Mainz Book of Peace

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The Mainz Peace Book (also: Friedebrief or Friedgebot ) is a collection of statutes for the protection of urban peace, which were issued by the Mainz city council, summarized in writing and continuously supplemented from the beginning of the 14th century. For the citizens of the Free City of Mainz , the Mainz Book of Peace was of great importance in regulating public life in the late Middle Ages.

Creation and processing

Until around the turn of the 13th to 14th century, legal regulations on public life in the city of Mainz increased sharply, especially in the form of city council statutes and so-called civil agreements. Public city life was thus regulated in increasingly complex regulations. These are received for the first time from the year 1300 and became the basis for the Peace Book, which collected and organized these provisions. Further additions are known from the years 1335 and again from 1352. Mainz City Counsel and town clerk Konrad Humery edited in 1437 the last time the Mainz peace book of the "Free City of Mainz".

Content

Basic regulations that ensured peace in the city applied to arbitrary violence among the citizens. Carrying arms, rioting or collusion with enemies of the city were forbidden, as was blood revenge or the violent expansion of the numerous feuds within the city. Furthermore, penalties for violent quarrels, injuries and manslaughter were defined, which were punished by the mayor and the city council with fines and evictions.

The statutes of the city of Mainz, laid down in the Peace Book, reached its limits when the death penalty was imposed. The secular court appointed by the archbishop was responsible for this, which restricted the autonomy of the Mainz city council in legal questions and actions.

meaning

The Mainz Peace Book was of great importance for the citizens of the city of Mainz in the late Middle Ages and can be roughly compared with a Basic Law. As part of a day of oaths, it was read out publicly every year at the swearing-in of new magistrates and the citizens' homage to the new mayors, and all participants re-conjured it. Violations of the provisions enacted in the Peace Book and thus this public oath were consequently regarded as a breach of the oath and punished accordingly.

literature

  • Wolfgang Dobras : The book of peace as a municipal constitution, Mainz, 1437. P. 77. In: Gutenberg, aventur and art. From secret company to the first media revolution. Catalog for the exhibition of the city of Mainz, publisher: City of Mainz, editor Wolfgang Dobras. Mainz 2000.
  • Ludwig Falck : The free city in its heyday 1244-1328. In: Franz Dumont, Ferdinand Scherf, Friedrich Schütz (Hrsg.): Mainz - The history of the city. Verlag Philipp von Zabern, Mainz 1999 (2nd edition), ISBN 3-805-32000-0

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ This version of the Mainz Peace Book from 1437 is now kept in the Mainz City Archives 4/50.