KNOWLEDGE PRACTICES IN THE ESTABLISHMENT AND REPRODUCTION OF THE MINING ELITE IN SAXONY, 1765-1868 - Brill
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KNOWLEDGE PRACTICES IN THE ESTABLISHMENT AND REPRODUCTION OF THE MINING ELITE IN SAXONY, 1765–1868 Hartmut Schleiff Introduction The present article employs Bourdieu’s methodology as an analytical tool for discussing the connection between education and professional advancement in Saxony’s mining administration between 1765 and 1868. In doing this, it is necessary, on the one hand, to highlight education (a crucial aspect of “cultural capital”,1 in Bourdieu’s terminology) as an important factor in upward mobility, but it is equally important to focus on sources that concretely illustrate his conception of the “habitus”. Bour- dieu defines “habitus” as “systems of durable, transposable dispositions, structured structures predisposed to function as structuring structures, that is, as principles of the generation and structuring of practices and representations.”2 Analytically, then, the aim is to understand the rela- tionship between dispositions (which enable someone to do something) on the one hand and cultural patterns of action on the other hand, which (over a longer period of time) establish a social order. Transgenerational comparison will be used here in order to uncover explicit and implicit pat- terns of action, which can be established actively or taken up passively. Cameralism and Mining References to “encouraging” and “animating” [Aufmuntern] miners abound in cameralist writing on mining. They help us understand the extent to which the social order of Saxony’s mining administration, the so-called Bergstaat, was structured by practices of symbolic classification that revolved around questions of honour. The task of improving mining 1 See Pierre Bourdieu, ‘Ökonomisches Kapital, kulturelles Kapital, soziales Kapital’, in Reinhard Kreckel (ed.), Soziale Ungleichheiten (Göttingen 1983), 183–198 and id., Homo aca- demicus (Frankfurt/M. 1998), 244ff. 2 Pierre Bourdieu, Outline of a Theory of Practice (Cambridge 1977), 72. © Hartmut Schleiff, 2013 | doi:10.1163/9789004243910_036 This is an open access chapter distributed under the terms of the CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 license. Hartmut Schleiff - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com03/05/2022 08:34:55PM via free access
828 hartmut schleiff was outlined in 1766 by Johann Heinrich Gottlob Justi, a cameralist who was very familiar with the situation in Saxony. Justi had taught fiscal accounting, commerce and mining at the Theresianum in Vienna; he had inspected the mining facilities of Schemnitz as a Habsburg mining coun- cillor; he was to become a mining councillor in Brunswick-Luneburg and a mining administrator in Prussia. Justi wrote that “the rulers’ measures to enhance mining can be primarily divided into three classes: 1) The subjects are to be encouraged and given incentives to engage in mining; 2) mining must be organized so as to favour the development and exploi- tation of new mines; 3) the mining sciences are to be brought to greater perfection in order to educate able and skilled subjects.”3 Such “encouragement” of mining targeted the “tribe of mountain- eers . . . since none of the other classes of the state’s dwellers easily adapts to this way of life, which is arduous and often involves danger to life and limb but nonetheless provides no more than a scanty livelihood. There is no estate deserving of more encouragement and less able to accommodate depression”, the Saxon audit commission’s mining report stated in 1771.4 The report took up suggestions that had already been made within the cameralist sciences, by Justi among others, in the mid-eighteenth century.5 In his 1766 System des Finanzwesens, Justi had described the specific con- ditions of mining in a similar fashion. The miners, Justi wrote, performed “work that is dangerous and detrimental to human health.”6 Hence, he 3 Johann Heinrich Gottlob von Justi, System des Finanzwesens, nach vernünftigen aus dem Endzweck der bürgerlichen Gesellschaften, und aus der Natur aller Quellen der Einkün- fte des Staats hergeleiteten Grundsätzen und Regeln (Halle 1766), 262: “Die Maßregeln der Regenten, um den Bergbau zu befördern, lassen sich vornehmlich in drey Classen brin- gen. Es müssen nämlich 1) die Unterthanen zum Bergbau aufgemuntert und angereizet werden; 2) die Art und Weise des Bergbaues muß zur Aufnahme und Beförderung dessel- ben eingerichtet werden; und 3) die Bergwerkswissenschaften müssen in größere Vollkom- menheit gesetzet und tüchtige und geschickte Subjecte in denselben erzogen werden.” 4 ‘Revisionsbericht von Friedrich Anton von Heynitz, Carl Eugen Pabst von Ohain und Johann Polycarpus Leyser, 1771’, ed. by Hans Baumgärtel, in id., Bergbau und Absolutismus: Der sächsische Bergbau in der zweiten Hälfte des 18. Jahrhunderts und Maßnahmen zu seiner Verbesserung nach dem Siebenjährigen Kriege (Leipzig 1963), 175: “Stamm der Bergleute selbst . . . da von den andern Claßen der Landes-Einwohner, niemand leicht zu dieser müh- seligen, öfters mit Leib- und Lebensgefahr verknüpfften, in den meisten Fällen aber der Gesundheit nachtheiligen, und gleichwohl nur den notdürfftigsten Unterhalt gewähren- den Lebens-Art übergeht. Kein Stand hat also mehr Aufmunterung nöthig, und kan weniger Bedrückung aushalten.” 5 See Justi 1766 (note 3), 286f. 6 Ibid.: “gefährliche und der menschlichen Gesundheit nachtheilige Arbeiten”. Hartmut Schleiff - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com03/05/2022 08:34:55PM via free access
knowledge practices in the establishment 829 argued, they should be encouraged to engage in mining by being granted “modest liberties and privileges.”7 Justi thus recommended: The welfare that is to be provided by the mining and financial adminis- tration boards for these workers must not only include the provision of care in cases of injury and sickness, for the purpose of which one needs mining hospitals, mining physicians and mining surgeons, but also the pro- vision of livelihood for workers who are no longer able to work. For that purpose, in most of the well-administered mines, miners’ guild insurance funds were established from which old or incapacitated miners receive a basic livelihood.8 Calls for the establishment of academic institutions concerned with min- ing, by Justi and others, preceded the founding of the Freiberg and Schem- nitz mining academies by a number of years.9 On this point, Justi agreed with the Saxonian commission councillor Carl Friedrich Zimmermann and his work Von der Beschaffenheit einer Bergakademie of 1746,10 which likely emerged from Zimmermann’s discussions with the mining admin- istrator Johann Friedrich Henckel, with whom Zimmermann had been on friendly terms.11 Justi subsumed the mining academies under “economic academies, societies and seminaries”,12 which “would be of great use for the common good, particularly as mining and naval academies, manu- factory and handicrafts schools, mechanical schools and others.”13 In his 7 Ibid., 287: “mäßige Freyheiten und Vorzüge”. 