XIV International Economic History Congress, Helsinki 2006Session 54

Selling textiles in a city in crisis, Antwerp 1650-1750Laura Van Aert, Center for Urban History, University of Antwerp

Introduction: gendered retailing? The case of the Antwerp textile retailersRetailing is often mentioned as a typical female sector of urban economies. Especiallyfoodstuffs and textiles – both ‘female’ wares – would not only have been mostlyproduced by women, but also sold by them. The marketplace could thus be considered asa specific female environment where, because of complications of amongst others foodconservation, women gathered daily for provisioning. There women met, not only forcommercial transactions but also- thus the traditional view tell us – to meet, greet, talkand gossip. Besides the marketplace women also held small shops in town and/or wereresponsible for the commercial aspect of their husband-artisan’s workplace. Someauthors even claim that ‘retail trade was clearly dominated by women’.1 Because retailingseldom required scholarly training and was easily combined with household chores, it isconsidered to have been an ideal sector for women, and as such a sector with high femaleparticipation. Furthermore, women are often considered to have been predominantlyactive in the ‘low status, low pay’ sectors of the economy, and thus of the retail trade.2As a result the overwhelming presence of women on marketplaces and in shops is onlyseldom viewed as a fully-fledged economic activity, but more as one of the rare sectors(together with proto-industrial activities, like spinning) in which they could generate theirpart of the family-income.3 But this image of retailing as an element of a ‘survivalstrategy’ is hard to rhyme with the conclusions of recent socio-economic research whichstate that commercial activities where one of the very few ways in which the lowerclasses could aspire to social promotion.4

This is the contradiction we want to explore further using the Antwerp textilesellers as a case study, in a specific period of economic regression, 1650-1750. Thischoice of sector, time and place enables us to combine different questions. Firstly theimportance of retailing in general, and textile retailing in specific as sector for femaleemployment. Where women in the majority or not? And more interestingly: what werethe differences with their male counterparts? We should search for those differences inbusiness organization, social standing or sold products. Secondly, this last aspect givesus the possibility to explore the great (r)evolutions in the retailing sector in this period.These transformations (the so-called ‘consumer and retailing revolutions’) were mostlyfelt in the fashion-sensitive sectors, among which we can certainly count the textiles.Which forms did these evolutions take and were there gender specific differences?

1 WIESNER (M.). Women and Gender in Early Modern Europe. Cambridge University Press, 2000, p117-1182 HOWELL (M.). The Marriage Exchange. Chicago, 1998.3 KNOTTER (A.). ‘Problemen van de family economy. Genzinsarbeid en arbeidsmarkt in pre-industriëelEuropa’. In BAUD (M.) en ENGELEN (Th.). Samen wonen, samen werken? Vijf essayes over degeschiedenis van arbeid en gezin. Hilversum, 1994, p 35-714 BLONDÉ (B.). ‘Bossche bouwvakkers en belastingen: nadenken over economische groei,levensstandaard en sociale ongelijkheid in de 16de eeuw’. In Bijdragen tot de Geschiedenis: Doodgewoon.Liber Amicorum Alfons K.L. Thijs, 87, 2004, p 45-62

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Thirdly, can we find traces of a growing exclusion of women in public space?5 Finally,since Antwerp knew profound economic difficulties, we try to asses the role of retailingin the ‘survival strategies’ of the less well-off.

In all cases, we should be careful and not forget that the female retailer didn’texist. Female access to the market in retailing took multiple forms: as independentbusiness owners, as married co-owners or as employees. It is hard to say with a level ofcertainty if the married male shopkeepers were helped by their wives, or if the wives haddistinct occupations. This problem echoes the difficulty of identifying the roles ofartisans’ wives. Qualitative information hints that the wives were responsible for thecommercial side of their husbands- artisans’ affaires, but in more quantifiable sourcesthose women stay hidden. The same goes for shopkeepers’ wives. Shop girls or otherwomen employed by retailers (for example, to hold a market stall in their stead) were asemployees participating to the labour market. Those girls were given the same status asdomestic personnel, thus not heading their own households, but falling under theresponsibility of the shopkeepers, be this last one male or female. In Antwerp there werequite a number of female shopkeepers, both married and unmarried independentbusinesswomen, who owned their own shop or market stall, large or small, free from allmale intervention of fathers or husbands. These women had a very public status ofindependent retailers. I dare to call this status ‘public’ since that is how the officialaccess to the market was regulated. Only ‘public female merchants’ were consideredcapable of conducting business ‘as men’, all other women were in theory denied thecapacity of formal contract, necessary to business dealings. I say ‘in theory’, since everyday practice wasn’t as harsh as legal prescription could lead us to think.6 But the bottomline is that those ‘female merchants’ are identifiable in the sources and can thus bequantified.

For them we can measure not only what retailing meant for female access to themarket (and thus to a specific part of the public space) but more importantly, whatwomen meant to the retailing sector and the transitions it went through in an age ofconsumption and retailing (r)evolutions.

Antwerp, a city in decline while the consumer and retail revolutions are bloomingIn studying the commercial middlemen of a local economy, Antwerp in the so called “ageof crisis” (1648-1748) has attracted our attention. During that period Antwerp was nolonger the commercial metropolis it had been in better times. The city and its surroundinghinterland remained in the 17th and 18th centuries a highly urbanized, populated andcommercialized area.7 Yet, the first signs of profound economic set-backs were alreadybeing felt in the second half of the 17th century.8 Enduring wartime, mercantilistorientation of international trade, and weak government intervention, all led to the

5 SCHMIDT (A.). ‘Zelfstandig en bevoogd: de speelruimte van vrouwen rond 1650’. In Tijdschrif voorSociale Geschiedenis, 29 (1), 2003, p 28-346 VAN AERT (L.). “Tussen norm en praktijk. Een terreinverkenning over het juridische statuut vanvrouwen in het 16de –eeuwse Antwerpen”. In Tijdschrift voor Sociale en Economische Geschiedenis,Jaargang 2, nummer 3, 2005, p. 22-427 BLONDÉ (B.) and VAN DAMME (I.). “Southern Netherlands between 1585 and 1830”, in MOKYR (J.),ed., The Oxford Encyclopedia of Economic History, Oxford, 2003, p. 392-394.8 VAN DAMME (I.). “Het vertrek van Mercurius. Historiografische en hypothetische verkenningen vanhet economisch wedervaren van Antwerpen in de tweede helft van de zeventiende eeuw”. In NEHA-Jaarboek, 66 (2003), p. 18–21.

