【简译】中世纪的行会（Medieval Guilds）

2022-10-24 11:57 作者:神尾智代 0人读过 | 我要投稿

Guilds of merchants and craft workers were formed in medieval Europe so that their members could benefit from mutual aid, production standards could be maintained and competition was reduced. In addition, by members acting collectively, they could achieve a certain political influence. There were two main types of guilds: merchant guilds for traders and craft guilds for skilled artisans.

商人与手工业者行会在中世纪欧洲逐渐发展，行会成员可以从互助中受益，行业生产标准可以得到较好地维持，激烈竞争也会相对减少。此外，行会成员的集体行动，可以让他们获得一定的政治影响力。中世纪欧洲主要有两种类型的行会：贸易商的商人行会和熟练工匠的手工业行会。

Entry requirements to guilds became stricter over time as those who controlled the guilds became part of a richer middle class and set a higher membership fee for outsiders. This new bourgeoisie successfully sought to maintain their position above workers without the means or skills needed to run their own small businesses.

随着时间的推移，行会的准入要求变得更加严格，因为那些控制行会的人成为富有中产阶级的一部分，并为外来者设定了更高的会员费。这个新的资产阶级一直寻求维持其地位，使其凌驾于没有经营自己小企业的手段或技能的工人之上。

The name 'guild' derives from the Saxon word gilden, meaning 'to pay' or 'yield', as members of the guild were expected to contribute to its collective finances. In the 11th century early guilds functioned in towns much like village communities did in rural areas with the additional factor that merchants required more extensive protection for themselves and their goods as they travelled along trade routes at home and abroad. From the 12th century guilds were organised according to types of merchants and professionals like doctors before the idea expanded to include skilled artisans. Accordingly, there were over 100 guilds in Britain, for example, representing first merchants and traders, and then any skilled craft industry from weaving to metalworkers. Italy was another country where guilds were popular; the city of Florence alone boasted 21 guilds in the mid-14th century and the clothmakers guild there controlled some 30,000 workers. Flanders, France (Paris alone had 120 guilds) and Germany were other places where guilds rose to prominence.

“行会”这一名称源自撒克逊语（古撒克逊人的西日耳曼语）gilden，意思是“支付”或“收益”，行会成员需要为其集体财务作出贡献。11世纪时，早期行会在城镇的功能与农村地区的村社很相似，另一个因素是商人在国内外的贸易路线上旅行时需要对自己和货物进行更全面的保护。从12世纪开始，行会根据商人和医生等专业人员的类型进行组织，然后扩大到包括熟练工匠在内的多种群体。因此，当时在英国出现了100多个行会，例如，首先代表商人和贸易商，然后代表从编织到金属加工等技术工艺行业。意大利是另一个流行行会组织的国家；14世纪中期，仅佛罗伦萨市就拥有21个行会，那里的制布商行会控制着大约3万名工人。佛兰德斯、法国（仅巴黎就有120个行会）和德国是行会崛起的重点地区之一。

商人行会

Security was a great concern for medieval traders who worried that their goods could be stolen in transit or while in storage. Mutual protection and travelling in groups thus offered the best solution in a period when state intervention was sporadic or non-existent in certain regions. The right to form a guild in England was often given by the crown as part of a town's charter of freedom. A charter of freedom involved the sovereign selling the charter which, when given, waived the obligation of a town's inhabitants to pay feudal duties. Instead, they could apply their own taxes to the traffic of goods through the town. Merchant guilds did give back to their communities, too, prescribing from their members charitable gifts of food, wine and money for the clergy and poor and needy. The political class of a town typically came from the merchant guilds and, with a charter also establishing local courts, a new and powerful middle class sprang up. A similar pattern of development had occurred and was ongoing in other European countries.

对于中世纪的商人来说，安全是一个非常重要的问题，商人们担心自己的货物在运输途中或储存期间被盗。因此，在某些国家干预零星地区或根本不存在管理的时期，相互保护和集体旅行为商人们提供了最佳解决方案。在英国，作为一个城镇自由宪章的一部分，组建行会的权利通常是由王室给予的。自由宪章涉及到君主授予宪章，宪章一旦被授予，就免除了城镇居民支付封建税的义务。相反，他们可以将自己的税收用于货物运输。商人公会也对他们自己居住的社区进行回馈，规定其成员为神职人员和穷人提供食物、酒和钱等慈善礼物。城镇的政治阶层通常来自于商人行会，随着皇室特许状，当地建立了地方法庭，一个新的、强大的中产阶级出现了。类似的模式在其他欧洲国家也在发生并一直持续发展。

