (n. 6), 69. See also Art. 8 of the 1713 letters patent of the bootmakers’ guild of Tata, ibid., vol. 2, 99. 52 See, e.g., Art. 6 of the 1728 letters patent of the buttonmakers’ guild of Komárom, Tuza/Vissi, vol. 3 (n. 6), 78 f. 53 Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 3 (n. 6), 93. 54 Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 3 (n. 6), 93.

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guild marry and want to enrol themselves in this guild, the daughter shall lose her right, and her husband having achieved her half right, shall pay for the other half instead.’

And Art. 13 of the 1731 letters patent of the weavers’ guilds of Hetés, Szent László, Nemesapát and Rád stated: ‘A mester Legények kőzűl, ha valamellyik magát Mesterűl bé akarná adni a Czéhbe, megh jelentvén Czéh Mesternek maga Szándékját, Szabadsághal észen a föllyűl tett Articulussoknak véghbe vitelivel, és be tellyessétéssivel. Ha tőrténettel úgy házasodna, hogj valamelly megh hólt Czéhbéli mesternek, ki már egész Czéhet ki fizette vala, megh hagyatott Őzvegyét, avagy hajadon Leánnyát házas Társúl venne, tehát az ollyan iffiu, a fellyűl tett Taxájnak felével tartozzék, a tőbbivel pedigh egészlen Szabad lészen.’55 ‘A journeyman, who wants to enrol himself in the guild, who has declared his intention to the master, […] and who marries the widow or daughter of another master who had already paid for the entire right to the guild, shall pay only the half fee to the guild and is free from paying the other half.’

With respect to the rights of the daughter, the guild of gingerbread makers and tallow chandlers of Kassa was far advanced. The daughter who lost her half right had to be compensated by the son of the master. Article 3 of the 1738 letters patent reads: ‘Ha valamelly Czéhben állani kivánó Czéhen kivűl való Mester, vagyis Legény más Mesternek Őzvedgyétt, vagy Leányát magának Feleségül venne, az a főnt nevezett 30. Forintoknak csak felit tartozik le tenni, ugy az Mester Emberek Fiai is el végezvén az három Esztendőbéli vándorlásokat, ha Czéhben állani kivánnak, e Szerint tractáltassanak. Az meg hólt Mesterek Műhelye pedig, az Leányokat masbul igazságossan az Fiak az erant contentálvan, csak eő reajok szallyon.’56 ‘A stranger master or journeyman who is willing to join the guild and who marries the widow or daughter of another master shall have to pay only half of the above mentioned 30 forints; similarly, if the son of a master of this guild, after having completed his three journeyman years, is willing to join the guild, he shall have the same conditions. The workshop of the deceased master shall go to the sons, but the daughters shall have a fair compensation from other goods.’

In summary, the many distinctions and nuances seem prima facie very complicated. However, they were based on straightforward principles. III. Losing guild membership Matrimony is a key aspect when discussing the details of guild membership. An unmarried master craftsman had to marry within a year after acquiring the status of a master; otherwise, he could lose the right to exercise the craft. The financial requirements for becoming a master craftsman were less burdensome ___________ 55 56

Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 3 (n. 6), 89. Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 3 (n. 6), 191.

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for a journeyman who married the widow or daughter of a master craftsman. Marriage was also of significance when starting an apprenticeship: every apprentice had to be born in wedlock, and he had to present the letter of baptism; and only apprentices had the chance to become a master in the guild. However, matrimony as well as honest conduct remained a key aspect to guild membership even after having acquired the status of a master craftsman, since the guild was founded on an ethical, trustworthy and righteous lifestyle and on marriage. For example, Art. 13 of the 1525 letters patent of the tailors’ guild of Szatmár, which were confirmed 1640, stated: ‘Ha Valamely Mester ember maga hazanal soros [sörös, iszákos] auagy Parazna Szemelyt, auagy egyeb gyalazatos hirü neueó embert tartana, egy Giraual beuntettessek megh, annak utanna megh intetuen rola, ha meghis ott tartana, kétt Giraual, harmadszor Penigh mesterséghétöl fosztassek megh.’57 ‘A master who has a drunkard, succubus or outrageous person in his home shall have to pay the fine of one gira, if the master continues doing so, he shall pay two gira, and the third time, he shall be deprived of his craft.’

And Art. 14 of the same letters patent added: ‘Ha valamely Mester ember feleseghe Paraznasaghban tanaltatnék, es az Ferie el nem akarna tole valny az mestersegh közül ki vettessék, az pedigh el valnek, az eo eleobbeny tiztessegheben es beochiületiben megh maradgion, ha penigh Ferffi mester talaltatnek illien vetekben, hasonlo keppen bünteettessek.’58 ‘If a wife of a master is caught in adultery and if her husband is not willing to divorce from her, the master shall be deprived of his craft. However, if the former master divorced his wife, he shall return in honour and respect. This rule equally applies to a husband caught in adultery, and he shall be sentenced the same way, respectively.’

The 1614 letters patent of the tailors’ guild of Nagyvárad included a similar provision: ‘Ha afféle apród vagy inas valami cégéres vétekben találtatnék, tudniillik lopásban vagy paráznaságban vagy egyébfélékben is, mindaddig megtagadtassék tőle az művelés az mesterek között, míglen őket avagy fizetéssel, avagy könyörgéssel meg nem engeszteli. Az szolgalegényekről is ugyanezen regula tartassék az felyül megmondott vétkekről, hogy soha az ő tisztségekről el ne feledkezzenek. […] Továbbá ha valaki tudva és akaratjával házában tisztátalan személyt, az ki paráznasággal élne, tartana, avagy táplálna, hasznot magának abból keresvén, és az megbizonyíttatik, afféle ember ilyen utálatos vétekért mesterségének elvételével büntettessék. Hogyha penig ő maga afféle vétekben vagy egyéb hasonlatos cégéres vétekben találtatik, mesterségét elveszti, mert az céhbe jámborok és tiszta személyek fogadtatnak és vétetnek be.’59 ‘An apprentice or varlet who is caught in grave misconduct as, for example, theft, adultery or the like shall be banned from exercising the craft with any master of the

___________ 57

Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 1 (n. 6), 23. Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 1 (n. 6), 23. 59 Cited from Binder/Kovách (n. 5), 162, 168 f. 58

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guild until he pays for his misconduct or prays for mercy. This rule equally applies to journeymen so that they do not forget their duties and right conduct. […] Furthermore, if it is testified that any guild member has intentionally and knowingly an impure, unchaste person in his home either for living or for being nourished and if the guild member has a profit from that person, he shall be deprived of the craft. Moreover, if any guild member is caught in the same or a similar unchaste, dishonest conduct, he shall be deprived of the craft, because only pious, righteous and pure persons are admitted into the guild.’

Article 1 of the 1717 letters patent of the tailors’ guild of Nagykároly stated in a more general fashion: ‘Minden Mester Istenfélő, böcsűlletes és tiszta légyen, azonkivűl senki ne légyen szitkozodó, atkozodó, kartyával és koczkával iádzodó, hamissan esküvő, és más olyan dolgokbanis becsűllet ellen járó, az Czéhnek föl tett ilendő bűntetése allat.’60 ‘Every master shall be fearing of God, he shall be honest, honourable and no one shall be cursing, be foulmouthed, be a gambler of cards, a hazard or a perjurer and no one shall act contrary to the honour of the guild.’

With respect to a deceased master craftsman’s children and his widow who wanted to take over the business, Art. 6 of the 1733 letters patent of the furriers’ guild of Székesfehérvár equally required an honest way of life: ‘Minden Czéh-béli Szür Szabó Mester Embernek Gyermeke /:ha böcsületesen viselte magát:/ a fél Czéhnek el-nyerésében részes legyen: Nem Külömbben a Czéh-béli Szür Szabó Mester Embernek halála-után meg maradott Özvegye-is férjhez menvén Szür Szabó Mester Legényhez fél Czéhet nyerjen.’61 ‘Any child of a master of this furriers’ guild shall have the half right to the guild, if he leads an honourable life, just as the widow of the master who marries a journeyman of this furrier guild shall have the half right to the guild.’

And finally, Art. 17 of the 1736 letters patent of the cartwrights’ guild of Kassa concerned the conduct of a journeyman working for a widow: ‘Az ollyan Legény pedig, az ki az Őzvegh Aszonynal dolgozik magat jámborúl visellye, mert ha valamely illetlen s tisztatatlan életrűl Vádoltattván, abbúl magát ki nem tisztittya ugy az Legény, mint az Őzvegy azon kívűl, hogy az Czéh Oltarara Érdemek Szerint meg bűntettettnek, az Mesterségtűlis el lésznek tiltatva.’62 ‘A journeyman who works for a widow shall lead a pious life, and if he is accused of indecent and impure conduct, and is not able to defend himself, both the widow and the journeyman shall be punished at the altar and shall be deprived of their craft.’

