The Aschach Toll Registers: Instruction Manual

Peter Rauscher – Andrea Serles

From 2013 to 2022, the Austrian Science Fund FWF-sponsored project “The Danube Trade” edited 25 volumes of the Aschach Toll Records covering the period from 1706 to 1740 (1706, 1709, 1710, 1711, 1713, 1716, 1717, 1718, 1719, 1721, 1724, 1725, 1727, 1728, 1729, 1730, 1731, 1733, 1734, 1735, 1736, 1737, 1738, 1739, 1740). The resulting database can be accessed via the project homepage. This database is dynamically expanded and improved. Therefore, the date must be given with each citation. 

In addition, our cooperation partner ACDH-CH of the Austrian Academy of Sciences stores the data in the digital long-term archiving system “Arche”. The data is available in the machine- and human-readable TEI format. This dataset is versioned at longer intervals. Each object (book, record) there is citable by a Handle-ID.

The books scanned by the Upper Austrian Provincial Archives are linked page by page to each individual data record. Additionally the registers and can be browsed in book-form in the long-term archiving program Phaidra of the University of Vienna in the collection “Der Donauhandel”. Here, each object (collection, book, and page) is citable by a Handle-ID, too.

The following text provides a brief introduction to the Aschach toll registers as a historical source as well as to the query possibilities offered by the database. 

1. Editing Toll Registers

Toll registers[1], i.e. account books listing the revenues of individual toll gates, provide valuable detailed information on the transportation of goods and persons. Especially for the periods prior to statistical recording of the flow of commodities, they represent key sources for answering questions on trade cycles and economic networks within and between regions. The cargoes recorded in toll registers allow inferences concerning the development of consumer behaviour; the listing of the freight forwarders and their customers (mostly merchants) forms the basis for analysis of the organizers of goods handling. In addition, toll registers can contain a host of other information on topics as diverse as climate history, migration history and military history (transport or supply of military units). They possess an even greater source value when they are preserved for extended and continuous periods of time, thereby providing the foundation for the creation of statistical series spanning a number of years, which in turn allow synchronous and diachronous structural analyses to be performed and trade cycles to be determined.

Like with any editing project, strategic decisions and methodical considerations must precede the processing of serially available account books like toll registers. The time required for comprehensive analysis of such sources and the associated costs are without a doubt considerable. Many previous research projects have foregone editions for this reason, instead limiting themselves—justified only in part by the number of preserved sources—to analysis of the accounts of individual years. Examples within the Austrian academic sphere are the studies by Herbert Hassinger, Othmar Pickl or Erich Landsteiner.[2]Naturally, this approach entails a massive loss of information and confirmability of the results. Furthermore, only a very punctiform view of transport and trade that may deviate severely from the long-term trend owing to short-term factors like weather, military campaigns or epidemics can be achieved on the basis of individual volumes of toll registers. This applies e.g. to the edition of the only preserved toll account for Linz from the year 1627, which was created during the Bavarian occupation of the Land above the Enns in a phase immediately following the Peasants’ War in Upper Austria. Its analysis relies heavily on aggregated data and is divided across multiple volumes of a periodical.[3] Hassinger’s mixture of edition and handbook on the trade and traffic history of Carinthia and Salzburg likewise fails to provide a satisfactory solution to the analysis of toll sources, as do the tables on the passages through the Sound based on the Danish Sound toll registers.[4]

In contrast to the presentation of aggregated data, registers of tolls/customs duties like the Rhine tolls in Katzenelnbogen have rarely been published in full.[5] With the rapid advances in electronic data processing, large data quantities can be handled and presented in a much more user-friendly manner online than would be possible in books. The project “Sound Toll Registers Online[6], for example, has been editing the Danish Sound toll registers, the best-known and most extensive European series of toll accounts, in the shape of an online-queryable database since 2009. The “Krems Weighing and Warehouse Books”, which are nowhere near as substantial, have been processed in a similar format since 2008. Another pioneer-project was the full text edition (TEI-format) of the “Annual Accounts of the city of Basel”.


