2.05 Guilds and a Changing Economy

Wheelwrights

Wheelwrights built and repaired wheels for wagons, carts, mills, and other uses.

The Money System

When you or your family need to purchase a good, you probably go to the supermarket, the shopping mall, a small downtown business, a department store, or a website. Today, most people buy rather than make their goods. In the Middle Ages, buying and selling goods was a new activity. For a time after the fall of the Roman Empire, the use of money declined. However, as trade revived in the later medieval period and reached across greater distances, the need for money as a unit of exchange became more important. During the High Middle Ages, a money economy began to replace the barter economy. People bought and sold goods and paid taxes using coin money. Coins were made from metals, but their size and weight varied as did the purity of the metal. This made valuing coins difficult. The increasing use of coinage encouraged European merchants to come up with standard weights and measures. The basic unit of coinage was a pound, which was broken down further into shillings, pence, pennies, and halfpennies. Standard weights and measures also made it easier to learn and teach specific crafts. By the 13th century, the money system had also given rise to a class of pawnbrokers, moneychangers, moneylenders, and bankers. This was the beginning of modern banking. Moneychangers simply exchanged one type of money, or currency, for another, charging a small fee in the process. Pawnbrokers made loans to people in exchange for property. People pledged to repay the loan with interest within a certain amount of time in order to reclaim their property, most often land. If they failed to do so, the pawnbroker could keep and sell the property. Moneylenders also made loans to people in exchange for interest. Both of these groups had to tread carefully. Church law prohibited usury, or the charging of interest. Many medieval Jewish people rose to become professional moneylenders because they were not bound by Church law. Over time, as money lending and other forms of banking became more widespread, usury came to mean the charging of excessive, or overly high, interest. Meanwhile, merchants found themselves needing a better way to keep track of and use their growing wealth. Merchant banks emerged in northern Italy, first among the grain merchants of Lombardy. These early banks advanced money to merchants and farmers to pay for plowing, seeding, and harvesting of crops and for the overland trade caravans. Merchants would repay their debts, again with interest, when they had sold their goods. Up to this point, the Middle Ages had classified many Europeans into classes based upon their relationship to land. With the dawning of new crafts and trades that produced money, workers began finding their identity in their skill or money made from their skills. God's desire people to work hard, provide for their family, but find their identity in Christ. (See Galatians 2:20) Like moneylenders, many of the first bankers were Jewish people who could not own land themselves but were not bound by laws against usury. Over time, many other Europeans came to resent Jewish bankers and moneylenders. This anti-Semitism eventually turned violent and would pose an ongoing problem for European Jews in later centuries.

Industrial Revolution:

a change in the production of goods characterized by the introduction of machinery and other technological advances that began in Europe in the late 18th and 19th centuries

interest:

a fee charged for money borrowed

guild:

a group of people with common interests and goals who unite for their mutual benefit

Commercial Revolution:

a marked increase in economic activity during the Late Middle Ages in Europe, characterized by the use of money, the expansion of foreign trade, the founding of overseas colonies, and the rise of powerful merchant companies

communes:

a medieval town or city

burgher:

a member of the merchant class in a German medieval town, or commune

city-states:

a self-governing state comprising a city and surrounding land

middle class:

a social class, or group, between the poor and the wealthy, generally made up of merchants, artisans, and other professionals

Journeyman:

a worker who has learned a trade and practices by working for a master artisan in exchange for a salary or a wage --->

charters:

a written contract that establishes a town or city and guarantees certain rights of citizens

weights and measures:

agreed upon, or standard, units used for showing quantity, such as number, weight, distance, length, and area

Hanseatic League:

alliance of German cities and merchant communities that controlled trade in the Baltic Sea from the 13th to the 15th centuries

Lombard League:

alliance of city-states in northern Italy in the 12th and 13th centuries

Master:

an artisan who has mastered his or her craft or trade; may operate a workshop and train apprentices

merchant:

someone who buys and sells goods, especially internationally

Coopers

Coopers made barrels, buckets, tubs, casks, kegs, butter churns, and other vessels, generally from wood.

Dyers and Tailors

Dyers used pigment from plants, berries, barks, leaves, and roots to color fibers and textiles. Tailors used finished cloth to stitch together clothing.

