Marriage on the boundaries: Cultural contact and marriage formation on the Welsh/English border, 1442-1526.

Format:

• Book
• Thesis/Dissertation

Author/Creator:

• Rabberman, Kristine L.

Contributor:

• Peters, Edward, 1936- advisor.
• Karras, Ruth Mazo, 1957- advisor.
• University of Pennsylvania.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

• Middle Ages.
• Europe--History.
• Europe.
• History.
• 0335.
• 0581.
• Penn dissertations--History.
• History--Penn dissertations.

Local Subjects:

• Penn dissertations--History.
• History--Penn dissertations.
• 0335.
• 0581.

Physical Description:

409 pages

Contained In:

Dissertation Abstracts International 59-11A.

System Details:

• Mode of access: World Wide Web.
• text file

Summary:

• This dissertation examines the influences of ethnicity and settlement type on marriage litigation in fifteenth- and sixteenth-century Hereford, a diocese on the Welsh-English border. Within the diocese, different cultural groups, most notably the Welsh, Anglo-Norman, and English, interacted for centuries. For this reason, the Hereford Acts of Office provide an opportunity to compare and contrast the kinds of marriage cases in which both groups were involved, and their reaction to the court rulings, within the same episcopal jurisdiction. Furthermore, because the records studied in this dissertation span the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, they give evidence of the extent to which the Welsh and the English assimilated in social practices over the 150 years following the Edwardian Conquest of Wales. Especially given the lack of uniformity in the Welsh marches in geography, economic structure, and law, the region provides a case study in the interplay among these factors as people created, perpetuated, and changed social institutions over time.
• Hereford's position on the Welsh-English marches profoundly influenced the kinds of marriages that its parishioners created, as well as the degree to which they accepted the official ecclesiastical definition of marriage in the late Middle Ages. Hereford had three different marriage patterns in this period: one that corresponded to a late medieval English model of marriage, one that had some remains of traditional Welsh marriage patterns, and an intermediate model that featured elements of both the English and Welsh models. Community type and geography are especially good indicators for the marriage models that existed in different deaneries across the diocese, as they influenced the degree of cultural differentiation and assimilation among the Welsh and English. Influential factors include the degree of nucleation in settlements, topographical features such as mountains and rivers that could aid or impede contact among these peoples, and economic structures. These findings provide a new perspective on the complex processes of social change and continuity following centuries of cultural contact on the Welsh-English marches.

Notes:

• Thesis (Ph.D. in History) -- University of Pennsylvania, 1998.
• Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 59-11, Section: A, page: 4249.
• Supervisors: Ruth Mazo Karras; Edward M. Peters.

Local Notes:

School code: 0175.

ISBN:

9780599121195

Access Restriction:

Restricted for use by site license.