[1] In the southern German-speaking area, the terms “Maut” (toll) and “Zoll” (customs) were used synonymously, and the same applies to this text.

[2] Cf. e.g. on the toll at Lueg am Brenner in 1734: Herbert HASSINGER, Der Verkehr über Brenner und Reschen vom Ende des 13. bis in die zweite Hälfte des 18. Jahrhunderts. Mit einem Tabellenanhang, in: Neue Beiträge zur geschichtlichen Landeskunde Tirols. Festschrift für Univ.-Prof. Dr. Franz Huter anläßlich der Vollendung des 70. Lebensjahres 1, ed. Ernst TROGER–Georg ZWANOWETZ (Tiroler Wirtschaftsstudien 26, Innsbruck–München 1969) 137–194; on Danube-tolls: Othmar PICKL, Handel an Inn und Donau um 1630, in: Wirtschaftskräfte und Wirtschaftswege 2: Wirtschaftskräfte in der europäischen Expansion. Festschrift für Hermann Kellenbenz, ed. Jürgen SCHNEIDER et al. (Beiträge zur Wirtschaftsgeschichte 5, [Stuttgart] 1978) 205–243; Othmar PICKL, Österreichisch- ungarische Handelsbeziehungen entlang der Donau vom 15. bis zum 18. Jahrhundert. Historisches Jahrbuch der Stadt Linz (1987) 11–40; Erich LANDSTEINER, Handelskonjunkturen, in: Die frühneuzeitliche Residenz (16. bis 18. Jahrhundert), ed. Karl VOCELKA–Anita TRANINGER (Wien–Köln–Weimar 2003) 201–205; Erich LANDSTEINER, Der Güterverkehr auf der österreichischen Donau (1560–1630), in: Wiegen – Zählen – Registrieren. Handelsgeschichtliche Massenquellen und die Erforschung mitteleuropäischer Märkte (13.–18. Jahrhundert), ed. Peter RAUSCHER–Andrea SERLES (Beiträge zur Geschichte der Städte Mitteleuropas 25, Innsbruck– Wien–Bozen 2015) 217–254.

[3] Hans-Heinrich VANGEROW, Linz und der Donauhandel des Jahres 1627. Historisches Jahrbuch der Stadt Linz 1962 (1963) 223–332, 1963 (1964) 255–377 [with supplemental volume], 1964 (1965) 41–98.

[4] Nina ELLINGER BANG–Knud KORST (eds.), Tabeller over skibsfart og vaeretransport gennem Øresund 1497–1783, 7 Vols. (København–Leipzig 1906–1953); Herbert HASSINGER, Geschichte des Zollwesens, Handels und Verkehrs in den östlichen Alpenländern vom Spätmittelalter bis in die zweite Hälfte des 18. Jahrhunderts. 1: Regionaler Teil, erste Hälfte: Westkärnten–Salzburg (Deutsche Handelsakten des Mittelalters und der Neuzeit 16, Deutsche Zolltarife des Mittelalters und der Neuzeit 5, Stuttgart 1987).

[5] Karl E. DEMANDT (ed.), Das Katzenelnbogener Rheinzollerbe 1479–1584, 3 Vols. (Wiesbaden 1978–1981).

[6] The project is ongoing at the University of Groningen and the center for Frisian history and literature “Tresoar” in Leeuwarden. Jan Willem VELUWENKAMP, Die “Sound Toll Registers Online” als Instrument für die Erforschung des frühneuzeitlichen Ostseehandels, in: RAUSCHER–SERLES, Wiegen (see footnote 2) 365–384, with current research literature and Internet resources.

