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Couples cooperating? Dutch textile workers, family labour and the ‘industrious revolution’, c. 1600–1800

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 August 2008

ELISE VAN NEDERVEEN MEERKERK
ELISE VAN NEDERVEEN MEERKERK
Affiliation:
Department of History, Leiden University.
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Abstract

This article aims to provide an empirical test of Jan de Vries' theory of the ‘industrious revolution’, most notably his assumptions concerning the increased participation of married women in the labour force. The focus is on the pre-industrial textile industry in the Dutch Republic, within which a distinction is made between various ways in which family members cooperated in the work they undertook. This differentiation depended on the existing segmentation of the labour market, between social groups and between the sexes. It is shown that at least some groups within proletarian textile families were able to make a decent living, and that the earnings of wives played an important role in the increased industriousness of these families.

Type
Research Article
Information
Continuity and Change , Volume 23 , Special Issue 2: SPECIAL ISSUE: PARTNERS IN BUSINESS? SPOUSAL COOPERATION IN TRADES IN EARLY MODERN ENGLAND AND THE DUTCH REPUBLIC , August 2008 , pp. 237 - 266
Copyright
Copyright © 2008 Cambridge University Press

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References

NOTES

1 Leo Noordegraaf and Jan Luiten van Zanden, ‘Early modern economic growth and the standard of living: did labour benefit from Holland's Golden Age?’, in Karel Davids and Jan Lucassen eds., A miracle mirrored: the Dutch Republic in European perspective (Cambridge, 1995), 414–15.

2 de Vries, Jan, ‘The Industrial Revolution and the Industrious Revolution’, Journal of Economic History 54, 2 (1994), 254CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Noordegraaf and Van Zanden, ‘Early modern economic growth’, 415; van Zanden, Jan Luiten, ‘The “revolt of the early modernists” and the “first modern economy”: an assessment’, Economic History Review LV, 4 (2002), 628Google Scholar.

3 For example see Catharina Lis and Hugo Soly, Poverty and capitalism in pre-industrial Europe (Hassocks, 1979).

4 See for instance Lorna Weatherill, Consumer behaviour and material culture in Britain, 1660–1760 (London, 1988), and Thera Wijsenbeek-Olthuis, Achter de gevels van Delft: bezit en bestaan van rijk en arm in een periode van achteruitgang (1700–1800) (Hilversum, 1987).

5 Jan de Vries, ‘Between purchasing power and the world of goods: understanding the household economy in early modern Europe’, in John Brewer and Roy Porter eds., Consumption and the world of goods (London, 1993), 98–106.

6 De Vries, ‘Between purchasing power’, notably pp. 107–21.

7 De Vries, ‘Industrial Revolution’, 255–8.

8 De Vries, ‘Industrial Revolution’, 261–2.

9 Jan de Vries and Ad van der Woude, The first modern economy: success, failure, and perseverance of the Dutch economy, 1500–1815 (Cambridge, 1997), notably pp. 693–710; van Zanden, Jan Luiten, ‘Taking the measure of the early modern economy: historical national accounts for Holland in 1510/14’, European Review of Economic History 6 (2002)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Van Zanden, ‘Revolt’, 632–4.

10 Noordegraaf and Van Zanden, ‘Early modern economic growth’, 426.

11 De Vries, ‘Between purchasing power’, 53–4.

12 Richard Wall, ‘Work, welfare and the family: an illustration of the adaptive family economy’, in Lloyd Bonfield, Richard M. Smith and Keith Wrightson, The world we have gained: histories of population and social structure: essays presented to Peter Laslett on his seventieth birthday (Oxford, 1986). See for a more recent elaboration of his ideas Richard Wall, ‘Some implications of the earnings, income and expenditure patterns of married women in populations in the past’, in John Henderson and Richard Wall eds., Poor women and children in the European past (London and New York, 1994), 312–35, notably pp. 326–8.

13 De Vries, ‘Industrial Revolution’, 261; See also Michiel Baud, ‘Huishouden, gezin en familienetwerk: een eerste inleiding op de thematiek’, in Michiel Baud and Theo Engelen eds., Samen wonen, samen werken? Vijf essays over de geschiedenis van arbeid en gezin (Hilversum, 1994), 25–8.

14 Of course, there were variations and deviations from this pattern across time and space. See Baud, Michiel, ‘Families and migration: towards an historical analysis of family networks’, Economic and Social History in the Netherlands 6 (1994), 94–7Google Scholar.

