Table Of ContentPeasants, Lords, and State
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The Northern World
North Europe and the Baltic c.400–1700 ad
Peoples, Economies and Cultures
Editors
Jón Viđar Sigurđsson (Oslo)
Piotr Gorecki (University of California at Riverside)
Steve Murdoch (St. Andrews)
Cordelia Hes (Greifswald)
Anne Pedersen (National Museum of Denmark)
volume 89
The titles published in this series are listed at brill.com/nw
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Peasants, Lords, and State
Comparing Peasant Conditions in Scandinavia
and the Eastern Alpine Region, 1000–1750
Edited by
Tore Iversen
John Ragnar Myking
Stefan Sonderegger
leiden | boston
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This is an open access title distributed under the terms of the CC BY-NC 4.0 license,
which permits any non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium,
provided the original author(s) and source are credited. Further information and the
complete license text can be found at https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
The terms of the CC license apply only to the original material. The use of material from other sources
(indicated by a reference) such as diagrams, illustrations, photos and text samples may require further
permission from the respective copyright holder.
Cover illustration: Miniature of three men scything grass, on a calendar page for June. (c) The British
Library Board: Royal MS 2 B VII, ff 71r–83v: fol. 76v.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Iversen, Tore, editor. | Myking, John Ragnar, editor. |
Sonderegger, Stefan, editor.
Title: Peasants, lords, and state : comparing peasant conditions in
Scandinavia and the Eastern Alpine region, 1000-1750 / edited by Tore
Iversen, John Ragnar Myking, Stefan Sonderegger.
Other titles: Comparing peasant conditions in Scandinavia and the Eastern
Alpine region, 1000-1750
Description: Leiden ; Boston : Brill, [2020] | Series: The Northern world,
1569-1462 ; vol.89 | Includes bibliographical references and index. |
Identifiers: LCCN 2020024555 (print) | LCCN 2020024556 (ebook) | ISBN
9789004429703 (hardback) | ISBN 9789004433458 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Peasants--Scandinavia--History. | Peasants--Alps
Region--History.
Classification: LCC HD1536.S29 P33 2020 (print) | LCC HD1536.S29 (ebook)
| DDC 305.5/63309480902--dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020024555
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020024556
Typeface for the Latin, Greek, and Cyrillic scripts: “Brill”. See and download: brill.com/brill-typeface.
ISSN 1569-1462
ISBN 978-90-04-42970-3 (hardback)
ISBN 978-90-04-43345-8 (e-book)
Copyright 2020 by Tore Iversen, John Ragnar Myking and Stefan Sonderegger. Published by Koninklijke
Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands.
Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the imprints Brill, Brill Hes & De Graaf, Brill Nijhoff, Brill Rodopi,
Brill Sense, Hotei Publishing, mentis Verlag, Verlag Ferdinand Schöningh and Wilhelm Fink Verlag.
Koninklijke Brill NV reserves the right to protect this publication against unauthorized use.
This book is printed on acid-free paper and produced in a sustainable manner.
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Contents
Preface VII
Acknowledgements IX
List of Figures X
Notes on Contributors XI
Part 1
Introduction
1 Historiographical and Methodological Reflections 3
Tore Iversen and John Ragnar Myking
Part 2
Comparing Scandinavia and the Eastern Alpine Region
2 Slavery and Unfreedom from the Middle Ages to the Beginning of the
Early Modern Period 41
Tore Iversen
3 Leasehold and Freehold c. 1200–1750 88
John Ragnar Myking
4 Peasant Participation in Thing and Local Assemblies
c. 1000–1750 121
Tore Iversen and John Ragnar Myking
5 Summary and Conclusion 178
Tore Iversen and John Ragnar Myking
Part 3
The Portrayal of Peasants in National Historiography
6 The Historian as Architect of Nations: A Historiographical Analysis of
the Norwegian Peasantry as Carrier of National Ideology and Identity in
the Medieval and Early Modern Period 205
Helge Salvesen
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vi Contents
7 The Participation of the Tyrolean Peasantry in the Government of the
Country: Theory – Reality – Ideology 219
Josef Riedmann
8 Peasant Ideology in German Historiography 230
Werner Rösener
9 Switzerland – A ‘Peasant State’? 248
Stefan Sonderegger
Part 4
Appendix
The Sub-peasant Strata in the Late Medieval and Early Modern Eastern
Alpine Region 269
Markus Cerman and Michael Mitterauer
Active Manorial Lords and Peasant Farmers in the Economic Life
of the Late Middle Ages: Results from New Swiss and German
Research 292
Stefan Sonderegger
Glossary 319
Bibliography 321
Index 365
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Preface
Our project ‘Peasants’ control over land and resources from the High Middle
Ages to the end of the early modern period – Norway, Scandinavia, and the
eastern Alpine region 1000–1750’ started in 2003 as a response to the tendency
to isolate the study of agrarian societies within the framework of national or
regional geographical limits. No matter how valuable and innovative such local
and national studies may be, an unintended consequence may be that traits
and developments common to a variety of countries or regions may be accen-
tuated as features characteristic only of the country or region subject to the
investigation. On the other hand, such studies may also overlook causes of na-
tional and regional development that can only be detected when highlighted
by the historical development in other countries or regions.