手工业行会

From the 12th century in France and Italy, 'craft' guilds began to form which were associations of master workers in craft industries. Cities like Milan, Florence and Toulouse had such guilds for food producers and leather workers. Some of the earliest craft guilds in England were guilds of weavers, especially in London and Oxford. Other craft guilds eventually included associations of cutlers (makers of cutlery), haberdashers (dealers in goods needed for sewing and weaving), dyers, bakers, saddlers, masons, specialists in metal goods such as blacksmiths, armourers, locksmiths and jewellers, and many others covering all aspects of daily life. Some guilds were based on the materials their members worked with rather than the end product so that, in France, for example, there were separate guilds for makers of buckles depending on whether they used brass or copper. So, too, guilds of the makers of prayer beads were distinguished by which material they used to make their beads, whether it be bone, amber, jet or whatever. Each guild was managed by a small group of individuals known as guildmasters who were assisted by a body of jurors whenever there were disputes amongst members.

从12世纪开始，在法国和意大利，手工业行会开始形成，它是工人师傅们的行会。米兰、佛罗伦萨和图卢兹等城市都有这样的食品生产者与皮革工人的行会。英国最早的手工业行会是织工行会，特别是在伦敦和牛津。其他手工业行会发展到后面，包括刀匠（餐具制造商）、缝衣匠（缝纫和编织所需物品的经销商）、染色师、面包师、马鞍工、石匠、金属制品专家（如铁匠、军械师、锁匠和珠宝商）以及其他许多涵盖日常生活各个方面的行会。有些行会是根据其成员所使用的材料而不是最终产品来决定的，例如，在法国，根据工匠使用的是黄铜还是铜，扣子制造者分属不同的行会。同样，祈福珠制造商的公会也是根据他们用来制作珠子的材料来区分的，无论是骨质、琥珀、黑玉（煤玉、黑碳石）还是其他。每个行会都由一小群人管理，他们被称为行会会长，当行会成员之间发生纠纷时，他们会得到陪审员的协助。

As this class of skilled workers with their own businesses became ever richer so the entry into a guild became more difficult as those with privileges sought to keep out those without them. On the other hand, there was another reason to limit entry: to maintain the high standards of skill of a particular profession. For this reason, many guilds insisted on an entrance fee which went towards the apprenticeship of the new member but also paid for the maintenance of the meeting place of members, the Guildhall, administrative costs, and health services for members if and when required. In addition, the guilds could organise festivals and pay funeral costs for its members or give financial aid to the widows and orphans of deceased members.

随着拥有自己生意的技术工人阶级变得越来越富有，后来者进入行会变得更加困难，因为那些拥有特权的人试图将没有特权的人拒之门外。另一方面，还有一个限制进入的原因：保持特定行业的高标准技能。出于这个原因，许多行会坚持收取入会费，用于支付新成员的学徒费用，同时也用于维护成员的聚会场所——市政厅，支付行政费用，以及在需要时为成员提供医疗服务。此外，行会还会组织节日活动，或为其成员支付葬礼费用，为已故成员的遗孀和孤儿提供财政援助。

Craft guilds were, as noted, particularly keen to make sure their members' products were of a high enough quality and the weights, dimensions and materials or ingredients of goods all met the current industry standards. Even such workers as bakers could face random checks on their bread by the guildmasters and jurors, as this extract on Parisian bakers illustrates:

If the master determines that the bread is not adequate, he can confiscate all the rest of it, even that which is in the oven. and if there are several types of bread in a window, the master will have each one assessed. And those which are found to be too small, the master and jurors will have them donated to charity. (Reglemens, quoted in Singman, 233)

如前所述，手工业行会特别热衷于确保其成员的产品具有足够高的质量，商品的重量、尺寸、材料或成分都符合行业标准。即使是面包师，也可能面临行会会长和陪审员对其面包的抽查，这段关于巴黎面包师的节选说明了这一点：

如果师傅确定面包不合格，他可以没收所有剩下的面包，甚至是在炉子里的面包。如果一个窗口里有几种面包，师傅会让每一种面包都接受评估。而那些被发现太小的面包，主人和陪审员会让面包师捐给慈善机构。(Reglemens, 引自Singman, 233)

Quality was further maintained by regulating apprenticeships which had to be of a minimum duration and with a master who had proven skills at their craft. After several years of training apprentices then worked for a master. To become a master one had to present a 'masterpiece' to the guild's hierarchy which showed that the worker had acquired the necessary skills in their particular craft. There was also a financial burden as the title of master was only given to those able to fund their own workshop, tools and a celebratory banquet.