8 Ibid.: “Die Vorsorge der Berg- und Finanz-Collegiorum vor diese Arbeiter, muß sich also nicht allein dahin erstrecken, daß sie bey Beschädigungen und Krankheiten umsonst mit Heilung, Cur und Pflegung versehen werden, zu welchem Ende Berg-Hospitalia, Berg- Medici und Berg-Wundärzte nöthig sind; sondern man muß auch vor deren Unterhalt sorgen, wenn sie nicht mehr zu arbeiten im Stande sind. Daher hat man bey den meisten ansehnlichen Bergwerken sogenannte Knappschafts- und Hütten-Cassen errichtet, woraus alte, oder zur Arbeit unfähige Berg- und Hütten-Arbeiter ihren nothdürftigen Unterhalt bekommen.” 9 See Johann Heinrich Gottlob von Justi, Abhandlungen von den Mitteln die Erkenntnis in den Oeconomischen und Cameral-Wissenschaften dem gemeinen Wesen recht nützlich zu machen (Göttingen 1755), 15. 10 See Carl Friedrich Zimmermann, ‘Von der Beschaffenheit einer Bergakademie’, Ober- Sächsische Berg-Academie: in welcher die Bergwercks-Wissenschaften nach ihren Grund- Wahrheiten untersuchet, und nach ihrem Zusammenhange entworffen werden 1 (1746), 9–56. The title of the first (1746) edition of “Ober-Sächsische Berg-Academie”, a periodical edited by Zimmermann, anticipated the Academy’s future name years in advance. 11 See Walther Herrmann, Bergrat Henckel: ein Wegbereiter der Bergakademie (Freiberg 1962), 101f. 12 Justi 1755 (note 9), 15: “oeconomische Academien, Societäten und Seminaria”. 13 Ibid.: “als Berg und Marine Academien, Manufactur- und Handwerksschulen, mecha- nische Realschulen und dergleichen vor das gemeine Wesen von große[m] Nutzen seyn würden.” Hartmut Schleiff - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com03/05/2022 08:34:55PM via free access
830 hartmut schleiff Grundsätze[n] der Policey-Wissenschaft, the second edition of which was published before the Freiberg and Schemnitz mining academies were founded, Justi recommended that practitioners of the mining sciences should “provide good teaching in such matters at universities as well as in specific mining academies.”14 In order to encourage the “tribe of miners”15 that resided in Saxony to engage in mining for generations to come, various measures had to be taken, the audit commission’s report argued, pointing out that the Seven Years’ War had caused vacancies which needed to be filled. The “encouragement” of mining and miners was to be achieved by establish- ing “proper uniform, simple and brief rights and special judges”, as well as ensuring appropriate wages, low grain prices and widows’ funds. Further- more, he recommended “more general education for the mountaineers as well as advanced teaching for capable subjects, who will take up careers as officials in the mining administration.”16 The fact that the uniform is mentioned first is indicative of the importance that cameralist thought placed on the symbolic order of “social space”.17 “Should and Should Wish to”: Ordering Saxony’s Bergstaat Immediately after the sovereign had founded the Mining Academy in 1765,18 which represented one of the most significant changes in Saxon’s min- ing administration since the mining regulations of the sixteenth century, 14 Johann Heinrich Gottlob von Justi, Grundsätze der Policey-Wissenschaft in einem vernünftigen, auf den Endzweck der Policey gegründeten, Zusammenhange und zum Gebrauch Academischer Vorlesungen abgefasset (Göttingen 1759), 108: “sowohl auf Univer- sitäten, als auf besondern Berg-Academien, guten Unterricht hierinnen veranstalten”. 15 Baumgärtel 1963 (note 4), 175: “Stamm der Bergleute”. 16 Ibid., 176: “eigene Tracht, Verfassung, einfache und kurze Rechte, und besondere Richter” and “allgemeinen mehrern Unterricht des Berg-Volcks, als besondern, weiterge- henden Unterricht fähiger, zu Berg-Beamten bestimmter Subjecte”. 17 Pierre Bourdieu, ‘Sozialer Raum und symbolische Macht’, in id. (ed.), Rede und Antwort (Frankfurt/M. 1992), 135–154: 149. See also Pierre Bourdieu, ‘Sozialer Raum und “Klassen”’, in id. (ed.), Sozialer Raum und “Klassen” und Leçon sur la leçon (Frankfurt/M. 1995), 7–46: 10f. and Pierre Bourdieu, ‘Sozialer Raum und politisches Feld’, in id. (ed.), Das politische Feld: zur Kritik der politischen Vernunft (Konstanz 2001), 127–131: 128ff. See also Wolfhard Weber, Innovationen im frühindustriellen deutschen Bergbau und Hüttenwesen: Friedrich Anton von Heynitz (Göttingen 1976), 137f. On the iconology of the miners’ uniform in the early eighteenth century, see Elisabeth Hackspiel-Mikosch, ‘Vorläufer der zivilen Uniformen im 18. Jahrhundert’, in id. and Stefan Haas (eds.), Die zivile Uniform als sym- bolische Kommunikation (Stuttgart 2006), 47–79: 72. 18 See UAF [Universitätsarchiv TU Bergakademie Freiberg], OBA [Oberbergamt], call number 236, fol. 121. Hartmut Schleiff - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com03/05/2022 08:34:55PM via free access
knowledge practices in the establishment 831 a new uniform ordinance was decreed in 1769.19 According to the new dress code, members of the Mining Academy obtained their own uniforms. “Especially during paydays, hearing days and holidays”,20 the regulations stipulated, the miners were expected to bear in mind “the old laudable mining spirit”;21 they should wear their Sunday uniforms or the miners’ day parade outfit. They were not allowed to deviate from the regulations, such as by “inappropriate luxury”,22 and were thus to comply with the social and symbolic order established by the dress code. From 1827 on, any additional decoration was explicitly banned, since it was considered to be a breach not only of the uniform regulations but, more generally, of the mining administration’s hierarchical structure, which the uniforms represented. The sovereign’s insistence upon adherence to miners’ laud- able customs can also be found in a decree of the Elector of Saxony from 1668: Order is hereby given that you prescribe at any local mining authority that those persons who are in our services as miners or mining officials should and should wish to wear, in keeping with their respective rank, their age- old customary miners’ uniforms during paydays, hearing days and holidays since it is a laudable custom and redounds to their and all building trades’ honour.23 The language in the 1668 sovereign’s order, “should and should wish to” [solle und wolle], reminds us of the long-lasting, continually resurfacing process of negotiation that surrounded the proper representation of the mining administration in its uniforms. The decrees responded to repeated breaches of effective orders which occurred over a long period of time. Another order calling for the miners’ compliance with the old custom of 19 See Georg Wilhelm Albert Borchers, ‘Vor 150 Jahren: Bergbau- und kulturgeschichtli- che Bilder aus der Vergangenheit des Erzgebirges’, Jahrbuch für das Berg- und Hüttenwesen im Königreich Sachsen (1916), A 181–197: 188. 20 Jahrbuch für das Berg- und Hüttenwesen in Sachsen (1929), 186: “insbesondere an Lohn-, Bergamts- und Feyertagen”. 21 Ibid.: “des alten löblichen bergmännischen Geistes”. 22 Ibid.: “unpassenden Luxus”. 23 Ibid., 187: “Als begehren wir hiermit gnädigst befehlende, ihr wollet bey jedes Orts Bergämtern die ernste Verordnung thun, daß sie auf solche Personen, die in Unsern Dien- sten und der Bergarbeit zugethan, bey den Amts-, Lohn- und Feyertagen Achtung geben lassen und so einer oder der andere befunden, dessen gebührlichen verweisen und sie hingegen mit Zugemüthführung, daß, weil es eine löbliche Gewohnheit, auch allen bauen- den Gewerken und ihnen selbst zu Ruhm und Ehren gereichet, jedweder nach seinem Stande in seinem uralten bergbräuchlichen Berghabit sich hinführo bey obgedachten Amts- und Feyertagen befinden lassen solle und wolle”. (my emphases). Hartmut Schleiff - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com03/05/2022 08:34:55PM via free access