Our primary aim with the project was to challenge a long-lasting perception
that Scandinavian and especially Norwegian peasants had much greater self-
determination then their European counterparts. Inspired by an unfinished
project from the 1920s (see ‘Introduction’), we have chosen the Alpine region
as a suitable region for comparison with Scandinavia. In the Alpine region we
have included Bavaria, which can serve as a suitable comparison to Scandina-
vian Denmark. To enable us to detect long-term changes, we have settled for a
time span that covers the period from c. 1000 to around 1750.
The huge span of time and the multitude of available local, national, and
regional studies have made our work challenging, and the sheer extent of the
task may account for misreading and many misinterpretations of the work of
outstanding colleges. Our hope is nevertheless that we have managed to ac-
centuate traits that can explain similar, as well as different, developments in
the two regions, thus creating a sound basis for evaluating the perception of a
Scandinavian ‘Sonderweg’ when it comes to peasant self-determination.
Funding by the Norwegian Research Council in the period 2004–2007 ena-
bled us to arrange three major seminars: Trondheim in 2004, Frauenchiemsee
in 2005, and Bergen in 2007, in addition to three minor workshops in Copenha-
gen, Innsbruck, and Vienna in 2006. These sessions provided us with a wide
network of contacts with Scandinavian- and German-speaking colleagues,
which we have been fortunate to draw on in our project. We are greatly in-
debted to our colleges who contributed to these meetings. Some of their con-
tributions are printed in this and our two previous publications (20051 and
1 Tore Iversen and John Ragnar Myking (eds), Land, Lords and Peasants: Peasants’ Right To Con-
trol Land in the Middle Ages and the Early Modern Period – Norway, Scandinavia and the Alpine
Region, Trondheim Studies in History, 52 (Trondheim: NTNU 2005).
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viii Preface
20072), along with articles written especially for these volumes. Our sincere
thanks to everybody who participated in our project, either through papers or
simply by taking part in the discussions.
Some colleagues have contributed to our project on a more regular basis
than others. We are especially indebted to the late Gertrud Thoma (1956–2009),
senior lecturer in medieval history at the University of Munich, who from the
start acted as our German co-ordinator, organized our seminar in Frau-
enchiemsee, and enthusiastically introduced us to a well of German literature.
She was also a co-editor of the second volume of our project. In our work, we
also received great help from the late Professor Heinz Dopsch (1942–2014) at
the University of Salzburg, whose comprehensive knowledge of Central Euro-
pean rural history made it easier for us to understand the complexity of the
German historical tradition and its focus on the relationship between lordship
and peasant society. Professor Stefan Sonderegger, Stadtarchiv St Gallen / Uni-
versity of Zurich, has been part of the project since 2007, greatly contributing
to our understanding of the Alpine region with his insight into alpine rural
history. After Dopsch’s death in 2014, Sonderegger stepped in as co-editor of
this final volume of the project.
Tore Iversen and John Ragnar Myking
2 Tore Iversen, John Ragnar Myking, and Gertrud Thoma (eds), Bauern zwischen Herrschaft
und Genossenschaft: Peasant Relations to Lords and Government. Scandinavia and the Alpine
Region 1000–1750 (Trondheim: Tapir Akademisk Forlag, 2007).
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Acknowledgements
This concluding volume to our project is long overdue. We would like to thank
our contributors to the chapter on historiography, who delivered their contri-
butions years ago, for their patience. A special thanks to Professor Michael Mit-
terauer and the late Professor Markus Cerman (1967–2015) who wrote their
joint article on sub-peasant strata especially for this volume.
Thanks also to Maria Tranter for translating German texts into English, and to
our copy-editor, Philadelphia Ricketts, who not only has secured a coherent
and prudent English throughout the volume, but who has also called our atten-
tion to illogical reasoning and obscure formulations on our part.
Tore Iversen, John Ragnar Myking and Stefan Sonderegger
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