The problem of the economic repercussions of the Thirty Years War is regarded as the key to an understanding of economic developments within the German Reich throughout the 17 [th] and 18 [th] centuries. The issue has been the subject of radically different scholarly interpretations over the years and no reasonably cogent and satisfying account has as yet been provided. This somewhat unsatisfactory situation may be largely attributed to the following:

1. For a long period of time discussions and evaluation were, in many respects, coloured by an extremely ideological and political approach to the subject matter [1];

2. Local or regional research, which provides the empirical groundwork for evaluations of this nature, has been limited solely to the preparation of materials and has omitted to formulate problems in an organised way; this made it all the easier to apply the results of such research to an imaginary entity, "Germany", and to use these results to underpin idiosyncratic evaluations of the sort suggested under 1.

As a result a number of controversial interpretative approaches were formulated: Adherents of the "disastrous war theory" assumed that the war befell a country previously characterised by thriving economic growth with correspondingly devastating long-term effects; the adherents of the "earlier decline" theory on the other hand took the view that signs of economic decay in Germany were already apparent in the preceding decades, but that the war accentuated this trend and set back the economic, political and cultural development of the German nation to an especially low level for a long period of time. Finally after the Second World War, Siegfried H. Steinberg introduced a "new interpretation" which, leaving aside previous assertions of catastrophe and decline, took earlier re-evaluative tendencies to their logical conclusion and played down the economic effects of decades of war entirely. Without making convincing reference to any of the research available, Steinberg's contention was that, while the population of Germany may have suffered geographical dislocation, it actually increased rather than decreased between 1600 and 1650, and the same was true of the economy: What was discernible was not economic decline but reorientation and changes in the regional location of trade and commerce. [2] "All in all, national income, productivity and the standard of living were higher in 1650 than at the beginning of the century." [3] Only when compared with other western European states such as England, the Netherlands and France, which were able to develop much more rapidly, would Germany appear to have stagnated. Despite the problematic nature of these assertions, taken individually and as a whole, they have continued to attract distinguished advocates right up to the present day. [4]

The obvious difficulties of attempts to weigh up and determine the effects of the war in terms more precise than "disaster", long-term "decline" or, at worst, a slackening in the pace of economic growth, relate on the one hand to the fact that the various levels of political, economic and social analysis cannot be approached in isolation from one another but need to be regarded in terms of the close interrelations prevailing between them. On the other hand, difficulties are also posed by the (closely related) issue of the adequate exploitation and interpretation of the sources. Research efforts would presumably have the best chance of navigating between the Scylla of sweeping appraisal and the Charybdis of obsessive data collection if they were based on a systematic array of analytical questions relating to the respective economic conditions in particular regions and the long-term relations between them before, during and after the war. A series of linked, optimally co-ordinated studies of this sort would probably offer us the best possible opportunity of arriving at a reliable and appropriately differentiated verdict on the economic effects of the war. In any case, it is advisable to be on one's guard against more or less speculative projections on the "all in all" level of a non-existent national economy as well as against the uncritical adoption of modern notions of growth which are hardly able to do justice to the economic conditions prevalent in central Europe during the period.

The following is an attempt to apply the regional approach on a limited scale to the largest and most self-contained territory in south-western Germany, the duchy of Württemberg. Württemberg was one of the regions of Germany most severely affected by the war. This was true not just in terms of the well-known and established losses suffered by the population, but also in terms of the whole regional economy. Our knowledge is much more limited regarding the latter however - not owing to a lack of sources, but because the sources available have not as yet been examined with the due care and attention which they merit. Above all there is a lack of the sort of structural data needed to achieve a reasonable idea of the magnitude of economic activities and thus of the work and transactions in which people at the time were engaged.

Pertinent documentary evidence was usually produced whenever the authorities themselves wished to assert financial claims or sought to indemnify themselves against claims from the other side. This was also the origin of the so-called war damage reports drawn up by the Government of Württemberg in 1652 to parry the petitions and appeals which were expected to be levelled against the duchy and estates "owing to current debts" and to ward off "any other intolerable exactions" as a preventive measure. It was for this reason that, in a general proclamation on 28.8.1652, the government in Stuttgart required all towns and local districts in the duchy of Württemberg to report on

1. "the number of households of which this wretched war has robbed our utterly depopulated duchy measured against former times of peace and perfect concord."

