Maristella Botticini and Zvi Eckstein
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- October 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780691144870
- eISBN:
- 9781400842483
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Princeton University Press
- DOI:
- 10.23943/princeton/9780691144870.003.0009
- Subject:
- Religion, Judaism
This chapter assesses the argument that both their exclusion from craft and merchant guilds and usury bans on Christians segregated European Jews into moneylending during the Middle Ages. Already ...
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This chapter assesses the argument that both their exclusion from craft and merchant guilds and usury bans on Christians segregated European Jews into moneylending during the Middle Ages. Already during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, moneylending was the occupation par excellence of the Jews in England, France, and Germany and one of the main professions of the Jews in the Iberian Peninsula, Italy, and other locations in western Europe. Based on the historical information and the economic theory presented in earlier chapters, the chapter advances an alternative explanation that is consistent with the salient features that mark the history of the Jews: the Jews in medieval Europe voluntarily entered and later specialized in moneylending because they had the key assets for being successful players in credit markets—capital, networking, literacy and numeracy, and contract-enforcement institutions.Less
This chapter assesses the argument that both their exclusion from craft and merchant guilds and usury bans on Christians segregated European Jews into moneylending during the Middle Ages. Already during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, moneylending was the occupation par excellence of the Jews in England, France, and Germany and one of the main professions of the Jews in the Iberian Peninsula, Italy, and other locations in western Europe. Based on the historical information and the economic theory presented in earlier chapters, the chapter advances an alternative explanation that is consistent with the salient features that mark the history of the Jews: the Jews in medieval Europe voluntarily entered and later specialized in moneylending because they had the key assets for being successful players in credit markets—capital, networking, literacy and numeracy, and contract-enforcement institutions.
Federico Varese
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780198297369
- eISBN:
- 9780191600272
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/019829736X.003.0008
- Subject:
- Political Science, Russian Politics
The first section of the chapter describes the main features of the original society of the vory-v-zakone – thieves-with-a-code-of-honour – the criminal fraternity that flourished in the Soviet ...
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The first section of the chapter describes the main features of the original society of the vory-v-zakone – thieves-with-a-code-of-honour – the criminal fraternity that flourished in the Soviet labour camps between the 1920s and the 1950s, and re-emerged in the 1970s. The account given is based on archival data that have not been presented before, and describes the rituals and practices involved, the vory code of behaviour, vory activities outside prison, and punishment in vory courts. The second section addresses the question of the origins of the vory-v-zakone society, namely, whether it was a Soviet or pre-Revolutionary phenomenon. It is concluded that the fraternity most likely evolved from pre-Revolutionary criminal nineteenth-century arteli (guilds) of ordinary thieves.Less
The first section of the chapter describes the main features of the original society of the vory-v-zakone – thieves-with-a-code-of-honour – the criminal fraternity that flourished in the Soviet labour camps between the 1920s and the 1950s, and re-emerged in the 1970s. The account given is based on archival data that have not been presented before, and describes the rituals and practices involved, the vory code of behaviour, vory activities outside prison, and punishment in vory courts. The second section addresses the question of the origins of the vory-v-zakone society, namely, whether it was a Soviet or pre-Revolutionary phenomenon. It is concluded that the fraternity most likely evolved from pre-Revolutionary criminal nineteenth-century arteli (guilds) of ordinary thieves.
SHEILAGH OGILVIE
- Published in print:
- 2003
- Published Online:
- January 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780198205548
- eISBN:
- 9780191719219
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198205548.003.0005
- Subject:
- History, European Early Modern History
This chapter investigates the economic position of widows in the pre-industrial German society under analysis in this book. Patterns of widows' work are distilled from a database of work observations ...
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This chapter investigates the economic position of widows in the pre-industrial German society under analysis in this book. Patterns of widows' work are distilled from a database of work observations extracted from church-court records and are compared with those of other females (and males). These findings are then set alongside information on widows' livelihoods from an 18th-century economic census. Data on widowed female household-headship are used to identify the variables encouraging widows' economic independence. Qualitative findings are then used to explore competing hypotheses about the biological, technological, cultural and institutional determinants of widows' economic position. The chapter discusses the institutional factors constraining widows' economic activities, in particular the ‘social capital’ of craft guilds, merchant guilds, and local communities. The chapter concludes by exploring the implications for the wider developing economy of these constraints on widows' work.Less
This chapter investigates the economic position of widows in the pre-industrial German society under analysis in this book. Patterns of widows' work are distilled from a database of work observations extracted from church-court records and are compared with those of other females (and males). These findings are then set alongside information on widows' livelihoods from an 18th-century economic census. Data on widowed female household-headship are used to identify the variables encouraging widows' economic independence. Qualitative findings are then used to explore competing hypotheses about the biological, technological, cultural and institutional determinants of widows' economic position. The chapter discusses the institutional factors constraining widows' economic activities, in particular the ‘social capital’ of craft guilds, merchant guilds, and local communities. The chapter concludes by exploring the implications for the wider developing economy of these constraints on widows' work.
