Part 2
Chapter 7
Hana Pátková
Introduction
Towns in medieval Bohemia developed relatively later than towns in west and south Europe and the surrounding regions. They were unable to build on the legacy of ancient town settlements; however, they were often linked to an older settlement, which was usually a settlement with production and market functions, which was converted into the form of a legal town, governed by town law. The 13th century was an important period in relation to the origin of towns, even though they also continued to originate subsequently (well-arranged by Hoffmann 1992, pp. 31–42; Hoffmann 2009, pp. 21–60). With regard to town law, both North German, so-called Magdeburg law, and South German law was enforced in the territory of Bohemia. The law of mining towns had certain particularities, Bohemian mining towns were governed by the law of the town of Jihlava, and subsequently by the law of the town of Kutná Hora (Haas 1952; Hoffmann 1975).
The beginnings of town official documents
The oldest evidence of official papers originating in towns comes from the 13th century. The oldest town seals, demonstrating that the town was able to issue documents, have been preserved from the 1240s (Vojtíšek 1928; Čarek 1985). Sporadic documents have survived from the second half of the 13th century. The oldest mention of a town ledger dates from the turn of the 1270s and 1280s; this ledger was allegedly kept in Prague, or more precisely Prague Old Town. However, it has not survived and it is not certain whether it actually existed (Vojtíšek 1953a). There is also information from as early as the end of the 13th century about town scribes, a list of duties of the scribe of Prague Old Town has survived from 1296. He was to write Charters and letters for the town and its residents and be involved in collection of town taxes. Major changes in regard to written sources occurred in the 14th century. The oldest actually preserved town ledger – the ledger of Prague Old Town – was kept from 1310 (Archiv hlavního města Prahy, ms. 986; Pátková 2011). Town ledgers from other towns have also survived. Five of them from the period before 1350 have been preserved in Prague Old Town, Nový Bydžov, Louny, Litoměřice, and Kolín (Pátková 2011; Kapras 1907; Herold 1971; Kocánová & Tomas 2006; Bláhová 1978; Vojtíšek 1953b), however, it is certain that these ledgers were kept quite commonly. The number of preserved ledgers rises steeply from the middle of the 14th century and they were also commonly kept in smaller towns. It is evident from the content of the oldest five ledgers that the content of the ledgers soon began to be specialised. As well as ledgers with a mixed content, a number of more or less specialised volumes, kept depending on the needs of the specific town in the specific period, originated depending on the type of administration. With regard to the relationship to the topic of the chapter, that is debts and loans, their utilisation is quite diverse. Ledgers of privileges and statutes (liber privilegiorum, statutorum) have quite a limited evidential value. Loan administration only appears in these if it is affected by a town statute. Market ledgers (libri contractuum, libri emptionum et venditionum, libri traditionum), which record purchase and sale, particularly purchase and sale of real estate, are a much more abundant source. And, finally, specialised types of ledger, recording debt administration – ledgers of entries or obligations (libri obligationum, libri cautionum) – were also created in some towns. Ledgers of pledges (libri additionum), which contain records of claims raised by creditors, are similar to these. Testaments, usually preserved in volumes of testaments, record debts and receivables of specific town residents. Ledgers originating during administration of the financial and economic affairs of the town are a completely separate group. This mainly concerned collection of various types of taxes, of which there were several in medieval Bohemian towns – either intended for the territorial lord, or the lord of the town, or intended for the needs of the town itself. Written sources originating on the basis of activities by other institutions residing in the town must also be taken into consideration. This particularly concerned guilds and brotherhoods. These corporations collected regular contributions from their members and could also provide them with a loan or contribution if necessary. However, sources arising from the activities of individuals also very rarely survived, these being several fragments of merchant’s ledgers. However, these existed in much greater numbers, as evidenced by mentions of lost papers in other sources, particularly in testaments.
This very general outline must be followed by a more detailed description of various types of sources.
Charters
A very broad range of various legal actions was recorded in writing in the form of charters, from the 13th century to the end of the Middle Ages. While charters are the only type of written document surviving from the 13th and the beginning of the 14th centuries, they exist in parallel to other sources in the 14th and 15th centuries, particularly official ledgers. However, their present is very inconsistent in the town environment, only a fragment of the original number has evidently survived. With regard to the fact that in most cases this concerned acquisitions between individuals, private persons – residents of the town, the probability of survival of such documents is less than of documents intended for the town as a whole. With regard to preserved IOUs and quittances, most of these are simple. Paper was quickly established as a writing material and printed seals appear alongside appended seals. The form of deed does not contain any decorative formulations as for example the IOU from Jan of Bezdědice for the town of Domažlice dated 1420 (Monasterium).