A Whole New Class

During the Middle Ages, the making of goods was very different. During the early medieval period, most people made their own goods or exchanged needed items within their village or fiefdom. However, as towns grew and merchants expanded trade, more people began to specialize in the production of certain goods. These artisans, or craftspeople, worked with specific materials, such as wood, fiber, and metals, to make weapons, tools, furniture, clothing, and other items. They worked mainly out of their homes, but as they began to trade and then sell more goods, their homes turned into workshops, which employed a group of artisans. Some artisans, such as stoneworkers, worked throughout a city or traveled from city to city to complete various building projects. Whatever their craft, artisans were a growing population, and like the merchants before them, they decided to organize. Artisans, such as masons, cloth weavers, or goldsmiths, joined with other artisans that shared their trade to form craft guilds. These guilds provided structure and support for their members. With more of the population understanding their own creativity in a new workforce, light began to appear at the end of the Middle Ages. Individuals were reaping the benefits of Ecclesiastes 9:10, "Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with your might." In the Middle Ages, artisans made most goods by hand. Machines and factories like we have today did not exist. Craft workers made all of the clothing, tools, weapons, jewelry, artwork, furniture, and other goods that people needed and wanted. Masters were skilled artisans who owned their own shops. Journeymen were artisans who had learned their trades well enough to work for pay. Apprentices were young men just getting started in their craft. Craft guilds established their own guildhalls with their own rules in towns and cities. Although not as powerful as merchant guilds, they also came to wield a great deal of influence. Merchant and craft guilds often had to coordinate to determine prices and rules of trade. Craft guilds also established standards for the production of goods to ensure a certain quality and to protect their members. Think of this as an early form of quality assurance. Artisans in a certain trade had to make goods in a specific way and use particular materials and tools. They also had to stay in a certain price range when charging customers to make sure that no one had an unfair advantage. The members of both kinds of guilds served on town councils and performed public services. Like the merchants, craft guilds also looked after their members and their families, paying for medical care, providing funerary services, and giving aid to those in need. Modern craft, trade, and labor unions have been strongly influenced by medieval guilds. Together, the merchants and artisans of medieval urban centers formed a new class in the social hierarchy—the middle class. This change opened new opportunities and, as a result, peasants had a better chance to break out of their class. Explore some of the types of work that medieval artisans did.

Marco Polo:

Italian merchant and explorer, specifically from Venice, who traveled to East Asia and back in the 13th century

Bath

Many medieval towns formed around cathedrals and other religious institutions. People traveled to the city to visit the cathedral, and those who did conduct trade likely did so in squares near these landmarks.

Traveling Merchants

Merchants traveled from town to town with goods to sell. They could often be seen moving in caravans, or groups, through the streets with goods loaded onto pack animals and into carts and wagons.

Potters

Potters used clay to shape bowls, pots, vases, and other ceramic vessels.

Ropemakers

Ropemakers twisted, braided, and wove fibers such as twine into sturdy ropes. Other types of weavers used fibers to make clothing, blankets, rugs, and other textiles. Most weavers spun their own fiber into thread.

Stonemasons

Stonemasons shaped different types of stone for use in buildings, bridges, hearths, arches, doorways, and other constructions, as well as for sculptures and other items.

Farm Products

The city was never far from the country. Outside the towns and cities, many peasants still worked the fields of manorial estates. Even as feudal manors began to decline, poor people remained tied to the land. People brought livestock, such as sheep, goats and pigs, and crops directly from the farms to the cities to sell or trade.

A Peddler

The first medieval merchants hardly qualified as merchants. They were peddlers who carried a small amount of goods on their backs, in carts, or in wagons, and they held little status or wealth in society.

