Krakow was one of the largest urban areas in the Polish lands. In the seventeenth and eighteenth century urban population was about 30 000 inhabitants. Well-developed trade and crafts generated demand for various transport services. Means of transport included first of all Vistula River that flew through Cracow. Goods were ...
(Show more)Krakow was one of the largest urban areas in the Polish lands. In the seventeenth and eighteenth century urban population was about 30 000 inhabitants. Well-developed trade and crafts generated demand for various transport services. Means of transport included first of all Vistula River that flew through Cracow. Goods were floated down the river mainly to the port of Gdansk by the Baltic Sea. The entire region was covered with a network of international trade routes. They crossed in Krakow. Transit of goods between Hungary and southern Italia and Baltic ports in the north, as well as between the Orient and the Ruthenia lands to the east and Silesia and Western Europe, was held through this way. Many rural roads overlaid this transit network, through which peasants delivered crops to agglomeration. The peasants also offered transport services, creating even informal businesses. Inhabitants of rich royal villages and from another villages located by the road took remarkable part in these activities.
The metropolitan area of Krakow also experienced significant migration movements, which can be recognized by the well-preserved urban sources, especially thanks to the books of admissions to municipal law and church registers. Rapidly growing regional market in the sixteenth century was interrupted by declining economic circumstances and demographic crisis of the mid-seventeenth century. Due to the transfer of the royal court to Warsaw, the city of Cracow lost a major recipient of goods, mainly luxury ones. However, the city still remained the center of Malopolska region.
Krakow urban agglomeration was very diverse. It is difficult to precisely determine its boundaries as they smoothly changed into a typically rural area. Economic criterion can be indicated here – so called direct impact of the city. This gives the area within a radius of 30 km. The agglomeration consisted of the city of Krakow belted with medieval walls, as well as of the two neighbourhood satellite cities: Kazimierz and Kleparz. Further away of suburbs of diverse ownership structure, focused on crafts, industry and the garden and fruit production. Inhabitants of the suburbs produced food for the needs of the city. They also sought employment in Krakow themselves.
Agglomeration of Krakow and its rural surroundings were strong connected. Villages were supplier of food and raw materials to the city (lime kilns, quarries), as well as complemented significantly population of Krakow resources. This refers to high extent to disciples in the guilds, as well as domestic servants, hired workers and beggars.
The mobility of peasants was strongly related to the life-cycle. Many young people migrated to urban areas and got married. Several thousand peasants marriages contracted in the parishes in the city of Krakow and within the agglomeration during 1581-1800 were analyzed. Parallel analysis of urban archive (e.g. of books of craft guilds, criminal records, books of admissions to municipal law) revealed various connections between the population of the city and the countryside. These connections were mainly based on kinship and economic bonds. With reference to research of the early modern cities of Western Europe, the important role of rural societies in reconstruction of cities population was proven. Therefore migration of people from the countryside to the cities could be treated as one of the most dominant social phenomenon in early modern period.
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