12 Artikel von Memmingen

Bayerische Staatsbibliothek

Description

The so-called "Twelve Articles" are the central manifesto of the "Peasants' War". To this day, they still have fundamental significance as one of the earliest declarations of human rights. They were created on the occasion of a meeting of representatives of the Upper Swabian Bauern Haufen (peasants' associations) in Memmingen in March 1525. The furrier and lay theologian Sebastian Lotzer (around 1490 - after 1525) was responsible for the editorial work. It is possible that he was supported by the Memmingen reformer Christoph Schappeler (1472-1551). The peasants and the craftsmen associated with them articulated in the articles their most important claims towards the Swabian Federation, a union of Swabian imperial estates. At the same time, they attacked thereby the feudal societal order and the system of rule as a whole; for example, they demanded the abolition of serfdom. On the one side, a close connection to the Reformation resulted from the fact that the authors orientated themselves on the Gospel as "divine right" and therefore regarded it as the divine will to free them from slavery. On the other side, they picked up the reformatory idea of church community. The "Twelve Articles" quickly proved to be sensationally successful: within two months, they were printed about 25,000 times and disseminated in large parts of the empire. Datum: 2016

Author

Matthias Bader

Rights Statement Description

CC0