In the previous centuries, Resian economy was based mostly on the limited pieces of cultivated land around the villages  , while the inhabitants could jointly use vast grazing areas and woods.

Breeding livestock and selling dairy products were the main activities producing income, which was integrated with other work, like weaving.

The textile production was closely related to the work of the kramarji, peddlers who emigrated during certain periods of the year. It was seasonal emigration, which had already been documented in the 14th century, and which took place in two periods: from the end of January to the beginning of June, when they came back for agricultural and pastoral work, and a new departure after August 15, which would last until the first days of December.

Therefore also in Resia, as in the whole Friulian mountain area, the job of the peddler/kramar was in full development at the time, and remained so until the first years of the 20th century.  

Their main destination were mostly the areas where Slavic languages were also spoken, for example Austria, Bohemia, and Moravia  , where they could also trade hardware like knives and scissors.

It is well documented that the kramarji possessed a good level of education and could read and write in different languages. This allowed some of them to reach substantial financial prosperity with their trade, to support their families, build houses  , contribute to building and restoring numerous places of worship  , and, especially in the 18th century, invest a lot of money in the valley’s villages.

This seasonal emigration gradually became temporary and later permanent for many emigrants, who never came back to the valley, but settled elsewhere, first in some central European countries and later, after the geopolitical changes of the 20th century, also in Italy.

Resian peddlers became stationary merchants and set up shops in various European cities, weakening however the economic structure of the valley, which was based mostly on their remittances. Since the end of the 13th century, a substantial specialisation of the emigrants’ jobs on a single village level had already been developing and spreading all over the Friulian mountain area.

In all Resia, but especially in Stolvizza, and also Ligosullo, Paularo, and Treppo Carnico in Upper Carnia, a particular job became always more prominent: the knife grinder /brüsar.