2. how many vineyards, fields, meadows and other tracts of land "still lie uncultivated, barren and waste" and

3. how many towns and villages, churches and tracts of land as well as noble castles and estates "have been burnt down and lie in ruins with irreparable war damage or which have been so badly battered as to remain uninhabited and left to go to ruin, and other such woeful vestiges of the pernicious war such as are to be met with time and again in our land and duchy.". Government official were instructed to enrol the help of the burghermasters and courts to gather exact information about each and every locality without delay. [5]

The main political concern was thus clear and was reflected in the "Specification" which the government drafted for the Regenbsburg Reichstag using the information received from the towns and local districts. Moreover the government in Stuttgart attached great importance to receiving as detailed information as possible and pursued the matter tenaciously if the data submitted was not precise enough.

The outcome of these endeavours was the "Specification of the billets, pecuniary contributions, pillaging, peace money and Römermonate (basic tax voted by the Diet) which the duchy of Württemberg has been compelled perforce to disburse, bear and tolerate from the outbreak of war de Anno 1628.629.630 to the present year of 1654 " [6] The tally amounted to a hefty sum (fl = guldens):

1) From 1.1.1628 to October 1634 Württemberg paid cash sums to the value of 6,354,325 fl to the warring parties

2) From October 1634 to the Restitution of the Duke in November 1638 the state defrayed the costs of billets and "extortions" amounting to at least 45,007,000 fl

3) From November 1638 until the Imperial Peace of1648, sums were paid, almost entirely in cash, to billeted Imperial and Bavarian troops for the maintenance of occupied positions as well as "at times" to the French army amounting to 6,211,006 fl

4) From the conclusion of peace until the final evacuation of the Swabian Circle cash sums were paid to billeted Swedish and French troops and garrisons amounting to 719,553 fl

5) Provisions for the garrison in Heilbronn 26,883 fl

6) Reparations to Sweden 241,296 fl

7) 100 Römermonate approved and paid to the Emperor 182,800 fl

Total: 58,742,864 fl

According to the "Specification" this was exacerbated by the loss of 57,721 households ("Mannschaft"). 8 towns, 45 villages, 67 churches, 150 rectories and school buildings and 36,086 houses and barns were reported to have been burnt down and ruined, and 248,013 jaucherts(= 117.251 ha.) of arable land, 40,195 morgen(= 12,668 ha.) of vineyards and 24,503 morgen (= 7,722 ha.) of meadows were reported to be still uncultivated.

The accuracy of this information, which was at least submitted at the highest official levels and occasionally even at the parish level, was often problematic enough in itself. The most reliable information was probably the data pertaining to the "Mannschaft" or households, which the responsible officer described as "plain and simple with no striking defects". [7] In other areas he was forced to work with estimated values as the local districts often failed to separate the areas according to categories (arable land, meadows and vineyards) and were highly inconsistent in their treatment of buildings.

The survey material for a new form of taxation which the destruction of the Thirty Years War necessitated is a great deal more reliable, although this has only been very selectively available and registered to date. The surveys provide us with a differentiated insight into the economic conditions prevailing in the duchy of Württemberg before the outbreak of war in 1634 and the situation several years after the end of the prolonged hostilities which adds a great deal to our present state of knowledge. These surveys also reflect the efforts made by the nobility and representatives of the estates to register and come to terms with the effects of the war as effectively as possible. The comparison between the situation before the "calamitous occupation of the land" or the "onerous incursion" by the Imperial troops after the battle of Nördlingen (5-6/9/1634) and the situation in 1655, which it was the function of the surveys to make, sheds light on a number of direct and indirect consequences of the war. And both the origin of the sources and their essentially sober contents removes any suspicion that they might simply be subjectively coloured, exaggeratedly edifying tales of atrocities recounted by this or that gentlemanly pastor the likes of whom may well have fallen easy victim to pillaging. [9] Another of its merits is that the information was collated several years after the end of the war and thus defuses any suspicion that the enormous drop in population reported was largely the result of a temporary flight from troops and belligerent action: Apparent losses of this sort had long since been compensated for by returning refugees. Owing to the immigration of outsiders into the region which was already beginning, hesitatingly, to occur at the time, the reports actually tend to give an excessively modest impression of the actual casualties incurred up to the end of the war. As a result, these reports cannot be taken entirely at face value. Their origin and the soundness of their contents still need to be examined.