These deeds could be issued by individuals – debtors, possibly along with their guarantors, and also very frequently by the town council, even if this concerned a loan to the town or if this was affair of an individual burgher (compare the debt of Klatovy burgher Jan owed to the monk of local Dominican monastery dated 1411) (Monasterium).
A fairly common way to obtain a loan in late medieval towns in Bohemia was sale of so-called permanent payments. These payments, usually linked to real property and most often a house, were sold most commonly for ten times their annual value. They were irrevocable. Sometimes they were restricted to a lifetime, but very often they were truly permanent, unlimited. Documents in the form of deeds have also been preserved regarding these business transactions and were often issued by the town council under the town seal, even though this concerned a transaction between two individuals (e.g. Kutná Hora burgheress Merl Schikactmertlin and burgher Ondřej Polner from 1398 (Monasterium). Survival of such documents is quite random, more of them are known from České Budějovice (Šimeček 1959), Vodňany (Šimeček 1960), and Kutná Hora.
The list of documents must also include testaments. Most – if they survived – have been preserved in testament ledgers in Bohemian towns; however, they also existed in the form of papers. Most of the surviving paper testaments were from České Budějovice and Soběslav (Hradilová 1992), which did not have testament ledgers. They have a very simple form in both towns – they are written on paper, the seal is additionally printed as usual, the script is more common, and the text does not contain decorative formulations. However, testaments issued under appended seals are also known from late medieval Bohemia. The testament informs, in more or less detail, of the debts and receivables of a deceased person. Written records of wills were not binding in late Bohemian medieval towns, this probably occurred more in cases of complicated inheritance or more complicated division of property by the testator (Testaments 2006). Comprehensiveness cannot therefore be assumed in relation to this matter. On the other hand, testaments often record information about places for which there are no other sources (e.g. surrounding towns where similar written documents did not survive but where the testator had business contacts), and also about rural inhabitants, whose appearance in sources is otherwise sporadic. Deeds from towns and burghers are recorded, with more or less comprehensiveness, in summarising editions of documents (Codex diplomaticus et epistolaris regni Bohemiae 1904; Regesta diplomatica necnon epistolaria Bohemiae et Moraviae 1855; Regesta Bohemiae et Moraviae aetatis Venceslai IV, 1967), municipal chartularies were issued for some more important towns such as in Žatec, České Budějovice, Ústí nad Labem, Krupka, Český Krumlov, Plzeň, and Most (Schlesinger 1892; Köpl 1901; Hieke-Horčička 1896; Müller 1929; Schmid-Picha 1908, 1910; Strnad 1891, 1905; Schlesinger 1876). Specialised editions also made the town privileges of Bohemian towns available (Codex iuris municipalis, 1886–1961).
Town ledgers
Official ledgers kept for the needs of the town and its residents – that is town ledgers are more substantial sources from the aspect of preserved data. These have been preserved in Bohemia from a fairly late date – from 1310, whereas only five of them from the period up to 1350 (Pátková 2016b) have survived. The number of surviving ledgers increased to 51 from the period between 1350 and 1400, and 232 volumes dating up to 1500 have survived (according to Nový 1963, passim). The analogical type of written document was commonly widespread in surrounding German lands, where traces of their existence appear at the end of the 12th century (Koln am Rhine), they appear in other towns by the end of the 13th century, and also survive from towns belonging to the lands of the Bohemian crown earlier than in Bohemia itself (Görlitz, Wroclaw) (for information regarding the situation in Germany see the project of records of town ledgers Index librorum civitatum). Nevertheless, town ledgers became widespread in Bohemia and became a very important source for the modern historian. However, their survival is random as a result of fires in Middle Ages such as the fire of the town hall in Prague Old Town in 1399 resulted in only four ledgers from the 14th century surviving in Prague Old Town or fires of the royal towns of Domažlice and Čáslav caused that nearly the entire medieval archives were lost. Also subsequent and modern losses as well as disasters such as destruction of part of the archive of the town of Prague in May 1945, and the tendency to throw away ‘old and unneeded’ papers, particularly at the end of the 18th and sometimes even in the 19th century, had a destructive impact and was something that affected the archives of the royal towns such as Hradec Králové (Vojtíšková & Šebesta 2013) or Žatec, the best-preserved type of sources of town provenience.