___________ 60

Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 2 (n. 6), 158. Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 3 (n. 6), 99. 62 Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 3 (n. 6), 171. 61

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IV. Conclusion Thus, a moral lifestyle of guild members was the key to enjoying all guild rights. And these rights included those of assistance, support and care in the event of illness, accident, widowhood or of becoming an orphan. The importance attributed to a moral lifestyle was the reason why guilds regulated the conduct of their members so rigorously.

E. The beneficiaries, forms, and details of guild support With the death of a master craftsman, his dependants – his children and his widow – had a right to assistance, support and care. This right was dependant on the honourable conduct of its beneficiaries. Above all, the children and the widow had to keep the deceased’s piety and memory in respect. The letters patent used the terms ‘bearing the master’s name and fame’ for this purpose. Correspondingly, any means of assistance, support and care lasted as long as the memory of the deceased continued; and this explains why any forms of support and care for the benefit of the widow terminated when she remarried and when she, thus, lost the surname of her deceased husband and took the name of her new husband. This rule was, without exception, included in every letters patent. The assistance, support and care took the form of vigils, help for the sick and, only rarely, financial allowances. Art. 8 of the 1525 letters patent of the tailors’ guild of Szatmár, confirmed in 1640, stated for example: ‘Ha valamely Mester ember auagy feleseghe megh betegednek, tehat az mesterek szerrel [sorban egymás után] (: ha az Betegh kiuannya:) minden Eczaka eorizny és mellette vigyazny tartozzanak //: 24 pénz büntetés alat.’63 ‘If a master or his wife become sick and they ask for it, the masters shall guard and take care of them every night in order one by one, otherwise they shall pay a fine of 24 coins.’

Articles 13 f. of the 1690 letters patent of the duvet- and coatmakers’ guild of Győr added: ‘Az mi Mestereink kőzzől ha valamely megh nyomrodnék, megh lássák, hogh az is szolgha nélkől ne maradgyon, ha penig halála tőrténnék, es szegenséghe miatt nem volna mivel el temetni, az Czehnek kőzőnséghes pénzibol temetessék ell. Ha valamely mesternek feleséghe eőzvegységhre iutna, mind addigh megh az Urának hérét nevét visseli, szabadon dolgoztathasson, es az is legény nelkól ne hagyatassék.’64 ‘If any of our masters becomes handicapped, he shall be examined and not left without any servant, and if he dies and if he cannot be buried because of his poverty, he shall be buried from the ordinary money of the guild. If a wife of a master becomes a widow,

___________ 63 64

Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 1 (n. 6), 21. Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 2 (n. 6), 29.

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as long as she bears her master’s fame and name, she shall work free and have title to a journeyman.’

The rights of a master’s dependants were even protected from his actions, as Art. 42 of the 1713 letters patent of the tailors’ guild of Lébényszentmiklós proves: ‘Hogy senki az Mesterek kőzzűl halálanak óraján, akar beteges ágyban, az eő Mesterségét se pénzen se ingyen senkinek se kőthesse és ne adhassa, hanem hólta után fiaira és leanyra szallyon, ha arra valók lesznek.’65 ‘In order that the dying or sick master does not bind himself to anyone either for money or for free, his craft shall be inherited by his sons or daughters when they become worth it.’

Forms of financial support were only rarely mentioned, but still there are examples of it, as Art. 19 of the 1692 letters patent of the German weavers’ guild of Győr shows: ‘Mikor valanelly Czehbeli mester a vagi mester legény az Úr Istennek veghetetlen akarattjából beteghseghben a vagi más nyavalyában esnék, és kőltséghtelen vólna, és annyira szűkőlkődnék, hogi maghahozis jo tehetetlen volna, tehát az tőbb Czehbeli mesterek annak tartozzanak kepes szerént való kőltséggel és segitseggel lenni az Czeh ladábúl illyen okkal, hogi ha az Úr Isten ismegh eőket jó egesseggel megh latogatná, ismégh tartozzék az Czeh ladában reá kőlt kőltseget haladassal megh teritteni. Annak főlőtte egj mester legeni a masik beteghseghben lévő kőrnyűl az Czeh Mester rendelesse szerént tartozzon foroghni.’66 ‘When a master or journeyman by the indefinite will of our Lord becomes sick or has other evil, and if he is without any means to cover expenses and is in need because he is unable to care for himself, then the other masters of the guild shall be obliged to cover the expenses and help from the guild box, in order that the Lord may give the sick strength, and then he shall repay the expenses into the box. Furthermore, a journeyman shall give assistance to the sick person by the order of the master.’

Financial aid was granted in form of a loan which the ill master or journeyman in need had to repay after having recovered, and it was offered not only in cases of illness or accident but whenever a member was in financial need. The money necessary for financial aid came from the fees and fines imposed on the guild members and was kept in the guild box. Article 31 of the 1694 letters patent of the butchers of Esztergom, for example, made explicit: ‘Az mely pénz az buntetésbul és taxalasbűl az Czeh Ladajaban be jőn, az jó őrezet alat tartassék, hoy ha valamely Őregh Mester a vagy Legeny annyra megh szegényednek, hogy maga magat el nem tarhatna, tehat abbul megh segettessék, sött ha valamely kőzűlűk megh halna, tehat az főldben be takarittasik.’67

___________ 65

Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 2 (n. 6), 87. Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 2 (n. 6), 36. See also Art. 20 of the 1694 letters patent of the Hungarian weavers of Győr, ibid., vol. 2, 65. 67 Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 2 (n. 6), 54. 66

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‘The sum of money that comes to the box of the guild from fees and fines shall be kept in the proper place, so that, if any old master or journeyman becomes so poor that he is not able to maintain himself, he shall be supported from that sum, or when he dies, he is buried from that money.’

There was also the possibility that the fellow masters exempted a new master from the obligation to host a banquet if he was too poor to pay for it. Article 8 of the 1713 letters patent of the tailors’ guild of Lébényszentmiklós stated: ‘Ha valamelly Uy Mester maga részére lészen szegénysegnek mivolta miatt megh nem adhattya az Mester ebédet, az Mesterek azon kónyorolvén, adgyon 2 forintot, és egy főlőstőkőmet.’68 ‘A new master who is not able to host the banquet because of his poverty shall, upon the mercy of the masters, only give two forints and host the breakfast.’

Keeping in mind the religious character of guilds, it is not surprising that help often took the form of wax for candles. Article 9 of the 1692 letters patent of the tawers’ and tanners’ guild of Veszprém may serve as an example: ‘Ha valamely Tobak Mester Ember megh betegszik annyira, hogy maghát nem bérna, tartozik az Ché mester két Mestert annak örözéssire minden éjel rendelny, s azoknak két pinzára gyertyát adnyi, és egy pint Bor árrát az Che Ladabul.’69 ‘If a tawer master gets so sick that he is unable to care for himself, the grand master shall order two other masters to guard the sick every night and to give wax for candles and wine from the chest.’

Furthermore, guilds proved their sensitivity to social requirements and practical necessity in that they allowed the families of masters to react to cases of need. In general, the guilds regulated the travelling years of journeymen rigorously. However, a journeyman who was needed by his family due to a case of illness may have been allowed to return. Article 2 of the 1692 letters patent of the weavers’ guild of the manor of Lózs stated in this respect: ‘Ha valamely Inas az eő tanulo esztendejet ki tőlti és fől szabadul, tartozik két Esztendeigh, az Mester Fia pediglen egy Esztendeigh vandorlany, és ha az megh nevezet ődőnek előtte hozzank visza jőnne és itt ebben az hellyben munkaladni akarna, semmi hele ne legjen ennek az Vandorlásanak, hanem ésmegh uyjobban kőll néki vandórlani, hogy ha pediglen teőrtennék, hogy az Mester fianak Attya a vagy Annja betegségben vagy mas szerencsétlensegben ésnék, afféle nem tartozik uyonnan vandorlani, ha szintén haza jűnneis.’70 ‘A journeyman who fulfils his time of learning in the guild and becomes disengaged shall travel for two years, the son of a master shall travel for one year, and no one shall return to work in this guild before that time mentioned above; and the time of travel shall not be calculated into the journeyman years, but they are obliged to travel again [if they return early]. However, if the father or mother of the son of a master becomes

___________ 68

Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 2 (n. 6), 84 f. Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 2 (n. 6), 42. 70 Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 2 (n. 6), 57 f. 69

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sick or falls into despair, then the son shall not travel again, even if he returned home early.’