The Impact of Craft Guilds

The rise of guilds led to broader changes in the European economic system. Specialization and organization gave way to a new division of labor, making it possible for people in the lower class to change their position. Here's how the craft guilds worked. Young men interested in learning a particular trade would leave their homes, often at the age of twelve, to learn from a skilled artisan. They would live and work with that craftsman according to standards set by the guild. Each would-be artisan had to pass through three stages: Apprentice, Journeyman, Master Perhaps you have heard the word apprentice before in pop culture. An apprentice would spend several years working for a master artisan and in exchange received training but no pay. In fact, his family generally had to pay a fee for the master to take him on, but the master boarded the youth during his apprenticeship. Think of this like an unpaid internship that many students have today. The apprentice had to demonstrate his skill, usually through a series of tests approved by the guild and judged by the master, to advance to the next level. An apprentice could not marry or leave the master's household. The journeyman was a professional artisan who worked for his master in exchange for a salary. He was often given his own tasks and projects to complete independent of the master. However, he usually continued to live in the master's workshop. While working for the master, the journeyman had to complete his own "masterpiece," a work that would demonstrate his mastery of the craft. Both the master and the guild had to approve the journeyman's masterpiece for him to advance. Finally, when an artisan's masterpiece had been accepted, the journeyman would be invited to join the craft guild and become a master. As a master, the artisan enjoyed all the benefits—and responsibilities—of guild membership. He could open his own shop, and generally, he and his family enjoyed a higher level of status within the town and community. This system of apprenticeship brought a new type of opportunity and education to the medieval world. Now, members of the peasant class had a way to rise out of poverty. Learning was no longer reserved for the nobility and the clergy who attended schools or universities. However, the guild system did not change the status of many women. During the Middle Ages, women and their work were confined largely to the home, and few received wages. Those who were paid received less than their male counterparts. Urbanization and the growth of the merchant and artisan classes expanded the need for other professionals. Scribes and other important professionals such as doctors and lawyers increased their numbers and even formed their own guilds. The rise of the merchant and artisan class did not greatly affect the role of women. Most guilds refused membership to women, and the few who did obtain the status of artisan did so as spinners and weavers of textiles. Most provided this labor in assistance to their families or their lords. A few women, generally from among the upper class, emerged to become professionals in their own right. Christine de Pisan became an author. Two of her books, Book of the City of Ladies and Treasure of the City of Ladies, addressed issues of importance to women. The nun Hildegard of Bingen became an accomplished author, musician and composer.

BIG Ideas

-Where and why did towns form in medieval Europe? -Why did merchants and craftsman form guilds? -How did craft guilds operate? (Apprentice, Journeyman, Master) -What was life like in medieval towns in Europe? -How did medieval Europe interact with the rest of the world? (Marco Polo, Silk Road) -What were the lasting effects of urbanization, expansion of trade, and the development of money and guild systems in medieval Europe?

To learn what charters were like, read the excerpt from the 14th century town charter of Southampton, England.

1. In the first place, there shall be elected from the gild merchant, and established, an alderman, a steward, a chaplain, four skevins, and an usher ... 19. And no one of the city of Southampton shall buy anything to sell again in the same city, unless he is of the gild merchant or of the franchise. And if anyone shall do so and is convicted of it, all which he has so bought shall be forfeited to the king ... 20. And no one shall buy honey, fat, salt herrings, or any kind of oil, or millstones, or fresh hides, or any kind of fresh skins, unless he is a gildsman: nor keep a tavern for wine, nor sell cloth at retail, except in market or fair days; ... and whoever shall do this and be convicted, shall forfeit all to the king. ... 22. If any gildsman falls into poverty and has not the wherewithal to live, and is not able to work or to provide for himself, he shall have one mark from the gild to relieve his condition-when the gild shall sit. ...

Armourers, Bladesmiths, and Gunsmiths

Armourers made chainmail and other types of armor, or protective gear, for medieval knights and soldiers. Bladesmiths focused on fashioning swords and knives, and toward the end of the Middle Ages, gunsmiths began making firearms.

Saddlers

As mounted knights, or cavalry, became more important, so did the job of the saddler. Saddlers crafted seats, or saddles, for riders made from wood, leather, textiles, wool, and horsehair.

Legions of Artisans

By the High Middle Ages, a variety of artisans could be found throughout the urban centers of Europe. Cobblers made shoes, armourers made weapons, tanners prepared leather, and weavers made textiles. These products were sold directly from their workshops-increasingly for money rather than for barter.

Carpenters, Blacksmiths, Goldsmiths and Locksmiths

Carpenters made tools, furniture, and other goods from wood. Blacksmiths, or metalsmiths, made metal goods, such as chains, nails, pots, and even weapons. Goldsmiths specialized in products made from gold. Locksmiths focused on the production of locks and keys.

