Leist (Circle of Friends)
In Bern, Leist has been a closed circle of friends of men since the late 17th century at the latest.
Word meaning
The term Leist can only be approached etymologically. Sigmund von Wagner (1759–1835) says in his Novae Deliciae Urbis Bernae : This name Leist-Stube comes from the fact that in the past every member of society, if something was missing against the social laws, or had incurred debts that he could not pay , there, at his own expense, had to sit in arrest, or have others drink there at his own expense until he had paid. The Bernese societies ( guilds ) exercised lower jurisdiction on their houses, which also included dining rooms, until the 18th century. Minor offenses were punished with fines or arrest. Using the example of Burgdorf Castle, we learn that prison cells were called service rooms. The Bernese dialect writer Rudolf von Tavel uses the word performance in the sense of paying fine, and in everyday language the term Leist has been preserved for school teachers. The teacher is largely a punisher into the 20th century. It is obvious that the word Leist stood for groups in the 18th century who happily violated the laws of morality in the dining rooms.
history
Sigmund von Wagner reports that a society formed at the beginning of the 18th century that met in the tower room of a tower in the curtain wall near the Aarberger Gate . Councilors also belonged to this society. Later the Mohrenleist, also called Brittlerleist , would have formed in the Haus zum Mohren on Neubrückstrasse . This achievement played an important role in the elections to the council. Von Wagner also reports on Major Kienberger, who served wine in the Bern department store. Here councilors , gentlemen and masters are said to have drank and discussed together in the department store. Later, both the tea and smoke bars were derived from the department store bar. In 1769, the Rauchleist moved into the premises on the ground floor of the Hôtel de Musique . Emanuel Friedrich von Fischer also reports something similar to Wagner's : “So the so-called bar, closed associations of a number of men who came together at a place designated for them, were formed. [...]. In addition to the large and small society, the main federation point of the patriciate, the department store and the tea service, where older magistrates and other respected men came together, one noticed the Rauchleist, the literarleist etc. "
While the Rauchleist remained a larger association, after the middle of the 18th century the ledge developed into small circles of friends in which young men of the upper class were united. The records of the historian and writer Karl Ludwig Stettler , who was a ten-year-old member of a Leist: “On Sundays we had a so-called Leist with the boys, that membership in a service was probably not based on voluntariness but on arrangements made by parents von Erlach, Stettler von Frienisberg and von Riedburg, Benoit , May von Schöftland and occasionally small feuds were waged there, soon with other strips, or with the youth of the Matten and Mezgergasse [today Rathausgasse], although it seldom removed wounds or lumps . "
There are only a few remnants of the bar from the 18th century, as the bar was very loosely organized. In addition to the bars designed as a circle of friends that did not accept new members, some constituted bars continued to exist until the 19th century, such as the Neue Rauchleist , the Sommer - or the Krähenbühlleist . In 1818, some young Bernese from families who were able to advise but who did not rule before 1798 founded the Burgerleist, "from which no legal citizen of Bern is excluded." The philosophy professor Johann Rudolf Wyss gave the impetus for this idea . The Burgerleist should be open to everyone and also have an external effect, which was new for a Leist. He gathered in the rifle house on the Schützenmatt, the traditional meeting place of the non-ruling Bernese.
Traditional bars, organized as a circle of friends, still exist in Bern to this day and have traditionally been named after the extinct families of Bern since the 20th century at the latest and usually also bear the corresponding family coat of arms.
With the Lorrain service founded in 1863, a neighborhood association adapted the term Leist for the first time. Many more quarter and alley strips have been established since then.
literature
- Manuel Kehrli: Sociability in Bern, the bar and the foundation of the Grande Société , in: Georg von Erlach et al .: Hôtel de Musique and Grande Société de Berne , Bern 2009, pp. 41–57.
- Sigmund von Wagner: Novae Deliciae Bernae or the golden age of Bern , in: New Berner Taschenbuch on the year 1916, pp. 226–285. on-line
Individual evidence
- ↑ Membership table of the Rauchleist, 18th century, Bernisches Historisches Museum, inv. No. 1272, see catalog of the Historisches Museum in Bern (Middle Ages and Modern Times) , Bern 1897, p. 95.
- ↑ Bern Burger Library , Gr.A.177