It is precisely the genesis of these reports, drawn up by the towns and local districts in 1655 to provide the government and estates with information about the state of taxable property and the applicable taxation modalities, which speaks for their comparatively high quality: While, under the increasing pressure of the war, the government of Duke Eberhard III managed to enforce the first general tax directive in 1629 after dogged negotiations with the estates and thus established minimally equitable taxation principles throughout the whole land [10], the results recorded in the parish tax registers were very soon open to serious question given the losses and destruction caused by the war. After the war, the allocation formula for the tax levy no longer corresponded with the taxable capacity of the individual local districts and parishes and, given the generally lower level of economic productivity during an especially marked period of post-war depression, the inequities which arose as a result understandably gave rise to discontent.

As a result appeals from all parts of the country were made against taxation, there was a huge increase in tax arrears [11],and at the beginning of 1655 representatives from the Great Committee of the Diet lodged a request with the Duke for a new tax base to be established. [12] After protracted negotiations both parties agreed on the following procedure: With the aid of the mayors, town clerks and courts, the local district head officials were charged with evaluating the previous and current tax situation on the basis of specified questions and with reporting the results to the privy council within two months. The main objective of the whole undertaking was to bring about "full equality" in tax assessments based on the taxable capacity in each instance. In order to achieve this the following needed to be ascertained for the period before the "occupation of the land" and for the present:



- Households and citizenry;

- The main "subsistence or livelihoods of each locality";

- Number, property and assessment of day labourers "who can nowhere be satisfied with a wage or otherwise paid";

- The number of taxable buildings (houses, barns, mills, etc.);

Information about taxable tracts of

- meadow, grasslands and kitchen gardens;

- vineyards;

- arable land

- forests in private possession.

- Was currently uncultivated land subject to taxation and if so, at what rate? Did cultivated land bear the tax burden for uncultivated land without distinction and did every locality have to pay the tax laid down in 1629?

- Capital value of fruit, wine and money encumbrances;

- Capital value of trade and crafts "which in this time of little expense refuse to be bound to taxes or economy of any kind" but which demand "excessive payment" in cash; in particular both should be inspected to ensure that, compared with agriculture, they had been assessed "proportionately".

- Assessment of fishing waters;

- Interest-bearing capital from the towns and local districts together, each of the parishes and private persons.

As a basis for comparison, and given the loss of numerous land registers across the land, the Commission was instructed to draw on the tax papers of the Estates Parliament of 1629. The Commission was also charged with tracking down any arrears and paying particular attention to "whether it be precisely the wealthy who are being passed over, while the indifferently propertied and indigent are being held to their debts." [13]

After the reports had been received, a Commission made up of equal numbers of the Duke's and the Landtag's representatives examined the papers again in eleven local districts. These then confirmed the overall reliability of the data provided by the local districts, despite the discrepancies in detail between the reports. [14] With this material to hand, the Great Committee worked through the reports from the towns and local districts and considered how each town or parish could be reassessed. After the findings had been presented to the full committee, the Landtag used the papers to tackle each of the towns and local districts in alphabetical order, invited the representatives of each community to speak, heard the petitions of neighbouring communities, drew up their tax assessment and requested the opinion of the princely deputies. In this way the whole tax assessment procedure was completed in five days at the beginning of June 1656. [15]

Even though the reports by the local districts do not bear comparison with the with the methods of collecting statistical data used today, they nonetheless provide basic data for a relatively large area which, if treated with caution, enable the period before and after the war to be compared and certain conclusions to be drawn about economic conditions at the time and the changes to which they were subject as a result of the war. [16]

