etc., sold the prisoners of war made in the German invasions; while the
Germans, in their turn, when successful, carried away or sold their
booty to the human traffickers from various regions. Thus Aurelian,
who was a military tribune previous to becoming emperor, sold several
hundred Franks, Suevians, etc., probably in the city of Maguncia
(Mayence). Soon the forays became more and more destructive, and for
several centuries invasion succeeded invasion until the impoverishment
and ruin of the people were accomplished. The issue of a long train
of interacting social circumstances was the same in Gaul as in Italy:
senators and oligarchs owned the lands and the cities, and proudly
domineered, while the rest of the population sank into tenants, serfs,
and bondmen, and most of them into chattels. These last had, of course,
nothing to defend against the invaders, who even at times in many ways
alleviated their condition: therefore the invaders were often received
with open arms by the enslaved populations. When the destroyers of the
Roman rule over Gaul finally settled therein, many of the nobles and
rich magnates understood how to ingratiate themselves with their new
masters, and thus shared in their spoils of lands and slaves. By far
the greater number, however, were themselves ruined and enslaved.
In Gaul, as over the whole ancient and Roman world, not the
slaveholders but their slaves survived the general destruction, nay,
finally stepped into the places once occupied by their enslavers and
masters.
XVI.
GERMANS.
AUTHORITIES:
_Tacitus, Codex Legum Antiquorum Barbarorum, Jacob Grimm, Mentzel,
Wirth, Puetter, Zimmerman, etc._
The Germans, in all probability, were the last of the Aryan stock who
immigrated into Europe. History first discovers them finally settled in
central Europe; and for how long a time they had previously roamed in
the primitive forests of these regions it is impossible to conjecture.
With the exception of the left bank of the Rhine, Switzerland, and the
northern slopes of the Tyrolean Alps--which regions, in the course of
centuries were conquered from various Keltic tribes--the Germany proper
of to-day is about the same as when Cæsar met the barbarians on the
Rhine. Then the Germans were rude savages, with but little agriculture;
living on milk, cheese, and flesh; and their condition was in many
respects similar, perhaps even inferior, to that of the Tartars,
Kalmucks, and Bashkirs, who still rove over northern and central Asia.
Neither clanship nor patriarchate existed among the Germans, but the
rule of individual will strengthened by the family ties. Divided into
numerous tribes, the Germans seem to have spent many centuries in
hunting the wild beasts of their primitive forests, and in making war
upon each other. Most probably these almost uninterrupted domestic
wars created and developed aristocracy and slavery, both of which
were firmly established among the Germans when they first appear on
the record of history. Among the European descendants of the Aryas,
the primitive Germans reflect most strikingly the Euphratic story of
Nimrod, "the strong," "the hunter," subduing the feeble and preying
on his person and labor. A bitter hatred between the tribes prevailed
from time immemorial; and consequently feuds and wars were perpetual.
The conquered was compelled to labor for the conqueror; and thus
originated, very probably, bondage and domestic slavery, as well as
the aristocratic contempt which the fighting part of the population
had for the subdued and enslaved laborers of a tribe. When one German
tribe subdued another, the victors either seized on the lands of the
conquered and settled thereon, transforming the former occupants into
bondmen; or, if they did not settle among the subdued, they made them
tributaries, carrying away a certain portion of the population as
slaves. Thus the Germans, in their wild forests, were mainly divided
into two great social elements--the freemen, or nobles, possessed of
all rights, and the bondmen possessed of none. But all, free and slave,
were of kindred race and lineage.
All the German dialects have a specific denomination for the chattel.
_Schalch_, _scalch_, _schalk_, is the word for slave, and _seneschalk_
for the overseer. Afterward, in mediæval times, _seneschalk_ was an
office, dignity, or title.