2. The “Registers of the Toll at Aschach”: Source Preservation and the Editing Project

No series of account books is preserved from any of the large princely tax and toll agencies along the Austrian Danube, i.e. Engelhartszell, Linz, Mauthausen, Ybbs, Stein and Vienna. Owing to this lack of existing material, the Aschach toll registers possess extraordinary significance. The toll station in Aschach, which had existed since the High Middle Ages, was purchased in 1622 by Count Karl von Harrach. It remained in his family’s possession for one and a half centuries before being bought back by the state and abrogated in 1775/76 like the other “private tolls”.[1]

A substantial number of records of the Aschach toll station from the time of the Harrach administration are preserved. They were transferred to the Upper Austrian state archive in Linz in 1954 as the so-called “Depot Harrach”. The core of these records are the revenue accounts of the toll collectors referred to as the “Protokollbücher der Maut zu Aschach” (registry books of the toll at Aschach). A total of 194 volumes of these records (including 53 so-called concept versions, i.e. doublets) exist for the period between 1627 and 1775. The source value of these books—which were initially kept on a quarterly, then on a yearly basis—was first recognized by Georg Grüll, author of the inventory of the holding: “This collection of toll registers from Aschach for the time from 1627 to 1775 in particular represents a unique and—due to its completeness—extremely valuable source for the economic history of our country.” The completeness of the assets emphasized by Grüll must be qualified to a degree, however: While the available material up to the 1680s, with the exception of the 1670s, is quite fragmentary, at least six of the ten annual volumes per decade are preserved for the period from the 1690s to the 1760s. Owing to this density of preserved documents alone, the Aschach toll registers must be regarded as the most important source on trade on the Austrian section of the Danube during the 17th and 18th centuries.


[1] On the following, see Peter RAUSCHER, Die Aschacher Mautprotokolle als Quelle des Donauhandels (17./18. Jahrhundert), in: RAUSCHER–SERLES, Wiegen (see footnote 2) 255–306, there with further literature.

3. Contents and Structure of the Source

Each yearly volume of the Aschach toll registers comprises between 450 and 650 sheets, i.e. 900 to 1300 pages. The entries are arranged chronologically and contain the following information:

  1. The date followed by the name and place of origin of the skipper, the type and number of water vehicles passing the toll gate, and the corresponding fee paid. The designations of places are often problematic: On the one hand, they often obviously refer to the starting point of the shipping journey, as evidenced clearly by the frequent specifications of different places of origin for the same skippers. On the other hand, they also often refer to the actual hometown of the skipper himself, e.g. in cases where skippers from Linz or Vienna—i.e. from cities downstream of Aschach—are mentioned on downstream trips passing through Aschach. In these cases, the specified places cannot be the origins of the journeys but instead must be the respective skipper’s place of residence—or the starting point of a preceding upstream journey. In contrast to the Sound toll registers, the Aschach toll registers only rarely specify the destination of the registered journeys, and the direction of passage (“herauf” or “hinab”, i.e. “upwards” or “downwards”) is likewise provided only in a fraction of the entries. Upstream journeys can be deduced from the number of towing horses required to pull the vehicles upstream and listed at the end of the respective entry.
  2. Following the data on the vehicles, passengers riding aboard the boats are generally mentioned summarily or generically—“people”, “pilgrims”, “clerics”, “a count”—with passengers of exceptionally high social status sometimes specified by name.
  3. This is followed by entries on the shipped goods, with the name of the owner or the recipient (person or institution like bishopric, monastery etc.) listed first. In rare cases, only a profession (“the butcher at Aschach”) or, even less specific, descriptions like “a man” are provided. In a scant few cases, there is only the declaration “toll note without name” or “toll note without signature”. Where this information is missing and no name can be associated with a cargo, it can be assumed that the goods belonged to the skipper himself. 

Finally (but not in every case), the type of container, e.g. “Päckel” (packs), “Kistel” (boxes) or “Fässel” (barrels), and the weight, number or value of the shipped goods are listed. Furthermore, the toll levied—or toll dispensation applied—for each cargo item is noted.

These entries in the Aschach toll registers can thus be used to determine which skipper from which town passed through Aschach on what day with which type and number of vehicles, whether he was transporting passengers and what cargo he was ferrying. The great advantage of the Aschach documents in comparison e.g. to the Sound toll registers is that they also list the owners (though not their provenance) of the shipped goods. Based on this information, it is possible to obtain a detailed picture of the merchants active in the Danube area.

