Matheus Miller}}}s Memoir A Merchant}}}s Life in the Seventeenth Century [Paperback]

This book reconstructs the worldview of a Lutheran merchant from the city of Augsburg in the seventeenth century. Miller's is a singular story. Though he lived through some of the great events of his age, he scarcely mentioned them. Though he was raised in the standard values of his age, he understood and applied them idiosyncratically. This is the story of one man's experience and perception based on his memoir and associated documents. Yet, despite its individual focus, the book explores universal institutions of early modern Europe: patriarchy, hierarchy, honor, community, and confession.List of Illustrations/Maps Preface Introduction Marriage and Patriarchy Public Office and Public Sphere Sociability and Social Structure Death and Confession Conclusion Index

In Safley's skilled hands, Matheus's remarkable memoir enlivens our understanding of the experience of the German bourgeoisie... - Gary K. Waite, Canadian Journal of History

This well-written book presents an excellent picture of seventeenth-century life and one individual's bourgeois values. - History: Review of New Books

...he shows a sensitive respect for the self-revealing honesty of this remarkable human document. - Sixteenth Century Journal

...[Safley's] intelligent and sensitive rendering of the ambivalences and complexities in his merchant of Augsburg.

-American Historical Review

Thomas Max Safley is Associate Professor of History at the University of Pennsylvania.