Besides wars and conquests, there were other sources which fed and
sustained slavery: thus certain crimes were punished with slavery, and
even freemen gambled away their liberty--a custom found among no other
race or nation; a freeman, likewise, could at any time sell himself
into slavery. Any one condemned to compound in money for murder or any
other offence, if he had no money, gave himself as a slave into the
hands of the family or individual whom he had offended, or to the man
who loaned him money to pay the composition. The _schalks_ were more
absolutely in the power of their master than were the Roman slaves
under the empire, or even, if possible, than the chattels of the
American slave states. Although Tacitus says that masters killed their
slaves only when intoxicated or otherwise maddened with passion, the
barbarian codes and other historic evidence show that the _schalks_
were treated with the utmost cruelty, and even subject to be maimed
in various ways. Some historians who hold up the Germans as models of
social and civic virtue, attribute this cruelty to their contact with
the Romans, whose example they followed. But the influence of Roman
polity on Germany began only toward the end of the fourth century;
and many of the northern tribes, as the Saxons, Frisians, etc., did
not come under the influence of Roman, Christian, or any foreign
civilization till about the eighth century. Some of these barbarian
codes were written when the barbarians had settled on the Roman ruins;
then, undoubtedly, they incorporated some Roman ideas, and contained
laws bearing on existing relations; but still they were principally the
embodiment of their own immemorial usages. The Visigothic code, for
instance, was written very soon after they settled in Gaul and Spain,
long before the destruction of the Western empire, and consequently
could not have been seriously influenced by the legal conceptions or
customs of Rome.
Tacitus says that little difference existed between the mode of life of
masters and slaves: _Inter eadem pecora in eadem humo degunt._ At the
time of Diodorus Siculus, youthful male and female _schalks_ served at
the tables of masters, who were always willing to sell them for a jug
of wine.
In this primitive epoch of German historical existence, the pride of
blood and descent seems to have been deeply ingrained in the German
mind; and there was a strong aversion against corrupting the lineage
by intermarriage with a _schalk_ man or woman, even although they
were of the same race and family. Among the Saxons immemorial custom
even punished a _mesalliance_ with death. Thus the very ancestors of
many American slaveholders, now so proud of their Saxon blood, were
considered unworthy of marriage with their masters. But concubinage
with slave women was then common (as it now is in the South), whatever
Tacitus may say concerning German conjugal fidelity. The bastards
of parents one free the other slave, became serfs to the soil. If
a freeman married a slave woman, their children were _schalks_, and
sometimes the father even was reduced to slavery. A free woman marrying
a slave, might be killed by her parents or became a slave of the
king--when the Germans had kings in their new, post-Roman monarchies.
Most of these cruel legal customs, and many others found in the codes,
belong to the heathen epoch, to the period of pure Germanic existence
unadulterated by contact with the corruptions of civilized life. They
prove how deep was the Germanic contempt for the ignoble or unfortunate
among their own brethren; they show also the very ancient appearance of
slavery among them, and its violent and criminal origin, like that of
slavery always and everywhere.
Ancient usages and laws regulating inheritance perpetuate themselves
remarkably among peoples and nations. From their forests the Germans
transplanted the right of primogeniture over Europe. The land was given
to the males, while the daughters received the movables, _mancipia_,
and the schalks--a conclusive evidence that not alone bondage to the
soil, but positive chattelhood, prevailed in the primitive forests of
Germany.
Cities and organized industry had then no existence. Freemen, _i.e._,
masters, had but a few crude wants, and these were supplied by the
work of the schalks in the dwelling or in the _hof_ (court) of the
master. In primitive prehistoric times, as in the time of Tacitus and
afterward, all the male and female household menials, peasants and
workmen, were _schalks_.
Manumissions were common, but depended wholly on the will of the
master. They could be obtained in various ways--might be bought with
labor, produce, money, etc. The manumitted did not, however, enter at
once into full enjoyment of the rights of freeman or master; indeed,
only his descendants of the third generation became fully purified
and capable of entering into the noble class. They then constituted,
probably, the inferior nobility or freemen, who were followers and
companions of the first class; and perhaps from them sprang the free
yeomanry, who originally possessed but small property and a small
number of schalks and serfs.