832 hartmut schleiff wearing the miners’ uniform during holidays and hearing days was issued, for instance, in 1749.24 On the one hand, the miners’ uniform was a “laud- able custom”25 which was ordered by the regent’s decree and controlled by the mining authorities. On the other hand, it represented a living tradition which had been passed down through numerous generations. These inter- dependencies between regular social practices on the one hand and their effective regulation by rule on the other illustrate the function of miners’ uniforms as “principles of the generation and structuring of practices and representations.”26 In this decree, the mining administration was both manifested and presented in its structural elements, which were colour- coded according to mining districts and hierarchical levels. The decrees concerning marching formations during miners’ parades reveal similar concerns. Such cultural strategies for visualizing social structures were consistent with the schematic representation of the mining administra- tion in mining almanacs. In these almanacs, imagery and text provided a form that represented the administrative and social structure of Saxony’s mining administration, i.e. of Saxony’s mining experts. Soon, the task of representing the administrative hierarchy in the almanacs was taken up by the mining administration itself, as only this body could ensure the scheme’s accurateness, as the mining administration claimed in the 1827 edition of the almanac.27 The administration’s insistence on taking on the responsibility for publishing the mining almanac can be considered a conscious strategy of social self-representation within the Bergstaat. The mining almanacs of the 1790s, which were edited by Alexander Wilhelm Köhler, contained representations of both the hierarchical schema28 and the uniforms.29 24 See ibid., 188. 25 Ibid., 187. 26 Bourdieu 1977 (note 2), 72. 27 See Jahrbuch für das Berg- und Hüttenwesen in Sachsen (1827), 1–3. 28 The term “Schematismus” was used for mining almanacs in Austria during the first half of the nineteenth century. See, for instance, Johann Baptist Kraus (ed.), Allgemeiner montanistischer Schematismus des österreichischen Kaiserthums (Wien 1842). 29 See Alexander Wilhelm Köhler (ed.), Bergmännischer Kalender für das Jahr 1790 (Freyberg and Annaberg [1789]), 26ff. and id. (ed.), Bergmännischer Kalender für das Jahr 1791 (Freyberg and Annaberg [1790]), 55ff. Hartmut Schleiff - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com03/05/2022 08:34:55PM via free access
knowledge practices in the establishment 833 Cultural Capital and Social Mobility While the mining almanac’s annual editions, which were published with little interruption since the beginning of the 1770s, provide immediate snapshots of the administrative and social hierarchy of the mining admin- istration, social advancement or upward mobility becomes visible only indirectly by comparing editions over a longer period of time. The follow- ing sections of this article will portray these patterns of social order, which are represented in the almanacs both directly and indirectly, for the time between 1766, when teaching at the Saxonian Mining Academy began, and 1868, when the Direktionsprinzip was abolished for good. Three arguments structure the following discussion of the connection between professional advancement and education in the Saxonian mining administration over about one hundred years or five generations of mining experts. First, the connection between social advancement and education sug- gests that experts had to secure social status mainly through recognition of performance, which is to say that status could not be secured by birth alone. Social historians such as Hartmut Kaelble and Peter Lundgreen have discussed to what degree social mobility was an integral element in developing industrial society. The intention here is to discuss the question of social mobility in the early industrial period, which is widely consid- ered terra incognita in this regard.30 Furthermore—and this leads to the second aspect—the aforementioned authors portray the transition to industrial society as a process in which the demand for specific occupational groups increased and thus provided increasing opportunities for social advancement or upward social mobil- ity. In the course of the nineteenth century, technical and scientific edu- cation became crucially important in the formation of these occupational groups.31 In this process, it will be argued thirdly that (a) the functional differentiation of institutionalized educational opportunities increased, and (b) such opportunities had to be adapted in quantitative terms to the demands that arose from emerging occupational groups. Saxony’s mining elite is thus characterized by three aspects: (1) opportunities for 30 See Hartmut Kaelble, ‘Sozialer Aufstieg in Deutschland 1850–1914’, Vierteljahrschrift für Sozial- und Wirtschaftsgeschichte 60 (1973), 41–71: 43 (note 5). See in general Winfried Schulze, ‘Die ständische Gesellschaft des 16./17. Jahrhunderts als Problem von Statik und Dynamik’, in id. (ed.), Ständische Gesellschaft und soziale Mobilität (München 1988), 1–17: 3, 12 and 16. 31 See Kaelble 1973 (note 30), 48. Hartmut Schleiff - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com03/05/2022 08:34:55PM via free access