通过规范学徒制来进一步保持商品质量，学徒制必须有最短结业期限，而且要有一个在工艺上被证明有能力的师傅。经过几年的培训后，学徒们开始为大师工作。学徒想要成为大师，必须向公会的高层提交一份“杰作”，表明自己已经获得了特定工艺的必要技能。他们还面临着一个经济负担，因为大师的头衔只给那些能够资助自己的车间、工具和庆祝宴会的人。

The advantage to guild members of all these rules, besides maintaining public confidence in their products, was that they could control competition and be exempt from local taxes, although a producer could not undercut the prices of fellow guild members. Additional rules that protected members from each other included not poaching a customer from another member's shop or criticising the produce of a fellow member (this was especially relevant to cooks), not working on religious holidays or, in some cases, not working after dark.

所有规则对行会成员的好处，除了维持公众对其产品的信心外，还在于他们可以控制竞争，并免除地方税，尽管生产商不能压低行会成员的价格。保护成员之间的其他规则包括：不从其他成员的商店挖走顾客或批评其他成员的产品（这与厨师特别相关）；不在宗教节日工作，或在某些情况下，不在天黑后工作。

Other parts of the industry that a guild controlled included wages and the conditions of sale of the product. In effect, then, a guild established a monopoly on all aspects of a particular craft and their control of wages was especially significant when labour became short under such conditions as plagues or famines. Under normal circumstances, a labour shortage would mean a rise in wages for labourers but the guilds often ensured this did not happen (and so make their goods more expensive to sell). Ordinary workers were even prohibited from forming their own associations and this sometimes led to riots and revolts, particularly violent ones breaking out repeatedly in Flanders and Florence, for example, in the 14th century.

行会控制行业的其他部分包括工资与产品的销售条件。实际上，一个行会建立了对某一特定工艺所有方面的垄断，当在瘟疫或饥荒等情况下出现劳动力短缺时，他们对工资的控制尤其重要。在正常情况下，劳动力短缺意味着劳动者的工资增加，但行会往往确保这种情况不会发生（从而使他们的商品卖得更贵）。普通工人甚至被禁止组建自己的行会，这有时会导致暴乱和起义，例如，14世纪在佛兰德斯和佛罗伦萨就多次爆发暴力事件。

行会对社会及妇女的影响

Guilds, especially the merchant guilds, helped produce a rich middle class in medieval society as merchants prospered and began to buy what has always been regarded as a badge of the aristocratic elite: land and property. These nouveaux riches may not have been fully accepted into high society but they themselves began to carve out their own unique place in the social order by distancing themselves from everyone below them. Many guilds, even craft guilds, only accepted new members if they were the sons of existing ones or if one could gain the sponsorship of a master who would take them on as an apprentice. Masters were often biased towards relatives and membership fees were higher for those outside the community so that many guilds, in effect, produced hereditary professions. Further, by stipulating that masters owned their own means of production in the form of their workshop and tools, guilds thus created a permanent class divide between owners and labourers.

行会，尤其是商人行会，有助于在中世纪社会产生一个富有的中产阶级，因为商人们繁荣起来，开始购买一直被视为贵族精英的徽章：土地与财产。这些新贵可能没有被上流社会完全接受，但他们自己开始通过与下面的人保持距离，在社会秩序中开辟自己独特的位置。许多行会，甚至是手工业行会，只有当新成员是现有行会的儿子，或能获得大师的赞助，并收他们为学徒时，才接受他们。师傅们往往偏向于亲属，而社区外的从业者，会费也较高。因此许多行会实际上产生了世袭的职业。此外，通过规定师傅拥有自己的生产资料，即他们的工场和工具，生产资料所有者与劳动者之间逐渐形成了一道永久的阶级鸿沟。

As guilds made the rules and decided the wages it became difficult for ordinary workers to protect their rights and own interests. Strikes by textile labourers in the city of Ghent in 1274, for example, resulted in business owners agreeing with those in neighbouring towns not to give work to strikers. However, it is important to remember that in medieval societies there was less of a conflict between wealth and labour than there was between rival industries and towns. In this sense, guilds may well have actually helped make medieval society, at least in larger towns, more cohesive and stable. Finally, one aspect of society which sprang from educational guilds and helped, at least eventually, to allow some people a means to climb the social ladder, was the 22 universities of medieval western Europe.

