The History of Families and Households: Comparative European Dimensions

277 Pages·2016·2.493 MB·English

by  Silvia Sovič, Pat Thane, Pier Paolo Viazzo

The History of Families and Households
Central and Eastern Europe
Regional Perspectives in Global Context
Series Editors
Constantin Iordachi (Central European University, Budapest)
Maciej Janowski (Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw)
Balázs Trencsényi (Central European University, Budapest)
VOLUME 6
The titles published in this series are listed at brill.com/cee
The History of Families
and Households
Comparative European Dimensions
Edited by
Silvia Sovič, Pat Thane, and Pier Paolo Viazzo
LEIDEN | BOSTON
Cover illustration: Family portrait, c. 1910. Unterdrauburg, Austro-Hungarian Empire (now Dravograd,
Slovenia). Photo by Pietro Antonio Micelli (1846–1929).
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Contents
List of Figures and Tables vii
Notes on Contributors IX
1 The History of European Families: Old and New Directions 1
Silvia Sovič, Pat Thane and Pier Paolo Viazzo
part 1
Commonalities and Diversities 
2 North European Families in the Past: Family Ties Revisited 23
Beatrice Moring 
3 From Modernity to Tradition: Households on Kythera in the Early
Nineteenth Century 47
Violetta Hionidou 
4 The Reconstruction of Domestic Communities in the Branković Region
of Serbia in 1455 69
Mirjana Bobić
5 Variation Within: Regional Differences in Household Structures in
Mid-Nineteenth Century Rural Serbia 93
Siegfried Gruber 
PART 2
Church, State and Family 
6 Women’s Reputation and Marriage Disputes in Protestant and Catholic
Europe, 1500–1800 119
Daniela Lombardi
7 The Reformation, the Council of Trent and the Divergence of Spiritual
Kinship and Godparenthood across Europe: A Long-run Analysis 142
Guido Alfani
vi contents
8 Household Structure in the Nineteenth Century in a Transylvanian
Village 168
Judit Ambrus
PART 3
Family Strategies 
9 Old Age in the Life Cycle of Polish Peasants at the Turn of the
Middle Ages 189
Piotr Guzowski

10 Succession Choices of Small Farmers and Women Farmers’ Wills in
the Area around Trieste in the Nineteenth Century 207
Marta Verginella 
11 Inheritance Practice and the Elderly in Central Europe: The Example
of Western Bohemia, 1700–1850 232
Alice Velková
Index 257
List of Figures and Tables