As far as the pre-war situation is concerned, the figures for the existing "Mannschaft", or independent (taxable peasant) households, enable the population density before the war to be calculated with reasonable accuracy [17]: Population density in the whole duchy was at least 50 people per sq. km but varied greatly depending on local farming productivity - while population density was less than 20 inhabitants per sq. km in the higher regions of the Alb and the Black Forest it rose to between 60 and 70 inhabitants per sq. km in the fertile lowland farming areas and peaked, almost without exception, in excess of 100 per sq. km in characteristically wine-growing regions. The duchy of Württemberg consequently came near the top in the rankings of the most densely populated regions in Germany and even in Europe as a whole. The fact that, in the decades before the war, population growth in Württemberg had obviously begun to subside would appear to permit the assumption that food supplies were increasingly being outstripped by population pressures. This assumption is also supported by the available comparative data on taxable agricultural acreage (arable land, meadows, vineyards). While these areas were certainly not simply identical with the actual land available - measurements were nothing like as accurate as modern standards, some agricultural holdings were exempt from tax, and a great deal of land was excluded from tax calculations. Nonetheless tax concessions were on the whole extremely limited, particularly in the duchy of Württemberg, and given the conditions prevailing at the time tracts of land which were not registered, such as parish property (pastures) or outlying farmland, may be regarded as decidedly marginal; as a result there are no grounds for assuming that areas such as these yielded a significant portion of the national product.

On the basis of a series of reasonably realistic assumptions about the pool of available slack labour, the amount of labour needed to till cultivable farmland, average harvest yields and the food needs of the population certain cautious conclusions may be drawn about the economic conditions prevailing in Württemberg before the Thirty Years War. These suggest that, assuming the land was put to more or less rational use, agriculture and forestry would have provided a livelihood for around 70 percent of the labour force. Grain production calculated for the local districts registered covered 85 percent of requirements which would have made considerable additional imports necessary. Fragmentary contemporary evidence does at least clearly indicate that supplies of food in Württemberg were falling further below requirements and that so much marginal land was being put to the plough that not even the forests were spared and that, in more densely inhabited areas, cattle rearing was reduced wherever possible in favour of more intensive arable farming and that this in turn led to a deterioration in soil qualities as a result of excessive manuring. Consumption of meat, animal protein and fat was correspondingly low and was further limited by official measures. The planting of vineyards on the other hand was the most important process of agricultural intensification to take place in Württemberg in the century before the Thirty Years War. Previously unused or poorly used steep sloping, forested and pasture land, but also arable land, was planted with vines: "Neckarwein" founds its way to Upper Swabia, Bavaria, Austria, Switzerland and northern Germany. And yet taking the requisite labour into account, profits remained significantly below those generated by the cultivation of cereals, despite demand from beyond the region itself. If arable land was nonetheless converted into vineyards, this is yet another indication of the plentiful supply of labour available.

All the more so as employment opportunities outside of the agricultural sector remained scarce. The available records suggest that a relatively large section of the population in Württemberg was engaged in various crafts and trades quite early on: indeed in the early 18 [th] century, before the population had recovered to pre-war levels, a quarter or more of all households made their living from trades or crafts. Nonetheless these sources of gainful employment mainly supplemented work on small plots of agricultural land. It would also seem reasonable to assume that, in the context of increasingly scarce agricultural resources, growing population pressure sought an outlet in domestic craft and cottage industries, especially in the case of textile production (spinning and weaving) which concentrated on the manufacture of woollen cloths in the Württemberg Black Forest (with its centre in Calw) and linen on the Swabian Alb. Even if one takes account of sources of gainful employment in princely or ecclesiastical service, trade and transport, the figures still suggest an overall unemployment rate of 15%. In reality that would imply the underemployment of a far larger section of the population.

