THOMAS MAX SAFLEY is Associate Professor at the University of Pennsylvania, where he teaches early modern European history.

"In Safley's skilled hands, Matheus's remarkable memoir enlivens our understanding of the experience of the German bourgeoisie..." - Gary K. Waite, Canadian Journal of History "This well-written book presents an excellent picture of seventeenth-century life and one individual's "bourgeois values." - History: Review of New Books "...he shows a sensitive respect for the self-revealing honesty of this remarkable human document." - Sixteenth Century Journal ...[Safley's] intelligent and sensitive rendering of the ambivalences and complexities in his merchant of Augsburg. -American Historical Review

• List of Illustrations/Maps Preface Introduction Marriage and Patriarchy Public Office and Public Sphere Sociability and Social Structure Death and Confession Conclusion Index