Ever since Aristotle’s time, there has been a line of thinking suggesting that the interactions between parents and offspring, as well as spouses, serve as an underlying model for governing bodies, offering a blueprint for how individuals engage with authority. While one may or may not align with this perspective, the routine existence and societal structure at the levels of family and residence are undeniably crucial to the historical functioning of European civilizations.
Yet, these subjects were long disregarded by historians who primarily focused on economic and political advancements or pigeonholed them into the realm of women’s history, treating them as distinct and insignificant. In terms of our historical comprehension of family and residence, many presumptions about the past are often based on the conduct of the elite class, literary portrayals, or outdated, ideologically driven research. For example, the notion that girls historically married universally and typically during their teenage years across Europe, or that expansive family units were customary in every society. However, upon closer examination, many of these assumptions do not hold up.
Exploring the arrangement of caregiving responsibilities commonly linked to feminine roles in society (such as childbearing, child-rearing, household management, etc.) can aid in comprehending the shifts within a specific era, not only for women themselves but for societies overall. In this segment, we outline the primary attributes of family and residence in early modern Europe, emphasizing chronological and geographical differentiations as necessary. The origins of these regional variances are disputed, with some historians proposing that legal frameworks, inheritance protocols, or agricultural practices (like the presence or absence of certain plow technologies) underpin these distinctions.
It is vital to distinguish between rural and urban environments, as well as between the circumstances of upper-class nobility and commoners. Moreover, the differentiation between family and residence also varies across contexts. While in some scenarios, all cohabitants may be blood-related, in other cases, additional individuals like boarders, servants, apprentices, etc., could augment the core domestic unit. Historians have generally found it simpler to investigate domestic living groups (i.e., residences) than kinship associations.
This composition is structured around the chronological sequence of life events, starting from birth (including infanticide), adolescence and upbringing, matrimony, residences and domestic aides, to the elderly stage and passing away (encompassing inheritance protocols). Finally, we delve into how residences were fitted out during the early modern era and the significance of assets during one’s lifetime and posthumously.
The periods of birthing and youth posed immense risks for individuals born in the early modern epoch. However, pivotal transformations occurred during this era concerning the management of these incidences, prompting extensive investigations into various subjects associated with infancy. The focus on birthing has empowered social historians (especially from the 1970s onward) to reconstruct the distinctive role women held in early modern families, challenge the notions of legitimacy, and analyze how heritage transmission was overseen.
Studies on the history of birthing have also shed light on the anatomical and medical awareness of the period. Within this sphere, religious aspects emerged as significant: inquiries into the moment of fetal animation and the fate of unbaptized deceased children held intense focus among contemporaries. Maternal and infant mortality rates were exceedingly high during the early modern era, with approximately twenty-seven percent of newborns failing to survive their first year (and about half not reaching adulthood), and four to five maternal deaths per thousand births. Given that mothers at this time typically bore multiple children, the risk for each mother was consequently elevated. Consequently, births were accompanied by religious and mystical rites in hopes of ensuring a favorable outcome. Upon delivery, swift baptism was sought to integrate the newborn into the community of believers.
Throughout the early modern era, children were birthed at home with the assistance of midwives, who primarily transmitted their expertise verbally. Insights into the midwifery practices of that period are available through territorial regulations and a handful of medical texts—Eucharius Rösslin’sThe Rose Grove (The Rose Garden) is an illustrated manuscript dating back to 1513 that widely circulated during the sixteenth century through versions in Latin, English, French, and Italian translations. Treatises authored by midwives started to emerge from the seventeenth century onwards. The first woman to publicly publish on this subject was the midwife Louise Bourgeois (1563–1636) from the royal court in France; while Justine Siegemund (1636–1705) from Lower Silesia gained significant acclaim for her handbook. Siegemund’s book, filled with elaborate illustrations, aimed to educate her fellow midwives by sharing her knowledge gained from readings and hands-on experience. She detailed the methods midwives should employ during childbirth.
