THE STONEMASONS OF GERMANY.
ii8
fellows had held meetings (literally chapters, in German Kapittelsweise) at Speyer, Strassburg,
and Eatisbon (Eegensburg), and had agi'eed and sworn to, the following rules and regulations.
These ordinances conclude by stating, that at Eatisbon in the year of our Lord 1459, on the
festival of St Mark, Jost Dotzinger of Worms, TSIaster of the buildings at Strassburg Cathedral
(and his successors for ever), was acknowledged as chief judge {oberster Rijchter) of the fraternity;
which regulation had been previously made at Speyer and Strassburg, and was once more
confirmed at Speyer in the year 1464:, on the 9th April. The very next paragraph, however,
somewhat places the whole matter once more in confusion, as it states that at Eatisbon in
1459, and at Speyer in 1463, the workmasters of Strassburg, Cologne, and Vienna were
"
These three are the highest judges and lodges of the
acknowledged as being chief judges
craft
these shall not be displaced without just cause."
Apart from the confusion thus
—
;
created, it
is
therefore evident that
but of one whose earliest date
up
in 1459,
that
is
it
Heldmann's copy
1464
is
;
is
not a transcript of the 1459 code,
but the fact remains that a set of laws was drawn
and was doubtless identical with the present; and we have Osterrieth's affidavit^
a true cojiy of the MS. which he saw in the lodge at Strassburg during the
Following tliis appointment of three chief lodges, we have a definition of the
province attaching to each and a fourth province inserted, namely, that of Bern, comprising
the whole of the Swiss Confederation.
Next come a few more regulations, and a paragraph
revolution.
;
it was agreed that the INIaster of the Strassburg Lodge, Jost
should call a meeting " after the manner of a chapter," and take to himself three or
Dotzinger,
four masters, and whatever should be decided by the majority of those then assembled in
chapter, either to render the articles more severe or more mild, that should be held of all the
stating that on the 9th April 1464,
and the day of such meeting was then fixed to be St George's Day 1469. So far as
we know, the meeting was never held at least we have no record of it. Then follow the
craft;
;
names
of those
who
agreed to these
"four weeks after Easter" 1459.
twent}'-one in the second.
of our Lord " 1472, on the
The above code
laws on the 9th April 1464, succeeded by those who signed
The number is not large, being six in the first case and
Additions are afterwards
Sunday
made
of fresh
names
as late as the year
before the 12th day of Christmas."
of laws or ordinances gives us a very good idea of the organisation of the
stonemasons as they then existed, and as they had probably existed for some centuries
the introduction expressly stating that they are drawn up according to ancient
and lays down in broad outline a comprehensive picture of their trade usages and
custom,
customs.
But we find one new feature that doubtless dates from 1459, that of the bond
previously
;
—
embracing
all
Germany and
—that
Switzerland,
is,
the inner fraternity and the supreme
We
can have no doubt, that previous and constant intercommunication had reduced
authority.
the various guilds of stonemasons scattered throughout Germany to one general uniformity,
except in some small matters (the length of apprenticeship, for instance), and that, like aU.
other trades, a journeyman free to work in one place was acceptable in another.
Yet
to positive strife, were by no means
under such circumdifferences, tending
impossible
1459 we find this rendered excessively difficult by the institution of a
universal guild or fraternity, and four chief lodges, to which all disputes must be referred.
Of
the latter, in spite of some obscurity in the wording, the
at Strassburg was the supreme
lodge
head.
It is even more than likely that this
assembly in 1459, and the rules then laid down,
stances
;
but in
'
Heldmaun, Die
drei Aeltesten Geschichtlichen
Denkmale,
p. 2il.