After what has been said it should come as no surprise that growing population pressure also clearly heightened existing disparities in income and wealth. Contemporary reports of increasing prosperity alongside growing poverty only appear inconsistent at the first glance as it was mainly the distribution of scarce and coveted real property, or rather the claims to the obligations such as encumbrances and tithes which accrued to its owners, which was the major factor influencing the distribution of income and wealth. Only the ownership of extensive tracts of land could guarantee the fulfilment of subsistence requirements while such ownership also offered the opportunity of profiting from the open market, opportunities which were all the greater given the high demand generated by the growth in population. On the other hand, at least the real value of wages and to some extent even nominal wages fell. The need to escape from a perilous dependence on the food and labour markets was expressed in an urge to acquire land, a tendency which itself led to a phenomenal rise in land and property prices and drove large sections of the population into debt. This did not of course constitute a risk as long as land prices continued to rise. However, as soon as the population, and consequently the demand for food, began to fall again, indebtedness threatened to become an excessive burden, as proved the case after the Thirty Years War.

The overall economic situation in Württemberg before the war presented neither a picture of a flourishing economy nor that of one dominated by decline. Growing population pressure accompanied by comparatively limited absolute economic growth almost certainly resulted in falling real per-capita income over a longer period. Neither did intensification processes such as the extensive planting of vineyards and expansion of export-oriented wool and linen production have any really major impact on this state of affairs. Conditions such as these only exacerbated the unequal distribution of income and wealth further. Large sections of the population must have lived a life marked by underemployment, malnutrition and, in the case of poor harvests, acute misery and a startling rise in the mortality rate.

It is against this background that the effects of the war need to be evaluated. Initially taxes rose to unprecedented levels, and more and more billets had to be provided for travelling attachments of troops. While the effects of the ill-famed "Kipper und Wipper" or see-saw era, 1621/22, characterised by the minting of debased currency to finance the increasing costs of the war, were still far removed from those of modern hyperinflation, they nonetheless resulted in a fourfold increase in grain prices - equivalent to the effects of a disastrously poor harvest - and were thus felt directly by wage-dependent labourers. The varying intensity in the debasement of currency resulted in stark price differentials in neighbouring regions and gave rise to the specious economic prosperity of the sort reflected in the three-fold increase in Württemberg's custom revenues. Nevertheless, the government in Württemberg attempted to mitigate the effects of the catastrophe on its own population by introducing price ceilings and prohibiting the export of foods; statutory endeavours to prevent the repayment of debts with debased money were also designed to achieve the same objective.

It was only after the autumn of 1634 with the first serious incursion of Imperial troops in 1634/35 that the full force of the war was felt in the duchy, transforming it into one of the most devastated areas in Germany. The interruption of the harvest, the pillage to which nearly every town and village was subject, huge movements of refugees, the sudden decline in cereal production combined with the additional, usually unfinanced, demand generated by enemy troops - all this led to acute famine and reinforced the impact of fatal epidemic diseases indiscriminately known as "the plague" carried by the army and spread throughout the whole country by the military and a population in flight. In contrast with earlier epidemic outbreaks, the scourges of war, disease, hunger and a fleeing population reinforced one another reciprocally over a relatively long period of time: The catastrophic invasion of 1634/35 was followed by numerous troop movements, the provision of summer and winter quarters for various belligerent forces with all the afflictions that these brought with them. Reports provide clear and reliable evidence of the long-term effects: The population level throughout the region in this period was only 43% of that for the period before the "calamitous occupation of the land"; the range of variation across local districts was between 69 and 23 percent. These substantial regional variations were the result of differences in the intensity of enemy action: Communities in the war corridors of the main military transit routes or other strategically important locations suffered the most, more remote communities were less dramatically affected; towns, better protected by their walls against marauding bands and small military troops, attracted immigrants from the surrounding areas and thus appeared to be less drastically affected.

This demographic catastrophe was far more the result of epidemics and hunger than a direct effect of war however. This was also reflected in the numerous marks of destruction which the war left behind it. Compared with the losses suffered by the population, a large proportion of buildings, 57 percent, were preserved, albeit in a parlous state of dereliction after being abandoned and neglected or because they had been stripped bare by the military or civil population as a convenient source of building and fire wood.

