ABSTRACT
Amidst the many changes that occurred in Frankfurt, especially during the sixteenth century, the city council retained its administrative and judicial power as well as its social composition throughout the period discussed here, that is the end of the seventeenth century. Divided into three benches, which together constituted the judiciary, the first two benches were occupied by local patricians and the third by members of select guilds. While all councilors had converted to Lutheranism, this religious change did not cause them to abandon prior practices in the legal and judicial realm.
