Rural credit and monetarisation of the peasantry in the Late Middle Ages. The Cheb city state c. 1450
Abstrakt
Specific and statistically based knowledge of the degree of monetarisation and credit market of the peasantry in the Late Middle Ages in Central Europe is rare. The Cheb city state is an exception, because we have exceptionally good fiscal and court records.
An analysis of 1435/1442-1456 showed that the degree of monetarisation of the Cheb peasantry was low in comparison with the Early Modern Period. Of the external factors that forced the peasants to acquire cash, it was mainly the land tax, namely to a bearable degree.
Of the internal factors for monetarisation, reproduction of the farmstead led, and the need to pay off the inherited shares, but not even that was in any way burdensome. The low degree of monetarisation was also related to the weak interaction of the peasants with the credit market.
Only the richest peasants were connected in the market with loans, who were borrowing from the wealthy burghers. The peasants were significantly more active in the sale of agricultural commodities to the burghers on credit.
This form of credit indirectly increased the inflow of economic resources from the countryside to the city, as market transactions could be executed even in the absence of cash.