Kleinkredit und Marktteilhabe in der Vormoderne: Projektdesign

Abstract

Our project explores the significance of small-scale and even micro-credit for the social and economic life of medieval societies. For the early modern period, scholars such as Laurence Fontaine, Jürgen Schlumbohm or Gabriele Clemens have proposed that social coherence is particularly generated by the individual possibilities of market participation. In three case studies from different European regions we put this assumption to a test in view of late medieval societies. Previous research in medieval studies has rightly pointed to a significant lack of sources for small-scale and micro credits. Therefore, all three case studies aim to identify new types of sources which have previoulsy not or only marginally been used to explore medieval credit activities.