Similarly, the renowned Parisian midwife Angélique Marguerite Le Boursier du Coudray, with the first edition of her work published in 1759, included colored plates in the later 1777 edition. The inclusion of such luxurious illustrations in the second edition highlights the popularity of her text, justifying the cost involved in the enhancements. These writings shed light on the intricate techniques employed by midwives during challenging deliveries, their utilization of tools, emergency baptism rituals, and the prevailing perceptions of the unborn.
Towards the end of the eighteenth century, the dynamics changed as midwives were no longer chosen directly by expectant mothers as in the past; instead, they were required to pass exams administered by male physicians. The establishment of maternity hospitals began during the eighteenth century. A comparison across Europe reveals notable differences in maternity care practices. For example, the Accouchierhaus in Göttingen, affiliated with a university and established in 1751, primarily served to educate male obstetricians. In Catholic regions, maternity hospitals also provided support for unmarried women to maintain their dignity. These institutions in Milan (since 1780) and Paris (Office des Accouchées of the Hôtel-Dieu, founded in 1378 but significantly expanded in influence later in the eighteenth century) were closely linked to orphanages.
In England, hospitals like the Lying-in Hospital for Married Women (founded in London in 1749) catered exclusively to impoverished married women, relying on charitable organizations for their existence. Initially, due to the high risk of infection, wealthier women preferred home births until the nineteenth century. In certain areas, newborns were routinely put in the care of wet nurses, illustrating the shift away from exclusively female responsibility for newborn care. Notably, in Tuscany, prospective fathers were sometimes consulted regarding the selection of wet nurses, underscoring the shared role in nurturing the newborns.
The Reformation and Catholic reform ushered in increased regulations and institutionalization of marriages, leading to challenges for unmarried pregnant women. Previously, declaring a marriage legally valid required a marriage vow and consummation, but ecclesiastical authorities began mandating that marriages be formalized before a priest and witnesses, while denouncing extramarital relations. Unmarried pregnant women navigated church courts to legitimize their status, seeking marriage and acknowledgment for their children, often facing societal pressures that sometimes led to drastic actions like abandoning their infants.
…Continues…(and continue) elevated for both males and females. However, the discourse concerning this subject has illustrated that rather than a clear-cut division across the region, it could be more precise to describe it as a spectrum, with Central Europe representing an intermediary scenario where the age of marriage was lower than in the western regions but higher than in the eastern territories. Consequently, we observe, broadly speaking, that the age of marriage is twenty-four and above (frequently significantly so) for both genders in north-western Europe, between twenty and twenty-four for females in Central and Southern Europe, and below twenty for females in numerous areas of Eastern Europe, albeit the male age at marriage is often considerably higher in these localities.
During a time when contraceptive methods were unreliable and extramarital relations were disapproved of (despite premarital relations occurring frequently), the age at which individuals married had a direct influence on the number of offspring women bore. The proximity in ages between spouses has been correlated with a more consensual, equitable type of partnership. Research on contemporary couples demonstrates that in regions where there is a substantial age gap between the husband and the wife, with husbands significantly older than their wives, there is a higher likelihood of exposure to domestic violence, diminished investment in children’s education (especially girls), and decreased influence in important decision-making processes such as healthcare expenditure distribution.
One element that could elucidate the higher marriage ages in north-western Europe is the expectation that couples, upon marrying, were required to establish their own households. This necessitated time for training, work, and saving enough resources to do so. While households in Eastern Europe were mainly constituted of blood relatives, to the west of the so-called ‘Hajnal line,’ live-in attendants and tenants frequently expanded the otherwise ‘nuclear family’ (i.e., a married couple and their children).