The fighting-men, or warriors, who subdued and enslaved other tribes,
or transformed into schalks the weaker members of their own tribe,
frequently located some of them on lands or homesteads which they
permitted them to cultivate for their own use, on condition of paying
a rent, generally in kind, and performing various other acts of
servitude. Such was the origin of the German _liti_, who afterward
constituted the common people.
The free, that is originally the _strong_, the _subduer_, was at the
summit of the whole German social structure. He was free because he
was absolute master over the weak, who had no power or strength in
himself or family, and therefore was rightless. The genuine meaning
of the word _frow_ (from which is derived _fri_, _free_, _freedom_,)
is "the right to own" land, _liti_ and _schalks_. From _frow_ comes
the _frowen_ "freemen," "rulers," "masters,"--the caste for which all
others existed. Land and schalks constituted the wealth of _frowen_
or nobleman, and to acquire them the German tribes exerted all their
warlike energies. All the remote Teutonic invasions, as well as those
of the mediæval times, were made principally for the acquisition of
land and slaves. The lands, conquered by the swords of the _frowen_,
were worked by the _schalks_.
The slave traffic existed and was highly developed among the
primitive Germans. It was carried on at the time of Tacitus, and some
investigators maintain that for long centuries it was the only traffic
known among the barbarous Germans; and slavery in its worst form was
in full blast in Germany when her tribes dashed themselves against
the Western empire. The slaves constituted more than half of the
whole Germanic population. Wirth, the most conscientious investigator
of the primitive social condition of the Germanic race, estimates
the proportion of freemen to slaves as one to twenty-four. All of
them--_frowen_, _adelings_, nobles of all degrees, followers, vassals,
_liti_ and _schalks_, lived the same simple, agrestic life. Rude in
mind and of vigorous bodies, in comparatively small numbers they
shattered in pieces the rotting Roman empire.
First the incursions, then the definite invasions and
conquests--Attila's forays from one end of Europe to the other--gave
a vigorous impulse to slavery, both abroad and at home. Abroad,
the invaders enslaved all that they reached--destroying, burning,
devastating, impoverishing the population, and increasing the number
of those forced to seek in chattelhood a remedy against starvation. At
home, immense tracts of land were depopulated and abandoned, and old
and new _frowen_, masters, seized upon them. Of course _schalks_ were
in demand, and were supplied by traffic and kidnapping.
The wars among the Germanic tribes, which were continued more or less
vigorously, and the wars with neighboring populations, increased the
number of slaves thrown upon the market.
The transition of a great part of Europe from the Roman to what may be
called the German world, was so terrible that for several centuries the
most unparalleled destruction, desolation, and slavery constituted the
principal characteristics of the first mediæval epoch.
But Europe, the Christian world, and humanity were not to be submerged
in the foul mire of chattelism. The awful crisis lasted through many
generations, and bloodshed and superhuman suffering were their lot. But
finally, the turning-point of the disease was reached: the disorder
began to yield. Often after such a crisis the malignant symptoms do not
abate at once, nay, they sometimes reappear with renewed force, and a
long period is needed for a complete recovery. So in the evolution of
Europe, overflowed by the German tribes, the most malignant symptoms
of chattelhood continued and reappeared for a long time in their
worst characteristics, before the social body entered the stage of
convalescence.
The bloody throes of the German world redounded to the benefit of the
nobles abroad and at home. _Liti_ and schalks increased, and land
rapidly accumulated in the hands of the few during the first centuries
of the German Christian era. Thus Saxony belonged to twenty, some say
to twelve nobles, who kept thereon half-free vassals, _liti_, and
schalks.
As the oligarchs of Greece and Rome and Gaul, so the German _frowen_,
the powerful, the rich, in all possible ways, _per fas et nefas_,
seized upon the homesteads of the poor; and the impoverished freemen
or _ahrimen_, smaller nobles, and vassals, became _liti_ and schalks.
