504 MUXRO— THE COST OF LIVING 



The fabliaux, or " laughable stories told in verse," the especial 

 literature of the merchant class, began about the middle of the 

 twelfth century. In these tales class-consciousness is very evident. 

 Thev ridiculed the knights and the clergy, while always depicting 

 the latter as wealthy. Some of these fabliaux, which were written 

 for the merchants of the twelfth century, sound curiously modern, 

 as if they might have been told in the nineteenth century in our own 

 western states. They are frequently irreverent, and show an inde- 

 pendence of thought which is very noteworthy in this early period. 

 Their attitude toward women is entirely at variance with that of 

 the courtly literature of the age. In fact, the merchants were think- 

 ing for themselves, and were no longer willing to be subservient to 

 the nobility and the clerg}-. They were rapidly becoming important 

 political factors, and were winning recognition from the monarchs. 

 They were vying in comfort and luxury with the nobles, and fre- 

 quently ineffective sumptuary laws were enacted to restrict these 

 nouvcaux riches. 



As yet too little attention has been paid to this change in the 

 standard of living and its eft'ects. In this paper an attempt has been 

 made to set forth only a few of the facts, merely to indicate the 

 nature and importance of the problem. Every one of the subjects 

 here discussed is susceptible of elaboration, and needs to be worked 

 out in detail for each country of western Europe and each period in 

 the twelfth century. The material is voluminous : as indicated 

 above, the legal documents should be utilized for the definite state- 

 ments which they contain, and the literature of the age should be 

 laid under contribution for its information as to the character, cus- 

 toms and points of view of the various classes. The chronicles un- 

 fortunately will furnish comparatively little, because they generally 

 give only the unusual events ; statements about prices drawn from 

 them are frequently of little value, because the figures are given on 

 account of their extreme highness or lowness. This field, as a whole, 

 oft'ers a good op|)ortunity for many monographs, and such work is 

 essential before we can understand the economic history of the 

 century which was most important in the advance of western Europe. 



U.M\KRsnv OK Wisconsin^ 

 Madison. Wis. 



