The Transmission of Well-Being : Gendered Marriage Strategies and Inheritance Systems in Europe (17th-20th Centuries) (New ed)

What does well-being mean when we talk about men and women in the past?

Their sheer chances of survival, their protection from want, their social status, their individual agency and their self-esteem were all strongly mediated by the family, the predominant social institution.

Family laws and customs of family formation created differences between insiders and outsiders in terms of well-being.

Within families, there were strong differences in autonomy, status and freedom between the genders and generations.

The book offers a fascinating exploration of gender differences in well-being in many regions of historic Europe, with some comparative perspectives.

It explores how historic family systems differed with respect to choosing a marriage partner, transmitting property, living and care conditions of widows and widowers and the position of children born out of wedlock.