Apart from wine growing, which only reached about 40 percent of its pre-war levels, agricultural lands were worked again to a far greater extent than the decline in population would have warranted: Plots of garden land in the immediate vicinity of communities were fully cultivated, most of the meadows, and a considerable 58 percent of the arable land. And, because marginal lands had of course been left fallow, agricultural yields probably almost matched those of the pre-war period, despite recurrent complaints about overgrown fields. Clearly many exploited the opportunity this presented to increase their exploitation of the soil to improve their own food requirements and in the hope of making a healthy profit. However as the fall in population meant that previous markets were now in a much better position to cover their own subsistence needs, the overproduction which inevitably followed resulted in the high grain prices of the pre-war and war period falling to unprofitable levels. If, despite a chorus of complaints about the widening gap between subsiding grain prices on the one hand and unwontedly high wages and prices for trade and craft products on the other, peasant smallholders made no attempt to deploy their labour and capital more profitably, this was in part because the economic situation affecting a number of crafts and trades was scarcely much better. As it was, demand for craft and trade products had to come from those working the land, but remained weak and restricted to the bare necessities owing to the reduction in sales of agricultural products and the poor prices which these commanded. It was building craftsmen and day labourers whose labour was particularly in demand who were able to profit from low grain prices, while other craftsmen and artisans were forced to work for a daily wage or to turn to husbandry if they were to avoid underemployment.

There were apparently sufficient agricultural implements and draught cattle available to cultivate comparatively large tracts of land however. Nonetheless, farmers were frequently compelled to acquire cattle on credit from well beyond the local area (e.g., from Alsace). Capital remained scarce. The dearth of capital also contributed to the decline in wine growing, especially as the prices for plain wines in particular collapsed. As a result winegrowers retreated back to the lowlands where, lacking capital resources of their own, they soon became even more dependent than before on financiers who lent money with a view to the next grape harvest.

The huge reduction in the population meant that people's basic nutritional needs were better met in the decades following the war than they had been before its disastrous outbreak. In this respect the effects of the war were similar to those of the catastrophic plague in the middle of the 14 [th] century, in terms of the shift in trade-off between agricultural products on the one hand and commercial products and human labour on the other. In other respects, however, there were major differences between the two economic depressions in the middle of the 14 [th] and in the 17 [th] century: After the Thirty Years War, it was mainly the stock of agricultural capital which needed replenishing; at the same time, by the end of the war the whole economy was burdened by huge debts and tax liabilities. In order to pay the taxes, war contributions and similar demands made during the war, the Estates, but also the towns and local districts were forced time and again to raise credit. Thanks to the well-established credit system the warring parties were able to acquire extended loans backed up by the future revenues generated in the countries concerned. And as a large amount of credit was acquired from abroad or the pertinent bonds were bought up by foreign creditors, particularly in Switzerland, redemption and interest payments also flowed abroad exacerbating the shortage of capital at home.

Stocks of movable goods and capital were reduced to a fraction of their former value. At the same time the value of real estate collapsed entirely owing to the fall in population and the associated drop in demand for accommodation and food: With strong regional variations, average prices probably slumped to about 75 percent of their pre-war levels. The effects of the war were such that previously manageable levels of debt acquired with the purchase of land were soon transformed into an excess of liabilities over assets and even a nominally static level of indebtedness now meant a fourfold increase in real loan payments. However, the available data shows that even the nominal value of per-capita private debt was higher than that for 1629 and local and district debts are estimated to have risen to four times their previous nominal values, while taxable real estate capital was only worth a quarter of its 1629 value. Taken as a whole, it would seem fair to conclude that the real level of indebtedness (measured against real estate prices at the time) had increased at least fourfold.

These rather sparing and highly abstract findings could be amplified by the wealth of colourful and differentiated detail provided in the local district reports. The pertinent information was usually assessed from the perspective of those who had been better off before the war, from the point of view of the more prosperous peasant and burgher classes. This perhaps explains the almost stereotypical tone of these reports, the complaints about the fall in grain prices, the rising costs of waged craftsmen and the fact that it was hardly worth tilling the land anymore, the lamentations about the loss of previously profitable sources of income - the sale of timber for ships to Holland, of domestic sales of firewood and commercial timber, the profitable sale of wine, the carting of wine and wood, the extra earnings which used to be made from fruit growing before most of the orchards were cut down, profitable livestock farming - to name but a few of the most important sources of income.

