Place: “Germany”
Time: 18th Century
By: Dan C. Heinemeier
(We are still in the Eighteenth Century in Germany)I mentioned the potato as a food item. Europeans were slow to adopt this staple, and there was much opposition to it. (At the Hans Herr House, which really belonged to Christian Herr who died in 1750, I ask visitors to name the foods that we would find in the cellar in Christian's time. Nearly always someone will answer the potato. This was not a food that Christian would have used.) In 1781 in the Elbe region of Germany, it is recorded that servants would rather change masters than be forced to eat potatoes. Dr. Kuby said in a speech once that in 1700 it was bread for breakfast, bread for dinner, and bread for the evening meal (assuming there were three meals per day). In 1800, he went on to say that it was potatoes for breakfast, for dinner, and for the evening meal. The introduction of the potato was one of the positive food revolutions of the Eighteenth Century.
After The Thirty Years' War, the economy of Germany was less of a world economy than its neighbors had, and even less than it had been before the war in Germany. Germany had no colonies or maritime activity. Spain, France, England, Portugal, and Holland developed a world trade base. German markets were local or confined within Germany. Much of the economic strength of Germany was based on agriculture whose practices were not keeping pace with the demands. There were few markets that earned foreign currencies. The most prominent was the practice of hiring out armies to other nations.
Production of goods was generally based on the guilds, which at the best utilized a very small shop. An exception was military goods. As the century wore on, the guilds lost power and social standing. The inflation required the master and his helpers to work long days. Much of the textile manufacturing, such as spinning and weaving, was placed out in the hands of the peasants, especially women and children, who were trying to earn some extra money for the family.
After The Thirty Years' War ended, the landlords tried to gain more control and to increase their income. This led to severe conflicts with the peasants who had agreements with the landlords about their rights and taxes. The Lords periodically asserted their rights to the common areas (pastures and wood lots) and the peasants insisted they owned these. These led to court cases and to appeals to higher Lords. These higher Lords would take up the case of the peasants because it would weaken the lower Lords and strengthen the claims of the higher Lords. The Gemmingens and the von Neippergs in the Kraichgau were not anxious to have the Duke of Wuerttemberg enter their squabbles with the peasants.
We gratefully acknowledge the work of John Blankenbaker who published over 2,500 Germanna History Notes via the Germanna-L@rootsweb.com email list from 1997 to 2008. We are equally thankful to George Durman (Sgt. George) for hosting the list and republishing the notes via rootsweb.com.