Analogous conditions produce analogous results in usages as in
institutions and laws; and often that which appears to have been
borrowed by one nation or people from another, is only a domestic
outgrowth germinating from similar circumstances.
When the German lay and clerical founders of the feudal system
possessed more land than they could cultivate, and when the iron hand
of Charlemagne prevented domestic feuds and the supply of slaves from
that source, then they kidnapped right and left, heathen and Christian,
poor freeman or schalk. Some of the feudal barons of the time of
Charlemagne owned as many as twenty thousand _liti_ and schalks.
Karl, Karle (the correct name), or Charlemagne (the more common
one), in one of his numerous edicts or capitularies, prescribes as
follows to those who received lands, baronies, abbeys, etc., as fiefs
or grants: "Et qui nostrum habet beneficium diligentissime prevideat
quantum potest Deo donante, ut nullus ex mancipiis (chattels) ad illum
pertinentes beneficium fame moriatur, quod superest ultra illius
familiæ necessitatem, hoc libere rendat jure prescripto."
Manumissions were promoted, in various ways, by the civil and clerical
authorities. Many free yeomen were created from manumitted slaves, as
well as from poor vassals or followers. But such were soon impoverished
by wars and devastations, and were, from various causes, reduced to the
condition of _liti_ and chattels.
Serfdom and slavery were generally more severe in the northern portion
of Germany, as Saxony, etc., than in the southern; but in both, the
peasantry were crushed, oppressed, and, when it was feasible, enslaved.
When Lothair I., grandson of Charlemagne, revolted against his father,
Louis the Pious, he appealed for help to the oppressed peasantry,
tenants, and chattels.
The centuries of the _faustrecht_--"right of the fist," that is
of the sword, of brute force--soon succeeding all over Germany to
Charlemagne's orderly rule, the strongholds of dynasts, barons,
nobles and robbers, shot out everywhere like mushrooms; and from
them radiated oppressions and exactions of every kind. The ancient
practice of ruining the poor freemen and tenants, then transforming
them into serfs, and then the serfs into chattels, went on as of
old. In proportion as the forests were cleared, however, the baron
found he could not profitably work the extensive estates with schalks
alone, and that it would be more economical to transform these chattels
into serfs, tenants, etc., and establish them on small parcels of his
property. This was the first feeble sign of amelioration. Villages
formed in this way by dynasts, or princes, and by barons, then received
some rudiments of communal, rural organization.
A more powerful engine of emancipation, however, were the cities. In
the course of the tenth century, dynasts, princes and emperors began
everywhere to found cities, endowing them with various franchises and
privileges. The legitimate flow of events, the necessities created
by a settled organic existence which could only be supplied by the
regular movements of industry and commerce, together with the influence
of Gaul, and above all, of Italy, stimulated the German rulers. To
the emperor Henry I., of the house of Saxony, belongs the glory of
having given the first impulse to commerce, and thus the first blow to
chattelhood and serfdom.
The population of the newly-founded cities consisted of inferior people
of all kinds--laborers, operatives, small traders, poor freemen, and
persons manumitted on condition of residing in the cities--the founders
of the cities originally peopling them with their own retainers and
with vagabonds of all kinds. Of course no nobles even of the lowest
kind became burghers, and thus the first municipal patricians were
of very inferior birth. Thus antagonism to barons and feudal nobles
generally formed the very cornerstone of the cities.
Among the privileges granted to the first cities was that a serf,
schalk, or, in a word, any bondman, seeking refuge in the precincts of
a city, became free if not claimed within a year. This respite to the
fugitive soon became a common law all over Germany, even between nobles
in relation to their fugitive serfs; and the hunter of a fugitive
lost caste even among the free masters--_freiherrn_. When a legal
prosecution was attempted, every difficulty, legal and illegal, was
thrown in the way of the claimant--the cities willingly resorting to
arms for the defence of their right of refuge.