During the 14th and 15th centuries, these ledgers developed into fairly diverse materials. Modern Czech diplomatic therefore created several classification systems according to which these ledgers are classified into several groups depending on their content or the town body that kept them (Nový 1963, pp. 21–7; Pátková 2016a, pp. 135–6, comment 225; Čarek & Lůžek 1968). From the aspect of keeping ledgers, this concerns the fact that judicial ledgers, kept by the municipal court, and council ledgers, kept by the town council, can be distinguished in Czech towns. Both these groups can overlap from the aspect of content, it depended on the competence of the court of law and the council in the specific town and the specific period.
Classification by content is fundamental for research of financial obligations, debts, and loans. The most commonly classified groups are: I. Town administration ledgers in the narrower sense of the word – this includes ledgers of privileges and statutes (libri privilegiorum et statutorum); various office ledgers – forms, copy ledgers (formularium, liber copiarum), etc., and also a large group of financial ledgers, kept for administration of the town’s economic management. II. Town judicial ledgers – these contain disputable and indisputable civil matters, criminal justice matters. III. Ledgers for the transmitted public competence of the town – orphan ledgers (libri orphanorum), hospital ledgers, and church expense ledgers.
If we proceed in order along the individual groups, we must state that the ledgers of statutes and privileges did not contain much data. These are essentially cases when a provision concerned matters of debts. Several provisions from the 14th century concerning debts and lien were published on the basis of the town ledgers of the Old Town (Archiv hlavního města Prahy, ms. 986; ms. 993) and other sources by Emil Franz Rössler in the 1840s (Rössler 1845, passim, and pp. LXIII–LXIV). This group of ledgers is similar to legal ledgers, of the towns we can mention the legal ledger of Kamenice nad Lipou, a smaller subject town in South Bohemia established in the 1460s (Krčilová, Martínek & Martínková 2004). With regard to the specific homogeneity of town law, these provisions are usually of a similar content. With regard to the separate chapter devoted to the legal framework of the debt administration, there is no need to pursue this matter further.
Financial ledgers
In the broadest sense of the word these are ledgers used to administer the town’s finances. Several types of these ledgers can be distinguished. (Nový 1960; Beer 1915) Ledgers used during collection of various taxes and allowances, whether these were intended for the territorial lord or nobility, or whether these were for the needs of the town – tax ledgers and registers, etc. Debt matters only essentially appear here in limited numbers – this mainly concerned arrears of various allowances. A specific register of arrears dating from 1486–1487 survived in Kutná Hora and there were undoubtedly more similar written documents (Archiv města Kutná Hora, ms. I D 4). Another large group of data is town quantities, usually recording income and expenditure chronologically according to the official terms of office of individual burgomasters. A ledger recording the debts of resigning town councillors owed to new town councillors has also exceptionally survived (České Budějovice, 1390s; Archiv města České Budějovice, ms. D 8). A list of townspeople owing the town for municipal real estate dating from 1511 to 1514 from Kutná Hora is also unique (Archiv města Kutná Hora, ms. I D 8). The financial ledgers of auxiliary municipal authorities recording specialised administration (trade in wine in České Budějovice; the office of the Prague Bridge in Prague Old Town, etc.) have survived in some towns. Ledgers originating directly in relation to a loan that the town provided to the monarch and in which its residents participated are of greater significance. Such a ledger survived in České Budějovice and dates from 1394 (Archiv města České Budějovice). From the aspect of form, these ledgers or registers are very simple, they have the form of a notebook or file, are written on paper, and record the names of specific persons and the relevant amounts.
As for the group of municipal justice ledgers, four types in particular are of interest in relation to debt administration: ledgers for debts or books of obligations, which, as the name implies, are especially kept for this type of administration, ledgers of pledges and also market ledgers, and, finally, testament ledgers.
