In the midst of the Industrial Revolution, craftsman and artisans continued to tout traditional skills; many started out as journeymen, moving from place to place as detailed by law and tradition. Georg Jakob Matz, one of my ancestors in what is now Germany, was one of these journeymen (working as a farrier, one who maintained horses' hooves).
To get a sense of what a journeyman was expected to do, here's a snippet from Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's Wilhelm Meister's Journeyman Years, or the Renunciants (1829):
"Not more than three days shall I remain under one roof. I shall leave no lodging without distancing myself at least one mile from it."
I'm looking at a copy of the Travelling Journeyman's Book for Georg Jakob Matz, Kingdom of Bavaria, Rhine Province, 1835-1837. At the time, it was more restrictive than a present-day passport, subject to all sorts of inspections by various "officials." Yet it also seems very contemporary, post 9/11.
Just two examples from this little book for now.
All civil and military authorities are urged, as long as he conducts himself according to the regulations that follow, to permit the aforementioned journeyman to pass free and unhindered and, in the event of an emergency, to render him every protection and assistance. Rinnthal 16 Oct 1836 The Office of the Mayor . . .
WARNING. Bad conduct brings injury to a person: loss or falsification of the Travelling Journeyman's Book, purposeless wandering about and begging inevitably draw upon themselves the penalties which the laws of each of the countries pronounce against forgerers, vagrants and beggars.
Note: Matz emigrated to the USA, eventually (Pennsylvania). If memory serves, he left for North America in the wake of the Revolution of 1848.
In 1983, I actually found the village of Rinnthal, at the time part of West Germany (then and now The Federal Republic of Germany / Bundesrepublik Deutschland). More on that little adventure at some point, but it looked exactly like the Pocono Mountains of Pennsylvania, where Matz settled in the nineteenth century, and where I was born in the twentieth.
Today's Rune: Wholeness.
5 comments:
"WARNING. Bad conduct brings injury to a person: loss or falsification of the Travelling Journeyman's Book, purposeless wandering about and begging inevitably draw upon themselves the penalties which the laws of each of the countries pronounce against forgerers, vagrants and beggars."
Seems to me the perfect way to lay the foundations of a dark and suspicious society.
Nice quote. You'll have to collect posts about your family together. Just how far back can you trace? Happy New Year! See you more next year!
I learned the word farrier from the mystery "Farrier's Lane" by Anne Perry once upon a time. It came in handy while helping a person at the library where I worked in the '90s find professional blacksmith organizations. Most interestingly still go by the farrier name or did in the '90s.
I know almost nothing about the Journeymen. This is interesting stuff. I wouldn't mind hearing more.
Thanks all for the comments!
Mark, too true.
Danny, I'll have to do that at some point, on paired web pages or something. It's a mixed bag on tracing, some back to the 1800s, some back to the 1600s, and all over the mostly European map.
Sidney, that's cool. I've seen a blacksmith at work and now suppose he was more specifically a farrier.
Charles, I'll definitely pick this thread up again. There's more, though it's still kind of mysterious.
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