Article 3 of the 1694 letters patent of the guild of the Hungarian weavers of Győr included a similar provision, but the journeyman had to pay a compensation to the guild for not completing his journeymen years.71 It seems certain that the son of a master again had to pay only half the sum compared to other journeymen. Article 11 of the 1686 letters patent of the furriers’ guild of Révkomárom makes clear that journeymen and masters alike were the beneficiaries of support, and it reveals that journeymen may have had their own brotherhood for that purpose: ‘Mikor penigh idő iartaval tőrténnék, hogy valamely Szőcs Mester avagy valamely Szolgaiok ez eő Czehekben való, nagy betegségben volna, az mely betegségben ne talantán ighen meghszűkölködvén, maghat nem taplalhatnaja, avagy hogy ha Isten ugy akarna, hogy megh halna, tehát efféle erőtlent és szűkőlkődőt, tartozik megh segéteni a Mestert az Czéh, az legent penigh az legeny tarsasagh. Ha penigh efféle beteges és fekűvő megh haland, tartozék és kőteles legyen azokat el temetni. Eztis hozza tévén, hogy ha valamely mesternek avagy szolgaioknak eő kőztők Istenek itiletiből, melynek ember ellene nem alhat, halala tőrtének, tehát az Mesterek és azoknak az eő Tarsasaghi tartozanak azonnal fel kelni és tiszteségessen el temetni, egy font viasz bűntetés alatt.’72 ‘When it happens by the passing of time that any furrier master or his servant in the guild is in grave illness or is in great need because of that illness or is not able to feed himself or by the will of God he dies, the guild shall support that master and the society of the journeyman shall support the journeyman. If the sick person dies, they are obliged to bury him. Moreover, if the death of a master or journeyman occurs by the judgement of God that none can resist, the masters and the others shall get up immediately and bury the deceased with honour, or otherwise they have to give one pound wax as a fine.’

The care for a journeyman appeared in a slightly different way in the united guild of the carpenters and millers of the county Gömör and Kishont. Article 11 of its letters patent of 1675 and 1697 stated: ‘A Mester Embernek Legennye ha megh betegedik, egj hetigh tartozzék az Ura gongját viselni, annak utána fogadjon Embert melleje, ha Attiafia nincsen, és az egész Czeh fizessen megh érette. Ha megh hal, a kőzel valók tartozzanak tisztessegessen el takarittani. A mi javacskája temetessetöll marad, legjen a Czéhe, ha Attiafia nincsen.’73 ‘If the journeyman of a master becomes sick, his master shall care for him for one week, after that the master shall hire somebody to guard him if the sick has no kindred, and the whole guild shall pay for that. If he dies, the members shall bury him with respect. The deceased’s possessions that remained after the burial are bequeathed to the guild if he had no relatives.’

___________ 71

Reproduced in Tuza/Vissi, vol. 2 (n. 6), 62 f. Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 2 (n. 6), 15. 73 Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 2 (n. 6), 48. 72

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The letters patent made clear in what order the master craftsman, the journeyman’s family and the guild were responsible for the care of a journeyman. This order was also partly reflected in who the deceased journeyman’s heirs were: first his relatives and then the guild. And it seems that this order was again a manifestation of the patriarchal relationship within a guild. Finally, the letters patent state that the question of who was the heir to the deceased journeyman was raised only with respect to ‘possessions that remained after the burial’. This seems to hint that the guild first received back any money which it had spent for the care and the burial of the deceased journeyman. The support of apprentices in cases of illness followed a very simple principle. They belonged to the family or household of the master. To the modern eye, the widow’s right to continue her deceased husband’s business and the right to keep and hire journeymen does not appear to be a form of support or assistance. However, letters patent make clear that it was simply the most common manner of supporting a widow. Thereby, she was able to earn her living, and by hiring a journeyman she was compensated for the loss of her husband’s manpower. Again, this form of support is a manifestation of the patriarchal character of guilds: the young supported widows, and when a journeyman was in need he was supported by the masters. Articles 8 f. of the 1683 letters patent of the weavers’ guild of Mihályfa, for example, included the following provision: ‘Ha mely Mester ember megh talal halni, felesége maradván, tartozik az Czéh egy becsűletes Mester legént neki adni, eőis tartozik az Czéh igasságát be szolgaltatni. Ha az olyatin Mester embernek fia maradna, tartozik az Czéh két esztendőre be venni, és mesterséghre megh tanitani.’74 ‘If a master dies and if he has a wife surviving him, the guild shall provide her with an honourable journeyman and she shall have the right of the guild as well. If the deceased master has a surviving son, the guild shall enrol him for two years and teach him the craft.’

Article 22 of the 1525 letters patent of the tailors’ guild of Szatmár, confirmed in 1640, made clear that she could even receive the status of a master: ‘Az Mester ember Eozuegje egy Esztendeigh miuelheti az miueth, eztendeo muluan az mesterek közze esküttessek.’75 ‘The widow of a master may continue the craft for one year, and after that year she is to be sworn into the masters.’

In this case, her guild rights were not any longer derived from her deceased husband; instead, she was a full guild member in her own right. The widow’s ___________ 74 75

Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 2 (n. 6), 9. Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 1 (n. 6), 21.

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right to continue her deceased husband’s business was not restricted to such professions which a woman could physically take on, but applied also to crafts which required such significant physical strength that she needed help, as was the case with the profession of butchers. In this respect, Articles 21 f. of the 1694 letters patent of the butchers’ guild of Esztergom also points to a different scenario. An elderly butcher master could become too weak to carry on with the profession himself. In that case, he, too, had the right to an additional journeyman that substituted his manpower: ‘Ha valamely Őzvegyűl hagyatott Meszarosne megent Meszáros Legenyhez megyen, az ollyan csak fele kőlcseget tartozik az Czeben le tenni. Ha hogy pedig azon Özvegysegben meg marad, tehat megh ell az Mesterséghben, fél Mester Ember szemelyeben lenni megh engedtessek. Hogy ha valamely Mester Ember mégh vénhezik, és Mestersegét az eutlenségh miatt nem gyakorolhatna, tehat tartozzanak az Mesterek neki fizetesért egy illendő Legént adni, az ki Mestere helyet az eő Mesterségét naponként elő mozdithassa.’76 ‘If the widow of a butcher master marries a butcher journeyman, she shall have only half the expenditure of the guild. However, if she remains widow so that she lives of her craft, she is allowed to be in the half status of the master. If a master becomes old and cannot perform his craft because of being powerless, the masters shall grant him a journeyman with payment that does his craft every day.’

The right of the widow was strictly protected, as becomes apparent from Art. 36 of the 1712 letters patent of the millers’ guild of Komárom: ‘Hogy ha valamelly Czéhbéli Molnár Mester ember megh talál halni, az ki már Malomban állott volt, tehát tartozik az Czéh megh maradott Eőzvedgyének (ha kivánni fogia) egy jó mester Legényt adni, az kit az Czéh alkalmatosnak és capáxnak itál lenni az Malomnak gondgya viselésére és molnárkodásra, kits az Eőzvegy Asszonyki kőtisigh megh tarthasson az malomban, ha hogy pedigh az malmos Gazda az Eőzvegyet és néki adott molnár legént malmában megh nem akarná szenvedni, hanem mástfogadna, tehát abban az Esztendőben azon Gazdának malmában molnár ne adattassék az Czéhtűl, melly-is azért esik kiváltképpen, hogy az szegény Eőzvegy és Árvákis élhessenek az Czéhnek assistentiájával és beneficiumjával. Ha pedig valamely találkoznék az molnárok kőzűl, az ki az Czéh tilalma ellen csak ugyan béállana az ollyatén malomban, és az szegény Eőzvegy kenyerét ekképpen el-akarná venni, az ollyatén molnár előszer őt forintokra, másodszor Tiz forintra bűntettessék, ha harmadczoris azt cselekzi, az Czéhbűl és mesterségétűl ki-tiltassék, és mind addigh Czéh és mesterségh nélkűl el-legyen, valameddigh az Czéh előtt kedvet nem talál és nem keres.’77 ‘If a miller master dies and if he has already been in that guild before his death, the guild shall grant the widow, if she requires, an accomplished journeyman, who is regarded capable and apt to manage the mill and milling. The widow shall have the right to this journeyman until the agreed date, and if the lord of the mill did not let the widow and the journeyman work in the mill, but the lord hired another person, the lord shall

___________ 76 77

Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 2 (n. 6), 54. Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 2 (n. 6), 82 f.

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not have any miller from the guild, the reason for this is that the poor widow and the orphans shall live on the assistance and beneficence of the guild. If there shall be any miller that enrols himself into this mill of the lord contrary to the regulation of the guild, so that he took away the bread and living of the poor widow, that miller shall be fined at first for five, then for ten forints, and later he shall lose the right to exercise his profession and be expelled from the guild […].’

Finally, all letters patent made clear that the funeral of a deceased guild brother had to be attended by all fellow guild members in proper attire. Any breach was heavily sanctioned. Articles 7 f. of the 1690 letters patent of the tailors’ guild of Somorja may serve as an example: ‘Ha valakinek temetéssére az egész Czéh hévatatnék, tehat az Czéhnek szaz pinz igassághat le tévén minnyaian oda menvén, késérjék el tisztességesen az Testet és el temessék, valaki pedigh az Mesterek közül oda nem menne, az miben az Czéhmester el bocsáttya a jelt, a légyen a büntetésse. Ha mezit Lab valaki az Mesterek közül Temetésre menne, a vagy fegyverrel az Czéhben, az ollyan büntetessek négy pénzel.’78 ‘If the guild is invited to the funeral, the guild granting 100 coins shall attend in full number and accompany the deceased; if there is a master who did not attend the funeral, he shall be expelled from the guild. If a person attended the funeral barefooted or with weapons, that person shall be fined with four coins.’

