Merkinės magistrato veikla XVI a. pabaigoje–XVII a. I pusėje

The article provides a good deal of new materials (mostly from unpublished sources, i. e. Lithuanian metrics and deed books of Merkinė magistrate) on the everyday life of the residents of Merkinė, the town officials, courts, the rulers’ privileges to the entire town and individual townspeople starting from the granting of the Magdeburg rights, i. e. the rights of self-rule in 1569 till the demolition of the town during the war with Russia in 1655. Until the middle of the 17th century the magistrate of Merkinė managed the property relations of townspeople and the crimes were dealt with by the court. The interrelations of the said two institutions of authority of the town were most frequently resolved by the court of assessors, since the vicegerent of the king in town could not be judged by anybody else. Nevertheless both institutions, i. e. the magistrate and the court, closely cooperated in resolution of the matters of the town, although sometimes there were certain conflicts of competence or personal differences. The life in Merkinė in the second half of the 16th century – the first half of the 17th century, with the exception of one or another special case (the plague and execution of death penalties to criminals), was rather quiet, trade was flourishing, guilds were being launched, the town was growing and was frequently visited by the rulers, who sometimes provided tax concessions or even gave plots of land to one or another townsman. The quiet life of the times was interrupted by Muscovites’ invasion in 1655, who demolished the town. Later on it was rather difficult for the town to revive, since such a revival was hindered by the plague, attacks by foreign armies, abolition of the self-rule rights and the downfall of the state