A soldier and a townsman during the Thirty Years’ War. Coexistence – Confrontation – Cooperation

The article deals with the basic issues of the relationships between soldiers and the city population during the Thirty Years’ War, primarily on the basis of German special literature, which is still authoritative in this respect and at the same time confirms and complements the author’s own research. Although the notion of the insurmountable ambivalence of both these social components, generally supported by countless reports of murders, robberies, rapes, physical and psychological attacks, the reality was much more colourful, and city experience with soldiers may not always have been negative. Whether it was mutual cooperation, especially on a commercial basis, or establishing friendly and

The Thirty Years' War is a term that attracts the attention of historians, as well as a wide range of readers. Through analysis, it is possible, alongside significant events and personalities, to study war campaigns and battles or sieges of strategic fortresses, as well as to study the everyday life during the war and the effects of struggle on ordinary people living in cities and villages. Different social groups were challenged by the war disaster to an extent not yet recognized and had to develop a modus vivendi, often also a modus cooperandi. It is common knowledge that the main burden of the army's accommodation was borne by fortified towns. However, questions arise as to how exactly did the coexistence of these two strongly antagonized parties in a relatively small space at first glance proceed? Has the presence of soldiers in the city always brought its devastation, or maybe some centres were able to benefit from it? Were there any regional differences in this respect, or were some cities destroyed by the military more than others? What was a normal day for a warrior accommodated in the city? How did he deal with this new environment? How did he entertain himself? What could he allow himself to do?

State and prospects of research
Learning how the population of towns and villages endured a long war, also due to the now fashionable historical and anthropological trend, is an attractive area of many researches. However, these are mainly concentrated in Germany, while in the Czech Republic and Poland they find little resonance. It should be noted, however, that also in Germany, no monograph on the relations between townsmen and soldiers in a given town centre during the Thirty Years' War was written. The absence is partly compensated for by post-conference volumes, which are most often the result of actions taken by the military and social research community in the early modern period (Arbeitskreis Militär und Gesellschaft in der frühen Neuzeit), represented mainly by Ralf Pröve, Bernhard Kroener and Michael Kaiser. The most successful, growing to be the foundation of further actions, are the volumes about the relations between the army and the early modern society, 1 or the army and the rural population of that period. 2 One of their editors, Bernhard Kroener, raised these issues in a further collective study. 3 Even more, the publications by Michael Kaiser and Ralf Pröve, contained in the collective works, should be considered fundamental. Michael Kaiser described his article as a remark about the rise of and levelling of antagonisms between soldiers and inhabitants, focusing on a different view of the value system of both groups 4 . Otherwise, Ralf Pröve, who took the circumstances of the military/soldiers' stay in the city as the aim of his deliberations, thus coming closest to the issue addressed in the following paragraphs of this article, although the time frame he adopted was wider and covered all early modern period. However, he proposed a basic research questionnaire. 5 The release of the volume on existence during the Thirty Years' War was also a very important step as it was seen "close to reality", containing many studies on the city and its destruction by soldiers. 6 Of course, the role of the townspeople and soldiers could not be omitted from any of the more recent monographs on towns during the Thirty Years' War.
In the second half of the eighties and the early nineties of the last century, several Bernd Roeck's works on Augsburg were published, in which the most valuable are the chapters on the spirit of people affected by the war and on the declining economy of cities. Bernd Roeck, who makes full use of micro history and historical anthropology, was interested in a simple man, but not necessarily in relation to the army, therefore, for the issues undertaken here, they are of a rather marginal importance. 7 A similar character is the insightful analysis of the situation in many southern free German cities by Thomas Wolf -mainly demographic and economic conditions. 8 The inspiration for Wolf's works can be seen in Kathrin Werner's dissertation, which focuses on the triad of North German cities of Demmin, Loitz, Anklam and Wolgast, but also includes other urban centres on the Peene River in Pomerania. 9 The next dissertation, this time by Christian Plath, on religious conflicts and occupation based on the example of Hildesheim, covering a broader period than the Thirty Years' War, i.e. 1580-1660, is very impressive in its size. Much attention has been paid here to the presence of the military. 10 An absolutely unique case was Ingolstadt, the main and unconquerable Bavarian fortress during the Thirty Years' War, where Tobias Schönauer could afford to describe the accompanying war phenomena, such as the overpopulation of the city by fugitives and soldiers. 11 Martin Wildgruber, who analysed a very short period between 1632 and 1634 in his work on Wasserburg, came closest to the reality of contacts between the townspeople and the army. These were the years of the greatest threat to the city centre from foreign troops, which, due to its military importance, was full of soldiers. 