Chapter 15 - The Experiences of Life in Early Modern Europe, 1500-1650
Economic Life
- Class dictated culture more than country or geography
- Nobles from across Europe had more in common with each other than with peasants on their own manors
- Trends:
- Increase in agricultural production - more land brought into cultivation and cleared
- Increase in population
- Increase in commodity prices
Rural Life in the 16th Century:
- 90% of the people lived on farms and small villages
- Social organization revolved around three factors: Manor, Parish and rural administration
- Cost peasants up to 50% of their income
- Bad harvests presented a constant threat
- Household: family unit (home)
- Life centered on the hearth
- Few possessions: wooden chest, few clothes, straw bed, table + chairs (luxury)
- Rarely traveled outside village
- Agriculture:
- Northern Europe: 3 field system - winter wheat / rye, spring barley, peas, beans
- Mediterranean World: 2 field rotation, olives and grapes supplemented income
- Mountains: Animal husbandry - sheep (mountains), pigs (woodlands), cattle (farms)
- Impact: agriculture was the main profession, land was the principle resource
- Lords owned land - rented it
- Western Europe peasants owned a greater percentage of land
- Feudal contracts dominated social / econ. Relationship
- Fields were planted / harvested communally
- Town Life
- Guilds dominated social / econ. Life
- set standards for training, labor conditions, wages and quality standards
- Towns were interdependent upon one another and the countryside
- 25% poverty rate, general welfare better than the countryside
- Larger the town the greater the specialization of labor
- Economic Change:
- Population explosion between 1550 and 1650
- At first an increase in agricultural production (increased land in production)
- Cycle of growth resulted in surplus labor and commodities for urban growth
- Eventually population outgrew production (new farm land tended to be less productive)
- Population increases caused problems in cities
- Increased poverty, crime, lower wages
Price Revolution:
- Between 1500 and 1650 cereal prices increased 5 to 6 times, manufactured goods 2 to 3 times
- Causes:
- Population increase
- Increase in precocious metals (new world)
- War and increased state deficits led to debasement of currency
- Highly susceptible to inflationary problems
- long term rents (99 years), rights to purchase products at fixed prices
Result: "social dislocation"
- Towns: manufactured goods inflated slower - loss of purchasing power
- Landowners: income tied to rent, fixed rent meant a loss of purchasing power
- Payment in kind rents, became wealthier
- Peasants: largely insulated, rarely participated in economic exchange
- Greater incentive to produce surplus crops - greater specialization
- increased unequal distribution of wealth among the peasantry
- Urban workers: hardest hit, many became migrant laborers
IMPACT: new understanding of wealth:
- People used to see land / tenants as wealth (asset), shift to liquid assets as a sign of wealth
Social Life:
- Basic assumption: inequality, hierarchy and stratification
- The group was the basic pattern of organization rather than the individual
- Hierarchy was the basic organizational form of society:
- Wealth was a poor indicator of position (rise of the new rich)
- STATUS was the key: conferred privileges and responsibilities, reflected everywhere as publicly as possible
- The Great Chain of Being: universe was a chain, everything has its place from God all the way down to rocks (implied hierarchy and interdependence, precluded social mobility)
- All life connected and interdependent
- Body Politic: Metaphor that saw the state as a body (implied hierarchy and interdependence, precluded social mobility)
- Head = rulers
- Arms = protectors
- Stomach = nourished
- Feet = labor
- Soul = church
- Hands = crafts
Social Classes
- Nobles: legal rank that carried privileges and obligations
- Prince, duke, earl, count, baron
- Political order: held govt. positions
- Economic order: exempted from most taxation
- Obligations: ran local areas
- Town elite / Gentry
- As wealth increased so to did power - devised their own system of status
- Wealthy farmers who acquired their own tenants, began to act as if they were nobles
- Rise of the Gentry created a rift in society b/w old money and new money
- Nobility of the Robe: conferred status
- Nobility of the sword: hereditary status
- New Rich: expanding wealth and population created a demand for an increased ruling class (result of the Price Revolution)
- New Poor: more of them and greater dislocation of the poor (result of the Price Revolution)
- Traditional poor: "deserving poor" were cared for by the community in which they lived (church primary actor)
- Problem: more poor than could be supported, led to migrant labor
- As destitute migrated they lost their rights to alms
- Crime rate increased with poverty, dislocated poor were blamed and targeted for retribution
- Society became increasingly reactionary
- Peasant Revolts:
- Organized petitions in response to perceived changes in their rights / obligations
- Met tremendous opposition
- Agrarian changes led to the revolts
- Expansion of agricultural practices
- Enclosures: fenced off sections, removed decision making fromcommunal agriculture
- Gave greater freedom to wealthy landowners
- Hurt the small farmer
- Seen as an "effect not a cause"
- Ket's Rebellion (England) was in response to enclosures
- Similar uprisings occurred across Europe
- German Peasants' War - a series of uprisings
- Agrarian and religious in their motivation
- Twelve Articles of the Peasants of Swabia (1525)
- List of demands: Marriage, freedom of movement, elimination of death taxes, stable rents, limit on labor service
- Crushed by the German nobility
Private Life
Life was in a state of change: new worlds, centralization of state, war and religious reform
The Family:
- Primary kin group
- Nuclear: married couple w/ children
- Extended family more common in Eastern Europe (taxes based on household)
- Linage determined one's status
- Provided stability and predictability to society
- Social organization provided discipline / hierarchy that society was based on
Gender roles
- Women experienced as many pregnancies as possible, often dictated gender roles
- Dominated work in the household
- Roles changed over lifetime
- Work was conducted within the household - private life
- Men worked in public and were seen as the leadership within the household
- Work often focused on heavy labor
Local Communities:
- Guided by lords (acted as administrators of justice) and priests (conduits of communication)
Weddings:
- Public events which served as a rite of passage into the adult community
- Property was exchanged and status was conferred (maintained a stable society)
Popular beliefs:
- Preliterate society, very superstitious
- Magical practices were still accepted
- Magicians: herbs & plants focused on diseases
- Alchemists: rocks, minerals - precursor to experimental science
- Astrologers: studied the stars to predict the future
- Witches: animals
Social Disorders:
- Skimmingtons / Charivari: shaming ritual to ensure traditional gender roles
- Aimed at women who challenged traditional gender hierarchy
- Became increasingly common as economic pressure increased
- Witchcraft craze
- Witchcraft = use of magic for evil
- 1550-1650 30,000 victims (80% women)
- Why single women?
- Fringes of society
- Often sold herbs as a means of income
- No male protector
- Traditional bias (religion)
Subject:
European History [1]
Subject X2:
European History [1]