David M Wilkinson
- Published in print:
- 2006
- Published Online:
- September 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780198568469
- eISBN:
- 9780191717611
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198568469.001.0001
- Subject:
- Biology, Ecology
This book raises and attempts to answer the following thought experiment: ‘For any planet with carbon-based life, which persists over geological time-scales, what is the minimum set of ecological ...
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This book raises and attempts to answer the following thought experiment: ‘For any planet with carbon-based life, which persists over geological time-scales, what is the minimum set of ecological processes that must be present?’. The main intention of this book is to use an astrobiological perspective as a means of thinking about ecology on Earth. Its focus on processes contrasts with the commoner focus in ecology textbooks on entities such as individuals, populations, species, communities, ecosystems, and the biosphere. The book suggests that seven ecological processes are fundamental (not including natural selection and competition, which characterize all of life rather than only ecology): energy flow (energy consumption and waste product excretion), multiple guilds (autotrophs, decomposers, and parasites), tradeoffs (specialization versus generalization, leading to biodiversity within guilds), ecological hypercycles (cycles within cycles), merging of organismal and ecological physiology (as life spreads over the planet, biotic and abiotic processes interact so strongly as to be inseparable), photosynthesis (which it suggests likely in most biospheres but not inevitable), and carbon sequestration. These fundamental processes lead to the emergence of nutrient cycling. The integration of Earth System Science with ecology is vitally important if ecological science is to successfully contribute to the massive problems and future challenges associated with global change. The book is heavily influenced by Lovelock's Gaia hypothesis.Less
This book raises and attempts to answer the following thought experiment: ‘For any planet with carbon-based life, which persists over geological time-scales, what is the minimum set of ecological processes that must be present?’. The main intention of this book is to use an astrobiological perspective as a means of thinking about ecology on Earth. Its focus on processes contrasts with the commoner focus in ecology textbooks on entities such as individuals, populations, species, communities, ecosystems, and the biosphere. The book suggests that seven ecological processes are fundamental (not including natural selection and competition, which characterize all of life rather than only ecology): energy flow (energy consumption and waste product excretion), multiple guilds (autotrophs, decomposers, and parasites), tradeoffs (specialization versus generalization, leading to biodiversity within guilds), ecological hypercycles (cycles within cycles), merging of organismal and ecological physiology (as life spreads over the planet, biotic and abiotic processes interact so strongly as to be inseparable), photosynthesis (which it suggests likely in most biospheres but not inevitable), and carbon sequestration. These fundamental processes lead to the emergence of nutrient cycling. The integration of Earth System Science with ecology is vitally important if ecological science is to successfully contribute to the massive problems and future challenges associated with global change. The book is heavily influenced by Lovelock's Gaia hypothesis.
James E. Shaw
- Published in print:
- 2006
- Published Online:
- January 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780197263778
- eISBN:
- 9780191734823
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- British Academy
- DOI:
- 10.5871/bacad/9780197263778.003.0005
- Subject:
- History, European Modern History
The guilds were essential allies in the operation of the regulatory system, which can be considered an early-modern example of a public/private partnership. Not only were the guilds the chief ...
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The guilds were essential allies in the operation of the regulatory system, which can be considered an early-modern example of a public/private partnership. Not only were the guilds the chief ‘customers’ of the court, providing much of the funding for public officials, they also had the authority to enforce market rules in their own sector. The price paid for their cooperation was the confirmation of their privileges and the division of the economy into separate sectors. This chapter emphasizes the functional role of guild litigation as opposed to the rhetoric that has surrounded it. From the point of view of a ‘command economy’, guild litigation served no useful purpose. The government considered it to be a waste of money, ‘petty disputes’ of no real significance.Less
The guilds were essential allies in the operation of the regulatory system, which can be considered an early-modern example of a public/private partnership. Not only were the guilds the chief ‘customers’ of the court, providing much of the funding for public officials, they also had the authority to enforce market rules in their own sector. The price paid for their cooperation was the confirmation of their privileges and the division of the economy into separate sectors. This chapter emphasizes the functional role of guild litigation as opposed to the rhetoric that has surrounded it. From the point of view of a ‘command economy’, guild litigation served no useful purpose. The government considered it to be a waste of money, ‘petty disputes’ of no real significance.