4. Difficulties of Interpreting the Source

Despite the immense benefits of the Aschach toll registers as a source for transport and trade on the Danube as the most important shipping route of the region encompassing southern Germany and Austria, the quality of the entries imposes certain limitations on their edition and interpretation. The most significant problems are:

  1. It is not always possible to localize the mentioned places due to garbling or truncation of place names or the existence of multiple places with the same name in the greater Danube area.
  2. Uncertainty as to whether the specified places are the starting point of the journey or the hometown of the skipper.
  3. Massive orthographical deviations in the spelling of surnames. E.g. “Wagner”. Variants:

“Wagner, Wägner, Magner, Wag, Wanger”; “Rugendas”. Variants: “Rugenlos, Rugendos, Rugendros, Ruggenloß, Ruckenloß”. Concerning the edition, there is therefore the danger of multiple persons being combined into one individual, or of individual persons being registered in the database in multiple different variants. Such mistakes cannot be excluded and should be taken into consideration while querying the database.

  • Inconsistent use of first names for identical persons: “Adam” – “Johann Adam”;
  • Missing or inconsistent dimensions for the shipped goods, thereby preventing the determination of precise quantities:
    • Missing dimensions, i.e. specification of container type only: e.g. “1 Fass Zucker” (1 barrel of sugar);
    • Inconsistent dimensions for the goods: volume, weight, number, value;
    • Combination of different goods in a single container or summary measurement: e.g. “2 ½ Zentner Mandeln, Weihrauch und Kaffee” (2 ½ centners of almonds, frankincense and coffee);
  • Identification of the goods specified in the source.

In order to minimize the impact of these difficulties, normalized data on persons, places and goods are being established during the further analysis of the Aschach toll registers. 

5. Principles of Data Entry: Standardizations and Additions

5. 1 Normalization

To make utilization of the database as simple as possible, the names of persons, places and trade goods are normalized. This means that all names either follow current orthography rules (places, goods) or, in the case of persons, a notation is chosen that closely resembles current usage and conventions. If a person is known in literature, the established spelling of the name is used (e.g. “von Starhemberg”, not “von Stahrnberg”). Where no similarity to current names or their notation is apparent, a spelling variant that is common in the source is used (especially for goods and places).

5. 2 Rules for the entry of persons

a) First names

Even when it is assumed that two persons may be identical, but their first names differ, two separate entries are created in the database of persons. For example, separate person data sets are created for “Johann Sinzinger” and “Johann Georg Sinzinger”, as it cannot be excluded that they are two different persons. The same applies when a person already identified by first name and surname is assigned a provenance by a further entry in the source that is not yet included in the data set for that person. In such cases, multiple person entries are also created since the identity of the persons cannot be verified. E.g.: Person 1: “Johann Wagner”; person 2: “Johann Georg Wagner”; person 3: “Johann Wagner, Wien”; person 4: “Johann Georg Wagner, Wien”.

With regard to research in the database, this means that various persons may be included in the database in multiple variants and these variants should be taken into consideration during research work.

Exception: Han(n)s is always normalized to “Johann”.

The following first names are considered to be identical:

Andre – Andreas

Jörg – Georg

Johann – Johannes

Johann Maria – Johann Marina / Morina

Marx – Markus

Wolf – Wolfgang

The following names were presumably—but not verifiably—used synonymously by the writers of the Aschach toll registers but are considered to be different first names for the purpose of the edition. Please note that bearers of these first names may be identical to other persons:

Albert – Albrecht

Christian – Christoph Georg – Gregor

Gottlieb – Gotthard – Gottlob Leopold – Leonhard

Foreign-language first names are entered into the database in their respective foreign-language version unless the source material also contains a German variant of the name of the same person. For example, “Jean Ja(c)ques Briann”, who also appears in the source material as “Johann Jakob Briann”, is referred to as “Johann Jakob Briann” throughout the database.

Two separate entries are also made in the database in the case of persons for whom it is likely that the order of their first nameshas been reversed: e.g. “Karl Christoph Mayr” – “Christoph Karl Mayr”.

b) Descriptions

The entry of persons into the database can be problematic when they are not mentioned by name, but instead designated by their function or title.