834 hartmut schleiff upward social mobility through the recognition of individual performance, (2) the functional differentiation of technical occupations and adminis- trative tasks, and (3) these elites’ connection to educational institutions which canonized educational paths and institutionalized what, following Bourdieu’s terminology, can be considered “cultural capital”.32 The sovereign’s mining prerogative comprised control and exploitation of the mines, so as to ensure the due levying of contributions, mining jurisdiction, and supervision of the technical side of the mines’ opera- tions. Below the ministerial level in Dresden, the mines’ technical and economic operations were controlled by state employees in various insti- tutions: the Chief Mining Authority [Oberbergamt], tithe collecting agen- cies, and local mining authorities [Bergämter]. This type of administrative practice had been recommended by Justi, too, “for the establishment and improvement”33 of mining. It is known as the Direktionsprinzip. From 1710 on, smelting of Saxon silver ore was done by the state through the General Smelting Administration [Generalschmelzadministration], which formed part of the Chief Smelting Authority [Oberhüttenamt]. As Justi and Zimmermann had already pointed out, this priority was based largely on the fact that silver was used as a monetary metal.34 In the nineteenth century, however, the Direktionsprinzip led to increasing conflicts with individual trades which began to pursue a form of economic activity that was less dependent on the sovereign’s direc- tives. Such tendencies were noted, for instance, by Karl Wilhelm Ferber as early as 1807 and by Heinrich Gottlob von Nostiz and Ferber three years later.35 It was not until the laws of 1851 and, to an even greater extent, 1868 that these contradictions were resolved and Saxony established a liberal organization in its mining economy. This long-term continuity in administrative tasks and structure (leaving aside the founding of the Min- ing Academy in Freiberg, the centre of the Saxon Bergstaat) provides an ideal context for discussing the question of social mobility. In the last third of the eighteenth century, Saxony’s mining elite, i.e. those who performed administrative tasks, numbered about 240 mining 32 Bourdieu 1983 (note 1), 185 and 190f. 33 Justi 1766 (note 3), 262: “zur Aufnahme und Beförderung”. 34 See ibid., 257 and Zimmermann 1746 (note 10), 51. 35 See Guntram Martin, Bergverfassung, Bergverwaltung, Bergrecht im sächsischen Mon- tanwesen des 19. Jahrhunderts: Probleme des Überganges vom Direktionsprinzip zur freien Unternehmerwirtschaft (1831 bis 1868), dissertation, TU Dresden, 1994, 92f. Hartmut Schleiff - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com03/05/2022 08:34:55PM via free access
knowledge practices in the establishment 835 experts.36 At that time, there were about 10,000 miners.37 While the num- ber of miners remained constant overall, the number of mining experts increased significantly over time. In 1827, for instance, there were 430 mining experts in the administration. For the first 75 years of the time period under consideration here, the number of mining experts in Sax- ony grew by about a third every 25 years. This remarkable tendency did not slow until the mid-nineteenth century. While income from mining increased for a few years after the Mining Academy was founded,38 by the turn of the century, the continuous growth in the number of mining experts stood in stark contrast to declining income from mining, as Karl Gustav Adalbert von Weißenbach, inspector of the Mining Academy from 1820 to 1824, stated in 1833.39 As the number of mining experts increased, so did subsidies for ore mining. Turning our attention to the educational paths of the mining elite, we see that in 1850, three out of every four of Saxony’s mining experts had studied at the Mining Academy. This does not include the shift foremen, whose training took place at the mining schools that had been introduced in Saxony after the founding of the Mining Academy, starting in Freiberg,40 where the establishment of a mining school was decreed in 1776. It was located in close proximity to the Mining Academy. Some of the Acad- emy’s professors taught at the school as well, such as its first director, Johann Friedrich Lempe, who also taught theoretical mine surveying and mathematics at the Mining Academy. While mining schools educated the lower ranks, they also sought to identify particularly talented students, especially in Freiberg. From the end of the eighteenth century on, the Chief Mining Authority strengthened its commitment to promoting tal- ented miners by establishing special classes at the Freiberg Mining School, which prepared students to attend the Mining Academy.41 The special 36 The term “mining expert” is used here to refer to all members of Saxony’s mining administration mentioned in the mining almanacs. 37 See Köhler 1789 (note 29), 24f.; id. 1790 (note 29), 28 and Karl Gustav Adalbert von Weissenbach, Sachsens Bergbau, nationalökonomisch betrachtet (Freyberg 1833), 21 and 164. 38 See Baumgärtel 1963 (note 4), 139. 39 See Weissenbach 1833 (note 37), 130: “Früher waren die reinen Überschüsse des Berg- baues noch bedeutender als jetzt, da er neuerlich einen immer größeren Theil davon als Unterstützung für sein Fortbestehen wieder in Anspruch genommen hat.” 40 For 1797, see WA BAF [Wissenschaftlicher Altbestand Bergakademie Freiberg], NL 161, call number 41, fol. 330b and 332. For 1833, see Weissenbach 1833 (note 37), 159: “die zu Heranziehung von Steigern bestimmten Bergschulen”. 41 See A.G. Werner’s report of 8 May 1797. WA BAF, NL 161, call number 41, fol. 333f. Hartmut Schleiff - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com03/05/2022 08:34:55PM via free access
836 hartmut schleiff role of Freiberg’s Mining School in relation to mining schools that were subordinate to other local mining authorities in Saxony corresponded to the new name it was given during the first decade of the nineteenth cen- tury: “Main Mining School” [Hauptbergschule].42 In other mining schools, teaching was often done by the local mining authority’s shift foremen. This arrangement guaranteed a focus on practical education. In the establishment of the Freiberg Mining Academy, spatial proximity to mines and to practitioners was of great importance as well, as the school was intended to provide professional skills for local mining experts and stimulate industriousness in the area. Such concerns also became appar- ent when the founding of the Mining Academy in 1765 was announced in the Leipziger Intelligenzblatt on 9 May 1767. The announcement docu- mented a coin which had been minted for this occasion. Displaying the phrase “For the Encouragement of Industriousness”, the coin was to be given as a prize to students at the Mining Academy who submitted “the best essays, plans, models et cetera to the Chief Mining Authority.”43 Teaching at the Mining Academy began in 1766. Christian Hieronymus Lommer taught mineralogy, Christlieb Ehregott Gellert gave lectures in metallurgical chemistry, and Johann Andreas Klotzsch in assaying. Fur- thermore, Johann Friedrich Wilhelm von Charpentier taught mathemat- ics, drawing and mechanical engineering, and Carl Ernst Richter taught applied mine surveying. Similar to the tendency observed in the overall personnel structure of the mining administration, the number of profes- sors and teachers employed at the Mining Academy increased between 1766 and 1868 by a factor of three and a half. However, it was not only the teaching staff that increased but also the number of disciplines in which instruction was being offered. If we take the names chosen for courses by instructors as a basis for calculation, the number of disciplines and sub-disciplines grew by a factor of three and a half as well. Chemistry, for instance, became differentiated into metallurgic chemistry and assaying, and then into theoretical, analytical and applied chemistry. Mathemat- ics was sub-divided into higher and applied mathematics. An increased demand for scientific and technical disciplines was also indicated by the 42 See Friedrich Gottlob Leonhardi (ed.), Erdbeschreibung der Churfürstlich- und Herzoglich- Sächsischen Lande (third edn., Leipzig 1804), vol. 3, 49 and id. (ed.), Abriß der Erdbeschreibung und Geschichte der Churfürstlich- und Herzoglich-Sächsischen Lande (Leipzig 1799), 179. 43 Leipziger Intelligenzblatt on 9 May 1767, no. 19, 182–184. See also UAF, OBA, call num- ber 236, fol. 121: “Zur Ermunterung des Fleißes” and “die besten Aufsätze, Risse, Modelle und dergleichen zum Ober-Bergamt-Amt einreichen”. Hartmut Schleiff - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com03/05/2022 08:34:55PM via free access
