Abstract
This contribution analyses houses as resources in early modern Frankfurt. Examining the ways in which early modern homeowners made money of their properties, the work focuses on the house as nucleus of urban sociality and it considers how individuals created and made meaning of their homes. In so doing, the contribution reinforces recent findings regarding the importance of and complex meanings given to houses. The Frankfurt case shows that houses reflected and perpetuated early modern inequality by multiplying opportunities for economic, social, and cultural participation. Homeownership thus played a central role in early modern urban life, and homeowners expressed the importance of their houses by decorating them carefully. As bearers of names, symbols, and inscriptions, houses were conspicuous representations of the prestige, confession, and memoria of their inhabitants, and of their own significance as stable resources in early modern urban life.