Henk Looijesteijn and Marco H. D. Van Leeuwen
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- January 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780197265314
- eISBN:
- 9780191760402
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- British Academy
- DOI:
- 10.5871/bacad/9780197265314.003.0009
- Subject:
- History, World Modern History
The Dutch Republic had a broad range of means to establish an individual's identity, and a rudimentary ‘system’ of identity registration, essentially established at the local levels of town and ...
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The Dutch Republic had a broad range of means to establish an individual's identity, and a rudimentary ‘system’ of identity registration, essentially established at the local levels of town and parish. This chapter seeks to provide a description of the ways in which the Dutch established an individual's identity. The various registration methods covered almost the entire population of the Dutch Republic at some stage in their life, and it is argued that on balance identity registration in the Dutch Republic was fairly successful. The chapter contends that the degree to which identity was registered and monitored in the early modern era in the Netherlands, while certainly not wholly effective, is remarkable given the absence of a centralized state and the lack of a large bureaucracy.Less
The Dutch Republic had a broad range of means to establish an individual's identity, and a rudimentary ‘system’ of identity registration, essentially established at the local levels of town and parish. This chapter seeks to provide a description of the ways in which the Dutch established an individual's identity. The various registration methods covered almost the entire population of the Dutch Republic at some stage in their life, and it is argued that on balance identity registration in the Dutch Republic was fairly successful. The chapter contends that the degree to which identity was registered and monitored in the early modern era in the Netherlands, while certainly not wholly effective, is remarkable given the absence of a centralized state and the lack of a large bureaucracy.
Bas van Bavel
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- May 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199278664
- eISBN:
- 9780191707032
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199278664.003.0003
- Subject:
- History, European Medieval History
Each region received its specific social organization during the process of occupation in the early and high Middle Ages. This chapter discusses the social distribution of power and property, and ...
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Each region received its specific social organization during the process of occupation in the early and high Middle Ages. This chapter discusses the social distribution of power and property, and shows the long‐term effects of these regional structures. In the infertile regions, small‐scale landowners remained well‐entrenched, but the fertile regions occupied in the Frankish period saw the build‐up of large‐scale properties of the king and religious institutions. These large properties were often organized by way of manors. The chapter analyses the causes of the rise of manorial organization and its decline in the 12th to 14th centuries. The coastal regions only opened up in the high Middle Ages, like coastal Flanders and Holland, did not see the spread of manorialism at all; they were characterized by the freedom of the population and the ample scope for self‐determination. Ordinary peasants and townsmen organized themselves in villages, towns, guilds, commons, and other associations. Their rise was probably helped by the dissolution of central power, and the rise of competing authorities like princes and banal lords.Less
Each region received its specific social organization during the process of occupation in the early and high Middle Ages. This chapter discusses the social distribution of power and property, and shows the long‐term effects of these regional structures. In the infertile regions, small‐scale landowners remained well‐entrenched, but the fertile regions occupied in the Frankish period saw the build‐up of large‐scale properties of the king and religious institutions. These large properties were often organized by way of manors. The chapter analyses the causes of the rise of manorial organization and its decline in the 12th to 14th centuries. The coastal regions only opened up in the high Middle Ages, like coastal Flanders and Holland, did not see the spread of manorialism at all; they were characterized by the freedom of the population and the ample scope for self‐determination. Ordinary peasants and townsmen organized themselves in villages, towns, guilds, commons, and other associations. Their rise was probably helped by the dissolution of central power, and the rise of competing authorities like princes and banal lords.
Tirthankar Roy
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- October 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780198063780
- eISBN:
- 9780199080144
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198063780.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, Economic History
This book chronicles how the concept of organizing people to serve economic ends emerged in early modern and colonial India. It examines rules of cooperation, why people decided to join forces, how ...
