| Carpenter
That is a good old German custom
a journeyman craftsman, after he has completed his journeyman’s test,
goes “on the tramp”, or more correctly, “takes to the road” with
hat, staff (curved walking stick) and a large rolled-up bundle of
belongings (in place of a knapsack).
The German carpenters of today still
wear their black wide-corduroy suit with enormous bell-bottom pants,
large black floppy hat, golden earring, collarless shirt and heavy
pocket-watch. Even in the middle of the atomic age, the true itinerant
journeyman “tramp” from town to town, occasionally hitch-hiking a
part of the way every now again. They add considerably to their
knowledge and skill from all the master craftsman that take them in
during this period, but they cannot, according to standard regulations,
stay any longer than 6 weeks with any single master.
The journeyman-”guilds” are the
descendants of the craftsman’s guilds that were founded back in the
12th century. One of them bears the name “free Vogtlanders”. They
come from the region, which forms the boundary of the western Erzgebirge. |