Pilgrims

Christian pilgrims helped encourage the growth of trade and cities. As life became more peaceful, more people began traveling to visit holy sites in Europe and in Southwest Asia. Pope Urban II launched the Crusades, in part, to protect pilgrimage routes, which resulted in greater contact with the East and more growth in trade and pilgrimages. More travel meant an increased need for more inns and taverns and places to stop on their journeys, as well as more protection of roads, which then encouraged even more people, including merchants, to get out and about.

All for One!

During the Middle Ages, Europeans came together in various ways that strongly influenced their economy. They began building larger towns and then cities. Medieval people also developed new roles, or jobs, in society, and those who shared tasks in common began organizing groups to work for their mutual benefit.

Life in Medieval Towns

During the Middle Ages, many towns had walls built around them for protection. However, as towns grew, inhabitants had to cram more buildings within the walls, thereby making living conditions crowded. Streets were narrow and crooked and usually were not paved. Because people threw their garbage and sewage into the streets, conditions in towns became unsanitary and disease spread quickly. In addition, most houses were made of wood and, as a result, fires often destroyed entire towns.

Manorial Estate

Early in the medieval period, fiefdoms and their manorial estates were largely closed economies. Few people rambled about the countryside to swap goods or offer their services. Peasants farmed, worked as servants, and made most of the needed goods by hand. Vassals paid taxes to their feudal lords, not only with money, but also with crops and goods from their estates.

Most medieval towns and cities grew up around manorial estates to serve the lords.

False. Although many feudal estates included peasant villages and some towns grew around or near such estates, most towns and cities grew along crossroads and waterways where trade was conducted.

During the Late Middle Ages, people stopped using money to buy and sell goods and returned to a barter economy.

False. During the Early Middle Ages, the money economy of the Roman Empire collapsed, and most Europeans went back to using barter to exchange goods and services. However, in the Late Middle Ages, the tide began to shift again with the rise of merchants and artisans. People increasingly used money to buy and sell goods.

The rise of the middle class made it more difficult for peasants to escape poverty.

False. The rise of a new middle class of merchants, artisans and other professionals increased social mobility. Especially within the artisan class, with a new division of labor and system of apprenticeship, people in the lower class had new opportunities to increase their status.

Moneylender

Guilds and town councils passed laws against fraud to prevent people from clipping or otherwise changing coins to affect their value. Many people weighed rather than counted their money to be sure of its value. Scales were an important tool for medieval merchants, artisans, and moneylenders.

Steps Toward a More Global World

Medieval merchants continued what European Crusaders had begun. They reopened and expanded contact with other parts of the world. In the Late Middle Ages, merchants ranged farther and farther afield, and so too did European explorers. The military and economic activities of medieval Europeans brought them back into contact with peoples of Africa and Asia. Trade expanded notably in the latter medieval period, setting the stage for the Age of Exploration that would soon follow. Between the 900s and the 1400s, many merchant communes in northern Italy had grown into powerful city-states. In 1167, Venice, Genoa, Bologna, Milan, Padua, and several others formed the Lombard League to strengthen their defenses. Other city-states, including Florence, Rome, and Naples, existed in central and southern Italy. Citizens who formed these city-states agreed to a system of mutual defense. They pledged to protect one another. Later in the medieval period, some of these cities, including Genoa and Venice, broke away to form their own republics. Representative bodies of various types governed these states. However, wealthy merchant families still held most of the power.