12 Numerous details about the circumstances of the accommodation can also be found in the works of Anja Rieck (about Frankfurt am Main) 13 and Philipp Tober (about Wismar). 14 In addition to the above, a number of further publications of a similar nature have been produced, but their level is sometimes varied and the relationship with the subject matter addressed here is minimal. 15 Czech historiography in the sphere of towns and cities still prefers the 'pre-weissenberg' period, although studies of later decades are also quite lacking. The author of these words prepared a monographic picture of Mělník during the war, 16 a Central Bohemian centre belonging to the towns that are widow's pensions for queens, similar to mining areas of Kašperské Hory. 17 An impressive book on art history devoted to Prague during the Thirty Years' War, but its aim was completely different from describing the wartime existence of the townspeople. 18 Nothing important has been added to the issue of the relations between the townspeople and the army, except for the works Kortus 19 and Marek Ďurčanský. 20 In 2010, a conference was organized in Teplice in cooperation with Charles University and the Technical University of Liberec to inspire our research and discussion on soldiers in the cities and villages of the early modern era. 21 Soldiers and villages have recently received the attention of Jaroslav Šulc, and the results of his research are used in the analysis of the situation in cities. 22 These scientific studies should be supplemented by often very subjective narrative and yearbook sources, created by townspeople themselves. The tragic Thirty Years' War made them reach for their pen and write down their observations more than any earlier. Editions of such sources are numerous as in the Czech Republic, as well as in Germany, where even a list of them was created 23 and where valuable anthologies were published. 24 Similar ones were created in the Czech Republic thanks to Josef Polišenský 25 and Tichá. 26 Especially rich is the Saxony's chronicle tradition in the mining towns of the Czech Ore Mountains, 27 which influenced the achievements on the Czech side of the mountains. These very interesting chronicles of the Czech borderland written in German, however, do not enjoy the attention they deserve. Recently, the Chronicles of Michel Stüeler, 28 burgher and tanner from Krupka, the Chronicle of Hans Kriesche 29 from Česká Lípa and partly extracts from the Chronicle of Chomutov by Andreas Augustin Fiedler 30 were made. Interestingly, all Czech language chronicles had been published much earlier. 21 Turek, Švéd a Prajz. Vojenský živel versus město a venkov českého raného novověku, eds. J. Kilián, M. Koldinská, M. Svoboda, "Historie -otázky -problémy" 2011, no Unfortunately, comparable examples of relations from the military side are beyond our reach. If the soldiers kept their diaries and chronicles at all, these did not survive or were not discovered. A unique source is the diary of the German warrior Peter Hagendorf, 31 son of a miller or malt-gardenener, born around 1600 in Zerbst. However, he also does not favour his view of the urban environment, despite the fact that he came from it, and he probably also studied in a good urban school, where he gained the ability to read, write and count. However, his notes show the motivation to join the army -it was a desire to travel, to learn, to have adventures. The robbery and rape in the cities was so common to him that he didn't even write about it. It was similar with the living standards in cities, where he mentioned only once that he got a good accommodation. The pity is even bigger because in this case we have an above-average soldier who exchanged his jacket for an Italian-German dictionary and who was interested in natural beauty or agricultural and technical curiosities. However, he was not as resistant towards the townspeople as he was towards peasants -enemies of soldiers in life and death. 32

Soldier in town
Obviously, soldiers were not an unknown problem in Central European cities even before the outbreak of the Czech State Uprising. So far, however, these were rather one-off stays or raids, which did not cover larger areas of the country and which were followed by quite a long recovery period. The Thirty Years' War, with its pernament-like warfare and exhausting character, changed everything. Armies have occupied the vast majority of Holy Empire cities. There were many reasons for the presence of troops in the cities.
In the case of important strongholds, capital or residential cities, there could be no shortage of permanent military crews (garrisons), at the time of the threat of attack reinforced even more strictly. Tobias Schönauer, who was stationed in Bavarian Inglostadt, described everyday life there, with growing number of soldiers who were added to the permanent ones since the 1630s. They were accommodated in bourgeois houses, of course, and their living conditions depended mainly on the wealth of the owner. Local councillors were spared, the same was true of professors from the University of Ingolstadt, Jesuits and others. In the most difficult war period, however, between 1631 and 1634, there were no longer any exceptions, although the middle class continued to bear the greatest burden. Not only the military, but also the workers working at the city fortifications were to be accommodated. If somebody managed to bypass accommodation, he had to put up with the army costs, which in the times of the greatest burden of the city were expensive. 33 However, Ingolstadt was lucky not to have enemy troops accommodated, which cannot be said of many other cities.
