History of Butchers' Guild in Český Krumlov

In Český Krumlov the butchers´ trade was classified among the most noted and profitable food crafts. The butchers who supplied the whole town with meat usually belonged to the esteemed and very well-to-do burghers. The first mention of the butchers´ trade in Český Krumlov dates from 1347 when the Rosenberg ruler Peter I. von Rosenberg issued Letters regarding the sale of meat in meat market in which butcher Masters offered their goods (History of Meat Market in Český Krumlov).

Butchers as well as members of other trades gathered together in their own guild which represented their professional organisation regulated by rules issued or approved by the nobility. For instance in 1539 Jošt von Rosenberg issued a Guild Privilege for the butchers which modified the conditions for slaughtering cattle. It was allowed to slaughter only at the town´s slaughterhouse, called "šlachtáta" (History of Slaughterhouse in Český Krumlov), and it was prohibited to slaughter cattle in private houses or at the meat market. Later the slaughterhouse became the cause of the conflict between the butchers and the municipal magistrate, as the place where cattle was slaughtered was full of filth and a strong stench which spread to the broad surroundings. In 1833 the town therefore bought the old slaughterhouse and built a new one including a meat market at its own expense.

Contentions of the competitive type often occurred between the Český Krumlov butchers´ guild and craftsmen engaged in other trades, as for example shoemakers and tanners, who assumed the right of selling cattle as butchers did. The butchers´ guild became extinct similarly as the other guilds after the mid-19th century in association with the change of economic conditions. One of the witnesses of its past is for example the butchers´ guild sign which decorates the front of the house at Horní No. 153 where some of the butchers lived in the 16th century.

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Other information:
History of Guilds and Crafts in Český Krumlov