knowledge practices in the establishment 837 fact that teachers and professors at the Mining Academy often occupied administrative posts within the mining authorities as well. About three in four teaching staff members had such positions, most of them at the middle administrative level, i.e. at the Chief Mining Authority or the Chief Smelting Authority. The majority of teachers and professors at the Mining Academy listed this institution as their own alma mater, further docu- menting the Academy’s importance for Saxony’s mining administration. In order to examine social mobility—in this case among the Mining Academy teaching staff—a model of social stratification is required. The work of Peter Lundgreen, Margret Kraul and Karl Ditt is particularly help- ful for this purpose since their model covers the predominant part of the period under consideration here.44 Lundgreen, Kraul and Ditt base their occupational classification on a six-tier stratification model, which starts with an upper, middle and lower class and sub-divides each of those into an upper and a lower stratum. For the purpose of analysis here, profes- sors are part of the upper stratum of the upper class and lecturers are part of the lower upper class. Comparing the initial stratum, indicated by the father’s occupation, with the achieved stratum (that of professors and lecturers, respectively), we see that about three in four Mining Academy teaching staff members are part of the upwardly mobile group and about one in four maintains their social status.45 This includes the moderate social advancement made by Charpentier, Busse, Breithaupt and Reich, who climbed from lower upper class to upper upper class. Charpentier’s father was a captain, Busse’s father a superintendent, Reich’s a govern- ment councillor, and Breithaupt’s a chief bailiff and councillor. The group of “class climbers”, i.e. those who rose from middle class to upper class, comprises Abraham Gottlob Werner, who climbed from the upper middle class to the lower upper class (his father was an ironworks inspector). Upper upper class status was also achieved by Lampadius, whose father was a first lieutenant and therefore a member of the upper middle class; the brothers Naumann, whose middle class father was a concertmaster in Dresden; Mohs, who came from a merchant family in Gernrode; Karl Friedrich Plattner, whose father was a mechanician and tax collector; and 44 See Peter Lundgreen, Magret Kraul and Karl Ditt, Bildungschancen und soziale Mobil- ität in der städtischen Gesellschaft des 19. Jahrhunderts (Göttingen 1988), 319–364: “Anhang II Berufklassifikation und Schichtungsmodell”. 45 The data on the Mining Academy’s professors and teachers are taken from the Saxon mining almanacs and from: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (Leipzig 1875ff.) and Neue Deutsche Biographie (Berlin 1953ff.), as far as they are listed in ADB or NDB. Hartmut Schleiff - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com03/05/2022 08:34:55PM via free access
838 hartmut schleiff Johann Friedrich Lempe, whose father was a contribution collector. In addition, upper class status was achieved by Alexander Wilhelm Köhler, who taught mining law and was a member of the Leipziger Ökonomische Gesellschaft. As the headman of a local mining authority, his father had been part of the upper middle class. The group of “extreme climbers”, who rose from the lower class to the upper class, consisted of Johann Friedrich Freiesleben and Julius Weisbach, both of whom came from miners’ families. Christlieb Ehregott Gellert, Bernhard Cotta, Andreas Heinrich Klotzsch, Johann August Sieghard and Albin Weisbach maintained upper class status. In the majority of these cases, the fathers had already been professors or teachers at the Mining Academy. Bernhard Cotta’s father, Johann Heinrich Cotta, was the founder and director of the forestry acad- emy in Tharandt, which had been founded as a forestry school in 1811 and became a state forestry academy in 1816. Albin Weisbach, whose father had been one of the “extreme climbers”, maintained the initial status of his parents: Whereas his grandparents were simple miners, as their grand- child, he could claim membership in the upper class in the second gen- eration. In the aforementioned cases, it is apparent that these professors’ families succeeded in reproducing their social status. In different strata of the mining administration, we can identify status reproduction pro- cesses by means of transgenerational transmission of an occupation or, more concretely, an administrative task, from father to son. In the upper lower class, for instance, Anton Schumann followed his father Carl Got- tfried Schumann into the workshop as model maker; within the lower middle class, the contribution collector in the Johanngeorgenstadt mining authority, Gottlob Traugott Gündel, passed on his position (and precise administrative task) to his son Carl Traugott.46 Two individual cases, those of Christian Friedrich Brendel and Abraham Gottlob Werner, allow us to illustrate pathways of social mobility within the mining elite in greater detail. Brendel came from a simple miner’s family. In the terminology of social stratification we have been using, he was initially a member of the lower lower class. In 1797, after he had attended mining school in Freiberg, his teacher successfully recommended him for the Mining Academy. At the Academy, Brendel specialized in technical equipment for mining. In his second year, he was awarded a 46 For detailed information on this, see my paper ‘Aufstieg und Ausbildung im säch- sischen Bergstaat zwischen 1765 und 1868’ in the proceedings of the symposium Staat, Bergbau und Bergakademie: Montanexperten im 18. und frühen 19. Jahrhundert, held at the University of Freiberg on 22 February 2009 (forthcoming). Hartmut Schleiff - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com03/05/2022 08:34:55PM via free access
