CONTENTS - ouroboros ponderosa

INDI)STRIAIJSM ANI> i)(lMJSrJ('ATH )N
and then marketed the finished products. At tirst th,c cranS"'l"1I
generally owned their Own tools, but later came to rent them. III illol"1
case, thc rclationship to the "means of production" affonkd greal
stratgic strngth. Unsupervised, working for several masters, and wilh
their time their own, a degree of independence was maintained.
"Luddism," as E. P. Thompson (Making of the Enghsh Working Ciass)
rcminds us, "was thc work of skilled men in small workshops." The
Luddltcs (c. 1810-1820), though thcy belong toward the end of the period
surveyed here, were perhaps the machine-breakers par excellence-textile
knittcrs, wcavers, and spinners who exemplify both the relative autonomy
and anti-employer sentiment of the free craftsman and craftswoman.
Scorcs of commentators have discussed the independence of such
domcstie workers as thc handloom weavers; Muggeridge's report on
LancashIre craftsmen (from Exell, Brief HL