Handicrafts as professions and sources of income in late eighteenth and early nineteenth century Turku (Åbo):

Abstract

This study focuses on the largest Finnish pre-industrial city, Turku (Åbo), as a seat of hand-made work or handicraft production. Special attention is given to the goods which every Turku inhabitant needed in his or her everyday life - clothing and footwear. The results are analysed from a gender-historical point of view. The study does not consider handicraft work only as a profession but also as a way of earning income. Both men and women earned a living through handicrafts but they worked separately, and their social, economic and political premises and objectives were different. If a hand-made fabric, a coat, a pair of shoes or a hat, was made and sold by a man, it was mostly a question of a profession strictly regulated by law, which had a tax liability, was mainly open to men only, required formal training, was a life-long career which gave social power and prestige, was practised among the male community and was well documented. If a hand-made fabric, a hat or a shirt, was made and sold by a woman, the work was almost always unregulated, untaxed, did not require formal training, did not mean a life-long career, had no status, was performed alone and was poorly documented. And when a field of handicraft became femaledominated, it lost the prestige and status it had had when male.