In regard to the first type, it must be mentioned that very few of these specialised ledgers have survived, we can chiefly mention several ledgers from Prague. Specialised ledgers were created at Prague Old Town in the 1370s at the latest. A justice ledger for minor debts from 1370 to 1371 has been preserved from this period (Archiv hlavního města Prahy, ms. 988). This is followed in order by a ledger of minor debts dating from 1400 to 1499 (Archiv hlavního města Prahy, ms. 998) and a ledger of major debts from 1400 to 1483 (Archiv hlavního města Prahy, ms. 997). The boundary between a major and minor debt was the amount of 10 stacks of 60 Prague grosses (about ledgers Kremličková 1952).
Prague Old Town also has so-called registration ledgers where debt obligations form part of the administration. These have survived from 1471 to 1518 (Archiv hlavního města Prahy, ms. 94), 1518 to 1535 (Archiv hlavního města Prahy, 2098), and 1518 to 1538 (Archiv hlavního města Prahy, ms. 99). The ledger of town rights, marriage contracts, and quittances from 1518 to 1552 comes from the very end of the monitored period (Archiv hlavního města Prahy, ms. 534), and quittances are recorded in a separate section of the ledger. Debt administration also appears in ledgers with mixed contents, the so-called white ledgers of registration, contracts, and other entries from 1452 to 1535 (Archiv hlavního města Prahy, ms. 2141). The second Prague town, Prague New Town, has a similar series of ledgers for debts of less than ten stacks of 60 grosses from 1377 to 1417 (Archiv hlavního města Prahy, ms. 2070, 2073, 2077, 2078). These ledgers are essentially kept chronologically on the basis of the dates when the municipal court went into session. Such notably specialised ledgers do not appear in other Bohemian towns. They were probably not kept in smaller towns and they may have existed in larger towns but probably disappeared over time. This is evidenced by the fact that larger towns in Moravia (Brno, Olomouc, Znojmo) and in Eger have similar ledgers (Nový 1963, pp. 39–49, 128–34, 190–200, 69–81). Ledgers of pledges recorded notification of claims before the town court or council. A specialised ledger of pledges regarding debts from Kutná Hora from 1514 has survived (Archiv města Kutná Hora, ms. E b/10), and this category can also include some ledgers from the Prague towns – the ledger of contracts, pledges, and levies of Prague Old Town from 1518 to 1558 can also be classified with these fairly late ledgers (Archiv hlavního města Prahy, ms. 2155), along with two ledgers from Prague New Town, these being – from the 16th century – the ledger of pledges, quittances, and town rights from 1518 to 1538 (Archiv hlavního města Prahy, ms. 554), and, finally, the ledger of pledges from 1490 to 1518 (Archiv hlavního města Prahy, ms. 2097).
The majority of the surviving books are therefore not specialised in this manner, records concerning debts are mixed among other administrative items. This is also the case of Prague Old Town, where a judicial ledger from 1351 has survived (Archiv hlavního města Prahy, ms. 987); records concerning debts are mixed in among other entries of various content. The ledger is basically kept chronologically according to the sessions of the town court (Třikač 1996).
The aforementioned market ledgers are a very frequent type where one can often find entries about sale of the so-called permanent payments among entries about sale of real estate. Permanent payments were very common in Bohemian late medieval towns. This system was abolished during the Hussite Revolution period but, with regard to the fact that there was no substitute for it in economic life, it very quickly reappeared. Records in Prague market ledgers provided most of the information on this phenomenon for a basic study by B. Mendl (Mendl 1932) which is also important because some of the used ledgers were destroyed during the fighting in Prague in May 1945. A specific debt usually originated during sale of real estate; payment of the entire price at once was not a common occurrence in late medieval Bohemian towns. It was much more common to pay part of the price and gradually pay off the remainder at specified intervals. Records of payments can sometimes be found as additional entries next to the original entry. Payment of the entire amount and therefore settlement of the obligation is usually graphically expressed by crossing out the entry so that the original text remains visible. Commemorative ledgers which contain mixed entries of various content, which is related simply by the need to record this information in writing for future memory or books that can be called civil justice ledgers in modern terminology, are much less specialised. The abovementioned types of ledgers are generally widespread and have survived from even very small locations, for instance Hošťka in North Bohemia (Nový 1963, p. 68) or Kaplice in the southern part of the country (Nový 1963, p. 93).
