Book Chapter

Female social mobility in an impartible inheritance society at the end of the pre-industrial era (north-eastern Catalonia, 1750-1825)

  • Josep Mas-Ferrer

This paper aims to contribute to the study of female social mobility through marriage, by presenting a study case for north-eastern Catalonia, during the second half of the 18th century. This is a region where there was a strong system of impartible inheritance based on male primogeniture, so that it was women who moved into the families of the heirs, while paying a dowry accordingly. It is precisely the combination of the value of the dowry with the occupation of the bride's and groom's family that permits to better understand the dynamics of social mobility that brides experienced at the time of marriage. The results obtained suggest that male primogeniture pushed many women towards downward social mobility, despite certain mechanisms to mitigate it.

  • Keywords:
  • Social mobility,
  • Inheritance systems,
  • Marriages,
  • Dowries,
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Josep Mas-Ferrer

University of Girona, Spain - ORCID: 0000-0002-5382-5263

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  • Publication Year: 2025
  • Pages: 523-538
  • Content License: CC BY 4.0
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  • Publication Year: 2025
  • Content License: CC BY 4.0
  • © 2025 Author(s)

Chapter Information

Chapter Title

Female social mobility in an impartible inheritance society at the end of the pre-industrial era (north-eastern Catalonia, 1750-1825)

Authors

Josep Mas-Ferrer

Language

English

DOI

10.36253/979-12-215-0667-9.26

Peer Reviewed

Publication Year

2025

Copyright Information

© 2025 Author(s)

Content License

CC BY 4.0

Metadata License

CC0 1.0

Bibliographic Information

Book Title

La mobilità sociale nelle società preindustriali: tendenze, cause ed effetti (secc. XIII-XVIII) / Social mobility in pre-industrial societies: tendencies, causes and effects (13th-18th centuries)

Editors

Angela Orlandi

Peer Reviewed

Number of Pages

612

Publication Year

2025

Copyright Information

© 2025 Author(s)

Content License

CC BY 4.0

Metadata License

CC0 1.0

Publisher Name

Firenze University Press

DOI

10.36253/979-12-215-0667-9

ISBN Print

979-12-215-0666-2

eISBN (pdf)

979-12-215-0667-9

eISBN (xml)

979-12-215-0668-6

Series Title

Datini Studies in Economic History

Series ISSN

2975-1241

Series E-ISSN

2975-1195

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