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detriment of one economic sector after another (agriculture, commerce and industry).Especially the export industries – once famous and in the first half of the 17th centurysought after in the whole of Europe – went into a steep decline, soon followed by a rapidde-urbanization.9 Around 1700 the city still harboured more than 70.000 inhabitants, buthalf a century later less than 50.000 were left.

However, at the same time – and strangely enough conflicting with the pessimisticdescription above – Antwerp experienced many of the changes one usually contributes tothe “birth of a consumer society” in this period.10 Newness and novelty were introducedin an ever quickening pace and known commodities came in ever-larger quantities andvariations (in quality, shape and material). No longer did consumers necessarily preferredhigh quality products with a long lasting lifecycle. Instead, the consuming patternsfocused on more replaceable and so cheaper, lighter and less durable products. Newproduction techniques and the substitution of expensive raw materials by cheaper onesenhanced a decline in prices that further stimulated this process.11

Both the urban decline and the emergence of a consumer society had atremendous impact on the retailing sector. This apparent contradiction was often reducedin everyday life by the decrease both in durability and in price of the consumer products.Nevertheless, the question remains how people managed to make a living in retailing, asector in huge transition, while the city they were operating in knew profound economicset-backs, even though consumption was on the rise. Unlike most British retail research,this project’s background is formed by a city that suffered a severe loss in economic andsocial energy.12 As a result, apparent causal relationships between consumptiondevelopment and economic growth (or the shopping sector and a favorable conjuncture)have to be reconsidered. Also, under reconsideration is the role of retailing as either asurvival strategy for the struggling poor or an occupational choice of the middling sort.

Questions, methods and sourcesA sector that was socially speaking so much diversified can offer precious insights inboth urban social stratification and Guild reactions to severe economic changes. For thispurpose, we have analyzed the textile trades within the mercers’ guild. This guild wasthe most important corporate organized group of retailers that was particularly active indistributing and promoting the new consumer goods in this period.13 However, it is

9 VAN DER WEE (H.). “Industrial dynamics and the process of urbanization and de-urbanization in theLow Countries from the late Middle Ages to the eighteenth century. A synthesis”. In IDEM, ed., The riseand decline of urban industries in Italy and in the Low Countries (Late Middle Ages – Early ModernTimes), Leuven, 1988, p. 307-381.10 BLONDÉ (B.). “Tableware and changing consumer patterns. Dynamics of material culture in Antwerp,17th-18th centuries”. In VEECKMAN (J.), ed., Majolica and glass. From Italy to Antwerp and beyond. Thetransfer of technology in the 16th-early 17th century, Antwerp, 2002, p. 295-311.11 SHAMMAS (C.). “The decline of textile prices in England and British America prior toindustrialization”. In Economic History Review, 48 (1994), p. 483-507; STYLES (J.). “Product innovationin early modern London”. In Past & Present, 168 (2000), p. 124-169.12 COX (N.). The Complete Tradesman: a study of retailing, 1550 – 1820. Ashgate, Aldershot, 2000;BERG (M.). “From imitation to invention : creating commodities in eighteenth-century Britain”. InEconomic History Review, 55 (2002), p. 1-30; IDEM. “In pursuit of luxury : global history and Britishconsumer goods in the eighteenth century”. In Past & Present, 182 (2004), p. 85-142.13 GEUDENS (E.). Het hoofdambacht der meerseniers. (Burgerdeugd-1), Antwerpen, 1903, p. 35-42;NEELEN (P.). Het Antwerpse Meerseniersambacht in de 16de eeuw (Unpublished Master thesis), Gent,1997, p 58-65; BLONDÉ (B.) and GREEFS (H.). Werk aan de winkel, p. 211-213; VAN AERT (L.). “Vanappelen tot zeemleer”. Koopvrouwen in Antwerpen in de 16de eeuw (Unpublished Master Thesis), Brussel,2002, p. 117-125

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important to bear in mind that the mercers were not the only player on the market. Manycompetitive retail circuits, acting within or coming from out of Antwerp, handled theselling of consumer goods. Corporately organized retailers (like the mercers or second-hand dealers) conflicted with non-corporate sellers (such as peddlers, itinerant market-traders and others) or went in competition with each other.14 The mercers’ so-calledmonopoly on retailing was also broken by the weekly food markets and the annual fairs.To understand the retail dynamics of a city in crisis one has to grasp the relations of allthese commercial circuits. But this task reaches beyond the scope of this paper.

The changes in consumer behaviour around this period induced the birth of newretail specializations within the guild: merchants in «confection»-clothes, wigmakers,«boutiquiers» (a new kind of grocer), fashion shops, tobacco-sellers, coffee andteahouses, and so on. The absorption of many of the new products explains for a greatdeal the enduring dynamism of the mercer guild in the 18th century.15 The mercers hadthe reputation for claiming all new products as theirs to sell. This evolution can befollowed in the entrance lists of the mercer guild. One notices new occupations rising andgaining popularity, often at the expense of older established occupations. The firstquestions are of a descriptive nature: which occupations rose or fell and when? And howbig was the (changing) female participation? But once we had gathered this information,more interesting problems emerged. Who had access to these new professions? Did menand women benefit from the same opportunities? Were the new occupations open to allmercers or only to the wealthy ones? Did the retailers only target the well-to-docustomers or did they also handle the so-called « poor man’s luxuries »? And, last but notleast, can we find indications of an increased professionalism? We have also developedlocalization patterns of retailers within the city of Antwerp. The combination of thesestatistics with other social sources (house rents and tax registers) gives us importantinformation about the economic situation of the retailers, but also about their mobility:how many of them moved within the city and whereto?

