High Medieval guilds in Western Europe didn’t come into existence out of nothing. They were
an evolution of a fraternity or a collegium system dating back to perhaps as far as the
Roman Empire but certainly at least to the early Middle Ages. If you want to know more
about early medieval ‘gilds’, I have made a video about that which you can watch here.
Despite their connections to the early medieval guilds, the guilds of the high Middle Ages,
from the 11th century onwards, were quite different compared to their earlier counterparts.
Early medieval guilds were sparse and resembled more religious fraternities and drinking clubs,
whereas high medieval guilds became more centred around a single occupation and were
far more numerous. The proliferation of high medieval guilds compared to earlier ones can
be attributed to the increasing urbanisation of Western Europe.
After the fall of Rome in the 5th century and the subsequent migration period,
urban centres of Western Europe substantially shrank in size as food production mostly switched
from the large-scale Roman villa farming system to much smaller subsistence farming that could
not support large growing urban centres. The 6th century also saw the Plague of Justinian
and a volcanic winter all adding to the fact why a lot of urban centres during this time
period saw a decrees in population. However, this started to change by the time of the 10th and 11th
centuries. The expansion of farmland due to new farm technologies, the ‘medieval warm’ period,
and the firm establishment of the feudal farming system created a surplus of food that could once
again support large and growing urban centres. On top of the growing population in urban centres,
the opening of new trade routes, which was thanks in part to the Vikings,
the emergence of the Islamic caliphate, and the medieval slave trade, facilitated an increase in
the production of goods in European urban areas which now had access to more and bigger markets.
The increasing food supply, urban population, and trade meant that 11th-century Western Europe
was a fertile ground for the creation of guilds which, rather than being social or religious in
character, like the early medieval guilds were, centred more around a single craft,
job, or occupation. In other words, because towns and cities started to have far more
people that shared the same occupation, it was only natural that these people used the
known guild system to establish institutions for the sake of furthering their jobs and careers.
The structure and operation of these guilds differed depending on their geographical and
temporal locations, but at their most basic, a guild was ‘an association of
people who shared certain interests and wished to pursue common purposes.’ This,
quote, ‘association of people’ could have been as simple as a list of artisans from a single
town that agreed on some production standards or as complicated as the Hanseatic League,
which was technically a merchant guild composed of solely other merchant guilds
all of which could have different contracts with the Hanseatic League while having different guild
structures within themselves. In other words, just like today’s companies can be both a large
conglomerate like Alphabet or a small 10 men operation, so could medieval guilds be a large
multi-kingdom conglomerate like the Hanseatic League or a small-town association of 10 bakers.
The formation of the most common type of medieval guild was quite simple. People
in a town who shared a common occupation got together and agreed to follow some rules and
standards regarding their occupation. These rules could have been as simple as saying that
every member of a tailoring guild can only make pillows and mattresses in this one specific way,
or they could have been as complicated as controlling every aspect of the artisan’s
work. Some guilds had rules that dictated when the members were allowed to work,
what they were allowed to make, from whom they were allowed to buy materials, to whom they were
allowed to sell their products, whom they were allowed to hire, how they have to fire people,
what kind of insurance they can get, etc. Basically, a medieval guild could have had
rules pertaining to every aspect of your occupation and sometimes even your life.
Some guilds had rules on when you were allowed to marry or how many times a week you must pray, etc.
Considering how much control a guild could have over its members,
why would artisans want to create or join such institutions rather than work independently? Well,
the reasons were many, but the most important one was collective bargaining. If you were,
let’s say, a fisherman in 12th century Worms, and you were getting priced out of the market
by cheaper imported fish, as an individual, there wouldn’t be much you could do about it . However,
as part of an ‘association’, a guild composed of all the fishermen in Worms, suddenly you had the
collective bargaining power to lobby the ruler of Worms to give the Worms’ Fishermen’s guild the
exclusive rights to control the wholesale market of fish in the city and not allow imported fish.
At the same time, due to this exclusive deal, any fisherman in Worms not part of the Fishermen’s
Guild would either have to join the guild or not be able to sell fish in Worms anymore.
An example of a similar deal happened in 12th-century London, where King Henry I
gave the London Weavers Guild an exclusive right to practice their craft in London. In other words,
only the members of the weavers guild could practice weaving in London.
Besides collective bargaining and market control, Guilds could also provide other
benefits to their members. Some guilds, on top of acting as occupation guilds,
also provided a healthy sociable character with frequent events often involving heavy drinking.
These events often happened at guild halls which were paid for by the dues of the guild members.
Guilds sometimes even built chapels for their members to prey in or bought buildings where
tools and materials could be stored. Plus, on top of market control rights, guilds often persuaded
rulers to give their members tax cuts or lower import and export dues. So these occupation
guilds initially started as collective bargaining associations and support groups,
but they quickly evolved into institutions that could control entire markets in towns and cities.
