Professions, Commerce, and Industry

From the fifteenth through the eighteenth century the trade guilds were organized in Savoie more or less as they were in other European countries. Apprenticeships were based on a contract between master and apprentice; the apprentice paid the master and also gave to the master’s wife a certain sum known as les épingles, probably because the sum was not large enough to buy anything else but pins. In exchange for these payments, the apprentice lived in the master’s house, where he was given room and board and taught all the secrets of the master’s techniques. The apprenticeship was concluded by the presentation of a masterpiece. Tradesmen who arrived from foreign towns or cities to establish businesses of their own had to undergo the critical visit of their new city’s authorities. Statistics show that 50 percent of confirmed apprentices stayed on in the master’s atelier, 30 percent emigrated to France or the Piemonte to learn other techniques and points of view, and 20 percent solved all their problems by marrying one of the master’s daughters.