For the city a very painful manifestation of the presence of the army, which was preparing for the enemy attack, was often the liquidation or at least partial demolition of the suburbs and buildings in the immediate vicinity. It didn't just happen in connection with the fighting. The removal of buildings that could have been used during the siege by the enemy was a preventive measure before the expected attack. The victims of such activities were houses with farming facilities in suburban areas belonging to townspeople, facilities such as forges, and especially mills, so important for providing food. Granaries, barns and vineyard buildings were demolished, trees, including entire orchards were cut down. 34 After the war the suburbs were the most affected parts of the cities: they were burnt out, depopulated, in some cases they disappeared at all and it took many years, or even decades for them to be rebuilt at least partially, although in general they did not reach the state before the battle of Bílá (1620).
For civilians, the siege was associated with a lack of food and all kinds of everyday objects, hunger and disease were spreading, and sometimes cannibalism was taking place. The tightly closed city, which also had to feed the army, and not only its inhabitants, was quickly running out of supplies and if the incidents outside the walls or the help could not improve the situation, a catastrophe of apocalyptic proportions could occur. Determined people cooked paper and leather from shoes or thongs, ate rodent meat and carrion, and in the worst cases anthropophagia and cannibalism occurred. Bernd Roeck gave a very vivid 33 T. Schönauer, Ingolstadt… 34 A contemporary account of these events in Bautzen is given by J. Zeidler, Tabeera Budissinae. Budissinische Brandstelle. Das ist: Was vor, in und nach der erbärmlichen ruin und einäscherung der Alten Volckreichen und Nahrhafftigen Budissin vorgangen, Dresden 1634, pp. 20-35. description of the famine and the resulting death on the example of Augsburg, besieged by the Imperial army after the battle of Nördlingen (Autumn 1634). 35 Apart from hunger, soldiers brought a whole range of infectious diseases to cities, especially plague. The army, which was characterized by considerable fluctuation, stationing here and there without quarantine and a low level of hygiene, was a perfect spreader right away. Their outbreaks and years of occurrence have changed, which we can trace in the metrics and other sources recording increased mortality. These sources are varied, for example, in the Czech Republic a marked increase in deaths can be observed in the mid-1620s, around 1631-1632 and 1634, as in the 1640s. These years coincide with periods of increased military activity, with dragonnades, Saxony's invasions and finally with Swedish voyages. The same examples could be given for German cities, in addition to the already mentioned Augsburg, for example Wismar, which suffered a plague due to the great concentration of troops and a dense plague in 1628 and lasted another 3 years. 36 There is no data on further diseases brought by soldiers (syphilis, whooping cough, typhus, various fevers 37 ), however, it is certain that those incapabilities also afflicted the population. What is more, the soldiers actively contributed to the spread of disease in the cities. In the conquered Landshut, they threw corpses and carrion into the well in order to poison the inhabitants, destroyed pharmacies and murdered doctors so as to prevent help for the infected and wounded. 38 The prolonged occupation mainly affected strategic and well-established cities, the others were often burnt out and abandoned. Sometimes the commanders formed the so-called 'salva guardia', i.e. a guard to protect the townspeople from robbery by the armies under their command. In some cases, however, it was not about the guard as such, but about the guarantee of protection. The Salva guardia was not as anonymous as the larger military crew and generally established better contacts with the townspeople.
In less strategically significant centres, the longest stays of troops were connected with their winter accomodation, sometimes lasting from late Autumn to 35 B. Roeck, "Als will die Welt schier brechen"…, pp. 271-279. 36 P. Tober, Wismar im Dreißigjährigen Krieg 1627 In the Bavarian Wasserburg in August 1633, due to the great military build-up, a "Hungarian disease" appeared, probably typhus or hemorrhagic fever (syphilis can also be found under this term advanced Spring. The soldiers were then to rest and gain strength for the Summer campaign, but for the townspeople it was extremely burdensome. Due to the lack of barracks, there was no other possibility than to provide the army with an accommodation under one's own roof with a fireplace during the period of frosts, rains and generally a bad aura. If the army was not provided with such winter accommodation, it was in danger of a complete moral decay. Suffice it to mention the famous case of the imperial army of Matthias Gallas, who after retreating from northern Germany stood under the walls of Magdeburg in the winter of 1644, whose commander refused to let the army into the town, even though both the imperial lieutenant general and over a thousand of his soldiers were ill. That's how the Gallas Army disaster happened. 39 A specific reason for locating the army in the town, especially in the Czech state in the mid-1620s, was the deliberate, imposed re-catholicisation of the inhabitants, i.e. the so-called Dragonnades. It was similar in the Upper Palatinate. Soldiers in large numbers were placed in the houses of non-Catholic owners and stayed there until the family decided to convert. 40 Especially in the late phase of the war, the inhabitants of towns and villages had to deal with deprived soldiers, the so-called marauders, who deserted from their units, merged into groups and made their living out of robbery on the roads, in villages or in unfortified towns. At the end of the war, some such gangs were strong enough to threaten regular military operations (for example, the famous "Petrovští" in Bohemia).

