Bandlkramerlandl#

Bandlkramerlandl ("ribbon chandler land"), a historic name for the textile-producing region around the towns of Waidhofen an der Thaya and Gross-Siegharts in the Waldviertel Region of Lower Austria, where, from the 18th century on, ribbons (Bandl) for underclothes, clothes and other use (girth-webs, coarse threads) were woven, mainly from domestic base fibre yarn (partly sheep wool) in the cottage industry system; the producers were smallcrofters, cottagers, lodgers and their family members, who were dependent on their merchant-employer. The merchant-employers (Bandlkramer) secured their position by providing the means of production (raw materials, weaving looms) and by monopolising retailing, for which they employed independent peddlars (Bandltraeger). Modernisation in textile production brought about the end of the cottage industry system, and from the second half of the 19th century ribbons were fabricated in larger textile factories. The decline of the whole branch of production began in the second half of the 20th century.

Literature#