The most important sources for this study are thus the list of the new mercers,which enable us to trace evolutions over the whole century under scrutiny.16 Sadlyenough, only for a few years do we have complete membership lists of the Mercers’Guild (1636 before our period, 1681-1690-1700 which give us the opportunity to followthe careers of the mercers, and 1788 after our research period).17 In this kind of study, asocial stratification is indispensable. Therefore, we have used the house rent values of1704. Unfortunately, those lists do not contain information about the occupations of theowners and tenants.18 But luckily, one of our few surviving membership lists dates from1700, and made some identifications possible. A far better social source is the tax

14 DECEULAER (H.). « Guilds and litigation : conflict settlement in Antwerp (1585-1796) », in BOONE(M.) and PRAK (M.), eds., Statuts individuels, statuts corporatifs et statuts judiciaires dans les villeseuropéennes (moyen âge et temps modernes) : actes du colloque tenu à Gand les 12-14 octobre 1995,Leuven, 1996, p. 171-208.15 VAN AERT (L.) and VAN DAMME (I.). “Retail dynamics of a city in crisis: the mercer guild in pre-industrial Antwerp”. In BLONDÉ (B.), BRIOT (E.), COQUERY (N.) and VAN AERT (L.) (eds.).Retailers and Consumer Changes in Early Modern Europe. Université François-Rabelais, Tours, 2005, p.139-16716 OCMWAA, Godshuizen (GH), Rekeningen 86-8717 Municipal Archives Antwerp (SAA), Gilden en Ambachten (GA), 4216-422218 House rents : SAA, R, 2520

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register from 1747, but this only survived for half the town.19 The population register for1755 is complete, but doesn’t give any social stratification, besides the number ofdomestic help.20 It does offer information on occupation, marital status, address andliving arrangements (a whole house, or only a room).

The Mercers of AntwerpThe mercer guild included everybody who engaged in commercial activities usingweights or measures (« de elle of het gewicht »). Although international tradesmen weresometimes part of the guild, it was essentially a retailers’ corporation, fixed on buyingand selling locally and in small quantities (« in het cleijn »). The guild comprised moremembers than the mercers alone (sellers of all kinds of haberdashery). Everybody whowas not under restriction of another guild and performed retailing-activities, fell under themercer guild: grocers, apothecaries, all textile sellers, sellers of greasy goods (fat, wax,candles), stall-holders, unspecified shopkeepers, sellers of small utilities or certain foodsand even a few small-scale manufacturing trades (such as glove makers, hatters, pinmakers, rope makers, wax makers, soap producers, producers of lead and pewter).21

Driven by the changing consumer preferences from the late 17th century onwards, newretailing specializations emerged and joined the guild: wig makers, « boutiquiers », « a lamode »-shops and sellers of ready-made clothing, tobacco sellers, tea and coffee houses,sugar producers. Even people who were not retailers in the first place could be found onthe mercers’ membership lists. Because, only by becoming a member of the mercers’guild one was allowed to sell small things as a secondary occupation.22

Membership of the mercer guild depended on several conditions: one had to be a“burgher” and one had to be able to enter into binding contracts, for which majority ofage was needed. This would have excluded all women from entering the guild, since inAntwerp women were considered unable to sign binding contracts, because they werelegal minors, always to be represented by a guardian. However, women did becomemembers of the mercers, thanks to the laws governing “merchant women”. Womenengaging in commercial activities were thus given the chance to negotiate contracts ontheir own, perform buying and selling activities, assist in a shop and so on.23 Allmembers had to pay a yearly fee of half a guilder and an entrance fee defined by theoccupation one wished to exercise and the relevant rights. The children of mercers (fatherand/or mother) were called “born mercers” and only had to pay half the entrance fee.There was no difference within the Guild between ‘masters’ and ‘journeymen’, since noapprenticeship or masterpiece was asked of people whishing to set up as a retailer.

During the period under scrutiny (1648-1748) there were never less than 1500 andrarely more than 2500 members of the mercer guild. The exact numbers are hard to figureout since the different sources sometimes contradict each other. In 1700, for instance, a

19 SAA, Pk, 2560. Map 3 in appendix.20 SAA, PK, 2561-6321 PRIMS (F.). Geschiedenis van Antwerpen. VII. Onder de eerste Habsburgers (1477-1555). Tweedeboek: De economische orde. N.V. Standaard boekhandel, Antwerpen, 1939, p.44.22 VAN AERT (L.), « Women in Trade in 16th Century Antwerp », (forthcoming Le parfait négociant :Buyers, Sellers ans Salesmanship in Medieval and Early Modern Europe, actes du colloque tenu à Anversles 13-15 novembre 2003)23 VAN AERT (L.), « Women in Trade in 16th Century Antwerp » and VAN AERT (L.), « Tussen norm enpraktijk », p. 22-42

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total of 2291 names were written down, to pay the yearly fee.24 But, in the accounts ofthat year, the sum of no more than 700 guilders can be found. If everybody had paid theregulatory half a guilder, that gives us a total of only 1400 members. This contradictioncan be explained by the fact that many mercers paid no fee or only half of it. While inearlier times – before the crisis – almost everybody paid the full fee, now people seemedto have had problems to reach even this rather modest sum. That the guildsmen acceptedit could signify that they were conscious that retailing helped to make ends meet.25

In 1700, the different manufacturing occupations represented 20% of the guild.The textile sellers were the largest group: 1/3 of all mercers were merchants in linen, silk,wool, lace, haberdashery, cotton, and so on. The sellers of greasy goods – the largest innumber in the 16th century – were only the second largest group of retailers (17%) in1700. The occupation of stall-holder, immensely popular in the 16th century, had almostdisappeared completely in this period.26 See graph 1 in appendix.