15 De Vries, ‘Industrial Revolution’, 266; See also Chris Middleton, ‘The familiar fate of the famulae: gender divisions in the history of wage labour’, in R. E. Pahl ed., On work: historical, comparative and theoretical approaches (Oxford and New York, 1986); van Nederveen Meerkerk, Elise, ‘Segmentation in the pre-industrial labour market: women's work in the Dutch textile industry, 1581–1810’, International Review of Social History 51, 3 (2006), 189–216CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

16 Elise van Nederveen Meerkerk, De draad in eigen handen: vrouwen en loonarbeid in de Nederlandse textielnijverheid, 1581–1810 (Amsterdam, 2007). The dissertation is part of a larger project, investigating the work of women in the Dutch labour market, 1500–1800. See: http://www.iisg.nl/research/womenswork.php.

17 Regional Archive Leiden (hereafter RAL), Stadsarchief II, inv. no. 1289 (population registration (hereafter pop. reg.) 1581) and inv. nos. 4121–4128 (census 1749); Regional Historical Centre Tilburg (hereafter RHCT), Dorpsbestuur Tilburg en Goirle, inv. no. 380-I (census 1665) and Volkstellingen, inv. nos. 1275–1277 (pop. reg. 1810); Municipal Archives 's-Hertogenbosch (hereafter GAHt), Oud Stadsarchief, inv. nos. 3311–3319 (census 1742) and inv. nos. 3328–3338 (pop. reg. 1775); Hilde van Wijngaarden, Zorg voor de kost: armenzorg, arbeid en onderlinge hulp in Zwolle, 1650–1700 (Amsterdam, 2000), 265–75 (census 1712); Historical Centre Overijssel (hereafter HCO), Oud Stadsarchief Zwolle, inv. nos. 426–429 (census 1742), and inv. nos. 420–425 (pop. reg. 1812).

18 See Hartmann, Heidi, ‘Capitalism, patriarchy, and job segregation by sex’, Signs 1 (1976), 137–69CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Honeyman, Katrina and Goodman, Jordan, ‘Women's work, gender conflict and labour markets in Europe, 1500–1900’, Economic History Review XLIV, 4 (1991), 608–28CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Van Nederveen Meerkerk, ‘Segmentation’.

19 N. W. Posthumus, De geschiedenis van de Leidsche lakenindustrie, vol. I: De nieuwe tijd (zestiende tot achttiende eeuw): de lakenindustrie en verwante industrieën ('s-Gravenhage, 1939); Gerard van Gurp, Brabantse stoffen op de wereldmarkt. Proto-industrialisering in de Meierij van 's-Hertogenbosch 1620–1820 (Tilburg, 2004).

20 Van Nederveen Meerkerk, ‘Segmentation’, 215.

21 Van Nederveen Meerkerk, De draad, 124–8.

22 See for instance Bibi Panhuysen, Maatwerk: kleermakers, naaisters, oudkleerkopers en de gilden (1500–1800) (Amsterdam, 2000), 201.

23 Schmidt, Ariadne, ‘Vrouwenarbeid in de Vroegmoderne Tijd in Nederland’, Tijdschrift voor Sociale en Economische Geschiedenis ∫, 3 (2005), 2–21CrossRefGoogle Scholar, notably pp. 3, 15.

24 See for instance Cor Trompetter, Agriculture, proto-industry and Mennonite entrepreneurship: a history of the textile industries in Twente, 1600–1815 (Amsterdam, 1997), 70; Gerard van Gurp, ‘Proto-industrialisatie in Tilburg en Geldrop’, Textielhistorische bijdragen (1999), 18–19; Van Gurp, Brabantse stoffen, 75.

25 RHCT, pop. reg. 1810.

26 This is true for the absolute as well as the relative figures, since relatively few households were headed by women.

27 Of course, the import of yarn has also to be considered. There was indeed a considerable amount of woollen, linen and cotton yarn imported into the Dutch Republic. However, interestingly enough, the imports of raw material were much larger, especially when it concerned wool, at least around 1750. See van Nierop, Leonie, ‘Uit de bakermat der Amsterdamsche handelsstatistiek II’, Jaarboek Amstelodamum 15 (1917), 54, 97–8Google Scholar. Since not much of this wool was re-exported (Van Nierop, ‘Uit de bakermat’, 165), it is likely that most of it was spun in the Netherlands, notably in the textile-producing areas.

28 Among live-in children and unrelated boarders these percentages were 56 and 23 respectively. The lower percentage for the last category is caused by the large number of servants included among them. However, when children and boarders are taken together, 43 per cent were spinning.