Why did, however, rulers give these exclusive rights to the guilds?
Well, First: if the guild is large enough to have most of the, let’s say, weavers of the
city as members, them threatening to stop working could be a big issue. Not having enough cloth,
especially during winter, could cause substantial problems for the ruler.
Second: bribery. A lot of the charters given to guilds by rulers that gave the guilds certain
rights also often stipulated some kind of payment on the part of the guild. This could have been a
one-time payment or a continuing payment. The weaving guild of London, for example,
paid Henry 16 pounds up front and another 1 pound and 33 pence annually. Plus, there was certainly
some back-door exchange of money or favours for these exclusive deals happening as well that
we just don’t know about. Third: these guilds were pretty helpful to
rulers for controlling the market. It was easier for rulers to negotiate directly with guilds and
enforce price adjustments through them rather than dealing with thousands of craftsmen individually.
Fourth: sometimes guilds, like the Hanseatic League, got so powerful that rulers couldn’t
really say no to their demands because if they did, they would find themselves at war with a
mercenary army hired by the guild. On the other hand, if a ruler had a very good standing with
a guild, the guild could sometimes help the ruler in a war by hiring mercenaries for them.
These are the reasons why rulers often gave very generous rights to many guilds.
What was the structure of these medieval guilds? I am glad you asked.
The most basic structure of a medieval guild looked like this. At the very top,
you had Masters of the Guild. These were people who were deemed to have ‘mastered’
the occupation of the guild and were often the only ones who could employ other members of the
guild. Masters either ran the affairs of the guild altogether in a sort of direct democracy,
or they voted in members from amongst each other into a ruling council in a
sort of representative democracy. Under the masters, there were the journeymen,
also called bachelors. Journeymen were members of the guild who had skills in the relevant
occupation and who could work for masters for a wage but who still did not have the title of a
master and could not employ other members of the guild. Lastly, there were apprentices who were
people being trained in the guild’s occupation while working under one of the masters. Some
guilds had slightly different structures compared to this, but this was the most common type.
From the 13th century onwards, guilds were so well established across Western Europe that in
almost all towns and cities, the only way to become a merchant, a craftsman, or a lawyer,
was to sign up with a guild and go through the guild’s training process. Each guild
set its own rules and criteria for how this training process looked, but the structure of
the process remained largely the same across all the guilds. This process worked thusly.
First, as an untrained urban dweller, you had to find a master in the specific occupation guild
you wanted to work in. Once you found one, you then had to convince the master to take you on
as his apprentice. This master could decide on his own whether to accept you or not, but often guilds
had rules set up about whom masters could or could not take as apprentices. There were often rules
about feudal status (no peasants), marital status (not married), age range (usually between 14-35),
gender (females were mostly not allowed), religion (only Christians), and by the time of the 16th
century even ethnicity (usually no “outsiders” allowed). If you, however, qualified under all
these criteria and a master had agreed to take you on, you were allowed to join the guild as
an apprentice. Usually, there was a fee you had to pay to join the guild, and there were
further payments throughout your training you had to give to the master for teaching you.
You sometimes got paid for your apprenticeship work, but this was often very little. Therefore,
apprentices usually had multiple jobs in order to pay for all the apprenticeship fees.
After becoming an apprentice, each guild set its own requirements for how long one had to
be an apprentice before becoming a journeyman, also known as a bachelor. This could be anywhere
from 2 years to as long as 10 years. Once you had completed the required time set by
the guild and learned the skills of the trade, you became a journeyman. Meaning you could now
work in the specific occupation of the guild you just trained in under any master you want
for a set wage determined by the guild. You can also travel to other places in Europe
to work under various different masters and learn new skills. Guilds across cities and
kingdoms often had contracts that recognised the training of each other’s journeymen and masters.
Becoming a master is a bit more complicated. Some guilds had hereditary masterships,
meaning you could not become a master unless your father was a master, while others had requirements
like you having to be married or having enough money to buy a workshop, or simply having to wait
until some master died because there was a quota on how many masters the guild could have. Usually,
you also had to pay another fee to become a master, and you also had to make a piece of
work relevant to your guild’s occupation. This piece of work was called a ‘masterpiece’ and
was judged by the current masters of the guild to see if you were skilled enough to become a
master. This was the most common way one would work through a guild’s membership structure.