In summary, it was marriage and marital property in the right to the guild which are keys to understanding the support, assistance and care granted to the widow of a deceased master craftsman and to his children. And it was the members honest conduct and marriage which are keys to understanding guild support in general. However, in substance the support and assistance offered by guilds was limited due to their limited capabilities. Nevertheless, they exhausted all their potentials by offering various forms of support. All guild members from apprentices to masters and their families had a right to receive support. Support could be offered in financial and non-financial forms, such as services.

F. Principles of guild support Guilds only offered support and assistance if the beneficiary was in need. The letters patent described this requirement, for example, with the phrase that somebody had to be ‘unable to feed himself or to supply himself with work’. However, it seems clear that personal need as a prerequisite for guild support was never specifically checked and verified. And there was no need for doing so – guilds were closed communities. The period of work lasted from early daytime until the late evening, with only one day off each week. Moreover, the attendance of meetings and religious ceremonies, like masses, funerals and processions, was obligatory and non-participation was heavily fined. Furthermore, guild members ___________ 78

Cited from Tuza/Vissi, vol. 2 (n. 6), 30. 

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usually lived and worked in the same street. Therefore, whether there was real need or only pretence should have revealed itself to the other guild members immediately. A principle of subsidiarity – according to which a person in need was supported first by the family and thereafter by public authorities (such as by the town), and then by the guild only if these first two avenues failed – did not exist. The reason why such a principle did not fully develop is to be found in the main characteristics of guilds: they were horizontal corporations at odds with the organization of feudal society. Accordingly, it was primarily the guild members who were responsible for each other. Assistance and support were mutual. Thus, first and foremost, it was the duty of the guild to help members in need. Functionally, the guild was more like the family for members in need. Of course, the letters patent also referred to the person’s next relatives, as for example in the case of journeymen, but in Hungary it seems to have been primarily the master craftsman in whose service the journeyman was standing who had to offer help. In conclusion, it is possible to state that a principle of subsidiarity applied to institutions of support and assistance, but only if one considers the guild as a functional and sociological equivalent to the family of the person in need. The principle of solidarity governed all aspects of guild life, and guilds could not have survived without it. Guilds were economically closed entities, which controlled all aspects of their respective craft. Membership was compulsory; exercising the craft outside guilds was often forbidden. The economic success or failure of the guild as a whole directly affected each and every member. All members enjoyed the same privileges. And as guilds participated in a town’s administration, they were able to secure the collective liberties for their members. Equally from a religious perspective, guilds were closed entities: the members gathered around the guild’s altar in the church as they came together in the guild house in order to gather around the guild box for assemblies. Furthermore, the participation in processions and the attendance of funerals did not allow separation and absence. A guild was a community in every respect and detail. Its members shared common responsibility and experienced the same ups and downs in their status. The fall of guilds occurred just at the time when the economy and society turned towards individual rights rather than collective privileges and liberties. Free trade, industrialization and entrepreneurship led to the collapse of feudal society, guilds and their mechanisms of mutual and collective support. Schemes of assistance, support and care had to be reinvented. Now it was on the state to develop and fund respective schemes and to engage in social policy. Modern forms of support and assistance are organised in the form of social insurance. The idea of insurance appeared in guilds only circumstantially, with its common fund coming from fees and fines collected in the guild box. Primarily, guilds promoted the right to exercise a craft instead of following ideas of

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modern insurance. Helping their members to maintain their profession was the most appropriate form of support for guilds, with financial assistance applying in only a limited way and usually with an obligation to repay any form of financial aid. After the abolition of guilds in 1872, voluntary associations for aid were established. They lost the closed character of guilds, and they were predominant until finally modern social insurance schemes were formed.

G. Conclusion: marriage at any cost The key aspect of guilds, especially with respect to their means of assistance and support, can be summarized in one phrase: marriage at any cost. The different means of support and assistance in all their variations were conceivable only in the framework of marriage. The requirements and process of becoming a master, the dependants’ title to guild rights, the possibility to exercise the craft, the care in cases of illness, poverty and widowhood, the care when being an orphan, the details of the participation in funerals – all were closely linked to the institution of marriage. And guild members were responsible for each other just like family members. The ties between guild members were even closer because having a common economic, social and legal status also meant that they were successful only together. It is a striking paradox that guilds had developed such means of great solidarity and mutual dependence, but that the mechanisms of help were actually more focused on the individual than is the case with modern social policy. Widows, sick and old-aged members and also orphans had the right to exercise their craft or to hire an additional journeyman: guilds promoted individual efforts to earn one’s living. Financial aid had only a complementary role. The individual responsibility of the person in need is plainly evident in the history of guilds. Guilds, whose essence was collectivism, relied heavily on the individual. By contrast, the modern social insurance that exists in a society based on individuality relies heavily on the collective.

Chapter 12: Comparative Analysis By Phillip Hellwege A. The objective of the present volume ....................................................................... 271  B. A first phase of guild support: from the Middle Ages to the 17th century............... 271  C. A second phase of guild support: the 17th and 18th centuries .................................. 275  D. A third phase of guild support: the 18th and 19th centuries ..................................... 277  E. Conclusion .............................................................................................................. 278

A. The objective of the present volume The objective of the present volume is to assess (i) whether it is possible to describe in terms of insurance the support offered by medieval and early modern professional guilds to members in need and (ii) whether guild support had an impact on the development of modern insurance and insurance law.

B. A first phase of guild support: from the Middle Ages to the 17th century Professional guilds existed across Europe. And across Europe, they offered support to members in need as well as to the dependants of deceased members. However, historical research on guild support faces methodological problems. Foremost, many guild statutes are simply silent on guild support. Nevertheless, from the Middle Ages to the 17th century, it is possible to identify certain elements of guild support which were shared throughout Europe. But there are also marked differences. Whereas in some European countries professional guilds themselves engaged in providing support,1 in other European countries it was organized by confraternities which existed alongside professional guilds.2 And many European countries saw in addition journeymen’s confraternities which supported journeymen in need.3 In most European countries professional guilds and confraternities offered support in the event of illness, and they participated in funerals in the event of a member’s death. Illness and death were the two risks ___________ 1

Hellwege, p. 10, above. Nieto Sánchez and López Barahona, p. 194, above; Deroussin, p. 135, above; Prak, p. 50, above. 3 See, e.g., Heirbaut, p. 28, above. 2

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which professional guilds and their confraternities were mostly concerned about. With respect to the question whether they also covered other risks – such as disability, old age, viduity, or that of becoming orphaned – there were again marked differences. Such differences existed also with respect to the forms of financial and non-financial support which guilds and their confraternities offered to members and their dependants. By contrast, the finances of guilds and their confraternities developed across Europe in parallel: guilds and confraternities raised their income through admission fees, periodical contributions, fines, other charges, and in some cases also through investment profits. Across Europe, professional guilds were poly-functional institutions that were primarily concerned with regulating the respective market, but which also served religious, social, and charitable functions, and which, in addition, also supported members in need as well as their dependants. Across Europe, we find confraternities existing side by side with professional guilds. In some European countries they only served religious and charitable functions, whereas in other countries it was the confraternities which, in addition to their religious and charitable functions, took over from the guilds the function of supporting members in need as well as their dependants. Hence, confraternities too were poly-functional institutions. The generated income was used to serve these different functions. With respect to Poland, Jakub Pokoj offers a convincing explanation as to why guild support developed in parallel to other European countries: Polish guilds were simply based on foreign models.4 Irrespective of all the variances which guild support may have exhibited across Europe, it is generally impossible to describe this support – as it had developed from the Middles Ages to the 17th century – in terms of insurance or preinsurance.5 The form of support which appears most prominently in the statutes of guilds and confraternities is that of guild members having to participate in a deceased member’s funeral.6 A modern insurance scholar will have problems categorizing this form of support as insurance. Furthermore, many forms of support were means of capacity building. Here again, these forms of support have nothing to do with modern insurance. Dirk Heirbaut stresses in this respect that in Belgium support was in general not for disabled members who were in need of permanent support, but only for those suffering from temporary misfortune and thus for those who were likely to recover and continue with their profession: support had the very purpose of helping ___________ 4

Pokoj, p. 220, above. Wallis, p. 102, above; Sunnqvist, p. 129, above. 6 Hellwege, p. 67, above; Deroussin, p. 144, above. 5

