The Old Agricultural Society and

its People - Sweden

In Swedish agricultural society, especially during the 18th and 19th centuries, one didn’t really speak about the family on the farm but rather about the people on the farm. The people on the farm included the farmer and his family, of course, but also the hired hands: pigor (pl.) and drängar (pl.). Piga was the term used for a female employee, i.e. a maid. Dräng was the term used for a male farmhand. Farmhands and maids could be either young people who took positions as hired hands until they could get enough money to get their own place or elderly people who hadn’t been able to get their own place as farmers or tenant farmers. The image to the right is from the kitchen in Kvekgården farm near Enköping town (C). Kvekgården is a today an old homestead museum. Photo Hans Högman, 1992. At most Swedish farms there were seldom more than 10 persons. It was difficult to feed more than that. A farmer often hired farmhands and maids if he and his wife were young and had small children. When the children grew up and could help out with the work on the farm, the farmer really didn’t need the help of farmhands and maids or at least not as many. Farmers usually didn’t have many children. They married late. Women were often 25 years old or more when they married, and men were around 30 years of age. It took a while before they could afford a farm. However, traditions were different in the various parts of Sweden. Tenant farmers (torpare/landbo) and the backstuge people didn’t have any farmhands or maids. They themselves worked for others and couldn’t afford to hire anyone else. These groups often had to send their young ones away to take positions as “lillpiga” (a young girl serving as maid) or “lilldräng” (a young boy serving as farmhand) to a farmer to earn their own living.

Marriage

In the agricultural society of former days, it wasn’t love that determined who one married. The family of the person one married and the size of their farm were much more important. You don’t have to go further back than to the beginning of the 1900s to find that it was unthinkable for a married woman in Sweden to be outdoors without any coverage of her hair. A woman couldn’t go out without covering her hair with a hat or scarf etc. This custom was very long- lived in the countryside. There is a story – true or not - about a woman a long time ago in a small country village who was outdoors in the early morning doing an errand. She was only wearing her night chemise and hadn’t covered her hair (and in those days the countryside women didn’t use any underwear because it was too expensive). Even though it was early, she met a neighbor. Quick-witted as she was, she lifted her chemise so that the hair was covered. It was obviously more important to cover the hair then the rest of the body.

Undantag

Undantag was a system of caring of elderly. In the old agricultural society the old ones on a farm were placed in “undantag”. This meant that when an old couple signed over their farm to one of their children (to a son, for example), the old couple could stay on the farm – usually in a smaller cottage that was provided for them. This smaller house or cottage was called undantagsstuga. The older couple signed a contract (undantagskontrakt/födorådskontrakt/fördelskontrakt) with the child who took over the farm which stipulated that the old ones would receive a certain amount of firewood, grain, hay, milk etc every year. This was called födoråd and the old people taking benefit of this were födorådstagare. This system was also used when someone else than a family member bought a farm from an elderly couple. Undantag (exemption) or undantagskontrakt (exemption contract) means the right of the seller to retain for his remaining lifetime the right to use a small dwelling or a small area of land, that is exempt from the buyer's right to dispose of the transferred property. The beneficiary retains this right even if the property was resold. Födoråd was a personal right which meant that the födorådstagaren (the recipient) received from a farm property certain goods such as daily needs of milk, potatoes, or hay.

Inhysehjon

Pigor (maids) and drängar (farmhands) who perhaps had worked all their lives on a farm could stay on the farm when they got older and couldn’t work any more, as inhysehjon. There were no social welfare programs or homes for the elderly back then so this was an early way of providing welfare: they took care of each other. An inhysehjon was someone in need of help from the society – public care, i.e. poor, sick, infirm elderly etc. However, not everyone in the countryside lived on farms. There were many poor, disabled, and sick people who had to survive on what the farmers could give them. It was a kind of charity.

Auctions of Poor Children

In the middle of the 19th century there even were auctions of poor children as well as infirm elderly to farmers who made the lowest request for compensation for taking care of them. It was the local village council, the socken, which held these auctions. Very often the children were submitted to hard work on the farm they were placed at. This was a kind of early foster-home placement. The auctioning of poor people continued until 1918 when the practice was abandoned.

Drängar and Pigor

Drängar (pl.) and pigor (pl.) were employees working on farms. However these terms once also referred to unmarried sons and daughters who were still living and working at their parents’ farm. This meaning is still used in Denmark as terms for boys and girls. In Sweden, employees at farms were called tjänstrdrängar and tjänstepigor to distinguish them from the sons and daughters on the farms. Tjänstepiga could be translated into servant “piga”. Collectively they were called “tjänstefolk”. However, later on, the terms dräng and piga were only used to refer to the hired people on farms. Other words used when referring to farm employees, besides tjänstefolk, were tjänstehjon and legohjon.

