Migrations of Journeymen in the Late Middle Ages

Abstract

Geographical mobility of workers in traditional societies constitutes a fundamental aspect of medieval social history. Micro-migrations - as opposed to major migration waves - have been the subject of few comparative syntheses. Migrations of journeymen craftsmen have been studied separately for German compagnonages (Schanz), French ones (Coornaert), and Belgian ones (Des Marez), but their economic and social significance has not been analyzed systematically.
This article analyzes the migrations of journeymen craftsmen in the late Middle Ages in Western and Central Europe, examining the institutional and spontaneous character of these movements, their role in the guild system, their function on the labour market, and their economic and social consequences.
The study draws on French judicial archives (Registre criminel du Châtelet), collections of journeymen's songs (Perdiguier), urban chronicles (Burkard Zink), and the comparative works of Schanz, Coornaert, and Des Marez on compagnonages in Germany, France, and Belgium.
The analysis demonstrates that journeymen's migrations played a dual role in the late Middle Ages. On the economic level, they regulated the situation on the labour market and contributed to the diffusion of production techniques and craft skills between towns. On the social level, they shaped bonds of solidarity among journeymen that sometimes transcended national borders and defined the distinctive character of this milieu within urban society. The guild system imposed pérégrination as a stage of professional formation, but migration also covered broader realities: flight from lack of work or closed access to mastership, which sometimes led to social degradation and marginalization. The micro-migrations broke old social ties and constituted, so to speak, the natural right of the journeyman youth. In the conditions of the late Middle Ages they were a widespread phenomenon, common even in countries where migration was not formally required for completing craft apprenticeship.