Figures
4.1 Map of Central Balkan States, 1375–1395 72
4.2 Map of the Region of Branković in 1455 74
4.3 Ideographic representation of various family (agnatic) forms in the
village of Vrbuča 87
5.1 Household typology in 13 districts in Serbia in 1863 116
5.2 Married couples per household in Serbia in 1866 116
8.1 Family book of Vista 173
10.1 The area of Breg 208
10.2 The age of testators from Dolina 211
10.3 Percentage of testators regarding the number of deaths and
according to gender between 1833 and 1904 – Dolina 212
10.4 Percentage of testators regarding total number of deaths between 1833
and 1894 – Dolina 212
11.1 Age of heirs at the time of their fathers’ retirement 249
11.2 Still active full peasants holders and smallholders by their age 252
11.3 Still active cottagers by their age 253
Tables
2.1 Residence patterns of widows in Northern European localities 27
2.2 Age distribution of widows in local communities, percentages 31
2.3 Occupational distribution of widows in 19th century rural parishes 34
2.4 Widows co-residence and gender 35
2.5 Co-residence partners of urban widows, percentages 41
2.6 Age distribution of widows 42
2.7 Classification of occupation or known source of income of widows in
census of Helsinki and Moss 1900, Lichfield 1851, percentages 43
2.8 Age distribution of widows in the Nordic countries, percentages 45
2.9 Age distribution of widows in England and Wales 1861–1911 46
3.1 Census year and population of Kythera 51
3.2 Percentage of migrants by sex and age group, Kythera 54
3.3 Percentage distribution of households, Kythera 57
3.4 Singulate mean age at marriage, Kythera 59
3.5 Percentage distribution of households by type, year and head’s gender 60
3.6 Percentage distribution of households for male heads by type and by
reported status of the father 61
viii list of figures and tables
3.7 Living arrangements by marital status of older people, Kythera 62
3.8 Percentage of male married heads among all married men by age group,
conjugal family and complex households only, Kythera 65
4.1 Houses according to the number of heads/tax payers, share of total in
percentages, Branković Region, 1455 86
4.2 Distribution of houses and taxpayers in Branković Region, 1455 87
4.3 Family households in Branković Region, 1455 89
4.4 Distribution of the population of the Branković Region in 1455 90
5.1 Correlation of the number of married couples with household
typology 107
5.2 Mean household size and mean number of married couples in rural
Serbia 1866 by srez 109
5.3 Descriptive statistics of independent variables 112
5.4 Model estimates: Serbia 1866 114
7.1 Typology of godparenthood models 148
8.1 Household types in Vista (1883/1884) 177
9.1 Duration of economic activity of Trześniowa villagers 196
9.2 Duration of economic activity of Trześniowa’s social elite 197
9.3 Duration of economic activity of peasants in Trześniowa 197
10.1 Number of testaments by settlement and time period 209
10.2 Gender of testators by time period – Breg 210
10.3 Population change in Breg (1779–1910) 215
10.4 Testators as percentage of the number of people who died in Dolina 221
10.5 Marriage status of testator by 10-year periods – Dolina 227
10.6 Gender of testator by 10-year periods – Ricmanje 227
10.7 Marriage status of testators by 10-year periods – Ricmanje 228
10.8 Marriage status of testators by 10-year periods – Boljunec 229
11.1 Structure of the deceased broken down by age and sex in the Šťáhlavy
region, 1708–1834 (in percentages) 238
11.2 Structure of the deceased at 50+ (in percentages) in the Šťáhlavy region
broken down by age and sex in 1708–1850 239
11.3 Structure of heirs of fathers handing over only one holding to their
children in the Šťáhlavy region, 1701–1850 243
11.4 Property transfers broken down by economic continuity in the Šťáhlavy
region, 1701–1850 244
11.5 Age at which heirs took charge of the holding inherited from their
fathers in the Šťáhlavy region, 1701–1850 245
11.6 Age at marriage of heirs of paternal holdings, 1701–1850 246
11.7 Mean age of fathers at time of property transfer in 1701–1787 and their
age at death 247
11.8 Age of fathers at the time of property transfer carried out in 1788–1850
and their age of death 250
Notes on Contributors
Guido Alfani
is Associate Professor at Bocconi University, Italy. He is chief editor of the
journal Popolazione e Storia and the organizer of the international scientific
networks EI-Net (Economic Inequality Network) and, together with Vincent
Gourdon, Patrinus. An economic and social historian and an historical demog-
rapher, he published extensively on godparenthood and social alliance sys-
tems, on economic inequality, and on the history of epidemics and famines.
He is the Principal Investigator of the ERC-funded project EINITE-Economic
Inequality across Italy and Europe, 1300–1800. His recent publications include
Fathers and Godfathers: Spiritual Kinship in Early Modern Italy (Farnham, 2009)
and Calamities and the Economy in Renaissance Italy (Basingstoke, 2013).
Judit Ambrus
received her PhD in ethnography and cultural anthropology from Babes Bolyai
University (Romania) in 2009. Since 2008 she has been an assistant professor
at Kodolányi János University College (Hungary). She teaches history, ethnog-
raphy and cultural anthropology, and has published most notably The Family
Book as a Source of Ethnographical Research (Szolnok, 2007), and Old People in
Peasant Society (Székelyföld Journal, Csíkszereda, 2008) on the social history
and ethnography of the elderly in the second half of the 20th century in two
Transylvanian villages. Her research interests include the history of population
exchange between Czechoslovakia and Hungary in the 1940s.
Mirjana Bobić
is professor of Social Demography, Contemporary Family Challenges,
Partnership and Childbearing, Contemporary Migrations, at the Faculty of
Philosophy, Department of Sociology, University of Belgrade, Serbia. She
received her PhD in Social Demography from University of Belgrade in 2003.
Since 2003 she has been a professor at the University of Belgrade. She is the
author of the books Brak ili/i partnerstvo. Demografsko socioloska studija
[Marriage and Partnership. Demographic and sociological study] (Belgrade,
2003), Demografija i sociologija. Veza ili sinteza [Demography and Sociology.
Relationship or Synthesis] (Belgrade, 2007); Postmoderne populacione studije.
Demografija kao intersekcija [Postmodern Population Studies. Demography as
an Intersection] (Belgrade, 2013). She has written several articles related to her
master thesis on the history of Serbian Family based on the Ottoman Census