Dräng

Drängar (pl.) were, in other words, male farm laborers doing heavy work on the farm. They were usually unmarried and hired for a year at a time. Their employment was regulated under a law called tjänstehjonsstadgan. On larger farms, farm laborers lived in special quarters for farm hands. This could be a room on the farm (drängkammare) or a separate building, a so-called drängstuga. The image to the right is a farm- hand's quarter (drängkammare) at Kvekgården farm near Enköping town (C). Kvekgården is a today an homestead museum. Photo Hans Högman, 1992. During the 18th and 19th centuries there were more pigor (maids) than farm laborers on farms. Bohuslän and Skåne, where fishing and heavy farm work required more male laborers, were exceptions.

Piga

Pigor (pl.) were servant girls or maids working on farms. They were usually hired annually to perform many different tasks. At larger estates or manors they had more specialized duties such as kitchen maid (kökspiga), cowshed maid (ladugårdspiga), etc.

Legostadgor

Between 1664 and 1926 the legal relationship between a farmer and his employees was regulated in a number of different lawful acts, the so-called legostadgor (pl.). Up until 1920, these acts allowed the farmers to use corporal punishment. After 1858 the farmer could only use this type of punishment on male employees younger than 18 and female employees under 16 years of age. Wages and working hours were also regulated by these legostadgor. Besides food, lodging and clothing, employees also received a small amount in cash. The first legostadga (statute) was issued in1664 and was followed by new statutes in 1686, 1723, 1739, 1805 and 1833. The last one wasn’t abandoned until 1926. The slankvecka or frivecka were terms for the free week when the agricultural laborers could take new positions at other farms, all according to the legostadga. The dräng or piga had to report to the new employer within 7 days from the day (flyttdag) they left their previous employer. The “flyttdag” was the day when a legohjon (maid and farmhand) contract came to an end, normally after 12 months. Outside of Stockholm, this day was usually October 24. In Stockholm the flyttdag was also April 24 (according to the 1833 legostadga). Before that time employees were hired on September 29 for a period of 12 months. However, this date was changed because it was during the busy period on a farm. When laborers changed employers they were entitled to a free week, the so-called frivecka (free week) or slankvecka (slender week).

Husaga - Corporal Punishment

The farmer (master) also had the right to use corporal punishment (husaga) on his wife and children. According to the medieval provincial laws (medeltida landskapslagarna), the master had the right to moderately use corporal punishment. In the laws of 1734 there are no references to the husband’s right to use corporal punishment on his wife; however it contains the right for parents to physically punish their children. The master’s and matron’s right to use corporal punishment on their employees was regulated in the different legostadgorna (laws of employment). The right to use corporal punishment was completely abolished in 1920.

Landbo

A landbo was a farmer that didn’t own his farmland, i.e. a farmer that was farming land owned by someone else (leasehold land). In other words, a landbo was a type of tenant farmer. The land he was farming could belong to the church, the nobility, the Crown or other farmers. Depending on the type of landownership, this type of farmer was called kyrkolandbo (a landbo on church land), frälselandobo (a landbo on noble land), kronolandbo (a landbo on Crown land) or bondelandbo (a landbo on a farmer’s land). The legal relationship between the landbo and the landowner was regulated by a contract (lease) called landbolega and in order to be able to farm someone else’s land a landbo needed to obtain this lease (landbolega). The landbo had to pay an annual fee/rent (called avrad) for the lease. When a new landbo took over the lease or when the landbolega (lease) was due for renewal the landbo had to pay an extra fee. The landbolega was replaced in the 19th century by the free tenancy lease. The system with landbolega was abolished in 1907. The system of landbo dates back to the Middle Ages. The corresponding term for landbo was called fästebonde in Denmark and leiglending in Norway and Iceland.

Åborätt

Åborätt (Åbo Right) was an inheritable right of tenancy for lanbo tenants on Crown land. This right was introduced at the end of the 18th century. The Åborätt made it possible for a landbo and his heir/heiress to stay put on their farms as long as they paid the tenancy. This right was adjusted by new regulations in 1808 and 1863 and is still in force today. This right of possession of the tenancy gave birth to the expression Åbo. An Åbo is a tenant farmer who is farming a leasehold land with an inheritable right of possession. There is also another more wide definition of an åbo and that is a small-scale farmer farming his own land.

