punishment, fines, damages or forfeiting one’s salary. The fact that the sanction for breaching the contract was constructed as a punishment meant that public authorities should decide the case.74 Formally, the worker was in a subordinate position, but not totally without legal protection. In reality an individual worker’s access to justice might have been very limited. Nevertheless, several considerable differences in relation to the master-servant relationship ought to be noted.The legislation did not prescribe any legal minimum time for the duration of the contract between master and apprentice or any tariffs concerning wages. In practice, workers could be employed for several years as well as for just a fortnight.The journeymen had small, but not at all negligible means to influence the fixing of their wages.They were not entirely forbidden to organise and negotiate, although this was subject to the master’s supervision.They often had their own organisations for mutual support in the case of illness or death, recognised by public authorities and the masters.75 An ordinary master could chastise his servant so long as he did not beat him “black or bloody”, “crippled or disabled”. In the privileged areas the masters as well as the journeymen were urged not to“badly beat or unreasonably treat” any apprentice, at the risk of being sentenced by the magistrate to fines or punishment.76 It is true that the apprentice was fully obliged to fulfil the master’s orders, but the laws simultaneously stressed that he should primarily be used for such work which “in fact” (Sw.“egentligen”) was connected to his education and craft.The journeyman’s duty of obedience was even more limited, namely to tasks that belonged to his profession (“som tillhör yrket”) or vocational training in question.77 In contrast to domestic and agrarian servants’ explicit c o n t i n u i t y a n d c o n t r ac t 47 74 Adlercreutz, A1954, p. 104; Söderlund 1943, pp. 86, 267; Sigeman 1967, p. 76. 75 Söderlund 1943, pp. 264 ff; Söderlund 1949, p. 375. 76 “illa slå eller oskäligen hanthera”. 1669 Skrå-Ordning för Handtwärckare (Statute on craftsmen), 1 Martii 1669, Art. 9:3. 77 “brukas til thet hans lära och hantwärck egentligen angår”, Skrå-Ordning för Handtwärckare, 1 Martii 1669, Art. 9:2.
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