Page 257 - Panjek, Aleksander, Jesper Larsson and Luca Mocarelli, eds. 2017. Integrated Peasant Economy in a Comparative Perspective: Alps, Scandinavia and Beyond. Koper: University of Primorska Press
P. 257
intangible and material evidence on the slovenian peasant economy ...
process may be at least twofold. One reasonable hypothesis, in line with the
integrated peasant economy concept, would be that the decrease of income
opportunities from trade, transport and other activities had led to an aug-
mented peasant pressure on land in substitution of other income sourc-
es in order to keep the economic balance (Panjek and Beguš 2014, 51–2).
On the other hand, the picture of the mid-18th century we presented might
correspond to a different reading, while still remaining coherent with the
integrated peasant economy model, as follows. The ‘privatisation’ of com-
mon meadow plots might signal a tendency towards a stronger individu-
alisation of animal breeding practices. It might be a sign of an intensifica-
tion of animal husbandry, not necessarily motivated with bare subsistence
issues, but market oriented. The growth of the nearby port-town of Tri-
este during the 18th century, from around 1750 onwards in particular, could
have been a driving force in this sense. Something similar may be said for
the newly reclaimed fields, and perhaps also for the fragmentation of the
old ones: The increasing urban demand stimulated the growth and inten-
sification of cereal and wine growing, while the growing opportunities for
the commercialisation of agricultural produce and of extra-farm income
sources could explain the rationality of land fragmentation (less land was
needed to reach the economic balance of the household). As we have seen
in the first part of the paper, the contemporary observers themselves de-
fined the Karst peasants as showing amazing ability and diligence, as ad-
mirable and hard-working, and even “industrious.” Such industriousness
in income integration had even made some of them “wealthy” and living in
houses “more gentlemanly than of peasants.”
We may therefore conclude that the quantitative evidence about the
Karst represents a striking confirmation of the thesis in Slovenian histo-
riography, asserting that the farmsteads were in many cases too small to
make a living out of them only and, at the same time, that the integrated
peasant economy concept fits well into the quantitative framework we were
able to reconstruct. In any case the presented figures may represent a small
contribution to the possibility for further comparative analyses.
Bibliography
Archival sources
AST, ATTA: Archivio di Stato di Trieste, Archivio Torre-Tasso Antico.
255
process may be at least twofold. One reasonable hypothesis, in line with the
integrated peasant economy concept, would be that the decrease of income
opportunities from trade, transport and other activities had led to an aug-
mented peasant pressure on land in substitution of other income sourc-
es in order to keep the economic balance (Panjek and Beguš 2014, 51–2).
On the other hand, the picture of the mid-18th century we presented might
correspond to a different reading, while still remaining coherent with the
integrated peasant economy model, as follows. The ‘privatisation’ of com-
mon meadow plots might signal a tendency towards a stronger individu-
alisation of animal breeding practices. It might be a sign of an intensifica-
tion of animal husbandry, not necessarily motivated with bare subsistence
issues, but market oriented. The growth of the nearby port-town of Tri-
este during the 18th century, from around 1750 onwards in particular, could
have been a driving force in this sense. Something similar may be said for
the newly reclaimed fields, and perhaps also for the fragmentation of the
old ones: The increasing urban demand stimulated the growth and inten-
sification of cereal and wine growing, while the growing opportunities for
the commercialisation of agricultural produce and of extra-farm income
sources could explain the rationality of land fragmentation (less land was
needed to reach the economic balance of the household). As we have seen
in the first part of the paper, the contemporary observers themselves de-
fined the Karst peasants as showing amazing ability and diligence, as ad-
mirable and hard-working, and even “industrious.” Such industriousness
in income integration had even made some of them “wealthy” and living in
houses “more gentlemanly than of peasants.”
We may therefore conclude that the quantitative evidence about the
Karst represents a striking confirmation of the thesis in Slovenian histo-
riography, asserting that the farmsteads were in many cases too small to
make a living out of them only and, at the same time, that the integrated
peasant economy concept fits well into the quantitative framework we were
able to reconstruct. In any case the presented figures may represent a small
contribution to the possibility for further comparative analyses.
Bibliography
Archival sources
AST, ATTA: Archivio di Stato di Trieste, Archivio Torre-Tasso Antico.
255