Accommodation and victualling
Because of the accommodation in the town, the soldiers appeared either in a patrician or bourgeois house. The properties of the richest and most affluent neighbours, usually standing by the market square, were mostly occupied by officers, while simple soldiers had to come to terms with a more modest accommodation. A soldier found himself in the middle of the economic and intimate life of a family; often with his own family, with his wife and children, therefore obviously found it difficult to establish a common language with those whose everyday lives they entered. A rough picture of such a situation is given by the accounts of Bavarian Wasserburg, which in the first half of the 1630s hosted 647 soldiers, and next to them another 373 people: their wives, children and servants. 41 On the one hand, if an officer moved into spacious and accessible rooms, which a landlord had to offer him, a simple soldier had to settle for an attic or a chamber, and in individual cases -a barn or a stable. On the other hand, one didn't have to complain about the cold that one would have had to deal with in a cold chamber without a stove. In the cold season it was, of course, the law to live in a heated room, 42 which often meant sleeping among the four walls with the host family. This in turn became one of the main reasons for the spread of the epidemic. It was the infected who should have been kept warm. Such a soldier also had the right to his own bed, a few candles to light his room and access to a kitchen where he could cook for himself, unless his companion (wife) did so, 43 or unless he received food from his household members. In practice, it looked more or less like a soldier had unlimited access to the whole house and invited to it, as if it were his own, his companions. There have been cases where soldiers slept on the beds of their hosts and the house owners were forced to spend nights on the floor, and even cases when the household members were driven out and soldiers tried to sell the house. 44 The martyrdom of the townspeople began when they had to accommodate many soldiers. Pröve also noted that the soldiers were most often housed in houses of two or three and shared a bed there. 45 But sometimes there were many more.
According to official orders, a soldier was entitled to a standardised daily ration in the form of bread, meat (usually 4 livres) and beer (about 7 pints), the horsemen were also to receive hay and food for their horses. The problem arose in the time of crop failure or when the butchers were unable to obtain meat from local peasants. They were punished for such inadequacies. The army was obliged to obtain the bread, meat and beer from specific neighbours, and the army was not to burden its hosts with this. Unfortunately, the reality was different. Soldiers wanted to have more than necessary basics, and their expectations sometimes reached the absurd. problem for one of the Polish warriors, who demanded plums and rice during his lodging in Mladá Boleslav. 46 In other cases, it was mostly fruit, vegetables and spices, especially salt and pepper, and sometimes vinegar, the most popular preservatives at the time. In Prague, the army demanded fruit and other southern delicacies, 47 and in Frankfurt am Main, tobacco was demanded many times. 48 Officers usually expected money. Everybody wanted alcohol, mostly wine 49 or more beer. If they did not receive the liquor immediately, they threatened to damage the ovens, smash the windows and break the tables. 50 There were also times when the army was not satisfied with the food and sold it in the city. 51

Social inclusion and cooperation
Instead of first sentence have something like this: There were some soldiers who did not experience these problems in the city. There were also those who made money from it, as well as former soldiers who found acceptance, sometimes also got involved with a woman or even settled down or returned to the town after the war with their wife. Sexual contact between soldiers and women was normal. After all, they were often young and attractive men, familiar with the world and sometimes also wealthy. Sometimes they were also educated craftsmen and there was always a possibility of benefiting from having someone skilful settled for longer. If not, the woman who tied herself to such a man was leaving with him for a new life visiting European battlefields. Examples include the wife of educated Peter Hagendorf, who gave birth to his children almost one after another and was still able to take care of the whole family, 52 or Susanna Hüebel from Krupka, who left her hometown after the wedding, widowed during the war and returned to her town after some time with another husband-soldier, who settled there with her and worked as a craftsman. 53 Soldiers, especially officers, were the godparents of townspeople's children, for which they were paid as well. with the army were strengthened in cases of longer lasting arrangements and in the case of smaller units, where anonymity was more difficult. There were some who simply became friends with the soldiers. 54 Also, the townspeople were much closer and showed sympathy to the soldiers or members of the salva guardia, who were humiliated by other soldiers during some combat. Cooperation was mainly manifested in the sphere of trade and exchanges. Cities were an ideal place for the army to dispose of their loot and trophies gained in other cities or villages. They willingly traded with the Jews although they did not get the equivalent of their loot. After the capitulation of Frankfurt am Main, the Swedes did not expel the Jews from the city, because their commercial competence was a big advantage. One rabbi there even realized that the fate of his nation was far better than that of Christians in this war. 55 However, there was also a lively exchange between soldiers and Christian city dwellers. There were also those who got very rich on this, following the Jews. The soldiers however, were satisfied with small sums of money for their booty. Munich's townspeople were buying from them almost everything that was stolen around the city and on their way to it, even whole peasant carts. 