On Sat, Aug 30, 2008 at 01:34:29PM -0400, Perry E. Metzger wrote: > The medieval Germans had a saying, "Stadtluft macht frei", which means > "City air makes you free" -- I believe it referred to the same > phenomenon.
The proverb refers to a specific legal ruling (around 10/11th century), after which a serf who escaped to the city and couldn't be revoerd for a year and a day went free (became the status of a city citizen). This was however overruled in 1232 by statutum in favorem principum http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statutum_in_favorem_principum -- Eugen* Leitl <a href="http://leitl.org";>leitl</a> http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com http://postbiota.org 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE
