Demographic conditions of the functioning of peasant families at the turn of the Middle Ages (original) (raw)
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Marriage strategies in Poland: social and spatial differences (16th-18th centuries)
Historical Social Research, 2003
In recent years Polish historiography has ob served an increasing interest in the functioning of the family in the past. Nevertheless, present knowledge of the issue still seems relatively insufficient. This paper is an attempt to present the circumstances of family creation rather than its functioning and failure. We aim to emphasise some social, religious and territorial differences concerning families be tween 16th-18th centuries in the kingdom of Poland, which was the 5th biggest country in Europe before the partitions (1772-1795). Doing this, we want to approach our ances tors' marriage strategies, their material status and other fac tors influencing them. On the basis of parish and judicial registers are presented the age of newly-married couples, their previous marital status and their social and territorial background. The analysis of the last mentioned aspects over those 300 years should give us an idea of the extent to which parish borders were crossed when choosing a ...
The article examines marriage behaviours, household patterns and household formation rules prevailing among the population of the Upper Silesian parish of Bujakow during the late 18th and the first part of the 19th century. Their character, it is argued, is crucial not only for the proper understanding of European family systems in the past, but also for accurate comparisons of family systems in Europe and Asia. The family pattern prevailing in this part of central Europe exhibited a 'hybrid' nature in many respects. The pattern's chief characteristics were a moderate age at marriage, the dominance of simple family households and the high incidence of lifecycle servants. Serial household lists revealed, however, the significant diversity in proportions of household types between censuses and between villages. Despite the strong indication of a stem family pattern in the parish, the analysis of headship transmission revealed the concurrent co-existence of various modes of household formation among families. Some of these formation processes did not vary much from neo-local principles or followed exactly this type of pattern. This study also made it possible to reconsider the supposed relationship between the seigneurial authority and family behaviours in the parish pointing out the considerable degree of autonomy of the peasant subjects.
Marriages in the Parish of Płonka Kościelna in the Years 1826–1864
The article presents weddings in the parish of Płonka Kościelna in the years 1826-1864, on the basis of parish registers residing in the parish archive. It contains basic issues such as the age of the betrothed and their marital status. Special attention was paid to the questions of having living parents on the day of wedding, and, what follows, the betrotheds' place of residence. The element of service is presented as a stage in the life cycle of an individual. The research employed statistical methods as well as selected examples of weddings and the couples involved.
In their modelling and classificatory ventures western scholars have usually mistakenly included family forms in historical Eastern Europe by induction in well-established generalizations about Russian or Balkan populations. At the same time, well into the late 1990s, most of Eastern European historians have shown no interest in studying domestic groups in socio-historical perspective. This article attempts to restate that picture through a thorough analysis of an unprecedented collection of historical household data for the late eighteenth-century Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, one of the largests political entities in Europe of that time. Through an application of a variety of methodologies three regional family patterns have been distinguished on the historical Polish territories, their main characteristics described and then juxtaposed against the major features of paradigmatic examples of the 'Eastern European family type'. The results indicate that the existing models of household systems in preindustrial Europe are far too rigid to meet the diversity of residential patterns of the Eastern European serfs. Analysis of the data set on spatially, culturally and socioeconomically diverse regions has also facilitated a preliminary identification of the factors shaping these family systems. The data presented here suggests that the conventional wisdom regarding the institutional mechanisms of the Eastern European manorialism of the second serfdom as sufficient to create a homogenous pattern of family residence must be seriously questioned. In particular, what must be meticulously revised is a sweeping generalization still in practice that posits a functional link between coercive forms of labor control and complex household structures among peasant subjects.
Marital Fertility and the Family in Poland from the Late Nineteenth to the Early Twentieth Century
Journal of Interdisciplinary History, 2018
In Poznań of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries fertility was determined by many socio-economic factors, between which there were strong interactions. Mother’s birth cohort and SES of a husband proved to be the strongest factors significantly influencing the woman’s age at matrimony, her age at first birth and the number of children per woman. Women born until 1889 married and started giving birth to the first child later (24.97 and 25.46, respectively) than those born since 1890 (23.76 and 24.09, respectively). Wives from workers and craftsmen milieu started reproduction earlier (24.96 and 24.31, respectively) and had more children (3.41 and 3.86, respectively) than those of white collar workers (mother’s age at first birth and number of children: 25.63 and 2.53, respectively). Religion did not influence woman’s age at marriage and her age at first birth, but it had an impact on the number of children per woman: a Lutheran woman gave birth to 2.9 children on average, while a Catholic one to 3.5 children.
Peasant Marriage in Nineteenth-Century Russia
The great historical syntheses concerning European family models present Russia as the most typical example of the eastern model of universal marriage. Very little is known, however, about the manner in which this result was obtained in practice, nor what effect historical and social changes had on marriage timing and frequency. The authors use parish registers and taxation lists to reconstitute the evolution of marriage during the nineteenth century in three rural villages near Moscow. They describe the functioning of the marriage market and the influence of serfdom. Tying peasants to a landowner and his land, this system forced those wishing to marry to do so within their community of origin. With the abolition of serfdom in 1861, this onerous constraint disappeared and the recruitment area for spouses expanded. Before and after 1861, however, marriage remained subject to the patriarchal rules of rural communities. Wives generally went to live with their husband’s family, and contributed to its wealth. The fact that marriage was not linked to the need to amass a patrimony beforehand partly explains its early and universal nature.
The Family in 18th Century Warsaw: Demographic Studies
Acta Poloniae Historica, 1990
to the development of family ties in towns. 4 The fullest information on the achievements of world historical de mographic research, including research into family structure, can be found in Bibliographie Internationale de la Démographie Historique, pu blished annually. Extensive lists of latest works concerning these questions can be found in M.