The following rules apply:

1. “Herr” is not considered a title and is not included in the database except where “Herr” appears without any other descriptors and without specification of a first name or surname:

E.g.: “an Herrn Strobl” (to Herr Strobl) – person: “Strobl, Herr”

E.g.: “Herr General”: “General”

E.g.: “Herr Graf”: “Graf” (count)

The same applies to “Frau”, “Monsieur” etc. If the same person is sometimes referred to as “Monsieur” and sometimes as “Herr”, the German Version is used. Wives are always referred to as “Ehefrau” (wife). E.g.: “XY mit seiner Frau” (XY with his wife): “Ehefrau des XY” (wife of XY).

2. “Ihro Gnaden” and “Exzellenz” are not considered titles and are not included in the database.

3. The description of a person’s function precedes their title.
E.g.: “General Graf von Starhemberg”, entry in the database: “von Starhemberg, General, Graf”.

4. “Herr”, “Freiherr” and “Baron” are identical when referring to a baron (i.e. if the respective person is identified as a baron at least once). In some cases, the same name is alternatingly written with and without the titular “von”. In such cases, the version including the “von” is used.“Bürger”: Inhabitants of Aschach who are referred to as “Bürger” (and are therefore exempt from paying toll) are entered into the database as “Bürger” even if the designation is missing in one or more entries in the source.

5. Persons with two or more designations
If the same person is designated with differing titles in different entries in the source, then separate database entries are made for that person.
E.g.: source entry 1: “an den Hofkriegsrat Kampmillner” (to Hofkriegsrat Kampmillner); source entry 2: “an Herrn Kampmillner Geheimen Referendar” (to Herr Kampmillner, Geheimer Referendar). Person 1: “Kampmillner, [designation:] Hofkriegsrat”; Person 2: “Kampmillner, [designation:] Referendar (geheim)”.

6. Adjectives
In the case of an adjective detailing a function, the adjective is placed in parentheses following the function:
E.g.: “bayerischer Hofrat”: “Hofrat (bayerisch)”

7. Surnames (except for nobility) and designations referring to women use the suffix “-in”:

“Daucherin”, not “Daucher”

“Frau General”: “Generalin”

“Frau Pflegerin”: “Pflegerin”

8. Groups of persons are entered into the database separately on principle:
E.g.: “Graf Sinzendorf samt Frau und Bediente” (Count Sinzendorf with wife and servants):
Person 1: “von Sinzendorf, Graf” (von Sinzendorf, Count)

Person 2: “Ehefrau des Grafen von Sinzendorf” (wife of Count Sinzendorf)

Person 3: “Dienerschaft des Grafen von Sinzendorf” (servants of Count Sinzendorf)

E.g.: “Hauptbergwerksämter Hall und Schwaz in Tirol” (principal mining authorities Hall and Schwaz in Tyrol):

Person 1: “Hauptbergwerksamt, Hall, Tirol”

Person 2: “Hauptbergwerksamt, Schwaz, Tirol”

9. Regiments
Regiments are designated according to the following pattern: “type of regiment” (cuirassier regiment, infantry regiment, dragoon regiment, Hussar regiment, regiment etc.) followed by “regiment owner”. E.g. “Dragonerregiment Prinz Eugen” (dragoon regiment Prince Eugene). Only if the owner cannot be determined is the regiment description entered as a postpositive adjective in parentheses.

10. Imperial court
In the case of the recipient “zur Notdurft des ksl. Hofstaats zu Wien” (for the exigence of the imperial court in Vienna) in the source, the term “Kaiserhof” (emperor’s court) is used in the database.

11. Non-natural recipients
If no natural person can be determined from the source as recipient of a trade good, a “non-natural recipient” is created.
E.g. “Marmor für die Pestsäule am Graben” (marble for the Plague Column on Graben). In this case, the “emperor” or the “imperial court” as alternative recipients make no sense; however, in the case of “für den Hochaltar in Klsoterneuburg” (for the high altar in Klosterneuburg), the recipient entered into the database is “Stift Klosterneuburg” (Klosterneuburg Abbey).

