Page 70 - Upland Families, Elites and Communities

Markéta Skořepová

Table 2.4 Average Prices for Homesteads within the Zmišovice Judicial District
upon the Arrival of a New Householder Based on Land Registers
Homesteads Year of the homestead’s takeover
– – – – – – – – –
        
Farms (a)         
(b)         
Cottages (a)  –       
(b)  –       
Notes Row headings are as follows: (a) number of transfers, (b) average price. The prices
for the period 1590–1769 are given in ‘kopas’ (kopa = 60 pieces) of Meissen groschen, for the
period 1770–1829 then in gulden (florin) of the Convention Currency (Fl.). In 1770–1799,
both systems were used simultaneously, therefore the transfers for the given period are
entered in two columns. Only the first transfers in given periods are included. Based on
data from na, apa i, inv. no. 1754, and 2609; na, apa, vs , inv. no. 52, 53, and 60.

study. Of course, some homesteads changed their holders more often than
after the end of one generation’s productive age: it may have been due to
premature deathsoreconomicspeculations, butalsotothe actual inabili-
ty to manage the farming, which could have led to a change of the head of
the household ordered by the landlord. The starting point for the follow-
ing analysis was always perceived as the year when the new householder
took his place as the head of the household. If more than one transfer oc-
curred within the monitored thirty years, the oldest one was followed, so
each homestead was evaluated at most once for each period; in some cases,
on the other hand, no data was available for the given thirty years.
The absence of a land register for the second quarter of the seventeenth
century means the loss of key data that could help reveal the damage
wrought bythe ThirtyYears’War in theregion. Alreadyby the second year
of the war, in 1619, none of the householders of the Zmišovice judicial dis-
trict paid the annual repayment on the homestead. By 1623, the house-
holders were paying regularly again, but for the following years, only the
reports of manorial officials about reckless looting have been preserved,
during which soldiers requisitioned food and livestock and committed in-
tentional damage to property (Tadra 1923; Dobiáš 1970, 258–69).
The fragmentary retrospective records from 1650–1679 might suggest
that homestead prices remained constant. The average price for 21 rural
farms, for which the necessary data is available in this period, is calculated
at 221 kopas of Meissen groschen. Before the war, the same homesteads had
an average price of 220 kopas, but a sharp difference occurred in the value of

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