Pyrenean Marriage Strategies in the Nineteenth Century: The French Basque Case

Abstract

Marriage strategies in the rural Basque country of the nineteenth century differed according to social background and gender. Propertied families had more diversified strategies than landless families as a result of persistent single inheritance practices, population growth, urbanization, and industrialization which generated massive emigration. Propertied families helped some of their children to settle in local rural villages and others to emigrate to cities (women) or to America (men). Landless families, by contrast, continued to settle most of their children in local rural villages, others emigrating to America only later in the century, avoiding the cities at all cost. Men, no matter their social background, benefited the most from new economic opportunities because most of them married into families of equal or higher status. Women, by contrast, did not have equal opportunities because few married upward and outside their professional group. When women did not marry within their socio-professional group or remain single, they married into families of lower status (more often than men).

Intimacies and Intimations: Storytelling between Servants and Masters in Nineteenth-Century France

“…A woman who had the status of potential heiress would prefer to remain unmarried rather than wed a man beneath her in the village social hierarchy. 27 A servant at least got paid for the same kind of labour that the wife of a poor man performed unpaid. A servant might, eventually, retire back to the family farmstead, as all offspring of the basseria had the right to do if they had not cashed in their inheritance.…”

Gender, Basque nationalism and women’s associations: The case of Lanbroa

“…The culture imposed traditional values upon the family in order to support the survival of the house; meaning the interests of the house prevailed over the interests of the individual members of the household. In order to preserve their ancient single inheritance practices and preserve this system, the first-born male or female child, who would marry the non-inheriting son or daughter of a family of similar background, would then settle in the heir's family house creating a multigenerational family unit (Arrizabalaga, 2005).…”

Social mobility and demographic behaviour: Long term perspectives

“…Many studies have indicated the prevalence of socioeconomic homogamy in pre-industrial societies, especially among landholding farmers (e.g. Arrizabalaga 2005;Bras and Kok 2005;Bull 2005;Dribe and Lundh 2005;Van Leeuwen and Maas 2002). At least to some extent this could be viewed as an indication of the strategic and instrumental nature of pre-industrial marriages (cf.…”