The second most common topic dealt with in labour legislation was the early departure or dismissal of servants. From the viewpoint of the employer, premature departure of a servant could have a significant impact. There was only a short window of opportunity to hire servants throughout the year. Servants were hired on yearly or half-yearly contracts starting in May or October.
1 See L. Vervaet, ‘The Employment of Servants in Fifteenth- and Sixteenth-Century Coastal Flanders: A Case Study of Scueringhe Farm near Bruges’, in Whittle (ed.), Servants in Rural Europe, pp. 23–4. After these dates, it could be difficult to find servants, as most of them would be employed. Early departure of a servant, therefore, could result in short-term labour shortages on a farm. For the servant, too, early dismissal could spell bad news and result in temporary unemployment. Specific provisions were included in labour legislation to protect both employer and servant against such situations. Importantly, not all departures of servants before the end of their term were treated as punishable offences. Marriage in particular was considered a valid reason to end service prematurely. In other words, labour laws not only explicitly recognised the life-cycle character of service but also prioritised the formation of new households over the labour needs of rural employers. Also, in case of sickness a servant could leave employment without incurring any fine or financial punishment. Finally, some regions also stated that unreasonable of unlawful behaviour on the part of the employers constituted a valid reason to put an early end to a service term. In the absence of these conditions, breach of service had important financial implications. In all regions, servants were fined and forfeited their wages when they left employment prematurely. In other words, the employer owed the servant nothing in this case. The fines that servants incurred varied regionally. The district of Bergues offered the servant the option to resume his/her service if they were not able to pay the fine.
2 Costumen der stede, casselrye, ende vassalryen, ibid. In most districts, however, early departure by the servant resulted in the permanent severance of the master–servant relationship.
The customs of most regions treated servants and employers on an equal legal footing. Servants and employers incurred the same fine for breach of contract. Also, in most cases employers were expected to pay the servant full wages if they dismissed them during their term. Servants, therefore, certainly enjoyed protection under the labour laws against early dismissal from their employers. The district of Bruges was a region where some important inequalities can be observed in this respect. Servants who left their employment before the end of their term and without the consent of the master forfeited their wages and incurred a fine of 6 £ parisis. Farmers, on the other hand, could send away their servants before the end of their term without incurring substantial additional costs. First, farmers were not fined for such actions. Second, they were also not expected to pay servants their full yearly wages. Servants could be dismissed prematurely through payment of the wages owed to them up to that date in addition to the equivalent of a week’s earnings. Importantly, this clause specified that employers only owed wages in proportion to the working time (‘naer rate van tyde’) that had elapsed.
3 Gilliodts-Van Severen, Coutume, ibid. The customs, therefore, assumed that labour efforts of servants were equally distributed over time. This, off course, was not the case during the early modern period. Some months were characterised by higher work intensity and longer working days. In theory, farmers in this region could hire servants shortly before the peak season and dismiss them shortly afterwards without incurring a fine or substantial costs. To what extent farmers in the district of Bruges made active use of this flexible and cheap severance option is not known. Most probably, this option offered by regional labour laws was not exploited to its full potential by farmers as this would ultimately reflect badly on individual employers and prevent them from attracting servants. Farmers with a reputation of dismissing servants prematurely would undoubtedly have encountered difficulties in hiring workers. More research is required to determine to what extent premature dismissal was actively prosecuted in rural courts. Farm accounts indicate that the potential of the labour laws was not fully exploited by employers. For example, a farmer named Jacob Haeghebaert recorded in his notebook that one of his manservants left his farm without notice before the end of his term. He wrote that he was offended by this behaviour, but apparently did not pursue this breach of contract in court.
4 Anonymous, ‘Uit een familieboek’, Biekorf, 11 (1900), 73.