Medieval guilds could have been an association of people doing any kind of occupation. There were
innkeeper guilds, merchant guilds, lawyer guilds, gardener guilds, cobbler guilds, baker guilds,
etc. Sometimes these guilds could have been extremely specific, like a guild of tailors
that made only mattress and pillow covers or a guild of blacksmiths who made only scissors,
also known as scissorsmiths. There were even guilds of only teachers and educators,
better known today as universities. In fact, the word university, or universitas,
was just a different name for a guild which over the course of the middle ages,
became synonymous with only teaching and education guilds (exceptions apply).
Medieval universities, like Oxford and Cambridge, function pretty much exactly as any other medieval
guild did. The guild, i.e. the university, was composed of masters who set the rules and laws
for the guild and who had apprentices for 4 years, i.e. the students. The students,
just like in other guilds, payed some sort of fee to the masters and the guild in order to
be taught. Once a student graduated, he was a journeyman also known as a bachelor. A bachelor
within the guild could work for a master as a teacher and a lecturer. A bachelor also got
a diploma which stated that he attained his bachelorship, and with that diploma,
just like in any other guild, he could go to other universities around Europe, which had
agreements with your original university, to teach there under different masters. After 3 years of
teaching, the bachelor could apply to the head of the guild, the chancellor of the university,
to be appointed a master. If you passed your test and the chancellor and other masters of the guild
agreed to give you the title, you became a master in the university. As a master in the guild,
you could now take on new apprentices i.e. students, and you could higher bachelors to help
you teach these new students you were taking on. Therefore, it is the medieval guild system from
which we get our modern ideas of a university degree which is recognised by other universities
and the names for those degrees, i.e. a bachelor’s degree and a master’s degree.
The idea of a Doctorate as something more than a master’s was a later development that did not
exist in the Middle Ages . “Were guilds good?”
In modern scholarship, medieval guilds are highly debated. This is because they
were complicated and possessed both positive and negative attributes.
On the positive side, guilds established production standards in order that no
tradesman could scam his customers by delivering a poorly made product. Some guilds were so intense
in enforcing the production standards that they would outright destroy the inferior products. For
example, brewers’ guilds were known to pour out barrels of beer that didn’t meet their standards.
At a time when the state did not regulate the standards of consumable products , guilds with
production standards definitely saved some people’s lives. It could also be argued that
guilds, with their frequent lobbying of rulers, forced medieval rulers to rely less on their
rural feudal farming population and become more invested in economically productive urban centres.
Lastly, the most praised positive aspect of guilds was their facilitation of knowledge
communication. Some historians like David de la Croix and others state that guilds’ systems of
apprenticeship and journeymanship facilitated the communication of valuable information not
just from one generation to the next but also across borders. Through the apprenticeship system,
a new generation of labourers could be effectively trained, and through the journeyman system,
where people travelled across Europe to work under various masters, valuable industrial
information could be communicated across borders. Proponents of this theory go as far as to argue
that this aspect of medieval guilds was the reason why Europe emerged from the middle
ages economically ahead when compared to other areas of the world like China.
For all the positives the guild system provided, however, there were also many negatives.
As already stated, medieval guilds often lobbied rulers to give them monopolistic
rights over their trade, which drastically hindered competition and innovation. Guilds
also often enforced production quotas- artificially creating market scarcity
and raising consumer prices. They also often had limits on the number of masters and apprentices,
along with sometimes extremely strict entry requirements, which often excluded 90% of
the population. Unsurprisingly in such a system, nepotism was very frequent,
with most new guild members coming from families that already had at least one member in the guild.
An interesting side note here, ethnic berries for guild memberships weren’t very common in
the middle ages but became increasingly common from the 16th century onwards .
With that said, without a doubt, the most excluded group from guild
membership were women. Out of all the guilds we have surviving records for,
only 0.5% of them accepted women , 60% of which were in France. A 13th-century
French guild master even complained that girls should be entirely barred from guild memberships
‘because girls were leaving their fathers and mothers, and beginning to practice their craft,
and taking on apprentices, and doing nothing other than leading debauched lives.’ I mean,
how dare girls have agency and social and economic mobility, am I right! (sarcasm)
Ogilvie probably summarised it the best by stating that guilds were
‘reserved for a privileged minority of the urban population … Guilds were not
all-encompassing workers’ associations analogous to twentieth-century labor
unions but exclusive organisations for relatively well-off, middle-class men.’
In his famous book The Wealth of Nations, Adam Smith even stated that guilds were ‘a conspiracy
against the public’ and that the government should not allow such institutions to exist.
So what do you think? Were medieval guilds a good thing?
I am sadly sick again so I’ll try to make this outro quick. I promised I’d make a
high medieval guilds video in 2021 so, you know, I am only 2 years late. I hope
you enjoyed it. As always special thanks to my Patrons who make these videos possible,
especially to my deity tier Patreons Rohan, Crafty Kriminalist, Bryan Lafata,
and Kim. As always my name is Matus Laser and stick around for history.