Leonard Jan Józef Lepszy

“ The common people, however, were not so easily deterred from pursuing their social aims; they stood up unanimously for their right of sharing in the municipal administration. In 1410 the merchants of Cracow combine to form a separate group, and instantly take up, in union with the craftsmen, the contest against the Town Council. The conflict grows more and more acute in the opening years of the sixteenth century, till it ends in a refusal of the town-rates. King Sigismund I, in 1521, settles all these differences by clearly circumscribing the power of the Town Council. ”

“ To the constant sources of income belongs, among others, the "scot," which comprises a rate not only from house-rent and from lands, but also from trade profits and personal income, and the fees for the night-watch. ”

“ Numerous books and documents throw much interesting light on their professional ability and productiveness. The guild's moneys and important documents were kept in a safe—called the guild's chest—usually under double lock. There also the old seals of the guild were preserved, which bore inscriptions in German, Latin, or Polish, and, in the middle, the guild's arms, with the tools and insignia of the trade. ”

“ The roofing, and the Polish eagle on the front wall, are modern. Two projections in the sides of the tower remain as traces of the gangway that connected it with the barbican.
Of the towers, the first one, at the outlet of Hospital Street to the east, is perhaps the richest and most graceful. It belonged to the lace-makers' guild. It is a semicircular structure on a foursquare basis of quarry-stones; the surface is ornamented with glazed bricks, stone fragments, and indented friezes; there are several moucharabies. ”

“ The living contact with the German guilds, the constant immigration of young journeymen into Cracow, had the effect that down to the middle of the sixteenth century the majority of the guilds consisted for the most part of German elements. German was almost exclusively used as the official language of business transaction and correspondence, and all the usages observed by the German guilds are, with slight local modifications, to be found at Cracow.
Each craft guild had its own special ordinances and privileges ”

“ There is a revival of the Cracow market in the fifteenth century, as it enters into new commercial relations with the Franconian merchants, those of Nuremberg taking the part of mediators between the East and the West. The discovery of America in 1492 brings about a thorough revolution in the world's commerce; colonial produce enters on the market, and the modern development of prices sets in. Polish commercial policy did not prove sagacious enough to meet these new conditions, and thus led to the decline of commerce and of the general prosperity of the towns. ”

“ To the east, the commercial routes from Cracow ran to the cities of Red Russia, reaching the colonies on the Black Sea, even to Kaffa, where the Genoese and Venetian vessels disembarked their cargo; from these, Cracow merchants chiefly took silks and spices. The expeditions to these far-off eastern ports were dangerous undertakings—although freedom of trade was guaranteed by privileges obtained from the Ruthenian princes—and they required brave and experienced men, able to face any danger. ”

“ From the sixteenth century onward frequent differences arose between employers and journeymen about advance of wages, duration of the day's work, Monday rest ("Crispin's holiday") , and the like; these causes of discontent often occasioned strikes, which were sometimes only settled by intercession of the municipal authorities.
The prices of manufactures were regulated by ordinances of the waywode and the town council (in the usual medieval way—best described in the first chapter of J. A. Froude's great work) ”

“ To the Corporation also belonged the journeymen, who, in course of time, got an administration of their own. Every guild appears as an independent company of limited authority, originally responsible for all delinquencies committed by its members, and exercising judicial power within its sphere ”

“ After the accession of a new sovereign, every craft guild was anxious to have its old privileges recognized, and, if possible, to obtain some new ones. We get a full idea of Cracow workshops—and thus of all German workshops in the late Middle Ages—from a famous MS. in the Jagellonian University Library, called Codex Picturatus, and written by Balthazar Behem, notary of the town. ”

“ In spite of all this, the Cracow people, as annals report, are always ready for sacrifices in case of need, they pay taxes and grant subsidies to king and state, defend the town from enemies and keep the fortress walls, at the expense of the corporations, ready for defence.
The common citizen was treated with supercilious contempt by the rich and imperious alderman or patrician. Accordingly, the Commons (Communitas) were in constant feud with the Council ”

“ The large Central Square formed two marketplaces, the poultry market and the coal market. The police control over building matters and provision against fire were entrusted to the "quartermasters" (heads of the districts) . These, e.g., together with the seniors of the corporations, estimated the value of houses, and drew up attestations on their being out of repair. ”

“ Through the mediation of Cracow merchants also the oak and yew of the forests of Little Poland (fit for the building of ships and the making of bows) , the lead and salt of the neighbouring mines, and the produce of the country in linen, wax, and leather, got into the export trade. In 1410 the merchants formed a company, the more effectively to defend their rights. ”

“ Others, as the Wirsings—called Wierzynek in Polish—in the fourteenth and the Boners in the sixteenth century, take also a large part in the administration of the royal domains, and thereby rise to wealth and power. The numerous magnificent sepulchral monuments of Cracow citizens (illustration 10) are lasting records of their importance for civilization, and their activity in promoting the development of art. ”

“ Florian Street—to be seen daily; magnificent beheading-swords of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries are to be found in the collections of the National Museum. The torture was applied three times, and after this painful inquisition there followed the verdict; upon this, the criminal—as the formulas of judgment testify—was still to be tried by ordeal, and after this followed the execution, by hanging, or beheading, or breaking on the wheel, or burying alive (the spot being marked by a pole) , or burning at the stake, &c. ”