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the member in need to recover.7 Furthermore, in cases of illness, financial support was granted in many European countries primarily in the form of a loan which had to be repaid; and in some European countries recipients had to give surety in order to be eligible to receive a loan, or it was the case that professional guilds could enforce the claim for repayment of a loan also against a deceased member’s estate.8 In the crafts, master craftsmen’s widows were allowed to continue their deceased husbands’ business; often they had the right to hire an additional journeyman. And old master craftsmen had the same right: they too were allowed to hire an extra journeyman so that they could continue their business and secure a steady income.9 In many European countries deceased members’ orphans were supported by means of capacity building: fellow craftsmen may have been under the obligation to train them as apprentices for free.10 For Spain, José A. Nieto Sánchez and Victoria López Barahona even prove that the support of orphans was a main concern of professional guilds and confraternities.11 By contrast, Heirbaut observes that in Belgium orphans hardly ever received any support and that they even had to pay their apprenticeship dues.12 However, there were also forms of non-repayable financial support, going beyond loans.13 Such forms of support are more akin to modern insurance. A prime example concerns funeral costs for guild members who had died impoverished.14 Beyond funeral costs, such forms of non-repayable financial support were rare. For France, David Deroussin mentions pensions which were paid in the event of work accidents.15 Another, unusual, example from 15th-century Venice is discussed by Marina Gazzini.16 And for Spain, Nieto Sánchez and López Barahona refer to early examples in which confraternities paid alms to members suffering from work-related illness or disability as well to members who were not able to work due to their old age.17 And it seems that these examples were in Spain more frequent than in other European countries. ___________ 7

Heirbaut, p. 30, above. Pokoj, pp. 226–230, above; Rigó, pp. 261–266, above; Hellwege, p. 65, above; Sunnqvist, pp. 130 f., above; Deroussin, pp. 147, 161, above. 9 Pokoj, pp. 226–230, above; Rigó, pp. 261–266, above; Heirbaut, p. 40, above. 10 Rigó, pp. 261–266, above; Hellwege, p. 67, above; Deroussin, p. 148, above. 11 Nieto Sánchez and López Barahona, p. 206, above. 12 Heirbaut, pp. 28, 40, above. 13 Sunnqvist, p. 131, above. 14 Pokoj, pp. 226–230, above; Rigó, pp. 261–266, above; Nieto Sánchez and López Barahona, pp. 199 f., above. 15 Deroussin, p. 150, above. See also Heirbaut, p. 37, above. 16 Gazzini, p. 181, above. 17 Nieto Sánchez and López Barahona, pp. 199 f., above. 8

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Nevertheless, for a number of reasons it would seem problematic to describe these forms of support in terms of insurance.18 First, Heirbaut points out that members paid contributions, that they received support in return, and that they may even have had the expectation of receiving support after they had made their contributions.19 This makes guild support akin to insurance, especially, as Pokoj stresses, to modern mutual insurance.20 Nevertheless, Heirbaut stresses a point which is true for most early examples of non-repayable forms of financial support granted by guilds and confraternities: the sums offered to members in need were small, they did not cover the loss, and they did not fulfil the actual needs of those in despair.21 Secondly, the decision whether guilds and confraternities offered support was mostly a discretionary decision.22 At first, members in need did not have a legal right to support. Thirdly, professional guilds were poly-functional institutions, serving market-regulating, social, religious, and charitable functions in addition to supporting members in need: in the context of marine insurance it is stressed that one can speak of insurance only once the insurance aspect in sea loan contracts was isolated and transformed into a separate contract. Furthermore, if we assume that one ingredient in the definition of modern insurance is that it is contribution based, then it is impossible to characterize guild support as a form of insurance if no separate funds existed for financing the support schemes. Fourthly, financial support was granted only if the guild or the confraternity had sufficient funds to do so.23 Here again, this aspect does not conform with the modern conception of insurance. Fifthly, support was not restricted to members but was also offered to other people in need. There was no clear distinction between supporting members in need, on the one hand, and charity on the other hand.24 Patrick Wallis draws our attention to two final points making it impossible to analyse guild support in terms of insurance.25 Insurance is contribution based. This, of course, implies that those who pay in buy an expectation of being supported in case of need. However, the fact that insurance is contribution based also implies – and this is the first point raised by Wallis – that support should be financed through contributions by all those who are eligible for support. With English guilds, support was, however, often financed by donation. Secondly, space in alms-houses, facilities which were again regularly funded through donations and legacies, was often limited so that not all members ___________ 18

See also the discussion by Deroussin, p. 156, above. Heirbaut, p. 29, above. See also Prak, p. 58, above. 20 Pokoj, pp. 235 f., above. 21 Heirbaut, p. 29, above. 22 Deroussin, p. 146, above; Gazzini, p. 187, above. 23 See, e.g., Prak, p. 58, above. 24 Deroussin, p. 159, above; Gazzini, p. 188, above. 25 Wallis, p. 102, above. 19

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in need were admitted to such homes. Thus, even support granted to members should be analysed in terms of charity rather than in terms of insurance. Thus, it is impossible to describe guild support as it had developed from the Middle Ages to the 17th century in terms of insurance.26 However, this finding does not imply that the rules on guild support did not have any impact on the development of insurance law. A legal historian may include in his or her research on the history of insurance law institutions which are not covered by modern definitions of insurance for the purpose of working out the origins and genesis of ideas, rules, and institutions of modern insurance law. However, even from this perspective, an analysis of guild support as it had developed from the Middle Ages to the 17th century is of no avail. First, the admission requirements for guilds and their confraternities did not aim at controlling the risk pool; rather, they reflected the primary function of guilds – that is to regulate the respective market. Secondly, there are few examples of guild statutes addressing moral hazards: some statutes excluded help if a member had caused the mishap by his own acts or through his own fault.27 Nevertheless, it is difficult to draw from these few examples the general conclusion that these early clauses in guild statutes were a root of modern insurance law. The idea of excluding help in such situations is simply self-evident, and the rules found in guild statutes were not very sophisticated. Thirdly, there are only very few rules to be found in guild statutes addressing problems of fraud – a guild member fraudulently demanding the support of the guild without being in need.28 Finally, rules defining the risk covered by guilds were underdeveloped and provisions addressing the question of how to deal with an increase in the risk did not exist.

C. A second phase of guild support: the 17th and 18th centuries In conclusion, up to the 17th century, guild support cannot be classified as insurance, and the legal rules on guild support as found in the guild statutes did not address any problems resembling those witnessed in modern insurance law. Especially the 17th and 18th centuries then saw important developments which transformed guild support into something more akin to insurance. However, for Germany, it seems that miners’ guilds had made the step from simple support to something more akin to insurance already in the 16th century.29 And some authors ___________ 26

Hellwege, p. 69, above. Heirbaut, p. 37, above. 28 E.g., Heirbaut, p. 38, above. 29 Hellwege, p. 74, above. 27

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have also pointed to earlier examples in the crafts, but these examples seem to have been isolated. There is one important exception to this general trend: England. Patrick Wallis gives a convincing explanation why English guilds did not follow a similar trajectory. Already in the early 17th century, England had seen the enactment of national poor laws. Consequently, there was no need for guilds to further develop the support schemes benefitting members in need. Instead, English guilds focused on charity.30 It seems that in continental Europe the development towards insurance was not driven by state legislation, even though guilds across Europe were subjected to tighter state regulation starting in the second half of the 17th century and then especially in the 18th century.31 Instead, the developments seem to have been driven by local actors, mostly by the different guilds. Non-repayable forms of financial support became more common.32 Guilds started to grant pre-defined benefits in cases of illness, and they paid pensions to older members who were unable to work as well as to widows.33 Furthermore, Heirbaut points to an example from 1753-Antwerp suggesting that a member had a legal right to support.34 And there were certain technical details appearing in different European countries: Heirbaut discusses an example from 1610-Antwerp where a journeymen’s contribution to the journeymen’s box were deducted from his wages and paid by the master craftsmen into the box.35 Similar mechanisms appeared in Germany and in Denmark.36 Further, in Germany and France there are examples suggesting that masters, too, had to pay into journeymen’s boxes, which benefited journeymen only.37 Whereas membership in guilds and their confraternities was usually compulsory,38 the 17th and 18th centuries saw an increasing number of voluntary support boxes which were established by guilds and their confraternities or which emerged in professional contexts.39 These boxes may have covered medical ex___________ 30

Wallis, pp. 102, 109, above. Rigó, p. 246, above; Sunnqvist, p. 130, above; Hellwege, p. 79, above. 32 Pokoj, pp. 217 ff., above; Hellwege, p. 80, above. 33 Prak, p. 47, above; Sunnqvist, p. 130, above; Hellwege, p. 80, above. 34 Heirbaut, p. 38, above. See also Hellwege, p. 84, above. 35 Heirbaut, p. 34, above. 36 Hellwege, p. 73, above, Sunnqvist, p. 130, above. 37 Deroussin, p. 143, above, Hellwege, p. 73, above. 38 An example of an early voluntary box dating to the 15th century is mentioned by Heirbaut, p. 33, above. 39 Heirbaut, p. 38, above; Prak, pp. 47, 49, 51, 56–58, above; Sunnqvist, p. 131, above; Nieto Sánchez and López Barahona, p. 207, above. 31

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penses and funeral costs, or they may have granted pensions to widows and orphans. And as regards these voluntary boxes, admission requirements were developed which aimed at controlling the risk pool, provisions addressing problems of fraud may have been introduced, reserve funds may have been established, and financial soundness was strived for. England saw a parallel development: friendly societies were established particularly in the second half of the 18th century. Whereas in continental Europe the many voluntary mutual support schemes were established or inspired by guilds, Wallis has established that in England, contrary to prevailing belief, friendly societies were not rooted in guilds.40 For Germany, I have suggested that these developments did not occur in isolation but that they were part of an emergence of ‘insurance thinking’,41 and one may assume that the same holds true for other European countries.

