Gyökerek • A Dráva Múzeum tanulmánykötete, 2004

Ander Balázs: Az agrártársadalom főbb problémái a barcsi járásban a 19-20. század fordulóján

Ander Balázs: Az agrártársadalom főbb problémái a barcsi járásban a 19-20. század fordulóján BALÁZS ANDER THE MAIN PROBLEMS OF THE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY IN THE COUNTYSIDE OF BARCS AT THE TURN OF THE 19

TH-20

TH CENTURIES SUMMARY Balázs Ander'

s essay provides an excellent insight into the most important issues of the agricultural society of the countryside of Bares for readers interested in the agricultural history of Hungary. Around the turn of the 19

th and the 20

th centuries considerable changes took place in Bares and in the villages in its neighbourhood and remarkable urbanization can be observed in Bares but the relatively high level of industrialization wasn't able to solve all the problems of the provincial population. The owners of the large landed properties didn't give the smallholders little pieces of lease, they handed over lands only rich capitalist tenants. It is comprehensible that they wanted to reach high rate of profit. Their farmhands' working conditions were very rigorous and the severe work discipline embittered their lives. There weren't many opportunities to work and for this reason the employment contracts were disadvantageous for the agricultural labourers. Their working day lasted from early dawn till late in the evening and the paltry wages were able to provide only a humiliating life for them. In order to achieve better circumstances of life and protesting against their stern drudgery farmhands came out on strikes in the period of 1905-1907. Their movements were partially successful because the wages were raised but they had to wait for the division of the large lands till 1945. The vast expanse of landed properties dominated the environs in this region too and the unequal distribution of estate determined the independent farmers' life too. In their social class - mainly among protestants - the only child system was very wide- spread in order to prevent that their small lands becoming less by inheritance. This inhuman compulsion caused conspicuous loss of population in the stratum of protestant smallholders. The old registers from that age shows the researchers that their proportion became less and less year by year causing destroying and harmful influence up to this day. If they wanted to live a better life the poorer smallholders had to sell their farms and they had to start a new life in the land of opportunities. But the richer farmers didn't want to abandon their lives in their homeland by emigrating to the United 123