Poverty Under the Eyes of Young Marx: The Trier List of the Poor from 1832

[Translate to Englisch:] Screenshot website Armenkarte

The media station is now freely accessible online with all functionalities of the in-museum version at the City Museum!

www.armenkarte1832.uni-trier.de

Armenliste 1832
The Trier List of the Poor from 1832

Around 1830, during Karl Marx’s youth, the second continent-wide cholera epidemic reached Europe. In the old Prussian provinces, it claimed thousands of lives. At the turn of 1831/1832, the epidemic began spreading westward into the member states of the German Confederation. In response to this threat, the Prussian authorities established a health commission in Trier to contain the spread of the disease. In line with the moral conventions of the time, efforts were focused primarily on the poor, who were seen as the breeding ground for the epidemic—due to “drunkenness, dissolute lifestyles, uncleanliness, foul air from accumulated filth, overcrowded living spaces, and lack of sufficient clothing and nourishing food” (quoted in Herres, p. 162). To act, authorities first needed to record the affected population.

The resulting table includes the names of heads of households, number of children, their occupations, precise addresses, classification into “poverty classes,” assessments of their “validity” and “morality,” as well as comment fields in which inspectors recorded their personal impressions. Despite the inherent subjectivity of such bureaucratic character assessments and the uncertainties in measuring social status objectively, these records are outstanding sources for urban social history. They date precisely to the time when the young Karl Marx was living in Trier, before leaving for university in Bonn in 1835.

Thanks to the continuous numbering of Trier’s houses introduced in the late 18th century, household information from the 1832 list can be precisely located on the cadastral map from the 1840s. Using a georeferenced version of this map, social status indicators can now be overlaid onto the historical city plan. The largely overlooked 1832 list of the poor (with the notable exception of J. Herres’ 1990 work) was transcribed and entered into a database, enriched with additional classifiers.

 

Ausschnitt aus dem Stadtplan Triers (ca. 1845)
Map detail of Trier in the 1840s (“Plan of Trier” by August Berthold, undated, Trier City Archive, Kt6 115a). The colored dot marks the Marx family home (Simeongasse 1070).

This initiative is intended as a preliminary step toward a broader stratification or social topography of Trier. It seeks to build on traditions of Trier’s social and urban history research. The integration of additional serial sources is envisioned for the future.

 

The media station has been available since May 5, 2018 as part of the Karl Marx Exhibition Trier at the City Museum Simeonstift.

 

Selected Literature

  • Althammer, Beate, Die Cholera - eine Naturkatastrophe? Reaktionen angesichts einer tödlichen Seuche im Rheinland und in Katalonien, 1831-1867, in: Traverse 10 (2003), H. 3, S. 21-35
  • Finzsch, Norbert, Obrigkeit und Unterschichten: Zur Geschichte der rheinischen Unterschichten gegen Ende des 18. und zu Beginn des 19. Jahrhunderts, Stuttgart 1990
  • Herres, Jürgen, Cholera, Armut und eine „Zwangssteuer“ 1830/32. Zur Sozialgeschichte Triers im Vormärz, in: Kurtrierisches Jahrbuch 39 (1990), S. 161–203
  • Monz, Heinz, Karl Marx, Grundlagen der Entwicklung zu Leben und Werk, Trier 1973 Zenz, Emil, Geschichte der Stadt Trier im 19. Jahrhundert, Bd. 1, Trier 1979

The Media Station in the Press

  • Interview im "Deutschlandfunk" (Reihe "Kultur heute", Dr. Michael Köhler), 7.7.2018 (externer Link - © Deutschlandfunk)
  • Heucher, Anne, (Art.) „Invalide, trunkergeben, bettelsüchtig“, in: Trierischer Volksfreund vom 7. Juni 2018, S. 23. (zum Download als PDF) und (externer Link)
  • Artikel u.a. in "Focus online", 7.8.2018 (externer Link)

 

Organization and Implementation

This media station was developed in cooperation with the Chair of Historical Regional Studies at the University of Trier and the Trier City Museum (Director: Dr. Elisabeth Dühr). On the part of the university, it was supported by funds and resources from the „Forschungszentrums Europa“ at the University of Trier. Technical support is provided in particular by the Trier City Archives (Dipl.-Arch. Bernhard Simon, Dipl.-Arch. Tobias Teyke) and the Trier City Library (Prof. Dr. Michael Embach).

Project Director: Prof. Dr. Stephan Laux (lauxstuni-trierde)

Project Team (Chair of Regional History): Stephan Laux, Nora Mergner, Leonard Preisler, Matthias Schneider, Jan Zünkeler (aktuell) sowie Daniel Kugel, Nina Schweisthal und Matthias Vinbruck (ausgeschiedene Mitarbeiter)

Coordination: Matthias Schneider, M.A. (schneidermuni-trierde)

Programming: Niklas Alt, M.A.

Design: Peter Albertz B.A.

Cartography: Dipl.-Geogr. Michael Grün