D. A third phase of guild support: the 18th and 19th centuries Even though guild support had been transformed into something more akin to insurance in the 17th and 18th centuries throughout continental Europe, these developments came to an abrupt halt in most European countries in the late 18th and early 19th centuries: guilds were banned in Spain, France, Belgium, the Northern Netherlands, and Italy.42 Scandinavia followed in the middle of the 19th century and Hungary in the 1870s.43 In Poland the development came to a halt with the Third Partition of Poland.44 In most German territories, guilds were similarly banned at the start of the 19th century during the Napoleonic period, but thereafter they were re-introduced.45 Consequently, the support boxes run by guilds evolved further in the first half of the 19th century. Guilds were finally abolished throughout Germany in the 1860s. However, their support boxes continued to exist, and Otto von Bismarck’s social security legislation, particularly the 1883 Act Concerning the

___________ 40

Wallis, p. 117, above. Hellwege, p. 84, above. 42 Nieto Sánchez and López Barahona, p. 211, above; Deroussin, pp. 133 f., above; Heirbaut, p. 22, above; Prak, p. 60, above; Gazzini, p. 190, above. 43 Sunnqvist, p. 131, above; Rigó, p. 246, above. 44 Pokoj, p. 223, above. 45 Hellwege, pp. 89–93, above. 41

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Health Insurance of Workers (Gesetz, betreffend die Krankenversicherung der Arbeiter) drew on guild support as a model.46

E. Conclusion The present state of research on the history of insurance is unsatisfactory. First, modern literature on the history of insurance and insurance law has developed distinct national narratives. Modern German research claims that there are three roots of insurance and insurance law: marine insurance, the cooperative protection provided by medieval and early modern guilds, and state-run insurance schemes, which were first established in the 17th century. By contrast, authors from other European countries usually claim that there is only one root of insurance and insurance law: marine insurance (law). Secondly, in modern German literature the importance of guilds for the development of insurance and insurance law is claimed rather than proven. Furthermore, there is a second, competing narrative in German literature: many authors argue that Germany’s modern social security schemes are rooted in medieval and early modern guild support. Yet here again, the lasting impact of medieval and early modern guild support on today’s social security is asserted rather than proven. The research agenda of the present volume was developed against this background: the objective of the present volume was to assess from a comparative perspective whether it is possible to analyse the support offered by medieval and early modern guilds to members in need in terms of insurance and whether guild support had a lasting impact on the development of modern insurance and insurance law. The different chapters collected in the present volume have focused foremost on professional guilds and those confraternities which were closely linked to professional guilds. It has become clear that medieval guild support cannot be described in terms of insurance. And medieval guild support did not raise any of the legal problems that modern insurance faces. Consequently, the legal rules regulating medieval guild support cannot be looked upon as a root of modern insurance law. The early modern period then saw important developments which transformed guild support into something more akin to insurance. German miners’ guilds had made the step from simple support to something more similar to insurance already in the 16th century, with other sectors to follow throughout continental Europe in the 17th and 18th centuries. However, this process of transformation did not occur in isolation. Research on the German developments suggests instead that this process was heavily influenced by an emerging ‘insurance thinking’.

___________ 46

Hellwege, p. 94, above.

Chapter 12: Comparative Analysis

279

Germany saw a third phase of guild support during the 19th century: it was further refined and the 1883 Act Concerning the Health Insurance of Workers (Gesetz, betreffend die Krankenversicherung der Arbeiter), the first element of Bismarck’s social security legislation, drew on guild support as a model. Thus, it is correct to describe guild support as a root of modern social security and modern social security in Germany. However, it was not medieval guild support which served as a model for the 1883 Act. Guild support had to first go through a process of transformation, a process which occurred in the early modern period and one which was conceivable only after an ‘insurance thinking’ had emerged. The reason why it was only in Germany that early modern guild support was able to serve as a direct model for modern social security legislation is a combination of two factors. First, guilds and their support schemes existed in Germany much longer than in other European countries. Guilds were finally abolished only in the 1860s, and even then their support boxes continued to exist. Secondly, social security was introduced in Germany much earlier than in other European countries, already in the 1880s. But what about insurance and insurance law? There seems to be no direct link between guild support and modern insurance and modern insurance law. Research on the developments in Germany suggests that guild support was developed further in the early modern period under the influence of an emerging ‘insurance thinking’. In turn, the development of insurance was influenced by guild support. More importantly, throughout Europe the 17th and 18th century witnessed new, often voluntary support boxes and funds which were rooted in – and which further developed – the ideas of guild support. Thus, guilds may have had an indirect influence on modern insurance and insurance law. However, an assessment of the importance of these 17th- and 18th-century voluntary support boxes for the development of insurance law is another research question waiting to be addressed.

List of Contributors David Deroussin is Professor of Legal History at the University of Lyon, France. Marina Gazzini is Associate Professor of Medieval History at the State University of Milan, Italy. Dirk Heirbaut is Professor of Legal History at the University of Ghent, Belgium. Phillip Hellwege is Professor of Private Law, Commercial Law, and Legal History at the University of Augsburg, Germany. Victoria López Barahona is a Post-Doctoral Researcher at the Autonomous University of Madrid, Spain. José Antolín Nieto Sánchez is Professor of Social History at the Autonomous University of Madrid, Spain. Maarten Prak is Professor of Social and Economic History at the University of Utrecht, The Netherlands. Jakub Pokoj is a Research Assistant at the Chair of Polish Legal History at the Jagiellonian University in Kraków, Poland. Balázs Rigó is Assistant Lecturer in the Department of Roman Law and Comparative Legal History at the Eötvös Loránd University of Budapest, Hungary. Martin Sunnqvist is Associate Professor of Legal History at the at the University of Lund, Sweden. Patrick Wallis is Professor of Economic History at the London School of Economics, England.

Index Aalborg 128 adverse selection 49, 100, 103, 117 Alberto da Bergamo 185 Algiers 129 Allgemeines Landrecht für die Preußischen Staaten Landrecht 80 alms 160 almshouses 111, 112 Amiens 144 Amsterdam 42, 47, 48, 50, 53, 54, 55, 62 Antwerp 24, 28, 29, 34, 36, 39, 42, 44 Anz, Christoph 124 apprentices 22, 28, 142, 148, 153, 161, 163, 228 Aragon 193, 194, 195, 199, 201, 208, 211, 214, 215 Archer, Ian 109 Arles 140 Arnhem 56 Arzignano 180 Asturias 211 Atienza 198 Aue 86 Austria 89, 246 Avignon 160, 162 Baia Mare 249 Bamberg 83 ban of confraternities 211 ban of guilds 52, 56, 60, 133, 137, 143, 150, 246 Barcelona 196, 199, 201, 204, 205, 209, 213, 214 Bastiat, Frédéric 163 Battle of Courtrai 21 Belgium 15, 21 Beregovo 255 Beregszász 255 Berehove 255 Bergamo 185 Bergen 124, 127, 128, 129, 130 Berlin 83, 86

Bermeo 198 Beszterce 248 Betanzos 198, 215 Bibó, István 244 Bikkal, Dénes 242 Binder, Pál 240 Biscay 211 Bismarck, Otto von 12, 94, 243 Bistrița 248 Bistritz 248 Blois 148 Bő 252 Boileau, Etienne 136 Bolde, Philip 110 Bologna 166, 168, 171, 173, 178 Bordeaux 139, 140, 146, 162 Bos, Sandra 25, 41, 42, 56, 99 Brabant 24, 28, 42, 44, 50 Brahe 231 brandstod 126 Brașov 249 Brassó 249 Bratislava 245, 251, 256 Brda 231 Bremen 67, 85 Bristol 104, 106 Bromberg 231, 234 Broos 248 Brothersby, Peter 112 Bruges 22, 39, 43, 44 Brunswick-Lüneburg 87 Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel 87 Brussels 23, 24, 26, 32, 35, 37, 38, 39, 42 Buda 245 Burgos 196 Bydgoszcz 231, 234 Cadillac 139 Caen 145 Čakovec 251 Carlos III (King of Spain) 211 Carpentras 160, 162