Independent working women in the 16th century turned often to the mercers’guild. In the 17th and 18th centuries this tendency even increased. Whereas in 1515-1585only 7% of the new members were female, in 1648-1748 this figure was already 16% andat the end of the 18th century almost 25%.27 These numbers are minima, since widows ofmasters did not have to enlist. In 1700 25% of all mercers were female (widowsincluded). Which factors were responsible for this gradual feminization of the mercers’guild? Was it the result of some kind of survival strategy of income pooling in answer tothe harsher economic climate? Or was it a creative response to the changing consumerpreferences? For an answer we have to look at the occupations of women. Women wereseldom or never active in the manufacturing trades (except the widows of masters). Wefind them almost exclusively in retailing, especially in the textile trades (30% femalelinen sellers, more than 25% female cotton sellers, and so on); in food production andfood retailing; as stall-holders (24%); grocers and sellers of greasy goods (both 16%).Thus, women were mostly active in those sectors of retailing that had a majority offemale customers.28

In 1700 the mercers were completely dispersed over the city. Almost in everystreet at least one retailer lived and worked.29 Around 1690, for instance, there was aretail-ratio of about 26 persons per mercer in Antwerp (this ratio even raises to onemercer per 16 persons in 1773).30 The enormous density of retailers in Antwerp even

24 SAA, GA, 4219 (yearly fee mercers 1700).25 The guildmen may have had no choice in this matter. Because the Guild’s policy since the late MiddleAges had been inclusive of all products to be sold, they could not refuse membership to the burghers sellingthese wares. Inclusiveness for products resulted in inclusiveness for retailers. Accepting even members ofother guilds… The half-fee could also be the result of some members only purchasing ‘half-rights’ of theguild, as was a possibility in other cities. STEEGEN (E.). Een winkel in de buurt? Kleinhandel enkleinhandelaars in Maastricht, 1680-1805. (Unpublished PhD-thesis) Vub, Brussels, 2005.26 BLONDÉ (B.) and GREEFS (H.), ‘Werk aan de winkel’, p. 211-213.27 VAN AERT (L.), ‘Women in Trade in 16th Century Antwerp’.28 BERG (M.). ‘Women’s Consumption and the Industrial Classes of Eighteenth-Century England’. InJournal of Social History, 1996, p. 415-434.29 For a theoretical framework of residential patterns, see RICHARDSON (H.W.), Regional economics.Location theory, urban structure and regional change, London, 1972.30 An estimate of 66.000 inhabitants and 2500 mercers. This number seems a quite normal average forAntwerp, since in 1615 the ratio was one mercer out of every 27 persons (60.000 inhabitants and 2210mercers). Calculations based on numbers by : BLONDÉ (B.) and GREEFS (H.), ‘Werk aan de winkel’, p.211-213.

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surpassed the London ratio where in 1759 there was an average of 30 persons per shop.31

These figures are even more impressive if one realizes that non-corporate retailers,second-hand dealers, peddlers and the like are not even taken into account. In Antwerp,even the poorest of society relied upon commercial mechanisms for the supply ofconsumer goods.32 The wide variety of retail outlets in the city probably also mediatedsuch consumer problems as shopping time and especially exchange and liquidity (credit).There was absolutely no concentration around marketplaces, but a slight clusteringaround the city centre – much more pronounced for some specific trades, but of that wewill speak later – does occur. See map 1 in appendix.

Winners and losersThe textiles sector is a great example of both the expression of consumer preferences inthe retailing practice as of changing female participation. Graphs in appendix.

Shops with the denomination « à la mode » or « fashion shops », knew a quitespectacular growth: from none before 1660 over 23 in 1681 and 41 in 1690. But themarket quickly reached a saturation point around 1700, numbering more or less 60simultaneously active fashion shops for the rest of the research period. These shops soldprêt-à-porter, semi-finished garments (to be finished to the size of the customer), andaccessories like pins, ribbons, and so on. Thus, adornment of people and clothing toobecame more important. It was easier to follow fashions by changing details of one’sdress, than to change dress altogether. Those adornments were sold by fashion shops (theexpensive kind) but also by lace shops (numbering around 100 in the middle of ourresearch period) and shops specialising in ribbons and tread (which were not new butknew a slow but steady growth: from less than 40 in 1681 over 70 in 1690 and almost100 in 1700, up to almost 150 in 1788). Tread was imported from Gent, Elberfeld orother production centres, while some ribbons were made locally and others wereimported, but lace was an important export product. Spain and its colonies were the maincustomers.33

Almost simultaneously with the rise of the fashion shop, we can witness thegrowing popularity of light cottons and mixed cotton and linens, and the shops that soldthem (180 cotton shops in 1788). Cotton prints made it easier to follow and implementthe rapidly changing fashion trends; they were more adaptable than textiles with in-woven designs. Printing was also cheaper. Thus, the success of cotton and the fasterchanging fashions went hand in hand. Printed cottons were both imported from abroadand printed locally. Their success was also to be attributed to the new ideas abouthygiene, with cottons and linens being easier to wash than woollens or silks. And last butnot least, (mixed-) cottons were cheaper, so with the same budget one could afford moreclothes. Clothing stayed expensive in the second half of the 18th century: one suit in(mixed-) cotton was worth at least ten working days pay for an unskilled labourer. But

