| This thesis uses a new, contextual approach to illuminate medieval kinship by analyzing transfers of familial property in ways that incorporate concerns of timing, practice, and agency. Three complementary sets of data were used: first, exhaustive collections of marriage "contracts," testaments, and intra-familial disputes; second, illustrative documents such as sales or donations; and third, in-depth case studies. Three premises guided the research. First, since the standard model of the medieval family was based on the study of the aristocracy, this thesis focuses on the experiences of the rest of the documented population. Second, this method focuses on practices, rather than on prescriptions or ideals, and reveals that medieval Occitanians enjoyed a significant amount of agency to choose among several ways of dealing their property and their kin. Women also possessed a greater degree of agency than has been allowed for in traditional models of family. This project considers the intra-familial disputes that arose as part of a process in which kinship was activated (or not) in practice by invoking norms about kinship, which people used as cultural resources to pursue their own interests. Finally, this dissertation focuses on "devolution"---a term designating the long-term process of transmitting property among generations at different junctures. Considerable attention has been paid to the moment in the life-cycle of a family when events occurred and to its composition at that time, since these factors often determined practices.;The main conclusions reached through the use of this method are as follows. First, many Occitanians married more than once, with significant differences between these marriages, and the shift to cash dowries did not happen as has been thought. Second, maintaining the patrimony intact was not a primary concern among Occitanians, since they frequently divided their estates. Third, receiving a portion as a pre-mortem transfer offered advantages for the recipient, such as the possibility for investment and no burden of debt as was the case for testamentary succession. Giving daughters a portion at the time of marriage (although dowered daughters did inherit in Occitania) was not necessarily disadvantageous to them, and could have been preferred. |
