A dimension of private life in Wallachia: violence between parents and children (1830–1860)

Abstract

Violence was present and had different forms in every family during nineteenthcentury Wallachia, either rich or poor, in rural or urban areas. Remaining in the shadow, almost never discussed between its members or even in public, this social act shocked the penal courts when it reached a critical point. But, during the century, violence between parents and children knew a constant evolution, visible in normative texts and in any written evidence left behind by the contemporaries. Thus, violence became a dynamic element in defining childhood and parent -child relationships.