Guild Towns

Merchants formed guilds to benefit their members and to serve their clients. The first guilds were called confraternities, because they were considered brotherhoods. Take a closer look at the term confraternities. You may notice it contains the word fraternity. You have probably heard of fraternities at colleges and universities, which are examples of mutual benefit organizations that exist today. Members of confraternities during the Middle Ages worked together to secure their goods, wagons, horses, and other property. Early guilds also helped to establish trading territories. They obtained charters from feudal lords that granted them rights to regulate trade in a specific urban center or to start their own urban center in which to conduct business. These charters essentially made the guilds vassals. In return for the charters, the guilds paid taxes, helped raise armies, and provided other services for their lord. As a result, guilds—and merchants—became closely involved with their lords in the governance of medieval towns and cities. Some guild towns even enjoyed a semi-independent status. They were known as communes. Their charters ensured town citizens certain rights, including the right to conduct trade and hold markets. These towns were especially common in northern Italy, where they would later grow into city-states, but also emerged in France, Germany, England, and other European kingdoms. Charters also gave merchant guilds the power of the law in enforcing their rules. Members of merchant guilds in German communes became known as burghers and enjoyed a special status as respected citizens. What other tasks did merchant guilds do? To begin with, they determined who could join, and they issued fines to non-guild merchants who tried to trade in the guild's city without permission. Guilds required foreign merchants to pay a certain fee in order to trade in their towns, and they set up rules for trade that applied to local residents and trade between cities. The guild also supported its members, providing aid when needed and caring for family members. Over time, merchant guilds' services—and responsibilities—became more complex. However, merchants were not the only ones to form medieval guilds. Other social and economic changes were occurring in European urban centers.

Moneychanger

Merchants, traders, and other professionals dealt with coins from across Europe as well as from Asia and Africa. Moneychangers helped people keep track of their earnings by swapping one form of currency for another—for a price.

Marco Polo

Probably the most notable European explorer of the era, the Venetian Marco Polo spent decades abroad in Asia. The son of a merchant family, Polo was no stranger to the road—or its business. In 1271, as a young man, Polo traveled with his father and uncle along the Silk Road across the Asian continent to the Mongol courts of China. The Polos spent as many as 17 years in the empire of Kublai Khan before starting their return journey. On the return trip, they took to the sea, but they made port at Hormuz in modern Iran. From there, they returned overland to Europe, reaching home in 1295. Soon after his arrival, Polo was captured and imprisoned by the rulers of the rival merchant city of Genoa. While there, he dictated the story of his many adventures to a fellow prisoner who recorded them in a book now known as The Travels of Marco Polo. To the north, a similar collection of German communes formed the Hanseatic League along the Baltic Sea. This league protected trade routes and defended one another against attack. The Lombard and Hanseatic Leagues as well as the Maritime Republics all expanded overseas trade.

Cobblers, Tanners, Furriers, and Hatter

Shoemakers, or cobblers, fashioned the footwear of the day, generally from leather. Tanners treated animal skins to turn them into leather, and furriers made animal furs into clothing, rugs, hats, and shoes. Hatters specialized in making hats from leather and other fibers.

Working Stonemasons

Stonemasons designed and built the cathedrals, castles and other buildings of the era. Most buildings contained some stonework, even just in their base. Many masons moved from town to town to work on different projects. Master masons generally oversaw all the work on a construction project, and the masons' guild became one of the most powerful of the era. Over time, the masons' guild developed a secret society, known as the Freemasons, that still exists today. The world's largest Masonic temple is located in Detroit, Michigan!

The Urbanization of Feudal Europe

The Middle Ages began with the collapse of the Roman Empire, in 476 CE. After this, Germanic lords warred for control of lands and set up small, competing kingdoms defined by tribal loyalties. Then Charlemagne was able to unite a large part of Europe under his rule during the 800s. After his realm collapsed, the medieval feudal system developed. Under feudalism, Europe became a patchwork of kingdoms defined by land ownership and vassalage. The continent was largely rural, with small villages of peasants and serfs farming on large manorial estates. Towns formed around centers of government, ports, markets, cathedrals, and monasteries. The vast majority of the medieval population lived and worked on farms and in villages owned by feudal lords. At times, people came to town to do business of one sort or another. A small number of peddlers moved from place to place, exchanging items from one estate or town for items from another. Some even brought goods from distant lands in the East. Most of the trade that took place involved a barter system. During the High Middle Ages, in the 900s and 1000s, the economic system in Europe began to change. Feudal lords and their knights established strong domains, which provided more security. To gain more farmland, lords had their peasants clear forests and drain swamps. Lords also supported the building of more large structures, such as cathedrals. All of this work stimulated the economy and promoted urbanization. In addition, the Crusades in the Holy Land introduced Europeans to Eastern goods, especially valuable silks and spices, which encouraged widespread trade and the building of more roads. An increase in pilgrimages also spurred travel, trade, and the building of inns and taverns. Peddlers began to deal in a wider variety of goods across greater distances. Many of them became merchants, who often traded goods with foreign lands. Merchants started banding together to protect themselves when they traveled. As their business increased, they hired other people to do the traveling for them and set up bases in towns and cities. Some established shops at ports and crossroads around which new towns developed. As multiple merchants banded together to travel and trade, especially in urban centers, they formed associations that became the first medieval guilds. A guild is a group of people with common interests and goals who unite for their mutual benefit. Think back to the start of the lesson where we looked at clubs and mutual benefits. Can you make the connection between a guild and a club?

