Auf der Walz

[Tamrin]

Auf der Walz

[Excerpts - Article by Sabine Barnhart, www.lewrockwell.com/2004/01/sabine-barnhart/auf-der-waltz/ - Linked Above]

"Auf der Walz" is a German expression that means traveling on the job. It is a centuries-old custom that was started by the Craftsmen Guilds of Europe, around the Middle Ages, and is still practiced there. A young man could enter the apprenticeship of a stonemason, carpenter, roofer or furniture-maker under the supervision of a master of his chosen craft, performing at first menial work for very little money.

Each year his responsibilities increase and if he proves himself trustworthy his wages are increased. When his three-year apprenticeship is up, he is considered a fellow (Geselle) after he’s taken a final exam. Then these young men and women are encouraged to go "Auf der Walz" if they want to take their learned craft and become a master.

In the past it was required to travel before becoming a master. Now it is voluntary and a matter of honor. The fellow, however, still has to be under the age of thirty and single and have accumulated no debt.

The decision to undertake this journey requires the fellow to remain outside a 50 km radius of his home. Once he acquired his craft after three years of apprenticeship, he will journey for two years and one day (in the past it was three to six years and one day), and can travel wherever he wants to including other European countries. Sometimes they will travel as far as Russia or Malaysia.

He will leave with only the bare necessities, literally packing only a bundle. He cannot return home until his journey is complete (with the exception of illness or death). His entire possessions consist of his craftsman's clothes (Zunft Kluft) and tools.

Most outfits for guilds are in black and white and adhere to strict dress codes. A proper outfit will be his black long pants, black shoes or boots, a white collarless shirt, and a velvet or corduroy vest with eight buttons (symbolizing an eight-hour work day). There's a colored scarf or tie that is pinned to the collar identifying his craft, sometimes necklaces that show the emblems of cities in which he worked, and a spiral walking-stick called Stenz that the fellow himself made. Last but not least his black wide-brimmed hat.

The hat is very important as it identifies him as a 'free' man, sent out into the world to learn his craft. His jacket will also be of black velvet or corduroy (depending on guild) with six buttons on the front (symbolizing a six-day work week). While "Auf der Walz" a stonemason will also wear a gold earring with the six-pointed star, which is a reminder of Solomon's temple built by the stonemasons.

There are quite a few young men and women going "Auf der Walz," traveling all over Europe and Asia Minor wearing their traditional Zunft Kluft. It is still seen as an honor representing their guild and learning about other customs, techniques and skills from other countries’ craftsmen. The wealth they return with is knowledge, and an experience that is undeniably unique and individual.

[Tamrin]

Taking it To the Streets
Germany's wandering artisans keep alive the ancient craft of the Walz

[Excerpt - Article by Ursula Sautter, Spezial-Ausgabe der TIME, Linked Above]

With its jumbled collection of rust-spotted portakabins, mortar mixers and rent-a-loos, the building site in Volgershall, a suburb of Lüneburg in Lower Saxony, is not unusual - except for the presence of a couple of odd-looking figures climbing over the plastic-shrouded scaffolding. Dressed in black bell-bottom trousers, white shirts, low-cut vests and large-brimmed hats, the men stand out from the rest of the construction workers like penguins in a gaggle of wild geese. These strange birds are traveling journeymen, members of an itinerant craft tradition that stretches back to medieval times.

In 1995, when he was 27, Richard Werner, part of the Volgershall crew, acquired his certificate of apprenticeship as a carpenter. Instead of settling into a comfortable career in his home village of Gersdorf near Augsburg, Bavaria, he decided to leave home and family to embark on the traditional Walz of the traveling journeyman - a period of at least three years and a day during which young artisans roam the world looking for temporary employment to gather experience in their crafts. Though custom demands that the Wandergesellen follow a set of strict rules - they may not enter a 50 km radius around their home town or remain in one place for more than three months - more and more people like Werner are following the calling. An estimated 500 traveling journeymen, about 10% of them women, from some 30 crafts are currently on the move-almost twice as many as 10 years ago.

The origin of the Walz in Central Europe lies in the Middle Ages. From the mid-13th Century onward journeymen - forced to leave the city of their apprenticeship by increasingly rigorous guild regulations designed to secure the livelihoods of resident master craftsmen - took to the road to earn their living elsewhere and gather the experience needed to become masters themselves. The free trade introduced by the Industrial Revolution did away with the need for travel by the mid-1800s, so the practice gradually fizzled out. lt threatened to vanish entirely until, in the wake of the workers' movements at the end of the 19th century, a handful of newly established journeymen brotherhoods, called Schächte, revived the custom in Germany.

[Tamrin]

Ami Weber, Wandergesellin (Journeywoman)

[Tamrin]

Traveling Tradesman

[Article - Swissnex, Boston, Consulate of Switzerland - Linked Above]

"Auf der Walz" or "Auf Wanderschaft" is a German expression that means traveling on the job. It is a centuries-old custom that was started by the Craftsmen Guilds of Europe, around the Middle Ages, and is still practiced there. A young man could enter the apprenticeship of a stonemason, carpenter, roofer or furniture-maker under the supervision of a master of his chosen craft, performing at first menial work for very little money.

This Monday four young and strong Tradesman from Switzerland and Germany visited us.

Each year his responsibilities increase and if he proves himself trustworthy his wages are increased. When his three-year apprenticeship is up, he is considered a fellow (Geselle) after he’s taken a final exam. Then these young men and women are encouraged to go "Auf der Walz" if they want to take their learned craft and become a master.

In the past it was required to travel before becoming a master. Now it is voluntary and a matter of honor. The fellow, however, still has to be under the age of thirty and single and have accumulated no debt.

The decision to undertake this journey requires the fellow to remain outside a 50 km radius of his home. Once he acquired his craft after three years of apprenticeship, he will journey for two years and one day (in the past it was three to six years and one day), and can travel wherever he wants to including other European countries. Sometimes they will travel as far as Russia or Malaysia.

He will leave with only the bare necessities, literally packing only a bundle. He cannot return home until his journey is complete (with the exception of illness or death). His entire possessions consist of his craftsman's clothes (Zunft Kluft) and tools.

Most outfits for guilds are in black and white and adhere to strict dress codes. A proper outfit will be his black long pants, black shoes or boots, a white collarless shirt, and a velvet or corduroy vest with eight buttons (symbolizing an eight-hour work day). There's a colored scarf or tie that is pinned to the collar identifying his craft, sometimes necklaces that show the emblems of cities in which he worked, and a spiral walking-stick called Stenz that the fellow himself made. Last but not least his black wide-brimmed hat.

[Tamrin]

The Felt Makers Company were first Incorporated in London, 1604

The Associated Felt Makers of the United Kingdom of Great Briton and Ireland



WE ASSIST EACH OTHER IN TIME OF NEED.

1820: 'We assist each other in time of need' is the motto of the Associated Felt Makers of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. A young traveller arrives at a craftsman's workshop in need of assistance, and is offered a beer by a serving maid. Two rabbits huddle in the corner. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

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