56 There was a demand for horses, for livestock, for food, but also for craft products (skins, brewing tools and similar) or everyday objects. They were generally aware that they were buying stolen goods, but they did not shy away from buying them. This is another manifestation of the moral decline caused by an exhausting war. Purchasers were threatened by the fact that goods identified as stolen would have to give back to the rightful owner without compensation. However, the risk was low and mainly related to larger animals or objects that the new holder publicly displayed.
Some of the townspeople joined the army. The motives for this are usually not known, 57 but we can assume that one of them was the attractiveness of an adventurous life, travel and the chance to get rich easily. Others wanted to get out of a difficult situation, such as prison. The rule was that mainly representatives of the lower social stratum applied for the army, which of course does not exclude exceptions. Similar motifs played a role in case of collaboration with or joining the enemy army. Among the Saxony's soldiers at the time of their invasion on the 54 M. Ďurčanský Czech state there were many townsmen next to the nobility, others could be found under Danish or Swedish flags.

Thefts and rapes
Thefts and robberies carried out by the warriors were 'everyday bread' in the Central European city during the Thirty Years' War and together with rape were the main source of conflict between civilians and the army. What was being robbed has already been mentioned, and one of the most desired goods were horses, which in addition were easily exchangeable for money. 58 The members of the 'salva guardia' also stole a lot. The robberies were not only carried out at night, in narrow streets, on abandoned roads, but also during the daytime in the centre of a town, as one burgher Martin Burian Polický testified in a letter of May 1634 to his friend Šadimský, mentioning that soldiers in Prague take people's hats and coats away. 59 The frequency of rape was noticeable in a conquered town. According to the law of war, a soldier was then entitled to loot in the form of anything he managed to get. 60 Most often the most desirable goods available were in the hands of commanders. With the exception of churches and ecclesiastical institutions, it was often about co-religionists. 61 The destruction of largely populated Magdeburg by Tilly's army in 1631 was so severe that the news about it was spread all over the world. The town was violently looted; the population was murdered, and majority of the houses burned down. The victims were counted in tens of thousands. 62 This event is sometimes written about as a "Magdeburg wedding", and for similar activities concerning other cities, even a term: "Magdeburgisation" was coined. The fate of Landshut, which was entered by the Swedes under Bernard of Sax-ony-Weimar command in 1634 after heavy fighting, was not much better -as a bloody massacre was set up in the city. Everyone found in the street was killed, the murders lasted for eight long days. Churches and monasteries were not spared, on the contrary, they were plundered in the first place and many Catholic clergy were killed or severely mutilated. Residents were forced to drink the so-called Swedish liquor, their ears and noses were cut off, and they were tortured (among other things, by putting ropes around their necks) so that they would tell where their valuables were hidden. 63 The "Magdeburgisation" became a part of life of yet another town -the Central Bohemian Nymburk, which fell into the hands of the Saxony's army after a three-day siege in 1634 during the Saxo-Swedish invasion. The outraged army began to share the destruction, mainly as a response to the town's resistance but also their own loses, without saving women, children and the elderly seeking refuge in the local parish church. 64 Part of the violence against civilians included the rape of women, which, of course, the sources are not silent about, but for understandable reasons do not generally provide more details. In the conquered city, women and girls (including nuns) could hardly avoid being raped, brutal soldiers with primitive sexual needs did not ask any questions. Sexual violence was a typical feature of the Thirty Years' War. 65 Mayor Christoph Brandis described the rape of a 17-year-old girl by a soldier from Ruthen in a very detailed way emphasizing the whole brutality of that act. 66 In Landshut many women were taken to a Swedish camp and raped there. When the soldiers satisfied their violent needs, many of the women were drowned in the river Isar, although other women, feeling disgraced sought death there for themselves. There were also those who spread blood on their intimate places, pretending to menstruate and therefore discourage rape. 67 Violence and rape against civilians were also not foreign to their own troops, although to a lesser extent and not so drastically (although there will be exceptions here too). The aggression could have reached such an extent that it endangered the lives of the townspeople. In the sources, we can find many cases of murders committed among townsmen by the Habsburg or allied armies during the Thirty Years' War. On the other hand, we also know such situations, when the townspeople, having some experience in armed combat, grabbed their weapons and confronted the army. However, this also did not guarantee that they would avoid later problems.