Building Wide Upper Stories

To save space, builders built up and made the upper stories of buildings wider than the bottom floors. Artisans generally lived and worked in the same building. Their homes-often town homes with multiple floors-doubled as workshops. The shop itself occupied the first, or ground, floor. The master and his family lived on the floor above. Journeymen and apprentices (usually just one of each) lived on the topmost floor or in the attic. Sometimes they might even sleep at the back of the shop.

European Trade Routes

Towns and cities grew where people needed them and where resources would support them.

In the High Middle Ages, traders known as merchants began forming guilds to provide for their mutual defense and other benefits.

True. As security increased in the High Middle Ages, more traders took to the roads. They began banding together to protect themselves against attack and soon formed associations called guilds. These guilds provided for their mutual defense and eventually entailed other benefits for members as well.

To support the growing merchant class, a new profession of money changers, moneylenders, and bankers emerged.

True. As trade expanded, merchants increasingly relied on a money economy. The use of money resulted in the need for new ways of managing finances and funding economic activities. Money changers emerged to help merchants from different places exchange one type of coin for another. Moneylenders and bankers advanced money to merchants, farmers, and artisans to fund their activities in exchange for repayment, with interest, later.

Both artisan and merchant guilds set standards of quality and other rules for their members in order to protect buyers.

True. Merchant and artisans set standards for how goods should be produced and sold as well as price ranges for goods.

The Crusades and an increase in Christian pilgrimages encouraged both urbanization and the expansion of trade.

True. The Crusades brought Europeans back into contact with Asian and African traders and their wares. This cultural exchange encouraged more European traders to venture east. Also, the rise in pilgrimages necessitated better roads, protection of roads, and places for pilgrims to stop on their journeys. This encouraged the growth of towns and cities and gave more merchants the motivation to take to the roads themselves and to establish shops in towns.

Medieval to Modern

Urbanization, the expansion of trade, and the development of money and guild systems had several key effects. The growth in trade launched European interest in foreign lands. Also, it encouraged finding sea routes to East Asia. In the coming centuries, wealthy European monarchs would fund voyages of exploration that would take Europeans to Asia, Africa, and the Americas. These encounters would lead to European colonial empires and the formation of powerful trading companies. Along with the expanding money economy, these changes would form the hallmarks of the Commercial Revolution. This revolution centered on expanding trade among multiple continents. The Commercial Revolution, in turn, would pave the way for the Industrial Revolution of the 1700s and 1800s. The guilds, the banks, and the money systems begun in medieval Europe were the beginnings of modern market economic systems. Think about how we do business today. We buy and sell goods with money. We save our money in banks and go to banks for loans to pay for houses, businesses, and education. Many of our workers belong to labor and trade unions similar to medieval guilds. Of course, not all of the consequences of these changes were positive. Medieval cities grew rapidly, without the benefits of modern practices in sanitation and sewage. They were dirty, overcrowded places where disease spread rapidly. In the 1300s, expanding trade brought the Black Death to Europe, probably by way of rats on board merchant vessels. These rats and the plague that they carried flourished in European cities. In a matter of decades, the Black Death had wiped out nearly a third of Europe's population.

masons:

builders and workers in stone

anit-Semitism:

discrimination or unfair hostile behavior toward Jewish people on the basis of their race, ethnicity, or religion

urbanization:

making an area into a town; the migration of people from the country to a town or city

Apprentice:

one who learns a craft or a trade through service to another --->

mutual benefit:

something that promotes the shared well-being of or is useful to 2 or more people

division of labor:

the breakdown of labor, or work, into different roles and tasks

barter:

the direct exchange of goods and services

usury:

the lending of money with a charge of interest, especially at a high rate of interest