It made perfect sense for the government of Württemberg to attempt to come to the aid of these sections of the population in particular, regarded as they were as the pillars of territorial prosperity. The revival of the agricultural economy was undoubtedly the most important aspect of any attempt to break the post-war economic stagnation gripping the land. The greatest effect could be achieved by reducing existing levies. The government hardly had a great deal of room to manoeuvre however. The Duke and the Estates attempted to achieve a more equitable distribution of tax burdens by collecting more heavily from those engaged in trade and craft production. More important however were measures taken to adjust the debt on real property to take more realistic account of its actual, reduced value, this being a prerequisite for the rapid movement of people back to the land: As long as the re-establishment of households was associated with the acquisition of war-induced burdens in the form of debts and taxes, newcomers would continue to delay taking up residence and would continue to sell their itinerant labour at comparatively high prices. The parishes however dispensed with taxation for new residents altogether fearing otherwise that they would move on again. In the end Württemberg failed to pave the way for a rigorous reduction of debts. The repayment of 75% of interest arrears was anchored in Imperial law. For taxpayers in Württemberg it was a significant success that the Württemberg assembly was able to reach an amicable settlement with its creditors which foresaw a reduction by half in interest and capital re-payments. But even then the nominal tax burden remained around twice as high as in the pre-war period or had almost quadrupled if calculated on a per capita basis.

Probably more effective however was the reassessment of debts and creditor claims on a private basis and the clarification of the right of title to vacated land and holdings. In this context debts were reduced to an upper limit of a third by way of settlement. In this way further redistribution, which would have led to a noticeable consolidation of estates and have threatened traditional agrarian structures, was prevented from the outset.

Other attempts by the government to improve the position of the agricultural economy in terms of labour markets and sales of agricultural products were not especially successful: The numerous price ordinances which, with their allusions to "Christian justness" and "Christian love", were aimed at depressing the price for waged labour and craft production to the benefit of agricultural economy, did not provide the government with the sort of leverage over economic affairs which it sought. The same was true of the official minimum prices for grain, although these were only fixed later in 1672. Nor is it likely that attempts to ward off imported goods and to divert existing demand towards domestic products were particularly efficacious. Sumptuary laws or import bans, particularly on textiles and wine, failed to affect the market in any very tangible way.

The burgeoning mercantilist approach to economic policy after the war remained firmly within the bounds defined by the traditional legal, economic and social order. As far as we can tell, land taxes continued to be levied to the same extent as previously, and only very modest exemptions were granted for the re-cultivation of deserted holdings. This and the reluctance to adopt an appreciably more lenient approach to religious toleration were both hindrances blocking a more rapid resettlement of the land. In contrast to, e.g. the Elector of the Palatinate Karl Ludwig, Württemberg thus abstained from exploiting the most effective means of implementing a successful immigration policy - the majority of those moving into southwest Germany were from the Catholic and reformed Alpine regions, from the Tyrol, Bavaria and, above all, Switzerland and, confronted with residency restrictions for non-Lutherans, they only very hesitatingly found their way into the duchy. The impressive average rate of population growth of 1.8 percent a year between 1652 and 1678 is largely explained by the high excess of births over deaths in the post-war period which produced a ratio of children and young people aged up to 14 or 15 years to the overall population of around 40 and 50 percent.

In Württemberg as elsewhere, the Thirty Years War altered the economic situation and presented new economic opportunities. Obviously it would be too simple to argue without qualification that the war brought a decline to a previously flourishing economy; the economic situation at the time was already showing too many signs of strain, even of overstrain, under the pressure of population growth. That the war itself represented a catastrophic irruption into the considerable material culture of the period and that it could draw nourishment from the substance of this culture for so long is undisputed. The war was not however followed by a long and sustained period of economic decline or stagnation, but by a period of arduous economic reconstruction. If this process of development was interrupted and retarded for a protracted period in the 17 [th] and early 18 [th] centuries because of the wars with Louis XIV's France, this can largely be ascribed to the political and military constellation with which southwest Germany was confronted at the end of the Thirty Years War with the weakening of Imperial structures and the emergence of France's power base in Alsace and on the upper Rhine.