31 MUI (H.C.) and MUI (L.H.), Shops and shopkeeping, p. 37-41.32 VAN BELLINGEN (M.), ‘Diefstal en heling van kleding en textiel : Antwerpen, 1775-1785’, Tijdschriftvoor sociale geschiedenis, 21 (1995), p. 385-405; VAN DAMME (I.), ‘Changing consumer preferences andevolutions in retailing. The Antwerp retailers and the selling of old and new consumer durables (c. 1648-c.1748)’, (forthcoming).33 THIJS (A.K.L.). Van “werkwinkel” tot “fabriek”. De textielnijverheid te Antwerpen (einder 15de –begin 19de eeuw). Gemeentekrediet, 1987, p.105-114

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this is less than it was hundred years before. This evolution had a growing clothingconsumption as result.34

Striking is the high female participation in ownership of those new shops: 55% ofall lace shops had female owners, as did 40% of all fashion shops, 30% of all ribbonshops and 20% of all cotton shops. These percentages are minima, since all the wiveswho held their shop in co-ownership with their husbands stay hidden here. Especially thefemale majority of lace sellers is exceptional since this was the one textile relatedmanufacture Antwerp had left with an important place on the international market. It wasvery important for the economy of the city too. In 1755 the majority of unmarried womenwere employed in lace production.35 Many of them lived together, something that alsohappened in that other lace productions centre Bruges.36 But what is striking is that theyoften rented rooms in the homes of – female – lace sellers.37 These women lace sellersoperated almost as guild masters, controlling and concentrating some of the productionunder their own roof. But they did not sell all of the produced lace directly to individualcustomers. Lace, like cotton, was an export product, sold by international merchants toSpain, the New World, France and the Northern Netherlands. Those merchants – bothmale and female – did only rarely contact lace makers themselves. They mostly tradedwith exclusively female lace sellers (often ex- lace makers) who were responsible for thequality of the product.38 This explains the living patterns. But this also makes for a verydiverse make-up of the lace sellers within the Mercers’ Guild. Both the small ‘inbetween’ lace sellers as the international merchants were members. Thus the making oflace not only helped a lot of poor women earn a (mediocre) livelihood, but the retailing ofit offered quite some middling women the possibility to open a shop, and even some wellto do women a chance in wholesale. The importance of lace did diminish spectacularlyafter the middle of the 18th century. Thus we don’t know if men would have taken overlike they did for the sales of cottons and finery (see infra).

Interesting to note is that female participation in cotton shops was much higherinitially, than later in the 18th century. Cotton was also considered as a ‘feminine’ cloth,with much more women than men wearing the gaily printed cottons, while men continuedto wear darker woollens.39 Women may have preferred the lighter, easier to manipulatecloth also because they often stitched themselves, while men maybe had their suits moreoften made by a tailor. But as cotton became more popular in dress, it was also taking agrowing place in the home both as furniture and as wall coverings. The upholsterersresponsible for the interior decorations were in England mostly male.40 For Antwerp,exact information is still lacking, but we have as yet found no trace of women in thisbusiness. Thus making men important customers in the 18th century. Since we know that

34 THIJS (A.K.L.). Van “werkwinkel” tot “fabriek”, p. 147-158 and DECEULAER (H). Pluriformepatronen35 SAA, PK, 2561-6336 DANNEEL (M.). Weduwen en wezen in het laat middeleeuwse Gent. Garant, Leuven, 199537 SAA, PK, 2561-6338 VAN LAERHOVEN (J.). Kanthandel te Antwerpen in de 18de eeuw. (Unpublished Mastersthesis),Ghent, 1968-6939 DECEULAER (H.). Pluriforme patronen, p 18140 EDWARDS (C.). ‘The upholsterer and the retailing of domestic furnishings 1600-1800’. In BLONDÉ(B.), BRIOT (E.), COQUERY (N.) and VAN AERT (L.) (eds.). Retailers and Consumer Changes in EarlyModern Europe. Université François-Rabelais, Tours, 2005, p. 53-69

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especially for larger orders men bought fashionable items themselves.41 This could,together with the growing scale of a lot of businesses, be one more reason why men weretaking over the shops. Comparatively, feminine shop-ownership was diminishing at theend of the 18th century for the fashion shops too: in 1788 they were only still in charge of20% of all fashion shops. This happened at the same time that in Paris too men took overthe direction of the fashion shops. The fashion houses became bigger, and with moreshops girls, but the direction was in male hands.42 As such illustrating the position ofwomen as ‘outsiders’ even in sectors, such as retailing, to which they had access: everynew commodity was an opportunity, an opening which they grasped at, often taking risksestablished men were unwilling to take, due to a lack of other possibilities. This couldalso explain the prevalence of women in the lace trade, where they were willing not onlyto take financial risks but also to invest a lot of time and personal space in the housingand supervising of the lace makers.

Some ‘old’ textiles stayed popular, as did linen. The largest group in 1700, itdidn’t attract more sellers, so that in 1788 there were only as many linen shops as cottonshops (180). Although linen was able to attract slightly more female shopkeepers thancotton (25%). Flax shops decreased dramatically in numbers around 1700 (only 15 to 20left), but were capable of restoring their numbers at the end of the 18th century to early17th century levels (40). During our research period most linen sold in Antwerp wereproduced in the Flemish countryside. Antwerp wasn’t anymore the international linenmarket it had been in the 15th and 16th centuries; neither did it still have the flourishinglinen industry of that period.43 Thus, our retailers can be considered to have catered onlyto domestic needs, servicing the city and its direct hinterland.44

Wool cloth stayed popular too with more or less 40 simultaneously active shops.Woollen cloth producers in Antwerp worked only for the local market, and suffered fromimportant competition from imported woollens. Indeed, Antwerp had been a distributioncentre for wool cloth since the late middle ages, and stayed active in that regard – even ifon a smaller scale – during the whole early modern period.45 Woollen cloth sellers couldthus sell domestic, more expensive or imported, cheaper cloth or even trade wholesaleand internationally. Shopkeepers and whole traders can be separated from each other inthe next chapter thanks to social sources. Both flax and wool cloth shops were in 25% ofcases registered under a women’s name. Some textiles disappeared altogether asspecialised occupations: knitted work and all kinds of mixed woollens and silks (saai,caffa, callot).46 Only knitting had known a lot of female sellers (35%). Also silk lostpopularity; in 1636 there were still 160 silk shops, but in the period 1680-1780 only half

