CHAPTER ONE

AUGSBURG, THE REFORMATION, AND THE DEBATE OVER THE EUCHARIST

Political Developments in Late Medieval and Early Modern

Th e free imperial of Augsburg was founded as a Roman garrison in the early fi rst century A.D., and by the end of the fi ft eenth century it had become the most infl uential in . Since the demise of the house of in the mid-thirteenth century, the ancient duchy of Swabia had dissolved into a patchwork of small and medium-sized ecclesiastical and secular lordships and numerous free imperial . Augsburg and Ulm—both lying within the of Swabia—along with Nuremberg and Strasbourg, formed a self- conscious group of the four largest and most powerful free imperial cities in southern . Like many free imperial cities, Augsburg in the early was an Episcopal city. Bishops, whose existence in Augsburg can be documented to the eighth century, exercised judicial authority over the city’s inhabitants and possessed the right to tax their economic activities. Th e bishop’s Augsburg subjects originally would have con- sisted primarily of small groups of artisans, soldiers, and administra- tors who provided necessary services to the bishop and his clergy. In addition, a settlement of merchants lived in Augsburg under the pro- tection of the , although they were still subject to the bishop. By the twelft h century, this settlement had grown substantially and was agitating for increased judicial and administrative powers. Th e year 1276 saw the inauguration of Augsburg’s history as a free imperial city—a city under the direct lordship of the emperor. In that year Emperor Rudolph I of Hapsburg visited Augsburg to hold an imperial diet. Th e residents took the opportunity to petition him for an offi cial recognition of their rights. Th e emperor granted them the right to self-administration and taxation, allowing them to set up a twelve- member .1 Th e bishop, however, still retained meaningful

1 Wolfgang Zorn, Augsburg: Geschichte einer deutschen Stadt (hereaft er Zorn, Augsburg) (Augsburg: Hieronymus Mühlberger Verlag, 1972), 109. 8 chapter one fi nancial and regulatory powers, which he exercised through his offi - cial, the Burggraff . Final judicial authority lay in the hands of the city Vogt, who represented royal authority in the jurisdiction. In 1316 Ludwig IV issued an edict declaring Augsburg to be forever under the direct lordship of the emperor, making no mention of Episcopal authority.2 Th e city’s powers were again enhanced in 1426 when King Sigismund granted the city the right to recommend the appointment of the city and territorial Vogt.3 By this point, Augsburg’s transition to self-administration was for all intents and purposes complete. In the fourteenth century, a new struggle for political power unfolded, this time within the city, between the ruling families that controlled the city government and the large number of disenfran- chised artisans living within the city. Th e artisans had begun organiz- ing themselves into guilds in the early fourteenth century, with the fi rst documented mention of a guild in Augsburg—the leatherworkers (die gemain der ledrer)—occurring in 1324.4 By the 1340s the patricians had been forced to share a limited amount of power with the guild community. Dissatisfaction continued to mount, however, and in October 1368 armed artisans rose up and took over critical city fortifi - cations and buildings.5 Aft er negotiating with the patrician rulers and consulting with other cities that had undergone guild revolutions, the city established a guild constitution. All artisans were incorporated into seventeen guilds, which together sent representatives to the small and large councils. Th e artisans were to possess a guaranteed majority on the council, although the patricians would be allowed to fi ll one of the two mayoral positions and also other important posts in the city. Augsburg’s guild constitution would endure until 1548, when, in the aft ermath of the Schmalkaldic War, Emperor Charles V restored a patrician constitution to the city. It would be a mistake, however, to assume that Augsburg was gov- erned by common artisans dividing their time between workshop and council chamber. Particularly at the highest levels of government,

2 Zorn, Augsburg, 121. 3 Zorn, Augsburg, 142. Th e jurisdiction of the Landvogt encompassed the small ter- ritorial holdings of the city. 4 Zorn, Augsburg, 125. 5 For an account of the guild revolution in Augsburg, see Friedrich Blendinger, “Die Zunft erhebung von 1368,” in Geschichte der Stadt Augsburg: 2000 Jahre von der Römerzeit bis zur Gegenwart (hereaft er Gottlieb, Geschichte), ed. Gunther Gottlieb et al. (Stuttgart: Konrad Th iss Verlag, 1985), 150–153.