knowledge practices in the establishment 839 small scholarship. Because of the quality of his work, the scholarship was increased in the following years. By accepting the scholarship, Brendel committed himself to a career as a mining official. The transcript kept by the inspector indicates that it was Brendel’s persistent success that allowed him to pursue a career as a mining expert. Consequently, Brendel sought employment in mechanical engineering. The scholarship he had been given due to his poverty had opened up an educational opportunity and formed the basis for his radical social climb. However, at least ini- tially, this climb also led to conflicts as his “habitus” was perceived as that of a common miner. For instance, such perceptions surfaced when mining prefect [Oberberghauptmann] von Trebra proposed to hire Brendel for a leadership position in mechanical engineering, a sector that was becom- ing increasingly important. Older members of the Chief Mining Author- ity Council [Berghauptmannschaft] such as von Oppel and Charpentier strongly opposed this proposal. As Brendel’s advocate von Trebra did not succeed initially, Brendel was sent to England to further his education. In a brief period of time during which von Trebra was absent from Freiberg, the Chief Mining Authority [Oberbergamt] rejected Brendel’s request for travel funds, pointing out that he was no more than a common miner. In order to achieve recognition on the level of the “habitus”, then, insti- tutionalized cultural capital such as a Mining Academy degree was not sufficient; it took the “social capital”47 of an aristocrat like von Trebra, the mining prefect. In 1811, Brendel became engine master and was given a seat and voting power in all local mining authorities. This administra- tive position gained greater prominence in 1817, when Brendel was named director of machinery with an own department. From then on, his tasks included the supervision of all machinery in the Royal Black Coal Works and the Meißen Porcelain Manufactory. Remarkably, a new administra- tive body was established which cut across the mining administration’s traditional structures, testifying to the importance of mechanical engi- neering. These administrative changes can be considered a marker of modernization. They highlight the extent to which scientific and techni- cal knowledge was in demand during the early industrial period. Brendel’s social advancement was made possible by this steep increase in demand, which led to the director of machinery gaining in importance and acquir- ing new responsibilities. In 1846, Brendel received full recognition as a 47 Bourdieu 1983 (note 1), 185, 188f., 191, 193–197 and id., Sozialer Sinn: Kritik der theore- tischen Vernunft (Frankfurt/M. 2005), 245. Hartmut Schleiff - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com03/05/2022 08:34:55PM via free access
840 hartmut schleiff mining councillor in matters of mechanical and structural engineering and was given a seat and voting power in the Chief Mining Authority.48 While Brendel climbed from the lower lower class to the upper mid- dle class, Abraham Gottlob Werner started from a much more privileged position. The son of an ironworks inspector, he was well-positioned for an upwardly mobile career by education. No later than 1770, in his first year studying at the Academy, he became an honorary member of the Leipziger Ökonomische Gesellschaft.49 One year later, Werner graduated from the Mining Academy and went to Leipzig where he attended univer- sity until 1774. In February 1775, Werner was appointed inspector of the Mining Academy50 and a teacher of mining and mineralogy.51 In support of the appointment, mining prefect Pabst von Ohain stressed the impor- tance of Werner’s recent publication Von den äußerlichen Kennzeichen der Fossilien.52 In 1784, Werner became gemstone inspector53 and eight years later, in March of 1792, a member of the Chief Mining Authority. He was given membership in the scientific academies of Berlin, Moscow, Stockholm and Paris.54 Overall, Werner’s potential to shape Saxony’s Min- ing Academy and the mining administration can hardly be exaggerated. Here, however, we shall focus more specifically on the ways in which his standing in “social space” allowed him to shape or establish knowledge- structuring instruments, “little tools of knowledge”55 in teaching, research and the mining bureaucracy over a period that comprised about two generations. 48 See Otfried Wagenbreth, Christian Friedrich Brendel: Leben und Werk eines bedeuten- den Ingenieurs der ersten Hälfte des 19. Jahrhunderts (Freiberg 2006), 70ff. 49 See Andreas Schöne, ‘Die Leipziger ökonomische Sozietät’, in Anneliese Klingenberg et al. (eds.), Sächsische Aufklärung (Leipzig 2001), 73–91: 83ff. 50 See UAF, OBA, call number 83, fol. 1. 51 See ibid., fol. 21f. 52 See Martin Guntau, Abraham Gottlob Werner (Leipzig 1984), 20. 53 See UAF, OBA, call number 85, fol. 58ff., 71f. and 74ff. 54 See Guntau 1984 (note 52), 109ff. 55 See for the discussion Peter Becker and William Clark (eds.), Little Tools of Knowl- edge: Historical Essays on Academic and Bureaucratic Practice (Michigan 2001) and Wolf- gang Schild, ‘Relationen und Referierkunst: zur Juristenausbildung und zum Strafverfahren um 1790’, in Jörg Schönert (ed.), Erzählte Kriminalität: zur Typologie und Funktion von nar- rativen Darstellungen in Strafrechtspflege, Publizistik und Literatur zwischen 1770 und 1920 (Tübingen 1991), 159–176: 166f. and 170f. Hartmut Schleiff - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com03/05/2022 08:34:55PM via free access
knowledge practices in the establishment 841 Little Tools of Knowledge In arguing for specific training that would allow officials to provide reliable reports and records, cameralists such as Johann Heinrich Gottlob Justi had worked toward successful development of the state’s economic affairs.56 In the Mining Academy, consequently, written reports and records were part of the curriculum early on, especially for the recipients of scholar- ships, i.e. those students who were to become officials in the mining administration. The Mining Academy’s first inspector, Christian Hiero- nymus Lommer, was commended in the 1771 audit commission’s report for the dedication he showed to the state survey of mineral resources. In producing the survey, Academy students were instructed in creating proper reports and records. “In this respect, Lommer has already created enormous benefits by surveying various regions with the Mining Acad- emy students.”57 In the state survey of mineral resources, Lommer was thus already combining teaching, research and reporting for the mining bureaucracy. This allowed him to deflect criticism, which the Chief Min- ing Authority Council had voiced two and a half years earlier. The Council complained “that the young people attending the Academy take so few actual tests and exams that assess the skills they have acquired in the art of mining.”58 To this criticism, Lommer responded on 23 November 1768, that he would “henceforth, on a set time each Sunday, interview and test all young people about what they have seen, inspected and written down from week to week and collect their weekly papers.”59 Three days later, Lommer’s insistence upon instructing students in reporting received the Chief Mining Authority’s approval.60 56 See Johann Heinrich Gottlob von Justi, Anweisung zu einer guten Deutschen Schreibart und allen in den Geschäften und Rechtssachen vorfallenden schriftlichen Ausarbeitungen, zu welchem Ende allenthalben wohlausgearbeitete Proben und Beyspiele beygefügt werden (Leipzig 1755). 