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This book chronicles how the concept of organizing people to serve economic ends emerged in early modern and colonial India. It examines rules of cooperation, why people decided to join forces, how disputes were settled, and how cooperative communities became increasingly unstable in more modern times. It focuses on five dimensions: actor, agent, time, purpose, and region. The leading actors are peasants, labourers, artisans, merchants/bankers, and the states. The rules of cooperation that formed inside communities of merchants and others were respected by the states. However, these rules would eventually become unstable due to the integration of India within a global-industrial economy and the introduction of a new rule of law in the old guise of ‘custom’. As a result, the endogamous guild, a kind of collective that used marriage rules to secure cooperative ties, became weaker, to be supplanted by other forms of organization. Collectives controlled property, managed resources, supplied training, and conducted negotiations. The regional angle is important because regions differed on the composition of enterprise, and globalization and colonialism unfolded unevenly across space. The book presents an economic history of institutional change in South Asia.Less
This book chronicles how the concept of organizing people to serve economic ends emerged in early modern and colonial India. It examines rules of cooperation, why people decided to join forces, how disputes were settled, and how cooperative communities became increasingly unstable in more modern times. It focuses on five dimensions: actor, agent, time, purpose, and region. The leading actors are peasants, labourers, artisans, merchants/bankers, and the states. The rules of cooperation that formed inside communities of merchants and others were respected by the states. However, these rules would eventually become unstable due to the integration of India within a global-industrial economy and the introduction of a new rule of law in the old guise of ‘custom’. As a result, the endogamous guild, a kind of collective that used marriage rules to secure cooperative ties, became weaker, to be supplanted by other forms of organization. Collectives controlled property, managed resources, supplied training, and conducted negotiations. The regional angle is important because regions differed on the composition of enterprise, and globalization and colonialism unfolded unevenly across space. The book presents an economic history of institutional change in South Asia.
David M. Wilkinson
- Published in print:
- 2006
- Published Online:
- September 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780198568469
- eISBN:
- 9780191717611
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198568469.003.0003
- Subject:
- Biology, Ecology
The problems faced by a hypothetical planet with only one species strongly suggest that any functioning ecological system must have organisms from at least two major ecological guilds: autotrophs and ...
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The problems faced by a hypothetical planet with only one species strongly suggest that any functioning ecological system must have organisms from at least two major ecological guilds: autotrophs and decomposers. While conventional predators do not seem to be crucial to planetary ecologies it is likely that parasites will quickly evolve, and through density dependent processes help to regulate population sizes. Density dependence may be crucial in preventing the runaway population growth of a species, leading to it monopolizing a planet's ecology. While density independent processes (be they a cold winter on a local scale, or the impact of a large meteorite at the planetary scale) can greatly affect abundance, they cannot provide regulation; this requires the ‘thermostat’ like behaviour of density dependence. As such, both multiple guilds and the presence of parasites are likely to have positive Gaian effects in most biospheres.Less
The problems faced by a hypothetical planet with only one species strongly suggest that any functioning ecological system must have organisms from at least two major ecological guilds: autotrophs and decomposers. While conventional predators do not seem to be crucial to planetary ecologies it is likely that parasites will quickly evolve, and through density dependent processes help to regulate population sizes. Density dependence may be crucial in preventing the runaway population growth of a species, leading to it monopolizing a planet's ecology. While density independent processes (be they a cold winter on a local scale, or the impact of a large meteorite at the planetary scale) can greatly affect abundance, they cannot provide regulation; this requires the ‘thermostat’ like behaviour of density dependence. As such, both multiple guilds and the presence of parasites are likely to have positive Gaian effects in most biospheres.
Cordelia Beattie
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- September 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780199283415
- eISBN:
- 9780191712616
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199283415.003.0005
- Subject:
- History, British and Irish Medieval History
This chapter first considers what prompts the use of the category ‘single woman’ in some guild returns of 1388-9. The contention is that the category carries with it connotations of the legal ...
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This chapter first considers what prompts the use of the category ‘single woman’ in some guild returns of 1388-9. The contention is that the category carries with it connotations of the legal construct femme sole, that is, a woman who was not under coverture and thus was legally and economically independent. The chapter then turns to guild registers and account books, which record the entry and transactions of individual members. It focuses on the Register of the Guild of the Holy Cross, Stratford-upon-Avon, which continues to uses the categories ‘maiden’ and ‘widow’ for unmarried women but introduces the vernacular term ‘sengilman’ for unmarried (probably never-married) men in the 15th century. This again suggests that the classification of individuals entailed value-laden choices and one must consider the potentially different moral associations of categories.Less
This chapter first considers what prompts the use of the category ‘single woman’ in some guild returns of 1388-9. The contention is that the category carries with it connotations of the legal construct femme sole, that is, a woman who was not under coverture and thus was legally and economically independent. The chapter then turns to guild registers and account books, which record the entry and transactions of individual members. It focuses on the Register of the Guild of the Holy Cross, Stratford-upon-Avon, which continues to uses the categories ‘maiden’ and ‘widow’ for unmarried women but introduces the vernacular term ‘sengilman’ for unmarried (probably never-married) men in the 15th century. This again suggests that the classification of individuals entailed value-laden choices and one must consider the potentially different moral associations of categories.
