Choices and constraints: marriage and inheritance in eighteenth- and early-nineteenth-century Catalonia

Abstract

This article looks at marriage in Catalonia during the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, a period of rapid economic and social change, using a case study of a proto-industrial community. Differences in age at marriage are related to data on occupations, wealth and age rank in order to consider as many of the factors influencing marriage decisions as possible. Economic factors were one obvious constraint upon marriage, but another was the particular system of impartible inheritance practised in Catalonia. This article shows that, while inheritance continued to affect marriage choices to a considerable extent, the rapid transformation of the economy was breaking down the traditional constraints upon marriage.