Medieval Guilds

The guilds were an important part of city and town life. Guilds were

• exclusive, regimented organizations;
• created in part to preserve the rights and privileges of their members; and
• separate and distinct from the civic governments, but since the functions and purposes of guild and civic government overlapped, it was not always easy to tell them apart, especially since many well-to-do guildsmen were prominent in civic government.

Two kinds of guilds were especially important to civic life--merchant guilds and craft guilds.

Merchant Guilds

The merchant guilds were probably the first to appear and constituted the nucleus for civic organization.

• As early as the 10th c. merchants formed organizations for mutual protection of their horses, wagons, and goods when travelling.
• Often a merchant guild would found a town by obtaining a charter.

Craft Guilds

The craft guilds came about by increased specialization of industry.

• A group of artisans engaged in the same occupation, e.g., bakers, cobblers, stone masons, carpenters, etc. would associate themselves together for protection and mutual aid.
• As these craft associations became more important than the older merchant guilds, their leaders began to demand a share in civic leadership.
• Soon no one within a town could practice a craft without belonging to the appropriate guild associations.
• The purpose of the guilds was to maintain a monopoly of a particular craft especially against outsiders. For example, the harness makers would get together and figure out what the owners of business needed from that trade then allow as many masters to set up shop as the business could support.

Consumer and Worker Protection

In protecting its own members, the guilds protected the consumer as well.

• Many craft regulations prevented poor workmanship. Each article had to be examined by a board of the guild and stamped as approved.
• Because of lack of artificial light, work at night was prohibited.
• In Florence the number of dyers was specified by the guild. In one place it was forbidden to see pigs fattened by a barber-surgeon lest the pig had been fattened on rich peoples' blood.
• Metalware plating was tantamount to fraud and, therefore, was forbidden.
• To regulate competition between members the guild forbade advertising.
• All prices were regulated
• Craftsmen could take work outside where it could be seen.
• Price-cutting was strictly forbidden.
• To preserve its monopoly a guild forbade the sale of foreign artisans' work within a city.
• The most important processes used in manufacturing were guarded. In Florence a worker who possessed any essential trade secrets and for some reason fled to a foreign territory must be tracked down and killed lest he divulge the information.
• Monopoly existed within individual guilds through the limitation of the number of masters.
• No member was ever allowed to corner the market by purchasing a large supply of a product or commodity so as to be able to fix the price.

Services Performed by Guilds
Guilds performed other services for their members as well. They

• provided funeral expenses for poorer members and aid to survivors;
• provided dowries for poor girls;
• covered members with a type of health insurance and provisions for care of the sick;
• built chapels;
• donated windows to local churches or cathedrals;
• frequently helped in the actual construction of the churches;
• watched over the morals of the members who indulged in gambling and usury; and
• were important for their contribution to emergence of Western lay education. In earlier times, the only schools in existence had been the monastic or cathedral schools.

Guilds and Community Interrelationships

The members of the guild were called confraternities, brothers helping one another. From the political viewpoint, the guild was neither sovereign nor unrelated to society outside the guild and town organization. As a collective unit, the guild might be a vassal to a bishop, lord or king, as in Paris. The extent of vassalage depended on the degree of independence of the town where it was located. There was a close connection between the guild and the city authorities:

• The City Council could intervene in event of trouble between guilds.
• Council could establish the hours of work, fix prices, establish weights and measures
• Guild officials were frequently appointed to serve in civic government because guilds usually voted as a unit, raised troops for the civic militia, and paid taxes as a group.

Each guild was required to perform public services. They:

• took turns policing the streets and
• constructed public buildings and walls to defend the town or city.

A perceived higher social status could be achieved through guild membership. The guildsmen of The Canterbury Tales had wives who liked to be called "Ma Dame" by their inferiors.

By the 13th c. to become a guild man one had to go through 3 stages:

• lowest was apprentice,
• next was journeyman, and
• top-ranking stage was master.

The same structure is present in labor unions and colleges today.

Apprentice -- usually a male teenager who went to live with a master and his family; his parents paid to have him taken on. He probably occupied the attic of their 3 story home:

• The shop where he would learn his trade was located on the ground floor.
• The second story was the masters' living area.
• The third story housed the journeyman who was there to learn also.

The apprentice was subject to the master. During his apprenticeship he was not allowed to marry. This learning period might vary from 2-7 years depending on the craft. His training included the rudiments of the trade. The apprentice then progressed to journeyman.

Journeyman or day worker -- entitled to earn a salary.
The next hurdle was to produce a masterpiece that would satisfy the master of the guild so that he could assume the title of master craftsmen and would thus get membership in the guild. This was not easy to accomplish because:

• The journeyman had to work on his own time to produce this masterpiece -- Sunday was the only day he did not work sun-up to sun-down.
• He must use his own tools and raw materials which required a capital outlay that he might not have been able to accomplish as a wage earner.
• Then if he did produce the required work, the state of the economy guided the vote of acceptance -- it was not desriable to have too many masters in a guild and when the economy was tight. The masters would not admit anyone to their ranks to strain the economy.

Master--Once the masterpiece was completed and the guild voted to accept the journeyman as a master, he could become one.

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