12. Additional information
The Aschach toll registers often contain additional indications concerning the senders and recipients of goods, like “an”, “in”, “zu”, “für”, “per”, “einem”, “dem”, “der”, “Herrn” [dem Herrn], “Frauen” [der Frau], “zur Notdurft”. This additional information is included in the respective data set and marked with “Ja” (yes) in the results list. Please note that in order to conserve space, the designations “einem/dem/Herrn” refer to the male variant as well as the female variant “einer/der/Frauen”.

5. 3 Place names and assignment to regions

1. Notation

All place names are normalized and appear in the database in their (German) notation in current use. Names of places that cannot be localized are used in one of the variants found in the source.

2. Assignment to regions

All places are assigned to historical regions by the editors. For places within the Holy Roman Empire, a historical region is considered to be a territory that could claim some form of sovereignty over the land (“Landeshoheit”). This applies to both the mostly rather small territories of the imperial cities and imperial monasteries, imperial knights and imperial villages as well as those of the larger ecclesiastical and secular imperial estates.[1]  Thus, for example, a distinction must be made between the territory of the “Imperial city of Augsburg” and that of the “Prince-Bishopric of Augsburg”. Likewise, for frequently mentioned places in today’s Italy, the historical units (“Republic of Venice”, “Republic of Genoa”, “Duchy of Milan”, etc.) are used. 

For the few places in “France”, “Poland”, “Switzerland”, “Hungary” and the “United Netherlands” in the database, only the respective kingdom or, in the case of Switzerland, the confederation, and in the case of the United Netherlands, the republic is given as the historical region for reasons of clarity and no further subdivision is made. The same applies to places in the “Ottoman Empire”.

In the toll registers, the kingdoms of “Portugal”, “Serbia”, “Sicily” and “Spain” are explicitly mentioned and therefore listed in the database as both “place” and “historical region”. 

Special cases are formed by: the “Belgrade Banat” (named as a region in the source), “Italy” (as a non-specific indication: “to/from Italy”), “Lombardy” (as a collective term for northern Italian duchies), the “military frontier”, the “Austrian Netherlands” (without further subdivision into duchies, counties and dominions), the crown and chamber domain “Timisoara Banat” as well as “Vorderösterreich (Vorlande)” (as a collective term for the various Habsburg possessions in the south-west of the Holy Roman Empire). 

If a place cannot be clearly localized, the regional assignment is accordingly omitted.

5. 4 Destination of the vehicle

A destination is entered for the vehicle(s) if it is explicitly specified in the source.

E.g.: “1 Plättel nach Wien” (1 Plättel to Vienna).

A destination is provided even if only one shipped commodity (e.g.: “mit Bier nach Linz” [with beer to Linz]) or one passenger or group of passengers (z. B.: “Leute nach Ungarn” [people to Hungary]) is listed with a destination in the source.

5. 5 Collective mention of goods with a joint toll application

Multiple collectively mentioned goods without individual measurements are usually entered into the database as a single entry with the individual goods separated by commas. The listing of the goods does not follow the order in the source but is instead alphabetical.

E.g.: “12 Pfund Würste und Käse” (12 pounds of sausages and cheese): 12 Pfund “Käse, Würste”.

Please note that when searching the database for specific commodities, it is not only possible to search for individual goods (e.g. “Käse”) using the drop-down lists (“Detail search”), but also to search for all combinations containing the desired commodity (“Käse, Würste” etc.) using the “Simple search”.

In the case of collective mention of goods with individual measurements but only one toll payment (e.g.: “1 Vässl Bayrisch Rueben, 2 Dutzend Würst: 12 d.” [1 barrel of Bavarian beets, 2 dozen sausages: 12 d.]) the editors undertake to calculate the individual toll fees by hand. E.g. “1 Kalb und 1 Lämpel: 5 d.” (1 calf and 1 lamb: 5 d.): “1 Kalb 4 d.”, “1 Lamm 1 d.”. In certain cases, it is not possible to calculate the individual toll fees precisely.