41 FINN (M.). ‘Men’s things: masculine possession in the consumer revolution’. In Social History, 25 (2),2000, p. 133-15542 JONES (J.). ‘Coquettes and Grisettes. Women Buying and Selling in Ancien Régime Paris’. In DEGRAZIA (V.) and FURLONG (E.). The Sex of Things. University of California Press, Berkeley, 1996, p25-5343 THIJS (A.K.L.). Van werkwinkel tot fabriek, p 90-10244 VAN UYTVEN (R.). ‘Peiling naar de beroepsstructuur op het brabantse platteland omstreeks 1755’. InBijdragen tot de Geschiedenis, 55, 1972, p 172-20345 THIJS (A.K.L.). Van werkwinkel tot fabriek, p 52-6246 “Saai” is a light woollen of slightly inferior quality, which was mostly popular in southern Europe.“Kaffa” is figured silk velvet and “calot” or “kamelot” is a mixed wool-silk cloth. THIJS (A.K.L.). Vanwerkwinkel tot fabriek, p 45, 129, 75.

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of them were left. Only 15% of all silk shops were held by women, but their numbersgrew during the 18th century. In fact we see here the opposite happening than for fashionor cotton shops, with female percentage rising while the number of shops dwindled. Thiscan be an illustration of women’s position as economical outsiders: just as they are thefirst to embrace the sales of new commodities, due to lack of opportunities, they are thelast to stay in sectors which are ‘losing out’.

In the middle of the 18th century, when so many women are selling textiles, onlyone specialized occupation is held exclusively by men: the growing number of shopsspecialised in pants and stockings (30 in 1681 up to 80 a century later). Since these wereaccording to fashion male dress, we can here make the same appreciation as for thefashion shops. The « consumption of fashion » was not an anonymous transactionbetween buyer and seller. On the contrary, a privileged relationship was forged, wheredue to the quickly changing fashions the advisory function of the retailer became ofutmost importance to the consumer.47 By optimizing this function, the retailer could hopeto bind his/her clients to him/her. And apparently women were more suited to fulfil thisrole towards other women, as men were towards other men. This division along genderlines of both the products and the salespersons is something we also see in the sales ofcoffee and tea. Tea being a ‘female’ product in the literature and indeed more often soldby women than coffee, which was known as a ‘male’ consumer item.48 Furthermore, aswe suggested for cottons, it is possible that women knitted their own stockings moreoften than men did.

CareersWe are fortunate that membership lists of the mercers’ guild survived for the years 1681,1690 and 1700, enabling us to follow the careers of the textile sellers over a twenty yearperiod. As such, we notice that the silk shops were the most established textile shops intown, with almost 90% of them being in business for ten years or more. Especially thefew women who sold silk were in it for the long haul, since all of the ‘independentmerchant women’ held the same shop for at least a decade.49 Woollen cloth shops weresomewhat less established, except when held by women, since all widows and all but one‘independent women’ held the same shop for ten years or more. Linen shopkeepersstayed somewhat less often long in business than those specialised in silk or woollens, butmore often than fashion, lace or ribbon sellers. For linen shopkeepers we’re still talkingabout 80% of cases having long-lived businesses, as did 75% of all fashion, lace orribbon shops. Again, we see foremost the widows hanging in there. This is a remarkablecontrast to the stockings shops, of which barely more than half stayed open for ten yearsor more. Interesting to note is that those shops were predominantly held by men. But thelowest rate of long-lived shops (35%) was counted among the flax sellers. Whiledisappearing occupations like the sales of old silk blends (caffa, callot), were tenacious.

47 BLONDÉ (B.) and VAN DAMME (I.), ‘Consumenten en commerciële circuits. Verbruiksveranderingenen hun betekenis voor de detailhandel te Antwerpen in de 17de en 18de eeuw : een terreinverkenning’,(forthcoming).48 VAN AERT (L.) and VAN DAMME (I.). “Retail dynamics of a city in crisis”.49 ‘Independent merchant women’ are those women in the membership list who are registered under theirown name, in stead of as ‘widow of’. We know those women had the ‘independent merchant’ status, butwe don’t know if they were married or not. Their status was not inherited from their late husband, as wasthe fact for most of the women registered as widows.

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Generally speaking, ‘independent women’ had less often long careers than men,just as widows had them more often. This is a bias often to be found in the sources.Long careers were mostly to be found in the more ‘traditional’ occupations, and less inthe ‘new’ ones, but those differences were not gender specific (male stocking shopowners and female silk or woolen sellers).

These long careers can be considered both in positive and in negative ways. Thepositive aspect is that women shopkeepers in general and widowed ones in particularwere capable of maintaining over a long period such expensive shops, in mostlyexpensive houses and neighborhoods (see infra). But the reverse side of the story is thatthey maybe had no choice in the matter, they had to hold on due to lack of otherpossibilities. Not a lot of guilds were open to women in their own right (only as widowsof masters, and even then under severe limitations).50 Maybe the shop was a matter ofnecessity for widows, having no other respected and respectable source of income.

