1688
The reason why list X was drawn up is not indicated. The very detailed "Instruction for correctly completing the censuses" does not mention it. However, there can be no doubt that it was for fiscal purposes. The census does not only provide information on people but also on property in the form of animals, wagons, carts, and arable or deserted land, meadows, woods, vineyards, and mills. Thus, a veritable land register before its term. As is clear from the "Instruction," this census was not carried out for the city of Luxembourg alone, but for the entire country. Where have all these documents gone, which, if any trace of them still remains, would provide valuable information for the history of the various localities, almost 80 years before the establishment of the land register of Empress Maria Theresa? The list for the city of Luxembourg was in fact drawn up in the first days of 1688.
First, it allows us to give for the first time the exact number of houses for the entire city. They are distributed as follows:
11 of these houses are not inhabited. Not mentioned in the upper town are the 3 convents of the Franciscans, the Capuchins and the Holy Spirit, the town hall, the house of the King (Recev. Gén.), that of Ryaville (Mahieu) and that of the Governor, so 7 in all and in the suburb of Grond, the abbey of Munster and the hospital Saint-Jean, both still in the process of reconstruction. This gives a total of 643 houses. It should also be noted that less than 4 years after the siege, which had destroyed almost the entire lower town, it has more houses than in the last census of 1683 (list VIII).
The number of people listed on List X is 3,991. But it would be premature to immediately see this as the total figure for the city's population. List Xa, a curious supplement of four well-filled sheets, inserted in the same register 39 in the A.V., in fact provides
still on some 360 other people, qualified as "Useless Mouths" because, for various reasons, they were not taxable and therefore of no interest to the people of the royal tax authorities. But these four sheets only cover the parish of St-Nicolas and we can rightly assume that the approximately 100 houses of the parish of St-Michel, just like the rest of the suburbs, in turn housed "Useless Mouths". Here is the table of the population according to lists X and Xa:
To this sum are added the 3 convents and the 4 houses mentioned above and not listed, as well as the 5 Clausen mills belonging to the lordship of Munster and the foreign occupants of 10 houses on which the lists do not provide details, i.e. at least 150 people. As, on the other hand, the number of children on list Xa is certainly higher - only one child was counted for each of the 18 "family" mentions - and the "Bouches Inutiles" (Useless Mouths) are missing for the rest of the town, the figure of 4,500 inhabitants should be largely exceeded. Especially since the officers of the garrison were housed with the inhabitants just as in the Spanish era, the barracks built by Vauban being intended for non-commissioned officers and soldiers. Since the 1683 census, the town's population will therefore have increased by more than 1,000 units.
Since List Xa does not distinguish between older and younger children, the number of 97 children could not be detailed. According to the "Instruction" (Art. VIII), boys over 14 and girls over 12 are considered older. The disproportion between older and younger children is at first glance surprising: 133 versus 484 for boys, 174 versus 496 for girls. However, it does not to illustrate what was said in list II, namely that many boys and girls of bourgeois served as valets or maids in other households of the city. This statement is also confirmed by the "Instruction" (V), "care should be taken not to count valets or maids twice, which could easily happen if the Fathers and Mothers, when stating the number of their children, specified those who do not live with them and who would be in service...who would come to be counted as valets or maids in the families of the masters with whom they would be". The percentage of young people, including, as in the previous lists, valets and maids, is 57% of the total population figure.
While, as already mentioned, a comparison between the different lists remains questionable due to the fact that the information provided is often disparate, we can nevertheless observe a change in the distribution of the population. It is now concentrated in the upper town to the detriment of the lower town, especially since the demolition of 95 houses in 1671. Thus, in
Out of 731 people, only 2 have two jobs at the same time. On the other hand, although the range has widened, it is no more plentiful. 42 of the 92 jobs, or 46%, have only one or two representatives. Among the other 50, haberdashers are at the top of the list, followed fairly closely by bakers, shoemakers, and tavern or innkeepers. Then come, in descending order, tailors and laborers. Masons, coopers, butchers, and drapers follow quite far behind. As for maids and servants, they have made a spectacular leap forward, in no way related to the population increase of approximately 30% since the 1683 census (list VIII). Thus, for the upper town, the number of maids is up 90% compared to that of 1675 and 153% compared to that of 1683. For servants, the increase amounts to
Instructions for accurately completing the counts in the attached Table.
1.
One must write the name of the Parish in the blank space left in the title above the Table and that of the Village where the Church will be located. If it is in the place, write in the Village itself; if it is not there and there is a Chapel where Mass can be said, write it down immediately.