 

[1] The assignment was made according to Gerhard Köbler, Historisches Lexikon der deutschen Länder. Die deutschen Territorien vom Mittelalter bis zur Gegenwart (München 7. Ed. 2007).

6. Query Form: Search Options

The query form combines a “Simple Search” for any desired character string with an “Advanced Search” using drop-down lists. 

The “Simple Search” makes it possible to search not only for full names of persons, places or goods, but also for parts of names or words, e.g. to find all variants of the commodity “silk” (silk, silk products, half-silk products etc.). The “Simple search” can be restricted to only persons or only goods. 

The “Advanced Search” is divided into four thematic blocks that can be combined as desired (also with the “Simple Search”). The alphabetically ordered drop-down lists used here reveal the contents of the database and facilitate the search:

  1. “General information”
    a) Search for the ID of a record (=passage of a vehicle). This is used, for example, to make it easier to find and check cited records in the literature.
    b) Searches covering a certain period of time, e.g. all toll passages between 01 Dec. 1728 and 31 Dec. 1728.
    c) Searches for days on which no shipping was possible on the Danube (due to ice, high water, or with no reason specified).
  2. “Person”
    a) Search for names of persons and companies as well as different institutions (monasteries, military regiments, imperial court, etc.). 
    b) Search for the origin of a person or company or the location of an institution.
    c) Searches for women and Jewish persons in the database. The purpose of this option is to facilitate use of the Aschach toll registers for research in the fields of gender history and Jewish history. Please note that Jewish persons are only identified as Jewish in the toll registers if they were travelling as passengers and therefore had to pay the so-called Leibzoll.[1] As owners/recipients of goods, they were only rarely distinguished from other persons by the toll officers using the designation “Jew”. The designation of an individual as a “Jew” is therefore largely down to interpretation by the editors, and it cannot be guaranteed that all Jewish persons mentioned in the toll registers were recognized as such.
    d) Searches for passengers only, e.g. concerning pilgrimages or emigration to Hungary.
  3. “Transport vehicle”
    a) Search for vehicle type. 
    b) Searches for vehicles travelling downstream and transporting horses for the subsequent upstream journey (“mit Rossen” [with horses]).
    c) Search for transport direction. The toll registers rarely specify directly whether shipments were headed up- or downstream. The number of horses (“Rosse”) required to tow or control the vehicles was specified at the end of each entry, however. Sometimes toll was paid for up- and downstream journeys at once.
    d) Search for a destination. This can concern the destination of the entire transport, of persons or only of individual goods (if noted in the source). Since destinations are only sporadically mentioned, caution is required when interpreting the results.
  4. “Cargo”
    a) Search by trade good. In the case of several cargoes listed together in one data record, the order is alphabetical and not as specified in the source. When searching for goods, it is therefore advisable to first perform a “Simple Search” in order to also recognize different combinations. 
    b) Search for the destination of a cargo. Since this is mostly not specified, caution is required when interpreting the results.


[1] Cf. Peter RAUSCHER, Den Christen gleich sein. Diskriminierung und Verdienstmöglichkeiten von Juden an österreichischen Mautstellen in der Frühen Neuzeit (16./17. Jahrhundert), in: Hofjuden und Landjuden. Jüdisches Leben in der Frühen Neuzeit, eds. Sabine HÖDL–Peter RAUSCHER–Barbara STAUDINGER (Berlin–Vienna 2004) 283–332.

7. Presentation of Results

At first, the “Search results” are displayed in chronological order and contain the following basic information: date of the passage – information on the source (Aschach toll register volume and year) – page no. (“pag.”) – internal identifier (ID) of the passage. 

Clicking on a date opens the individual data set for that specific passage through the Aschach toll gate (“Details”). Each individual data set contains:

  1. General information on the passage (internal ID, date of passage through Aschach and archival information).
  2. The name of the skipper and origin of the vehicle(s) or skipper, the number, type and direction of travel of the vehicle(s), and the levied toll.
  3. Links to the scans of the respective pages in the source.
  4. A list containing the transported goods and passengers. The search term is highlighted.