The peasant uprising that broke out in Württemberg was related to the random increase of new taxes by Ulrich, Duke of Württemberg. This guy lived a luxury and was squandered. From 1498 to early 1514, he had only succeeded to the throne for 15 years and owed huge debts of 1 million Gulden gold coins.
In order to repay foreign debt, Duke Ulrich had to "invent" new taxes and exploit the farmers of Württemberg. He created new "wine tax", "meat tax" and "bread tax". In other words, the Württemberg people had to pay taxes for eating and drinking. Then, he also created something called "capital tax", which stipulated that every commodity worth Gulden must be paid 1 Finney's capital tax to him...
These heavy taxes immediately angered the farmers in Württemberg, so under the leadership of the secret organization "Poor Conrad", the farmers decided to launch an uprising and resist.
About 8,000 farmers, holding simple farm tools such as sickles and shovels, surrounded Stuttgart City under the leadership of the knife caster Kasbar, and demanded the abolition of new taxes.
When Duke Ulrich saw that the peasants were powerful, he pretended to be soft-hearted and asked his officials to deceive the peasants, saying that he was willing to abolish the new tax. But behind his back, he was summoning the nobles and knights in the public sector to prepare for suppression.
Kasbar didn't believe the words of Duke Ulrich at all, but the farmers he brought were relatively simple and believed Ulrich's nonsense. After receiving the promise to abolish the new tax, the farmers happily put down their sickles and hoes and went back to farm.
In desperation, Kasbal had to take the core leadership of the rebel army to temporarily lie dormant. At the same time, he closely monitored the actions of Duke Ulrich...
After the news was sent back to Orich, Marin immediately remembered it - it seems that in the works of the two great men of Marx and Engel in later generations, many peasant wars broke out in the German region in the 15th and 16th centuries.
According to the two bigwigs of Mar and Engel, Wurttemberg of this era was one of the largest populations, with a population of 600,000 or 700,000 people. Of course, this did not count the Beihai Kingdom, a time traveler.
Moreover, Württemberg has so many populations, but its land area is only tens of thousands of square kilometers. Moreover, most of them are mountains and black forests. Unlike the North Sea Kingdom, although the population is more than twice that of the Principality of Württemberg, its local area is as high as more than 100,000 square kilometers.
Therefore, the farmers in the Duchy of Württemberg were very hard-working. Because there was not much cultivated land in the territory, each serf could not cultivate much land, which was far worse than the serfs in the North Sea, but they had to bear the main part of the high taxes of Duke Ulrich. In desperation, they were led by the "Poor Conrad" organization and prepared to launch an uprising...
...
But the peasant uprisings in Germany were very naive. They did not launch an uprising to compete for the country like the Chinese peasant uprisings, but just to arm the lords, trying to force the lords to abolish unreasonable taxes...
Such a naive approach must be taught to be a human being. Unlike the peasant uprisingers in China, who knew from Chen Sheng and Wu Guang that "the kings, princes, generals and ministers are not a good person." One just wanted to petition, but the other was to fight for the world with clear goals. The impact of the two was not to be thought about, and the result was also to know...
Therefore, because they were too naive, the German peasant war broke out many times and was suppressed every time. Because they did not know how to take the opportunity to kill the nobles when they had an advantage and eliminate the vitality of their opponents, but waited foolishly, waiting for the nobles to gather enough strength to suppress them...
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The frequent peasant uprisings occurred in the 15th to the 16th centuries, which has a lot to do with the increase in the population of Germany...
Since the end of the Black Death in the 14th century and to the 15th century, although the Black Death still broke out from time to time, its scale has been relatively small, and there have been few large-scale epidemics that have swept across Europe.
Against this background, the population in the German region began to grow steadily. But the problem is that the population has increased, but the land has not increased. Coupled with the touching low yield of European agriculture, it cannot support too many people at all.
Of course, if Ulrich collects less taxes, everyone can barely survive. But this guy owed 1 million Goulden gold coins for 15 years, and had to pay heavy taxes to squeeze the people into filling the gap. Then, naturally, everyone couldn't survive...
...
The peasant uprising in Württemberg has temporarily subsided, but Marin knew that the war would definitely rekindle. However, the news from Breschgao made Marin's spirit very refreshed - the lord there actually contacted the recruiting envoys from the North Sea country in Strasbourg, Alsace region, on the edge of Breschgao, to see if the captured uprising peasants...
The Breschgao area is similar to the Württemberg area, and now it is also crowded with people and land. Under the exploitation of the lords, the serfs also have a difficult life.
After capturing thousands of peasant war uniforms, several local lords executed hundreds of people who took the lead. However, the remaining 5,000 peasant prisoners made them embarrassed.
Keeping these people is a hidden danger. Moreover, the land is not enough for farmers to plant. However, if you kill it, it would be a pity and it would ruin your reputation.
So, after several lords discussed, they suddenly remembered that Marin had been recruiting immigrants. The Swabian League where Breschgao was located was one of the few German princes friendly groups. After all, everyone was from the emperor's faction. Therefore, they planned to send someone to ask Marin - whether they would like to buy these populations for a fee...
After all, it would be extremely cost-effective to exchange money and food from Marin for these originally useless people. And these people still have to spend food to raise them every day.
"Selling prisoners of war?" After listening to Kohler's report, Marin widened his eyes. Then, he took a breath and asked:
"How many peasant prisoners of war do they have? How much is the offer?"
Kohler flipped through the information and replied:
"They have about 5,000 farmers and prisoners of war in their hands. Including the farmers' families, it is estimated that more than 20,000 people will be included. But those lords probably won't sell all 5,000 farmers. It seems that they have selected 2,000 more honest and obedient farmers from them. There are 3,000 more 'thorny' farmers, and the lords plan to sell them to you. As for the asking price, it seems to be a family of 30 gold coins. However, it does not include children over 5 years old. Those children are very popular in the market and need to calculate the money... Only children under 5 years old will be given with gifts because they are not sure whether they can survive their childhood..."
"3,000 farmers...including their families are more than 10,000, right? OK, tell them, we bought it! However, I asked more than half of the funds to replace them with grain... In addition, try to buy all the farmers' children, especially those children in their 10s. These children can grow into Dingkou in a few years..."
Chapter completed!