The first Crusades emancipated large numbers of persons, as the
taking of the cross was the sign of liberty for serf and for slave.
But in Germany as in France, the great and permanent influence of the
Crusades on emancipation consisted in their strengthening the cities
and impoverishing the nobles, and thus producing a salutary change in
internal economic relations.
The wars of the Germans with their neighbors, and above all with the
Slavonians, Maghyars, etc., in the tenth and eleventh centuries, again
gave vitality to the slave traffic; and war prisoners and captives, not
now of their own kindred, but of foreign birth, were brought to the
markets for sale.
Nevertheless, chattelhood was slowly dying out, and about the twelfth
century but few traces of it remained: prisoners of war began to be
ransomed or exchanged, and villeinage, with various services attached,
altogether superseded domestic slavery.
The villein possessed the rights of family, of village, and partially
of communal organization. But many of the galling characteristics of
chattelhood were transfused into serfdom and villeinage. The nobles
became, if possible, more insolent, exacting and oppressive. But the
villeins and peasants began to feel their power, and to combine and act
in common in the villages, and afterward in the communes.
Partial insurrections followed each other in various parts of
Germany; here against one baron or master, there against another.
Every insurrection, even if suppressed, nevertheless gave an impulse,
though sometimes imperceptible, to amelioration and emancipation.
Insurrections of the down-trodden and oppressed classes are like
feverish efforts of diseased physiology to resist the disorder, to
throw out the virus, and restore the normal condition in the economy
of life. The whole world admires the glorious insurrection of the
Swiss-German peasantry against _their_ insolent masters. Then the
bondmen, villeins, etc., individually or in small bodies, by the axe,
by fire, and in every possible manner, protested their imprescriptible
right to liberty. So also did the celebrated Münzer when the
reformation dawned over Germany and Europe. He firmly believed that
religious reform, to be beneficial to the poor, must go hand in hand
with social ameliorations. The most notable insurrection, however, was
the great uprising of the German peasantry in the sixteenth century.
From the Vosgese mountains, from the Alps to the Baltic, numerous
isolated forces rose in arms, each inspired by the same great idea.
They had no centres, no possibility of a combination of effort, but
all of them recognized the same covenant: 1. The gospel to be preached
in truth, but not in the interest of their masters--nobles and clergy.
2. Not to pay any kind of tithes. 3. The interest or rent from landed
property to be reduced to five per cent. 4. Forests to be communal
property. 5. All waters free. 6. Game free. 7. Serfdom to be abolished.
8. Election of communal authorities by the respective communes. 9.
Lands robbed from the peasantry to be restored to the original owners.
This great war of the peasants was terrible, pitiless, bloody. More
than one thousand strongholds, burghs, and monasteries were destroyed;
but the peasants were finally overpowered, the nobility being aided
by the forces of the empire. Luther, too, thundered against the poor
peasants.[17] But not in vain did they shed their blood. The oppression
by the old _frowen_, strengthened by feudality, was finally broken at
the roots. The imperial German diet declared to the nobles, that if
they did not cease their cruelties, at the next revolt they should be
abandoned to their fate.
Serfdom was not yet abolished, but was moderated in various ways. The
direct and indirect influence of the Reformation on the condition of
the peasantry has been already mentioned. Mild reforms were introduced
in the dominions of various German sovereigns. Certain liberties were
granted to rural communes, and the number of free tenants slowly but
uninterruptedly increased. The conditions of villeinage on private
estates began to be regulated by the respective governments; and
absolute serfdom was slowly dying out. The prosperity of Germany
increased proportionally with the emancipation, though but partial, of
rural labor, and the freedom of the soil. On an average, those regions
were most prosperous which contained the greatest number of emancipated
rural communities, or where the villeinage was reduced, systematized,
and made more and more free from the arbitrary exactions of the master.