由于行会制定规则和决定工资，普通工人很难维护自己的权益。例如，1274年根特市（比利时）纺织工人的罢工，促使当地企业主与邻近城镇的企业主达成协议，不给罢工者工作。然而，在中世纪的社会中，财富和劳动力之间的冲突比敌对行业与城镇之间的冲突要少。因此，行会实际上有助于使中世纪社会(至少在较大的城镇)更有凝聚力和稳定性。最后，社会中最重要的一个方面是从教育行会中产生的，它让一些人获得了攀登社会阶梯的手段，这就是中世纪西欧的22所大学。

One section of society that was treated unequally by guilds was women. There were almost no specific guilds for women and the institutions were always dominated by men (there were a few exceptions such as the women's silk guilds in Paris and the gold spinners of Genoa). Even a profession dominated by women such as midwives did not have their own guild but belonged to that of the surgeons. Women, although they did frequently work alongside men in such industries as spinning, metal polishing and food preparation, only very rarely achieved master status and some guilds such as the pepperers, drapers and (eventually) brewers banned women from becoming apprentices. Legally, women were usually under a male relative's guardianship or their husband's. Only if a woman's fellow-guild member husband died could she enjoy some freedom. A widow could carry on a deceased master's business, for example, and have the full rights of guild membership if she had once worked alongside her husband and she did not remarry.

社会上有一部分人受到行会的不平等对待，那就是妇女。几乎没有专门针对妇女的行会，这些机构总是由男性主导（也有少数例外，如巴黎的妇女丝绸行会和热那亚的金纺厂）。即使是妇女主导的职业，如助产士，也没有自己的行会，她们属于外科医生的行会。尽管妇女经常在纺纱、金属抛光和食品准备等行业中与男子一起工作，但她们很少获得大师级地位，一些行会，如胡椒匠、窗帘匠和啤酒匠，禁止妇女成为学徒。在法律上，妇女通常受男性亲属或丈夫的监护。只有当一个女人的同业丈夫去世时，她才能享受一些自由。例如，一个寡妇可以继承已故主人的生意，如果她曾经与丈夫一起工作，并且没有再婚，她就可以拥有公会成员的全部权利。

演变——“地方政府”

In London, the wealthiest craft guilds, known as the livery companies, became very powerful political players in the city. Indeed, in many towns across medieval Europe, it became almost impossible to build a political career if one was not a member of a guild. The livery companies of London eventually morphed into major financial institutions. Across the waters in Paris, water merchants monopolised trade on the River Seine and had authority over such matters as petty crimes and the city's quotas of salt and grain. In 1260, four of the jurors of the water merchants guild were appointed as city magistrates. In 13th-century Germany several guilds, including ones from different towns, got together and formed an organisation known as the Hanse. These Hanse would then join and form the Hanseatic League of almost 200 trading cities by the middle of the next century. In contemporary Florence, the main guilds were permanently represented on the city council.

在伦敦，最富有的手工业行会，也就是所谓的伦敦同业公会，成为城市中非常强大的政治角色。事实上，在中世纪欧洲的许多城镇，如果一个人不是行会成员，那他几乎不可能建立自己的政治生涯。伦敦同业公会最终演变为主要的金融机构。在对岸的巴黎，水商人垄断了塞纳河上的贸易，并对诸如轻微犯罪和城市的盐与谷物配额等事务拥有权力。1260年，水商人公会的四名陪审员被任命为城市治安官。在13世纪的德国，有几个行会，包括来自不同城镇的行会，聚在一起，形成了一个被称为汉萨同盟的组织。一些商人随后加入了汉萨同盟，这个组织在14世纪中期遍布了近200个贸易城市（14世纪晚期—15世纪早期达到鼎盛，加盟城市最多达到160个）。在当时的佛罗伦萨，主要行会在市议会中都有常设代表。

Eventually, then, and across Europe, many guilds and functions of local government became inseparable as the wealthier middle class began to take some political power from the ruling aristocracy. Lower down the social ladder, the craft guilds permitted skilled craftworkers to protect their own industry and provide mutual social aid while at the bottom, the unskilled workers continued, as always, their fight for uncertain and seasonal employment which often involved moving to wherever such work could be found.

最终，在整个中世纪欧洲，随着较富裕的新中产阶级开始从统治贵族手中夺取一些政治权力，许多行会和地方政府的职能变得密不可分。在较低的社会阶层上，手工业行会允许熟练的手工业者保护他们自己的行业并提供社会互助；而在底层，非熟练工人一如既往地继续为不确定和季节性的工作而奋斗，他们往往需要在任何可以找到工作的地方生活。