Residential patternsDue to time constraints it was not possible to make detailed residential patterns.Nevertheless, some general considerations are worth mentioning. Foremost that almostall textile shops were concentrated in the centre of town, with a slight emphasis in theFifth District. Map of the districts in appendix. This was a neighborhood of neitherpolitical, nor religious, nor financial importance, but could rather be called a shoppingdistrict. It was a quite generalized commercial neighborhood, not specialized in textilesat all. This was also, partially as a result of this commercial concentration, the onlyneighborhood with a so-called ‘middle class’, the social class to which well-to-doshopkeepers belonged.51

Besides this concentration in the Fifth District, most kinds of textile retailerscould be found in all six central districts. Only a few exceptions can be noted. Cotton,linen and lace shops were also situated in the Ninth to Eleventh Districts, the well-to-doresidential part of town. Only very few silk shops and quite some ribbon shops couldalso be found in the two poorest neighborhoods: the Seventh (also called ‘the parish ofmisery’) and Eight Districts.

Female retailers didn’t have distinct residential habits. They followed the samepatterns as their male collegues. For the choice of residence the product one was selling,together with his / hers financial possibilities and social standing (and thus the size of theshop) was much more influencial than one’s gender.

Socio-economically speakingThe above roughly painted residential pattern already suggests that the textile sellers inparticular and the mercers in general belonged to the middling groups of society.Comparisons were made based on two social sources, which are both sadly enough onlyeither partially conserved (tax registers of 1747, see map 3 in appendix) or only partiallyreconstructed (house rents of 1704).52 The reconstruction is based on the comparison ofthe house rents of 1704 with the membership list of the mercers’ guild of 1700. More

50 WIESNER (M.E.). Women and Gender, p 117-11851 DEGRYSE (K.). ‘Sociale ongelijkwaardigheid te Antwerpen in 1747’. In Bijdragen tot deGeschiedenis, 1974 (57), pp 126-14552 SAA, Privilegiekamer, 2560 and SAA, Rekenkamer, 2520

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than half of all salesmen in every specific occupation could be matched. Nevertheless,the margin of error stays large. As is the case for the 1747 tax, for which half the city,including the three central districts, is lacking. To be able to compare we narrowed downthe number even further, by using instead of just the median house rent and tax for eachoccupation, the median 50%, thus creating a sort of artificial mathematical ‘middle class’.Very well knowing that this is an artificial comparison, which has nothing to do with theactual middling classes of the time, we can thus compare the occupations.53

As a whole, the mercers’ guild was doing rather well: the median 50% paidbetween 60 and 130 guilders house rent in 1704, while the median 50% for the whole citywas only 42 to 108 guilders. Within the mercers’ guild the best off were the coffee-housekeepers and the grocers, pharmacists and chemists (all somewhere between 100 and 200guilders), while the greasy goods sellers were the poorest, rating even lower thanAntwerp as a whole (48-82 guilders). The textile sellers were rather among the bettermiddling groups. Nevertheless, the intern social stratification of the above- mentionedtextile occupations can be slightly surprising. From graphs 20 and 21 in appendix showsthat the flax, stockings and fashion shops (and cotton in 1747) are the textile occupationswith the lowest socio-economical standing. Flax is an old specialisation, which knows adistinct drop in popularity during our research period, while the stocking shops know theopposite evolution and the fashion and cotton shops are even entirely new. Thepercentage of female participation in business ownership cannot be the explanationeither, since it is much higher for fashion shops (second highest after the lace shops) andcotton shops than for flax, while stocking shops are almost exclusively in male hands.

On the other side of the social spectrum, we see the same heterogeneity. Both silkand woollen cloth were old favourites, seldom sold by women and then almostexclusively by widows. Silk shops became less numerous, but nevertheless stayed on thehigh end of the social stratification, comparable with the grocers, pharmacists andchemists who were the only other as well to do members of the mercers’ guild. But thelace shops show us another side to the story: a new commodity sold predominantly bywomen, but still very lucrative. So, neither the low percentage of female business-owners nor the established nature of the commodity determined it’s lucratively. In themiddling group we find linen and ribbon shopkeepers. Both occupations with one thirdfemale owners and a history of growing popularity.

Social differences between men and women within one occupation were not to befound. This seems a story in which gender differences were less important than theinfluence of fashion – the growing or weaning popularity of certain cloth – or socio-economical factors like the investment capital. Nevertheless, it remains striking with howmuch enthusiasm women started selling those new commodities, both on the high and thelow end of the social spectrum. Places they had to abandon at the end of the 18th century,

53 A comparison based on the second and third quartile. The numers do not differ much when using themore traditional Median and Standard Deviation method.Guilders Ribbons Silk Linen Flax Stockings Fashion Woollens LaceMe (1747) 8 40 12 10 10 14 23 20St Dev (1747) 6,2 14 9,5 14,7 5,1 12,5 18,8 18,5Me (1704) 108 100 90 90 96 100 150 126St Dev (1704) 53,9 99 37,1 56,3 43,3 51,3 85,8 110,2Numbers with exclusion of all known wholesalers.SAA, Privilegiekamer, 2560 and SAA, Rekenkamer, 2520

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when those products gained economic importance. Here we can argue – without beingable to proof it at this point - that women’s access to the public market (both themarketplace as the rest of the retailing sector) was not as free as one could think. Theyhad to make themselves a place in the sun by taking risks on novelties, men were notpushed to. And once those risks had diminished, women were pushed out, and men tookover. This argument finds an example in the opposite case of the silk shops: exactlywhen silk is starting to lose popularity, female ownership grows.

Wives and shop girlsWomen may have lost positions as business owners, but this does not mean that there wasno more female presence in the shops. Both the wives of the shopkeepers, as the shopgirls were a presence to be reckoned with. Sadly enough they can only be measured for asmall moment in time, at the end of our research period. Both the partial tax register of1747 and the population register of 1755 provide this kind of information. Domestic orcommercial help were mentioned in the same category, making the difference sometimesunclear. 90% of all domestic and commercial help in Antwerp was female, if we don’tconsider the apprentice guildsmen (‘ambachtsknechten’). An unsurprising number, justlike the 18% of all Antwerp households which can afford at least one help.54 41% of allretailers are in that position, but with large differences amongst themselves.