These attendants were generally (though not always) young individuals employed for wages. This system resulted in a life cycle where a period of service was customary in north-west Europe, in contrast to the situation in Eastern Europe. Across various strata of society, families in north-western Europe dispatched their adolescent offspring out of their homes to serve as attendants or apprentices, to reside close to a tutor or educational institution, or to provide service for royalty. This mobility was conspicuous to visitors from distant regions. The era of life-cycle service waned with the transition from pre-industrial to industrialized production methodologies, which was detrimental to the status of women, as they no longer had access to employment markets to acquire skills and earn wages.
In addition to highlighting the importance of marriage customs, investigations have been carried out on the legal and confessional facets of marriage. Frequently, religious conversion was a prerequisite for marriage. The existence of interdenominationally mixed marriages exemplifies how fluid confessional identities could be in the early modern milieu. Dowries had to be haggled in each instance, although financial factors were not the sole bond between partners. In cases of domestic violence or other marital disputes, divorce was only viable in Protestant nations.
In Catholic regions, it was occasionally feasible to seek a dispensation on grounds of an unconsummated union or to request separation from cohabitation through a ecclesiastical tribunal. The supplications and testimonies necessitated in the context of examinations and court litigations offer insights into what individuals living in the early modern era had to convey regarding their everyday married existence. What frequently emerges is that those residing in the early modern epoch possessed more “agency” than we may sometimes presume, and chiefly, women approached courts to enforce promises of matrimony that had not been honored and found themselves literally cradling the newborn.
A crucial aspect of how households’ life cycles were arranged is what occurred after death. Although life expectancy at birth during the early modern epoch stood at approximately thirty to thirty-five years, most individuals who survived infancy could anticipate a significantly longer lifespan—possibly until around the age of sixty. This also meant that some extent of elderly care provision was frequently necessitated. In the Netherlands, early prototypes of retirement residences emerged where elderly couples could prepay for care. In numerous other regions of Europe, care provided by kinfolk remained the norm. These patterns of intergenerational support and cohabitation have deep historical origins, with effects persisting to the present day. In Spain and Italy, for example, even current state provisions for elderly care are greatly influenced by the notion that it is offspring who attend to their parents once they are incapable of doing so themselves. Households in north-western Europe were frequently augmented by live-in aides or lodgers who delivered commercialized care or the financial means to procure care.
Households not only function as sets of relationships but also as tangible, physical domains. Historians such as Raffaella Sarti have indicated the importance of objects within the sphere of early modern households. Young couples needed to secure the material prerequisites for cohabiting, including fundamental essentials such as a bed and a hearth. The early modern era also witnessed an escalating demand for luxury merchandise, such as the influx of goods made accessible through colonial trade networks, with spices and textiles from Asia reaching the European market.
This bolstered the so-called “industrious revolution,” a transition in which households devoted more time to labor and less to leisure in order to afford luxuries. Tied in with this, the putting-out system—delegating manufacturing tasks to remote laborers—meant that manufacturers across Western Europe in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries could leverage a substantial labor pool existing in rural households. The capability to produce goods for manufacturers at home while concurrently engaging in agrarian work allowed rural households to augment their monetary incomes. Consequently, urban households during the early modern era became increasingly integrated into a monetary system and the market, both in terms of production and consumption.
This chapter has underscored that household and family compositions varied significantly across Europe, displaying distinctive east/west nuances associated with marriage practices. These distinctions are debatable but also had a notable influence on societal functionality. It is commonly posited that individuals from regions where networks were rooted in extended familial bonds placed their faith in the extended family over market-oriented relationships, whereas in a nuclear family environment, individuals likely engaged more actively with the marketplace and placed greater trust in anonymous transactions, thereby stimulating the advancement of individualistic and capitalist ideals.
Consequently, households and families emerge as pivotal in comprehending numerous other crucial historical developments. They further aid in elucidating the genesis or continuity of disparities across the continent. Smaller nuclear households in north-western Europe offered a more limited safety net to rely on during adversity. These ‘weaker’ family bonds can also be associated with the evolution of collective actions (i.e., where people collaborate to enhance their circumstances and achieve shared objectives), such as guilds, commons, and other cooperative setups based on shared interests rather than familial connections.
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