With regard to testament ledgers as stated above, testaments have survived in some towns in the form of papers. However, most of them are preserved in the form of ledgers. The testament ledgers themselves have survived quite inconsistently, testaments are sometimes also mixed in among other entries of a different nature. When working with a testament one must remember that most deceased people did not create a testament; this usually originated in relation to more complicated inheritance or property relations which meant that written records of acquisition were necessary. Testaments are a very generous source from the aspect of research of debt administration. They record the receivables and debts of the deceased, and also record the method these were handled in. Receivables were specifically the subject of bequests and donation, whether to specific people or church institutions, however, these did not receive cash and the question is to what degree they were able to utilise these receivables. A very common type, though a fairly complicated from the research aspect, is ledgers identified as commemorative ledgers (liber memorabilium, memorialis). These are very common particularly in smaller towns where the administration of town authorities was not very extensive and so specialised ledgers were not created like they were in bigger towns. These ledgers have a mixed content and they can contain various entries which needed to be recorded in writing for more permanent preservation. In these, debt administration is mixed among other types of records and there are often long intervals between entries, especially in the ledgers of small towns, which complicates evaluation of the evidential value of these ledgers and the comprehensiveness of the entries. An example of such a book is the commemorative ledger of the town of Čelákovice in Central Bohemia, with records from 1366–1557 kept chronologically according to the session of the town court (Archiv města Čelákovice, 12).
Guilds and brotherhoods
Town corporations – guilds and religious brotherhoods – were also involved in loan administration. They were able to loan their members money from their resources. The existence of guilds and brotherhoods is documented in Bohemian towns from the first half of the 14th century. Written documentation kept by these corporations – mostly ledgers demonstrating guild management – would certainly be a suitable source but they have only been preserved very sporadically. Only several of these ledgers and their fragments from medieval Bohemia have survived, yet thousands of them must have existed (Pátková 2006). The archive documents of the guild of artists of Prague Old Town, including ledgers, are exceptionally well-preserved (Pátková 1996; Benátská 2011; Chytil 1906). The oldest artistic guild ledger contains records from 1348 to 1527, including accounts, but does not allow systematic monitoring of loans within the terms of the guild environment (Pátková 1996).
Accounting records were also kept by individuals in late medieval towns. The so-called merchant’s ledgers must be mentioned at this point. Only several fragments, the records of two merchants selling cloth and one selling spices dating from the 14th century, are known from Bohemia (Graus 1956), the recently identified specialised records of a Prague merchant (Musílek 2016) which means we cannot assume their extensive use. However, future findings of unknown material cannot be precluded. A ledger kept from 1455 (Třeštík 1956) has survived in a neighbouring land – from the town of Eger. Of course not only merchants kept such records. References to a ‘register’ which individual burghers kept and in which they kept detailed records of their debts, receivables, and possibly other similar administration appear in various sources. Similar mentions can also be found in testaments, where these ‘registers’ are commonly referred to for detailed records of the testator’s property. Thousands of similar documents must have existed but practically nothing has survived. The merchant’s ledger of the Runtingers from the relatively close Bavarian town of Regensburg (Graus 1956, p. 644; Bastian 1935–1944) mentions the Bohemian territory only very marginally.
Other institutions active in the town
After this summary of sources concerning the town, its residents, and originating as a result of the activities of the lord of the town, the town itself, and its residents, we must also briefly mention the activities of other – essentially out-of-town – institutions, active in the town.
Town residents were naturally able to enter into financial relations with these institutions. Church institutions – monasteries, chapters and churches – are particularly important in this aspect. Sources regarding financial transactions between them and burghers may be stored in their archives. They may be in the form of the abovementioned papers or may be bound in a ledger. So-called expenditure ledgers are important in this field. These contained records of the management of churches (Zilynská 1998; Kůrka 2010). Their survival is fairly random; the accounts of the Parish Church of Saint Nicholas in Prague Old Town from the 15th century have survived in Prague, with its great number of churches (Opatrný 1957); these ledgers have not been preserved in most towns. Surviving materials include ledgers from Kutná Hora, Ústí nad Labem, Kaplice, and the ledger from Jičín (Francek 1981), and also the ledger from Tábor from the beginning of the 16th century (Vandrovcová 2010).AcknowledgmentThis study was supported by the programme Progres Q07 implemented at the Faculty of Arts, Charles University.
References
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