Index Casimir III the Great (Polish King) 229, 231 Castellon 204 Castile 193, 194, 195, 197, 198, 199, 200, 201, 208, 211, 214 Catalonia 211 Châlons sur Saône 145 charity 17, 30, 45, 48, 49, 68, 85, 103, 107, 109, 134, 139, 145, 156, 159, 160, 184, 187, 188, 194, 196, 198, 203, 205, 222, 224, 234 Charles V (Holy Roman Empire) 27, 44 Charles V le Sage (King of France) 138 Charte de la mutualité 135 Chase, Malcolm 108 Clark, Geoffrey 108 Cluj-Napoca 249, 252 Codice civile 176 Cölln 83 Cologne 66, 76, 77, 84 Como 173 Cooper, Thomas 112 Copenhagen 126, 128, 129, 130, 132 Cordery, Simon 114 Costituzione della Repubblica Italiana 176 Courtrai 21 Cremona 185 Croatia 251 Csakathurn 251 Csáktornya 251 Csizmadia, Andor 243 Curtis, Thomas 112 Czech Republic 74, 75 Danzig 229 De Marez, Guillaume 23 De Munck, Bert 24, 45 Debrecen 245, 253 Déclaration des Droits de l'homme et du citoyen 134 Décret d’Allarde 22, 133, 143 Delft 51, 60 Den Bosch 50, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60 Denmark 125, 128, 129 Deutscher Orden 226, 227, 231 Deventer 60 Dijon 141 Dordrecht 50, 59, 60 Dutch East India Company 47

283 Eden, Sir Frederick 113 Edict of Nantes 115 Eger 242 Ehrenberg, Victor 11 Engels, Friedrich 193 England 10, 99, 128, 129, 130 entrance requirements 22, 38, 68, 83, 149, 209, 214, 222, 249, 253 Eperjessy, Géza 240 Esztergom 245, 256, 262, 266 Ewald, François 157 Faro Islands 128 Febvre, Lucien 174 Ferge, Zsuzsa 242 Ferrara 171, 178 Fiľakovo 251 Fileck 251 finances of guilds 32 – donations 33, 68, 151, 156, 175, 187, 197, 206, 225 – entrance fees 28, 32, 48, 57, 68, 73, 77, 83, 91, 134, 141, 150, 153, 175, 198, 199, 213, 253, 254, 255 – examination fees 202, 206 – fees 262 – fines 32, 48, 68, 83, 91, 141, 144, 152, 175, 188, 198, 213, 234, 262 – legacies 33, 110, 156 – membership fees 187 – periodical contributions 29, 32, 48, 50, 57, 68, 77, 82, 83, 91, 107, 126, 128, 134, 150, 154, 175, 197, 198, 199, 201, 214, 233, 234 – testamentary dispositions 187 fire insurance 9, 86, 100 First Partition of Poland 229 Flanders 42, 44, 220 Flensburg 128, 129, 132 Florence 166, 171, 173, 177, 178, 184, 185, 186, 188, 190 Flynn, Maureen 211 Földi, András 243 France 10, 41, 119, 128, 129, 133 François I (King of France) 137 Franconia 220 fraud 100 Frauenbach 249 Frederick II 169 Freiburg 72 French Revolution 21, 27, 133, 157 Frewen, Ambrose 111

284 friendly societies 53, 61, 100, 113, 118, 139 Friuli 171 Fröhlich, Sigrid 14, 66, 70, 72, 74 Fülek 251 Galicia 215 Gdańsk 229 General Feuer-Cassa 86 Genoa 185 Germany 9, 41, 43, 100, 124, 178, 193, 262 Gesetz, betreffend der Invaliditäts- und Altersversicherung 96 Gesetz, betreffend die Krankenversicherung der Arbeiter 94 Géza II (King of Hungary) 245 Ghent 22, 23, 27, 43, 44 Goldschmidt, Levin 11 Gömör 264 Goslar 84 Gouda 51, 60 Graf, Eberhard 12 Gratzel, Gilbert 12 Great Fire of London 109 Greve, Georg 12 Groningen 60 Groß-Magendorf 253, 255 Guala Bicchieri 186 Győr 261, 262, 264 Haarlem 60 Hamburg 65, 80, 85, 86 Hane, Edward 111 Hans (King of Denmark and Norway) 129 Hanseatic League 226 Hanvai, Sándor 242 Haugland, Håkon 124 Haywarde, Sir Rowland 110 Heath, John 110 Hecker, A.F. 83 Heinitz, Friedrich Anton Freiherr von 86 Hengst 75 Henri III (King of France) 138 Herbst, Stasnisław 227 hermandades de socorro mutuo 208 Hetés 258 Holland 129 Holstein 129 hospices 27, 31, 35, 37, 43, 212, 214

Index hospitals 23, 48, 66, 68, 76, 83, 145, 147, 156, 160, 176, 184, 202, 208, 214 Hřebečná 75 Huguenots 115 Hungary 239 Huys, Emiel 24, 26, 41, 43 Iceland 128 Imola 178 informal support 26, 49, 56, 60 information asymmetry 100 insurance law 23 Italy 10, 165, 245 Jáchymov 74 Jones, John 112 Jørgensen, J.O. Bro 124, 128, 130 Joseph II (Holy Roman Empire) 22 journeymen 22, 28, 35, 38, 40, 43, 44, 60, 68, 70, 89, 103, 108, 115, 143, 149, 153, 156, 161, 163, 200, 204, 213, 215, 219, 226, 228, 233 journeymen’s boxes 34 Julius (Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg) 87 Juntas de Caridad 214 Kálló 254 Kalvehave 125 Kaplan, Steven L. 138 Kaschau 245, 258, 260 Kassa 245, 258, 260 Kelemen, Miklós 243 Kinda 127 Kingston upon Hull 117 Király, István 239 Kishont 264 Kisteleki, Károly 243 Klausenburg 249, 252 Kluge, Arnd 70 Koch, Peter 11 Kolozsvár 249, 252 Komárno 254, 256, 266 Komárom 254, 256, 266 Komorn 254, 256, 266 Košice 245, 258, 260 Kovách, Géza 240 Kozári, Mónika 243 Kranke-Gesellen Institut 82 Kraschewski, Hans-Joachim 84 Kronstadt 249 Kuruc wars 245 Lamb, William 110

Index Lamballe 145 Lancashire 116 Languedoc 137 Lannion 144, 150, 158 Latvia 65 Lauf, Ulrich 11 Laurent, Émile 135 Le Chapelier, Isaac René Guy 143 Lébényszentmiklós 262, 263 Leeson, Robert 116 legal enforceability 103 Leiden 53, 54, 55, 60 Lemberg 229, 234, 235 León 211 Leopoldo de Gregorio 211 Lequeitio 198 Les Halles 140 Ley de Nueva Planta 194 Liège 28 life insurance 9, 100, 157, 174 Lincoln 117 Linköping 127 Lippay, István 239 Lis, Catharina 23 livestock 180 Lizenz 250 Loesch, Heinrich von 67 Loi Le Chapelier 22, 143 London 104, 106, 107, 109, 110, 112, 115, 116, 117, 119 Lorange, K. 124, 130 Losonc 250 Louis XIII (King of France) 138 Lózs 263 Luarca 198 Lučenec 250 Luckenwalde 80 Ludlow, John Malcolm 114 Lund 126, 131 Lviv 229, 234, 235 Lwów 229, 234, 235 Lyon 134, 137, 156 Mabbot, William 112 Madrid 201, 203, 204, 205, 206, 208, 210, 211, 213 Magdeburg Law 220, 225, 226, 229, 231, 232 Malmö 125, 126, 131 marine insurance 9, 100, 127, 157, 174 Marqués de Esquilache 211

285 Marseille 140, 142, 159, 161 Marx, Karl 193 Masure, Hadewijch 24, 42, 44 Mayo, Marjorie 48 Mechelen 24, 42 Michaelis, Philipp 82 Mihályfa 256, 265 Mikuła, Maciej 223 Milan 170, 171, 179, 182, 189 Minard, Philippe 138 mixed economy of welfare 48, 103 Modena 173, 178, 185 montepíos 212 Monti di Pietà 187 moral hazard 49, 103, 149 Morocco 129 Morrah, Dermot 116 Munich 83 Münster 64, 73 Murcia 199, 201, 203, 206 mutual aid associations 194 mutual aid brotherhoods 207 mutual aid societies 157, 162, 210, 214 mutual benefit societies 134, 151 mutualist movement 135 Nagybákay, Péter 240, 241 Nagybánya 249 Nagykároly 260 Nagymegyer 253, 255 Nagyszombat 249 Nagyvárad 259 Naples 186, 190 Navarro Espinach, Germán 196 Nemesapát 258 Netherlands 25, 41, 42, 44, 118, 194 Newcastle 104, 106, 112 Niederpfannenstiel 86 Norfolk 117 Normandy 140 Northern Netherlands 10, 47, 99, 119 Norway 127, 128, 129, 130 Oberholzer, Hans-Martin 10 Oexle, Otto Gerhard 168 Olivier-Martin, François 138 Orăștie 248 orphanages 212 orphans 26, 40, 56, 67, 86, 108, 113, 115, 130, 148, 155, 186, 201, 204, 205, 206, 207, 212, 213, 215, 224, 241, 242, 261, 265, 267, 269

