Danzig law

The arbitrariness Danziger, Danziger right Danzig Constitution was the municipal law applicable in Gdansk over many centuries.

The word arbitrary means "the erkorene with will." Until the 18th century it referred to in the German language - unlike the modern parlance - a piece of legislation or a collection of laws.

To 1224 gave the ostpommersche Duke Swantopolk II ( Zwantepolc de Danceke ) the Liibeck law at the German settlement of merchants in Danzig. After the takeover of Danzig by the Teutonic Order in 1308, the so-called right town was founded. A small craftsman's residence was fitted around 1370 with limited rights, the Old Town of Gdańsk.

The city was right in 1440 a founding member of the directed against the rule of the Teutonic Knights Prussian Union, the Old Town took a few weeks for later. 1452, the Prussian cities had their privileges and hand festivities of the Emperor Frederick III. confirm, so that the German Order, which also had the emperor as suzerain, was held to offend their privileges and hand festivities. The federal government rose in 1454 against the Order, which triggered the Thirteen Years' War among the cities of Prussia. The independent, but now allied with the King of Poland Danzig had an at will -created, and thus within the meaning of the term arbitrary, legal order, probably based on older designs. In return for their loyalty to the respective Polish king as patron had this Danziger special rights in the " Danziger privilege" to acknowledge.

There have been over the centuries Gdansk different revisions of arbitrariness. The research different:

• The oldest known written constitution of the Gdansk arbitrary dates from the year 1455
• The second oldest Danziger arbitrariness is probably made 1479-1500.
• The arbitrariness of 1574th
• The arbitrariness of 1597th
• The arbitrariness of in 1761.

Even after Danzig in 1793 part of the Kingdom of Prussia, was the arbitrariness of 1761 was initially still in force. It was only replaced on October 1, 1857 through the introduction of the West Prussian Provincial law in Gdansk.