57 Baumgärtel 1963 (note 4), 134: “Lommer . . . hat in dieser Absicht schon viel Nutzen geschafft, und mit den Berg-Akademisten verschiedene Gegenden . . . näher untersucht.” 58 UAF, OBA, call number 236, fol. 212: “daß nehml. die anjetzt bey der Academie sich aufhaltenten junge[n] Leute, sowenige Proben und Arbeiten von der in der Bergbaukunst erlangten Fähigkeit ablegen”. 59 Ibid.: “anheischig machen . . . künftig alle Sonntage in festgesetzten Stunden sämtl. junge Leute, in Demjenigen zu befragen u. zu untersuchen, was ein jeder von Woche zu Woche gesehen, befahren, und angemerket hat, und ihre Wochenarbeiten in Anzeigen schriftl. zu übernehmen und zu sammlen”. 60 See ibid., 213. Hartmut Schleiff - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com03/05/2022 08:34:55PM via free access
842 hartmut schleiff While written reports were already being taught and collected in Lom- mer’s curriculum, Abraham Gottlob Werner turned them into mandatory tasks that were graded systematically. Apparently five years after Lommer had become headman of the local mining authority in Johanngeorgen- stadt, his methods were no longer in use in the Academy. On 13 April 1777, Werner introduced them as if they were new:61 Students were to write exercises in the form of journals and “Specimina”,62 i.e. thematic course work reports, which could also be used by the Chief Mining Authority for assessing students.63 These reports were to be handed in before the end of each academic year, before the decisions about scholarships for the fol- lowing year were made.64 This practice was intended to ensure that those who were able to provide systematic written reports could take the career path of mining officials. Werner’s announcement included some new ele- ments: the link between the reports and the completion of an academic year, their role in awarding scholarships, and also the practice of increas- ing the scope of students’ reports each year, leading up to a report about a mine’s complete operations. Werner’s suggestions were implemented by a sovereign’s rescript a month later.65 Support for scholarship recipients, i.e. the future officials in the mining sector, was once again on the agenda of the Chief Mining Authority at an academic conference of 3 October 1785. Mining Academy inspector Werner and Professor Johann Friedrich Lempe presented their examination of students’ journals. Werner empha- sised “that all scholarship holders . . . showed poor results in orthography; that he recently looked after this when revising their journals and that he would continue to do so; that he, moreover, recommended one major focus of attention on orthography in the future when revising all their 61 See Walter Schellhas, ‘Abraham Gottlob Werner als Inspektor der Bergakademie Freiberg und als Mitglied des sächsischen Oberbergamts zu Freiberg’, in Abraham Gottlob Werner (Leipzig 1967), 245–278: 248. 62 UAF, OBA, call number 8R, fol. 47. See also ibid., call number 10, fol. 239 and WA BAF, NL 161, call number 41, fol. 6 and 13b. 63 Additionally, scholarship holders were to write decent reports, i.e. “besondre Fahrbücher . . .; in welche sie kurze Bemerkungen über jede ihrer gemachten Befahrungen einschreiben”. UAF OBA, call number 10, fol. 239. 64 See UAF, OBA, call number 8R, fol. 47 and ibid., call number 26, fol. 70ff. and ibid., call number 241, fol. 191. 65 See Schellhas 1967 (note 61), 248 and Horst Gerhardt, ‘Abraham G. Werner, der Berg- bau und F.W.H. von Trebra’, in Helmuth Albrecht and Roland Ladwig (eds.), Abraham Gottlob Werner und die Begründung der Geowissenschaften: Ausgewählte Vorträge des Inter- nationalen Werner-Symposiums vom 19. bis 24. September 1999 (Freiberg 2002), 64–72: 69f. Hartmut Schleiff - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com03/05/2022 08:34:55PM via free access
knowledge practices in the establishment 843 assessment papers.”66 Werner’s suggestion “was recommended to both teachers”, Alexander Wilhelm Köhler stated in his minutes.67 It was Köhler who was going to provide a practical “seminar on the German language.”68 According to Werner’s March 1795 report “on the Mining Academy’s pre- vious success, including proposals for its improvement”,69 the German language class was to be split up into two closely coordinated courses, “schooling in German language” and “instruction in the regular composi- tion of the most common types of mining reports.”70 The rationale given by Werner for the latter course makes it particularly clear that the main aim of Academy officials was to qualify students for the reporting system within Saxony’s mining administration:71 “It is certain that many of our officials lack the skills and knowledge necessary to write various types of mining reports in accordance with formal requirements, so that many of them are unsuitable for higher service in the administration.”72 He con- tinued: “In my view, the main requirements of a good business writing style are—apart from the formal requirements—completeness, definite- ness, orderliness, comprehensibility, coherence, purposefulness, brevity, clarity and decency, which may be completed by a harmonious sound.”73 In Werner’s presentation of 3 October 1785, it is already apparent that he wanted to develop a system of written reports that would make use of bureaucratic instruments in order to bridge spatial distances within the 66 UAF, OBA, call number 25, fol. 8b f.: “daß sämtliche Stipendiaten sehr, doch immer einer mehr als der andere in der Orthographie zurück wären, und daß er daher bereits bey dießmaliger Durchgehung der Tagebücher Rücksicht darauf genommen hätte, und auch künftig weiter nehmen würde, übrigens aber dafür hielte, daß es nöthig seyn dürfte für . . . künftige bey Durchgehung aller ihre[r] schriftlichen Arbeiten die Rechtschreibung mit zu einem Hauptaugenmerk zu nehmen”. 67 Ibid., fol. 9. 68 Ibid., fol. 134f. See also UAF, OBA, call number 10, fol. 185 and 188b. 69 Ibid., fol. 56: “über den bisherigen Erfolg der hiesichen [sic] Bergakademie samt ohn- maßgeblichen Vorschlägen zu deren Verbesserung”. 70 Ibid., fol. 186: “gleich vom Anfange her . . . mit diesem Unterrichte bezielt worden [waren]: nämlich Unterweisung in deutschem Stile und Anweisung zu regelmäßiger Abfassung der gewöhnlichsten bergmännischen Geschäftsberichten”. 71 For 1797/98, see UAF, OBA, call number 257, fol. 15ff., in particular 19b. For 1816/17, see UAF, OBA, call number 275: “Übersicht der Vorlesungen für das akademische Jahr”. 72 UAF, OBA, call number 10, fol. 186b f.: “Es ist ferner gewis, daß es vielen von unsern Offizianten und Beamten an der Kentnis der formellen Einrichtung der verschiedenen Arten von bergmännischen Geschäftsberichten, und an Fertigkeit solche abzufassen fehlt: so daß viele deswegen nicht zu höheren Diensten gebraucht werden können”. 73 Ibid., fol. 189b: “Haupt-Erfordernisse eines guten Geschäfts-Stils sind, nach meinem Erachten—außer dem nöthichen Formellen,—Volständigkeit, Bestimtheit, Ordnung, Ver- ständlichkeit, Zusammenhang, Planheit, Kürze, Reinheit und Anständigkeit; wozu höch- stens noch Wohlklang”. Hartmut Schleiff - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com03/05/2022 08:34:55PM via free access
