Page 216 - Mediterranea-ricerche storiche, n. 48, aprile 2020flip

216 Beatrice Zucca Micheletto

allows to better investigate the links between charity institutions,
guilds and economic privileges granted by the royal power.
Firstly, of course, artisans and entrepreneurs were asked to
perform different kinds of tasks, depending on the trade and on the
size of the manufacture they had to organize. Cornelio Wanderkrik, for
example, who produced woolens in one of the Ospedale di Carità’s
mills, had to oversee around thirty workers, while the master Gio
Sebastiano Eula managed ‘just’ a workshop, but we know he had up
to 7 apprentices from the Ospedale, in addition to other workers. The
case of the already cited French Jean Boullement, on the other hand,
reveals another pattern. Native to Normandy, Boullement signed an
agreement with the Ospedale di Carità to establish a workshop for the
production of laces. He was expected to live on the premises of the
institution with his family and two female workers and was required
to train 25 to 30 female inmates for four years. In exchange of this,
the Ospedale, granted him the right to keep and sell the outcomes of
their work; he also retained the right to reject unmotivated girls. Not
only the entrepreneur, but all his family – i.e. his wife and two
daughters - were required to participate and perform work in this
business.
Entrepreneurs, merchants and artisans could take advantage of the
labour force made available by charity institutions more broadly, that is,
not only by establishing a factory or workshop on the premises of the
institution. In December 1725, for example, Claude Robert de
Montincamp petitioned the king in order to set up a factory for processing
hemp thread and cloths in the region of Nice. Apart from a range of fiscal,
economic and symbolic privileges he was granted, he significantly asked
for the permission to employ the labour force available in the local
workhouses. ‘Boys and girls able to work’ were therefore encouraged (or
forced?) to work in his factory, together with other external workers, who,
in turn, were entitled to receive help from these charity institutions in
case of necessity. The petition did not say explicitly if these poor boys and
girls would be paid regularly; we know only that they would receive food
and other goods to sustain themselves .
46
Finally, we should take also into account the fact that these
entrepreneurs and merchants were wealthy, and could easily afford
to found and fund their own charity institutions: such was the case
for Ludovico Assom. Ludovico was a well-to-do merchant, born in
Villastellone (a town 15 kilometres off Turin). After a life spent in
the Piedmontese city, in January 1774 he founded in his native

46 F. A. Duboin, Raccolta cit., tomo 16, vol. 18, libro 9, Memorial à articles avec les
réponses (…), pp. 800-804.

Mediterranea - ricerche storiche - Anno XVII - Aprile 2020
ISSN 1824-3010 (stampa) ISSN 1828-230X (online)