한국서양중세사학회

For the city in northern Germany during the late Middle Ages, “the city has been regarded as a hostage of a merchant guild”. This paper is to review this basic thesis through the case of Göttingen, which was not a metropolitan city and not even located in northern Germany. First, in order to identify the cause of merchants and a merchant guild taking a dominant position in Göttingen City, the paper reviews the activities and interests of merchants who strove to pursue freedom in this city while glancing at the long hard journey to obtain freedom of the city. Also, the study detects the relationship between the conflicts and cooperation of the organization of a merchant guild, their urban lords, municipal council, and other guilds. As confirmed in Göttingen, the freedom of a medieval city was based on the economic power of its citizens. The reason why power of the long distance merchants within the city was great was because they shared the same context. After the mid-14th century, the merchants of this city benefited greatly from the Hanseatic League; however, the reason the merchant guild gained control of the city government exclusively was based not only on the Hanseatic League or long distance trade. For Göttingen, among those who participated in commercial activities during the construction period of the city, some noblemen were also included. Also, lords endowed merchants with a special right to economic activities, and merchants as a leading power of the urban community made an omni-directional effort to protect the interests of the merchants’ power and the autonomy of the city focusing on the municipal council. The workings of all of these were complex. The merchant guild of Göttingen during the later Middle Ages played a key role in an urban economy while executing long distance trade. Also, the union members led not only economic policy but also society through the municipal council. In this regard, the evaluation that “a city was taken hostage by merchants’ power” is not an exaggeration; however, from a close examination, some merchant families who were in a leading position based on the organization of the merchant guild monopolized influence rather than the organization controlled the society. This was possible because the guild and municipal council were operated in an oligarchical system rather than in a democratic manner. Meanwhile, the power of the citizens compared with that of the merchants was relatively weak; thus, the citizens were unable to demand the right to political decision making. Owing to these characteristics, regardless of the urban scale, characteristics of the industry, and geopolitical factors, it is difficult to conclude that it is a character generally of cities in northern Germany. This is because the unique circumstances of Göttingen had a great influence. In particular, the financial destitution of the dukes was a decisive foundation on which the merchants could expand their controlling power.