844 hartmut schleiff Bergstaat. According to this plan, future officials would be sent to “outly- ing mines.”74 A highly detailed plan for students’ written reports would be created, characterized by increasing complexity and difficulty, so that each would be “instructed from time to time, preferably once a month, about what he is to do in the assigned mine.”75 Werner provided a system for students’ reporting containing sixteen elements: First, a description of mountains and tunnels; second, previous history of the mine’s and neigh- bouring mines’ operations; third, existing premises of the mine; fourth, getters’ work; fifth, timbering and walls; sixth, output; seventh, mine air and ventilation; eighth, machinery and ground-water lowering; ninth, ore dressing; tenth, supply of driving water and suggestions for further mea- sures; eleventh, the pit foreman’s daily tasks; twelfth, the mine’s supervi- sion by officials and superintendents; thirteenth, accounting; fourteenth, materials administration; fifteenth, ore transport, sixteenth, assessment of the overall condition and value of the mine. Abraham Gottlob Werner’s 1786 report states that in December 1785, the Mining Academy inspec- tor established a specific curricular unit, the “Elaboratorium”,76 which was intended for “scholarship holders whose curriculum is drawing to a close and who should thus become more familiar with the practical side of structural engineering.”77 The Elaboratorium was intended for them to be trained in inspecting and describing the mining premises more orderly, precisely and clearly than they were previously accustomed to. . . . To this end, a particular part of the mining machinery, of a mine’s bookkeeping or of its premises are to be studied, inspected and described in the Elaboratorio every month; for this purpose, a draft plan will be provided and explained to them before- hand. The essays they produce are to be continuously revised during the composition process and after they are finished. In this process, I also have 74 UAF, OBA, call number 25, fol. 20. 75 Ibid.: “jedem von Zeit zu Zeit, und zwar am besten monathlich, vorzuschreiben, womit er sich auf dem ihm angewiesenen Gruben-Gebäude eigentlich beschäftigen soll.” 76 UAF, OBA, call number 246, fol. 139 and 141b f. In his report for the Chief Mining Authority of 28 July 1818, Johann Carl Freiesleben dates the beginning of Werner’s Elabo- ratorium to the academic year 1777/78. See UAF, OBA, call number 277, fol. 91b and ibid., fol. 94 and 99b. The same date is mentioned in Werner’s announcement of a “practical seminar” [praktisches Ausarbeitungs-Kollegium], see UAF, OBA, call number 8R, fol. 46 and see ibid., call number 241, fol. 189b. 77 UAF, OBA, call number 246, fol. 139: “Stipendiaten, deren akademischer Kurs ziemlich zu Ende gehet, und die also deswegen mehr ins praktische der Bergbaukunst hineingeführt werden sollen, eine ordentlichere genauere und bestimmtere Betrachtung und Beschreibung der Gruben-Gebäude, als bei ihnen bisher gewöhnlich gewesen ist”. Hartmut Schleiff - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com03/05/2022 08:34:55PM via free access
knowledge practices in the establishment 845 the opportunity to recapitulate important units from the lectures on min- ing. . . . Furthermore, I focus on German orthography and writing style.78 Werner’s typology of reporting tasks directly prepared scholarship recipi- ents for the tasks that awaited them in the mining bureaucracy. They were taught to take a highly complex company such as a mine and break it down analytically into single reporting entities. He did this because he had noted that “they do as well as they can, but they do not follow a plan and are not able to do so: because, firstly, they are not capable of understanding the entirety of their task; secondly, most of them are not talented enough to draft and carry out a systematic plan for their work.”79 Werner’s educational goal was to teach future mining officials how to turn complex objects and labour processes into clearly written reports and to reduce these processes to simpler tasks within an overall division of labour. Scholarship holders were expected to report about single ele- ments as they related to the larger whole, following a systematic plan, for instance in mining premises in the Ore Mountains of Saxony.80 As Werner’s statements at the academic conference on 3 October 1785 docu- mented, this required instruction in good use of the German language.81 An instructional material for all “written elaborations in business and legal matters”82 had been authored in 1755 by Justi, an author whose work Werner was familiar with. In the Academy, “teaching in grammar . . . [and] business writing”83 was introduced for mining administration scholarship 78 Ibid., fol. 139f.: “Es wird selbigen zu diesem Ende in solchen Elaboratorio jeden Monat ein besonders Stück, entweder der Berg-Technik oder des Grubenhaushalts eines Gruben- Gebäudes zu betrachten, zu untersuchen und zu beschreiben aufgegeben, wozu ihnen nicht allein vorher ein Plan entworfen und erkläret, sondern auch ihr nachher gefertigter Aufsatz sowohl während der Ausarbeitung als nach seiner Vollendung durchgesehen und korrigirt wird. Hierbei habe ich die beste Gelegenheit manchen wichtigen Satz aus den Vorlesungen über den Bergbau mit ihnen zu repetiren . . . Auch nehme ich dabei zugleich Rücksicht auf deutsche Schreibart und Stil.” 79 UAF, OBA, call number 25, fol. 20: “sich zwar, so guth als ihnen möglich, beschäftigen, doch aber nach keinen Plan arbeiten und zu arbeiten im Stande sind: weil sie, eines theils das Ganze, womit sie sich beschäftigen sollen, nicht zu übersehn vermögen, zweitens auch die meisten, sich einen sistematischen Plan über ihre Beschäftigungen zu entwerfen und solchen theilweise zu bearbeiten, nicht Talent genug haben”. 80 On the relevance of this kind of cameralist knowledge for the Bergstaat, see the recent work by Andre Wakefield, The Disordered Police State: German Cameralism as Sci- ence and Practice (Chicago 2009), 34–44. 81 See UAF, OBA, call number 25, fol. 22b. 82 Justi 1755 (note 56). 83 UAF OBA, call number 277, fol. 91b: “Grammaticalischer Unterricht . . . [und] ein Unterricht in Geschäftsstyl”. Hartmut Schleiff - 9789004243910 Downloaded from Brill.com03/05/2022 08:34:55PM via free access
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