The marriage exchange : property, social place, and gender in cities of the Low Countries, 1300-1550 / Martha C. Howell.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Howell, Martha C.

Series:

Women in culture and society.

Women in culture and society

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Husband and wife--Flanders--History.

Husband and wife.

Husband and wife--France--Douai--History.

Law, Medieval.

Marital property--Flanders--History.

Marital property.

Marital property--France--Douai--History.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (296 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Chicago : University of Chicago Press, c1998.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Medieval Douai was one of the wealthiest cloth towns of Flanders, and it left an enormous archive documenting the personal financial affairs of its citizens-wills, marriage agreements, business contracts, and records of court disputes over property rights of all kinds. Based on extensive research in this archive, this book reveals how these documents were produced in a centuries-long effort to regulate-and ultimately to redefine-property and gender relations. At the center of the transformation was a shift from a marital property regime based on custom to one based on contract. In the former, a widow typically inherited her husband's property; in the latter, she shared it with or simply held it for his family or offspring. Howell asks why the law changed as it did and assesses the law's effects on both social and gender meanings but she insists that the reform did not originate in general dissatisfaction with custom or a desire to disempower widows. Instead, it was born in a complex economic, social and cultural history during which Douaisiens gradually came to think about both property and gender in new ways.

Contents:

Frontmatter

CONTENTS

Foreword

Acknowledgments

Note on Money, Dates, and Names

Introduction. Le Libert v. Rohard

Chapter 1. From Custom to Contract

Chapter 2. The Social Context of Custom

Chapter 3. Legal Reform as Social Engineering

Chapter 4. The Social Logic-and Illogic

of Custom

Chapter 5. An Alternative Logic

Chapter 6. Living with the New

Chapter 7. The Weight of Experience

Chapter 8. The Douaisien Reform in Historical Context

Conclusion. Marie, Franchoise, and Their Sisters

Appendix A. The Evolution of Douai's Douaire Coutumier

Appendix B. Written Custom and Old Custom in Douai

Glossary of Legal Terminology

Glossary of Measures

Bibliography

Index

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9786612069949

9781282069947

1282069942

9780226355177

0226355179

OCLC:

320958460