Backstugesittare

Backstugesittare was a term used for people living in small houses or sheds etc on a landowner’s land or on the village common land. These poor houses, backstugorna (pl.), were exempted from taxation. Backstugesittare were without any assets and were a motley crowd of people consisting of craftsmen, farm workers as well as old people and the very poor. In the south and southwest parts of Sweden they were called gatehusmän (their houses were called gatehus) and in the southern parts of Norrland utanvidsfolk. On the westcoast they were also called strandsittare. The backstuge houses were often collected in groups of houses outside the cultivated land area of a landowner’s land (with the permission of the landowner). Normally there were a small strip of land belonging to these houses where they could grow potatoes and keep some pigs and poultry. Sometimes they also had the possibility to use the farmer’s farmland. However, normally they earned their living as farmhands, craftsmen etc. They had no permanent employments and the backstugesittarna were often underemployed and underfed. The number of backstugesittare increased a lot between 1750 and 1850. It was common that the backstuge houses only had three proper walls, so-called dugouts. The fourth wall was made of earth if the house was built in a slope. In other words, the backstuge houses were more or less hovels/shanties.

Undantag

Most Swedes know about the expression ”att sitta på undantag” – to be on benefits, however not everyone knows what this means. This was a term used in the old agricultural society. “Undantag” was a kind of pension benefit for the old couple on a farm. It was common that the old farmer signed over the farm to for example a son, prematurely, i.e. the son took over the farm while the parents were still alive. The law of property regulated Undantag. Undantag meant that the old couple was provided with free lodging, normally in a smaller house/cottage on the farm for the rest of their life (undantagsstuga). Further they got the right to a certain amount of firewood, seed for sowing etc annually (födoråd). Undantag could also be negotiated when the farmer sold the farm. Normally the old farmer then obtained right to free lodging on the farm, firewood, milk etc. He could also obtain a certain right to the yield of the farm in the negotiating (avkomsträtt). See also Undantag above.

Inhysehjon

Inhysehjon was a term used for the agricultural workers who didn’t own any land and were regarded as a lower class in the countryside. An inhysehjon was a lodger at a farm and normally wasn’t closer related with the family on the farm. Neither were they part of the employees on the farm. Socially they had a lower standing than the backstugesittare mentioned above. About 20% of the agricultural population was inhysehjon in 1855. To take on an inhysehjon was a way of social welfare back then. The inhyshjon were people that couldn’t support themselves. An inhysehjon could be orphans, disabled, infirm elderly, the very poor etc. See also Inhysehjon above.

Fattighjon / Fattighus - Paupers /

Poorhouse

The fattighus (poorhouse) was a building where the poor and the infirm had a shelter/lodging. These people were called fattighjon (paupers). In the 1686 church act it was recommended that the parishes should build poorhouses. According to the law of 1734 the parishes had to build them but that didn’t happen everywhere. Inmates at a poorhouse were called fattighjon (pauper/workhouse inmate). From 1860 and forward there were also a kind of poorhouses where people of small means, but still being able to do agricultural work, lived.

Statare

Statare were agricultural laborers receiving allowance (payment) in kind. They were employed for 12 months at a time at larger estates. Normally they were married because the wives also were expected to work at the estate, milking cows for example. The word statare indicates that they were paid in kind (stat). Normally statare only existed on large estates even if they also could exist on a few larger farms. Statare were without property, didn’t own any land or farm animals. In other words, they were poor agricultural workers hired for 12 months at a time and lived in the areas where the large estates were located, primarily the southern half of Sweden in the flat country areas. The estates had special kind of barracks for the statare called statarlängor. They were often in a poor condition damp, cold and draughty and with bugs and cockroaches. The hiring was done during the last week of October every year. During this week you could see horse and wagons with statare moving from one estate to another – it was always greener grass on the other side – they hoped for a better life at another estate. It was often the miserable lodging conditions that made the statare to take position as a statare at another estate. There were different kinds of statare depending of what kind a laborer work they did. They system of statare began in the middle of the 18th century and wasn’t abolished until 1945. The number of statare families reached a peak in the beginning of the 1900’s. The system of statare did not exist in the other Scandinavia countries. However, there was a similar system in the Baltic countries as well as in Germany. It did not exist in the English spoken world, which means it is difficult to find an English expression for statare. More information of the system of statare.

Related Links

• Croft and Crofters (Torp and Torpare) • Landownership • Agricultural Yields and Years of Famine • The Conception of Socken (Parish)

Source Reference

1. Swedish National Encyclopaedia, NE 2. Wikipedia Top of page