Termination and recapitulation
During the Thirty Years' War there were no barracks where soldiers could be accommodated safely, apart from just a few exceptions. 68 This affected not only their health, but also the damage to their expensive equipment and armaments, as well as the scale of desertion. The Emperor and commanders found it difficult to find an alternative. The army in the city was also a convenient solution for them as a means of pressure to achieve political, religious and economic goals. Placing soldiers in the homes of non-Catholic townsmen with the intention of forcing their conversion was a very familiar phenomenon, just as the threat of a forceful execution worked well for forcing contributions and supplies of provisions. In addition, it was possible to control two spheres: a soldier controlled a townsman and his family, a townsman could inform his superiors about the inappropriate behaviour of a soldier who was staying with him.
The free and forcible accommodation of troops meant relations were always on a 'knife's edge' it could explode at any time. Most of the reasons for that were thefts, alcohol and also the belief of the townspeople that the soldiers demanded too much, while the latter believed that they received too little. Other aspects were also important, such as incurring higher costs associated with heating more rooms in the house, and mainly -entering the intimate sphere of life of the host family. The conflicts were so common that we could hardly find a city that did not know them. They differed in their intensity, starting. Starting with verbal abuse, injury, through handcuffs to mutilation and death in fights leading to tragic consequences plus passivity towards the army's swagger. Many townspeople were able to deal with the enemy in a direct confrontation, but facing the threat other soldiers joining in were on shaky ground. Therefore, it usually ended up with formal complaints. If the town resisted the troops but were conquered, not only greater losses had to be reckoned with, but also their future fate would be entirely at the mercy of their invaders.
The duties of the cities in relation to their own and hostile armies did not differ in principle. In both cases they were asked for money, material support and human potential. The alien army didn't have to be more burdensome. Threats of seizures and counterattacks were directed against the cities by the armies of both sides. Nevertheless, foreign troops were more afraid of and generally more concerned about meeting their expectations.
However, we should not give in to the impression that the typical town from the first half of the 17th century did not have any possibilities of effective resistance against the army. The local community could secure themselves, and sometimes they did so very effectively. The cooperation between individual centres deepened, especially in the sphere of information, and stretches of self-defence were developed. Interestingly, it was considered an extreme solution to fight with a gun in hand or to escape. Typical town was aware of its economic importance and the fact that it was an integral part of the state's economic system. The complaints and demands from city representatives did not always fall on fertile soil, but were examples of pressure on the authorities and the monarch. Letters sent from cities were in standard form. The towns definitely presented themselves as worthy of mercy: extremely poor, plundered, and burnt out. The town appealed to the principles of Christian morality and inhabitants very often allowed themselves to threaten the noblemen with the possibility of leaving the place, which would result in economic regress in the area. It couldn't have left the authorities indifferent. Also within the town's community, there were many different ways found how to survive the war during the time of the imperial army's lodging or during the occupation. Among them was collaboration, purchase of stolen goods, solidarity, but variety of tricks as well. The overriding aim was to survive, which concerned the townspeople as well as the soldiers.

A soldier and a townsman during the Thirty Years' War. Coexistence -Confrontation -Cooperation Abstract
The article deals with the basic issues of the relationships between soldiers and the city population during the Thirty Years' War, primarily on the basis of German special literature, which is still authoritative in this respect and at the same time confirms and complements the author's own research. Although the notion of the insurmountable ambivalence of both these social components, generally supported by countless reports of murders, robberies, rapes, physical and psychological attacks, the reality was much more colourful, and city experience with soldiers may not always have been negative. Whether it was mutual cooperation, especially on a commercial basis, or establishing friendly and family relations.