286 Ottaway, Susannah 114 Ottoman occupation 245 Oviedo 198 Palencia 211 Pálos, Károly 242 Pálvölgyi, Balázs 243 Paris 134, 138, 139, 140, 141, 142, 145, 148, 150, 151, 152, 154, 155, 159, 160 Parma 166, 173, 180, 185 Partitions of Poland 223, 229, 235, 236 Pauli, Peter 84 Pavia 179 Pearson, Robin 101 Perugia 166, 171, 183 Pest 245 Philip VI (King of France) 137 Philippe IV le Bel (King of France) 137 Philippe V le Long (King of France) 137, 160 Piacenza 180, 185, 190 Pistoia 188 Płaza, Stanisław 220 Poland 15, 217 Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth 227, 229, 231 poly-functionality 146, 221 Pomogyi, László 243 Ponfick, Friedrich Wilhelm 12 poor relief 27, 44, 51, 52, 80, 89, 92, 105, 113, 119, 156, 194, 242 Portugal 129 Posen 232, 235 Poznań 232, 235 Pozsony 245, 251, 256 Pressburg 245, 251, 256 Provence 148, 152 Przemysł I (Duke of Greater Poland) 232 Rabstein, Klaus-Dieter 85 Rád 258 Rammelsberg 88 ransom insurance 125, 128, 129 Reales Sociedades Económicas de Amigos del País 212 Reconquista 195 Reformation 41, 50, 51, 54, 62, 114, 117, 118, 131 Reggio Emilia 173

Index Reichszunftordnung 79 religion 25, 41, 43, 138, 222, 239, 244 Rennes 155, 156 Révkomárom 264 Rév-Komárom 255 Riga 65 risks covered – accidents 175, 208, 241, 242, 261 – blindness 198 – captivity 125, 127, 128, 129, 199, 200, 214 – death 52, 53, 54, 57, 59, 61, 99, 100, 107, 129, 139, 142, 144, 157, 173, 175, 177, 178, 187, 197, 198, 199, 201, 205, 208, 214, 230, 234, 236, 241, 242, 261, 264, 266, 267 – disability 31, 66, 113, 155, 173, 182, 198, 199, 206, 212, 213, 214, 215, 241, 242 – domestic violence 209 – fire 100, 125, 126, 131, 148 – illness 36, 47, 52, 53, 54, 57, 58, 59, 60, 66, 71, 80, 84, 99, 112, 113, 115, 117, 131, 134, 141, 145, 147, 150, 151, 155, 157, 162, 173, 175, 177, 178, 180, 186, 187, 194, 197, 198, 200, 201, 203, 205, 206, 208, 214, 222, 224, 228, 232, 234, 235, 241, 242, 261, 262, 263, 269 – imprisonment 37, 198, 201, 208, 214, 215 – incapacity 48, 57, 79, 86, 147, 150 – infirmity 37, 146, 182 – miscarriage 209 – old age 27, 31, 37, 47, 53, 57, 58, 66, 99, 113, 130, 146, 151, 155, 157, 173, 181, 186, 198, 199, 212, 214, 228, 235, 241, 242 – political persecution 180 – poverty 50, 68, 104, 117, 126, 129, 134, 139, 141, 145, 147, 148, 186, 187, 194, 199, 200, 201, 203, 205, 206, 213, 222, 228, 230, 232, 236, 243, 261, 263, 269 – shipwreck 125, 127 – unemployment 100, 173, 194, 200, 209 – viduity 26, 40, 53, 56, 66, 79, 86, 99, 104, 108, 110, 115, 130, 146, 147, 155, 194, 198, 201, 205, 207,

Index 208, 212, 213, 224, 228, 235, 236, 241, 242, 261, 265, 267, 269 – work accidents 36, 71, 74, 198, 199, 214 Roermond 60 Roger II (King of Sicily) 169 Romania 248, 249, 250 Rosenstiel, Friedrich Philipp 86 Roskilde 126 Rotterdam 51, 60 Rouen 142 Rymanów 225 Saint-Jean-d’Angély 160 Salisbury 104 Šamorín 251, 267 Samsonowicz, Henryk 224 San Pedro de Fuenterrabía 198 San Pedro de Lequeitio 198 San Vicente de la Barquera 198 Santiago de Compostela 178 Sapori, Armando 174 Saragossa 196, 204, 205 Sathmar 250, 254, 259, 261, 265 Satu Mare 250, 254, 259, 261, 265 Saxony 87, 89, 220, 245, 248 Scandinavia 123 Scania 126, 131 Schewe, Dieter 25 Schlaggenwald 77 Schleswig 129 Schruijders, Martinus 57 Schweinfurt 83 Scotland 115 Second Peace of Toruń 231 Seville 196, 201, 202, 211 Shrewsbury 104, 106 Siebeneicker, Arnulf 86 Siena 186 Skanör 125 Slack, Paul 119 Slovakia 249, 250, 251, 253 social security 22, 23, 25, 45, 135, 157, 210 sociedades de socorros mutuos 210, 214 Söderberg, Tom 124, 126 Solingen 83 Soly, Hugo 23 Sommerein 251, 267 Somorja 251, 267 Sønderborg 126

287 Southern Netherlands 21, 100, 194 Spain 128, 129, 193 St. Joachimsthal 74 St. Roch 162 Stockholm 126, 131 Stolleis, Michael 94 Strasbourg 64, 72 strike funds 29 Stuttgart 83 Sulzer, Melanie 12 Sunnhordland 127 support, forms of – allowances 29 – alms 65, 80, 107, 198, 199, 201, 205, 206, 207 – continuing the workshop 235 – dowry 204, 215 – financial allowances 261 – financial support 38, 126, 200, 208 – funeral costs 52, 54, 57, 59, 66, 72, 77, 82, 85, 105, 129, 130, 142, 145, 151, 162, 197, 199, 200, 201, 203, 206, 214, 230, 236, 261, 263, 264 – loans 65, 66, 68, 71, 72, 75, 79, 81, 131, 161, 226, 235, 262 – medical care 208 – medical costs 38, 53, 54, 57, 201, 204 – medical treatment 83 – mercy pay 76 – non-financial support 228, 234 – non-financial support in funerals 234 – participation in funerals 67, 77, 107, 139, 157, 177, 178, 198, 199, 244, 247, 267, 269 – pensions 47, 57, 103, 135, 151, 212 – ransom 125, 128, 129, 199 – sick pay 84, 199 Svendborg 129 Swanson, Thomas 112 Sweden 125, 127, 131 Szádeczky, Lajos 240 Szászváros 248 Szatmár 250, 254, 259, 261, 265 Székesfehérvár 245, 252, 257, 260 Szent László 258 Szombathely 242 Tarascon 162 Teutonic Order 226, 227, 231 The Hague 60

288 Third Partition of Poland 223, 236 Thirteen Years’ War 231 Thorn 226, 227, 231, 235 Timon, Ákos 239 Toledo 199 Toro 211 Tortosa 199 Toruń 226, 227, 231, 235 Toulouse 142, 143, 149 trade unions 22, 61, 243 Transylvania 240, 245, 246, 248, 249 Trebilcock, Clive 101 Trembecki, Jan 224 Trento 178 Treviso 186 Tripoli 129 Trnava 249 Tunis 129 Turgot, Anne Robert Jacques 133 Tuza, Csilla 240 Tyrnau 249 Ugolino da Neviano 186 Ukraine 229, 255 Unfallversicherungsgesetz 96 Unwin, George 108 Uppland 131 Uppsala 131 usury 187 Utrecht 50, 51, 53, 54, 55, 56, 59, 60 Valencia 199, 201, 204, 205, 206, 207, 209, 210, 211 Valladolid 205, 211 van der Linden, Marcel 99, 118 van Leeuwen, Marco 49, 53, 99, 103 Västanstång 127 Veľký Meder 253, 255

Index Venice 167, 171, 172, 181, 182, 185, 188, 189 Vercelli 186 Veszprém 240, 251, 263 Villa d’Ogna 185 Vincent, Catherine 139 Violet, Paul 136 Vissi, Zsuzsanna 240 Viterbo 178, 181 Vitré 155 Vlissingen 56 Waldheim, Harald von 11 War of the Spanish Succession 194 Weely, Robert 112 Weichsel 231 Weinbren, Daniel 114 Westphalia 245 White, Symon 111 Willem, Cia 23, 26 Williams, Thomas 112 Wisła 231 Witwen- und Waisenkassen 87 Władysław IV Vasa (Polish King) 229 Worm, Christen 129 Wunder, Bernd 87 Württemberg 89 Würzburg 82, 95 Wymondham 117 yeomanry 109 York 117 Yorkshire 116 Zamora 211 Zealand 129 Zedtwitz, Clemens von 11 Zeeland 56, 60 Zierikzee 56 Zwolle 60