This building used to serve as a wool weigher. No wool was allowed to pass through or be traded until it had been presented at the wool weigher for weighing. It was customary to lease out the collection of this excise duty.
The joint sovereigns of Maastricht, whose coats of arms are shown next to the scales, were entitled to a share of the revenue.
hoC ponDere CVIqVe sVVM," reads the chronogram under the scales, that is, at this scales everyone gets what is his (1721). And both Maastricht sovereigns must have found that was a nice saying.
The coats of arms of both Maastricht sovereigns.
On the left that of the then Prince Bishop of Liege, Joseph Clemens, Duke of Bavaria.
On the right that of the States General as successor to the Duke of Brabant.
In the 18th century the cloth industry in Maastricht was no longer very important. But in the Middle Ages, Maastricht cloth appeared on the annual fairs in the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation and was certainly also traded in Antwerp and Bergen op Zoom in Brabant, as well as in the county of Holland.
At that time the guild of cloth weavers was the most powerful craft in Maastricht. They had many domestic weaving mills, both in the Boschstraat district and in the Jeker district, and floating fulling mills ('vollen', stamping clay into the fabric to make it thicker and fuller) on the Maas. According to the legend of the clothmakers' guild, it is worth mentioning that the construction of the large St. Matthew church at Boschstraat was paid for to a large extent from the guild's penance.
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