29 Ogilvie, Sheilagh C., ‘Women and labour markets in early modern Germany’, Jahrbuch für Wirtschaftsgeschichte. Märkte im vorindustriellen Europa 2 (2004), 34–5Google Scholar; Pfister, Ulrich, ‘Work roles and family structure in proto-industrial Zurich’, Journal of Interdisciplinary History 20, 1 (1989), 89, 100CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

30 Database on poor relief in Zwolle. Many thanks to Hilde van Wijngaarden for providing me with this database.

31 Based on my analyis of the criminal records, as described in van den Heuvel, H. M., ‘De criminele vonnisboeken van Leiden, 1533–1811’, Rijnland: Tijdschrift voor Sociale Genealogie en Streekgeschiedenis voor Leiden en Omstreken 14–15 (1977–1978), 166–439Google Scholar.

32 RAL, Hallen, inv. no. 221, 5-9-1767.

33 Posthumus, Geschiedenis, 502–4.

34 RAL, H. G. Weeshuis, inv. no. 3845.

35 RAL, Hallen, inv. no. 127j.

36 ‘Burling’=removing small knots or lumps from a piece of cloth.

37 An average family of 4 to 5 people supposedly needed around 80 stuivers a week in order to survive; De Vries and Van der Woude, First modern economy, 564. See note 46 below for some clarification about the monetary value of stuivers and gulden.

38 She could of course have stocked yarn, but exactly a week earlier she had brought in 17 skeins, and it thus seems highly unlikely that she already had other yarn in stock without bringing it with her in the previous week. See N. W. Posthumus ed., Bronnen tot de geschiedenis van de Leidsche textielnijverheid, vol. 5: 1651–1702, nos. 496, 6-5-1679 and 13-5-1679.

39 RAL, DTB Leiden, inv. no. 12, fo. 95v.

40 RAL, DTB Leiden, inv. no. 12, fo. 285.

41 RAL, DTB Leiden, inv. no. 12, fo. 244.

42 Posthumus, Bronnen, vol.5, no. 496, 23-12-1679.

43 RAL, DTB Leiden, inv. no. 3, fo. 66v.

44 See for instance Ariadne Schmidt, Overleven na de dood: weduwen in Leiden in de Gouden Eeuw (Amsterdam, 2001), 237.

45 In these books, conflicts between textile workers who appeared before the Governors of the cloth industry were taken down in detail, as well as the verdicts by the Governors.

46 One gulden=20 stuivers. The average daily income of a carpenter (a fairly skilled worker) around 1650 was 24 to 28 stuivers. A 12-pound rye bread loaf cost around 15 stuivers in the same period; Leo Noordegraaf, Daglonen in Alkmaar 1500–1850 (['s-Gravenhage], 1980), 138, and Hollands welvaren? Levensstandaard in Holland 1450–1650 (Bergen, 1985), 26–7.

47 RAL, Hallen, inv. no. 219, 23-9-1666.

48 RAL, Hallen, inv. no. 219, 8-1-1671.

49 Olwen H. Hufton, The poor of eighteenth-century France, 1750–1789 (Oxford, 1974).

50 HCO, Stadsarmenkamer, inv. no. 309, fo. 138.

51 HCO, Stadsarmenkamer, inv. no. 312, fo. 18.

52 HCO, Stadsarmenkamer, inv. no. 312, fo. 22.

53 De Vries and Van der Woude, First modern economy, 564.

54 Posthumus, Bronnen, vol. 5, no. 496.

55 RAL, SAII, inv. no. 3229, 20-5-1656.

56 HCO, Oude stadsbestuur, inv. no. 7740, 1649.

57 HCO, Oude stadsbestuur, inv. no. 7740, 1650. A peat superintendant (and inspector) was a relatively low-ranking public official who supervised the urban peat supply.

58 This observation is also made for late-eighteenth-century England by Wall, in ‘Some implications’, 323.

59 HCO, Stadsarmenkamer, inv, no. 312, fo. 7.

60 Van Wijngaarden, Zorg voor de kost, 198–9, p. 202.

61 RAL, Judicial Archives, inv. no. 30, fo. 3v.

62 HCO, Stadsarmenkamer, inv. no. 312, fo. 27v.

63 HCO, Stadsarmenkamer, inv. no. 311, fo. 9.

64 HCO, Stadsarmenkamer, inv. no. 311, fo. 92.

65 HCO, Stadsarmenkamer, inv. no. 312, fo. 37.

66 G. P. M. Pot, Arm Leiden: levensstandaard, bedeling en bedeelden, 1750–1854 (Hilversum, 1994), 179–80.

67 See also Deborah Simonton, A history of European women's work: 1700 to the present (London, 1998), 71–2.

68 Jan de Vries acknowledges this as well, and he literally defines the industrious household (as well as the subsequent male-breadwinner household) as ‘ideal types’; De Vries, ‘Industrial Revolution’, 263.