Opposed to the rest of the city, among the textile sellers especially the singleunmarried men had at least one shop girl. This is surprising because all theories aboutlife-cycle agree that unmarried men were all things considered poorer than married men,since they were often younger and / or not well off enough to marry. In all otherprofessions mentioned in 1755, unmarried men have much less often an aid in thehousehold or the workplace, than married men do. Not so, with the textile sellers (thepicture seems to be slightly different for the other retailing occupations, but I cannotprove it at this point). For example, all three unmarried male woollen cloth sellers in1755 had two or three aides, as did all five unmarried male silk sellers. While widowsdidn’t always have a help, nor did married men. Among the flax sellers, it is againforemost the unmarried men and the widows who enjoy the helping hands of a shop girl(seldom more than one), as did the stocking sellers. All but one unmarried linen sellerhad a help, while only slightly more than half the married men did, and less than half ofthe widows or less than a quarter of the unmarried women. The picture is even clearerfor the ribbon sellers, where the unmarried men were the only ones with more than onehelp, while all the others (married men, widows and unmarried women) only rarely hadeven one. Among the fashion shop keepers all unmarried men had at least one shop girl,while only 7 of the 19 married couples did. This apparent necessity for male shopkeepersto have female help – either in the form of a wife, either an employee – is an added cluefor the importance of female salespersons for fashion sensitive products.

The only exceptions to this rule were the cotton and the lace sellers. The problemis that lace was already a specialty with a majority of female business owners, making themen in this occupation in and off themselves exceptions. In 1755 we also counted 45%female cotton sellers (18 out of 40) – a much higher percentage than in the guild records.

54 compare to 16% in Utrecht in 1795 or 13,5% in Delft in 1749 or 16% in Leiden in that same year.Numbers by Julie MOSMULLER, Ariadne SCHMIDT and Ad VAN DER WOUDE, given to me byAriadne SCHMIDT at the ‘Derde Dag van het Onderzoek’, Rotterdam, 18-03-2005.

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The reasons are still unclear, but this oddity has as result that there were only threeunmarried male cotton sellers (compare tot eleven female), all without shop girls. Maybethey were exceptions, maybe not. Further research will be needed.ConclusionsFirst and foremost we have to conclude that women in early modern Antwerp, opposed tocurrent historiography, did not form the majority of all textile retailers. Nevertheless, thiswas one of the sectors they were very present in. Still, textile selling was a much smallersector of female employment than textile production.55 The women active in textileretailing were not ‘forced’ there out of some ‘low end commercial circuit’ imagery, sincethey were very comparable to their male counterparts in social standing. But womenwere more interested in the sales of novelties than men and we can say that womenretailers positively revelled in the new commodities which were the results of the shifts inconsumer preferences. Here it is necessary to note for the Antwerp that in the textilesector we can’t really talk about consumer and retail ‘revolutions’, but rather of‘evolutions’. Some textiles appeared while others disappeared, but this was a processwhich often took decennia. Women did play an important part in these evolutions. Thiswe can conclude of the high female participation in the new specialties. But once thenovelty wore off, and the scale of the business grew, men took over. Nevertheless,female presence in the shop didn’t diminish since both shop girls and wives stayed anabsolute necessity.

In the meantime, textile sellers, both male and female, were compared to the restof the town and even the rest of the mercers’ guild socio-economically speaking ratherwell off, and this in times of crisis. Social differences between men and women active inthe same occupations were not to be found. This is a story in which other elements –either fashion or investment possibilities - seem to have been more influential. But, theenthusiasm with which women retailers embraced the new commodities, both high andlow in the economic spectrum, stays striking. Maybe as a result of a lack of otheropportunities and a will to make ‘a place for themselves’. Places they often had toabandon at the end of the 18th century, once their success was apparent. In the meanwhilethe percentage of women in the guild kept on growing. But those lucrative large textilesbusinesses were gradually closed off. Even though we can’t say that this was a result ofthe closing of public space for women, because the number of female independentretailers kept on growing (both relatively and abolutely) and the male woned large textileshops employed shop girls, wives and daughters. Nevertheless, the fewer women activein the sale of more traditional cloth with smaller female participation, like silk orwoollens, did have very long careers. Thus, when women were able to hold a business,they weren’t hosted out of it. Textile retailing seems to have been a way to socialpromotion for both men and women. But with a limited ceiling for women, because theirnumbers dropped once investments became to important. Nevertheless, even if the stepwas higher for women, it was still lower than in a whole lot of other occupations.

55 THIJS (A.K.L.). Van werkwinkel tot fabriek, p 423-432

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Appendix:Graph. 1 : Source : SAA, GA, 4219 (yearly fee mercers 1700)

Occupations of Mercers in 170013%

20%

33%

8%

17%

5% 4%

unknown

manufacturers

textile sellers

food

greasy goods

grocers, etc.

new beverages andtobacco

Map 1 : Source : SAA, GA, 4219 (yearly fee mercers 1700)

Graph 2: new fashionshops Graph 3: total number of fashionshops

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Graph 14: new stockings sellers Graph 15: total number of stockingsellers

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Graph 16: new woollen cloth sellers Graph 17: total number of woollencloth sellers

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Graph 18: new silk sellers Graph 19: total number of silk sellers

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Map 2: The districts of Antwerp since 1581.56

56 Based on VAN GOETHEM (Paul). Gegevens van demografisch-administratieven aard betreffende destad Antwerpen (1577-1585). Onuitgegeven licentiaatsverhandeling, RUGent, 1946.

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Map 3: The partially conserved tax of 1747. Dark grey districts are missing.57

Graph 20: Median 50% houserents of 1704in guilders for textile sellers found in 1700

Graph 21: Median 50% tax in guilders fortextile sellers in 1747

57 Based on SAA, Pk 2560 and DEGRYSE (K.). ‘Sociale ongelijkheid in Antwerpen in 1747’, p 126-145

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