II.
Write in full in the squares of the second column of Names and Qualities the name and nickname of the Individuals domiciled and residing in the Place, starting with the Lord, Priest, and then all the Inhabitants, indicating for each their qualities: Gentleman, Priest, Chaplain, Farmer, or Craftsman, specifying for the latter what their profession is, for example, Peter, Cavan, Tavern-maker, and so on
Count in all the squares of the other columns the number of each thing that each individual or head of family will have in the Place and the extent of his territory only and not elsewhere whose species are marked at the head of each column and when there is one that he will not have, it is necessary to count in the squares of said species a zero. Thus the said zero in the squares of men or women will indicate the Widows or Widowers and in the other squares that there is none of the species contained in the column.
IV.
That the same zero which will be continued in all the squares following the one where a house will have been counted will signify abandoned or deserted houses.
V
Care should be taken when making the count not to count the Valets or Servants twice, which could easily happen if the Fathers and Mothers, when counting the number of their children, specified those who do not live with them and who would be in service in the place where the count is to be made, or elsewhere, which would come to be counted as Valets or Servants in the families of the masters with whom they serve
wind, it would be found that they would be counted twice for one, which must be avoided by carefully inquiring about those who serve in order to specify them only in the families where they are found.
VI. It must also be taken care that the Fathers and Mothers, by giving a correct count of their children, do not include those they have married who no longer live with them because otherwise they could still be counted twice.
VII. When there are two or three families in the same house, they must be named and written each separately in as many rows of squares in the second column and joined together by a line similar to that [cy, marking in the middle of said joining or line the number I in the square of the column of houses, which will make it clear that in the same house there will be as many families as there are included in the joining of said second column
VIII. Observe that all boys and girls who will be counted as adults must be at least 14 years old, and girls 12 years old and above, and that all little boys and girls must be below this age, that is, boys 14 years old and girls 12 years old.
IX. That the column of the number of horses must include the oxen used in harness to pull the carts and plows.
X. That in the column of names and qualities, the King must be employed in the places where there are lands and property in holdings that belong to His Majesty because of his domains to count them in his name, and observe the same for abbeys and other beneficiaries who will similarly have houses and property in holdings in the places, their banns and boundaries, which will be counted
IX. Likewise, enumerate the said Abbeys, Monasteries, Religious Houses, Houses of Refuge, and other Church people who will be established in the places to be enumerated, and fill in the species that each of them will have in their particular, as well as with regard to the Lords and other families.
XII. Care must also be taken that the Seigniors of Ecclesiastical places, Gentlemen, and all other individuals, in thus giving the just enumeration of their houses, Lands, and Goods that they have in the places where they are domiciled and reside, do not include those that they will have and belong to them in other places where they do not reside; the Censiers who will exercise them will declare them in the place of their situation, which will be counted to also avoid them being declared twice.
XIII.
And to make known to whom the aforementioned Goods will belong and to ensure that there is no mistake in the particular faculties of the Censiers to whom those that would be counted under their names would be attributed, we must make the distinction observed here, for example, Jean Gillet, Laborer, Censier to such and such a Lord or other individual for what is his, and in the following rank of the squares, put the same for what is his master's.
XIV.
Finally, a copy similar to that of the census that will be sent in this table will be kept in the premises and which is in the same order so that when we want to renew them in the future, we only have to decrease or increase according to the changes that will occur without transposing any of the articles used there.
XV
As no table has been made expressly for the census of Luxembourg, several have been joined together to be able to contain all the names of the individuals who are accustomed to and reside both in the upper town and in each of the lower towns of Grondt and Paphendal and the houses of Clausen separately, or these distances not having been observed to distinguish the parishes and the streets where they must be counted, as it would have been appropriate to put them in order, this deficiency will be compensated for by leaving a few rows of squares empty and blank in the space in which one will write such street of such parish and then one will fill the table with the houses located on a street and thus of the others.
The titles of the different columns are
for the first sheet:
House, Names and Qualities, Men, Women, Big Boys, Big Girls, Little Boys, Little Girls, Servants, Maids, Horses.
for the second sheet:
Wagons, Carts, Horned Beasts, Pigs, Sheep, Goats, Acreage of Arable Land, Meadow Mowed, Commons or Deserted Land, Acreage. Arpans of Wood, Arpans of Vineyards. Mills.
Only the indications from the first sheet concerning the people have been transcribed, so that the numbers behind the respective names indicate in order: man, woman, big boys, etc., up to the maids