Aristocratic marriage and the English peerage, 1350–1500

Marriage was obviously an important institution to the late medieval aristocracy. Almost all of the peers between 1350 and 1500 married: all but seven did so at least once, and 144 of the 424 peers (or 34 percent) married two or more times. Since marriages were for political and economic reasons, as much or more than for personal ones, we find that many of them were contracted within the forbidden degrees of kinship and affinity, by dint of an ecclesiastical dispensation. Some dispensations were issued before the marriage, while others — usually carrying some sort of penance — came afterwards. Few proposed marriages were actually repressed or prevented by the Church. But there is also considerable evidence for affection and partnership within a marriage. Husbands who died first usually left considerable personal goods to their widows. They often made them executrixes and spoke of them in terms of trust and continuing responsibilities. Though there is no question that marriage at first was more business than pleasure, qualitative data show that it often became a satisfactory personal relationship and that it offered considerable scope for sentiment and cooperation

Affection · Aristocracy (class · Dowry · Institution · Kinship · Nephew and niece · Pleasure · Political science · Politics · Sociology · Spouse · Wife · Historical Economic and Social Studies · History · Law · Medieval Literature and History · Psychology · Reformation and Early Modern Christianity · Social Psychology

• Exploration and Discovery

  Open Access•Felipe Fernández-Armesto, Felipe Fernández‐armesto•The New Cambridge Medieval History•1998

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• Portugal

  Open Access•Armindo de Sousa•The New Cambridge Medieval History•1998

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• Popes and Councils

  Open Access•Antony Black•The New Cambridge Medieval History•1998

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• The Swiss Confederation

  Open Access•Roger Sablonier•The New Cambridge Medieval History•1998

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• Yorkist and Early Tudor England

  Open Access•Rosemary Horrox•The New Cambridge Medieval History•1998

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• The New Cambridge Medieval History

  Open Access•Rosamond Mckitterick, E James et al.•The New Cambridge Medieval History•1998

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• Politics

  Open Access•J P Genet, Jean-Philippe Genêt•The New Cambridge Medieval History•1998

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• Representation (Since the Thirteenth Century)

  Open Access•Wim Blockmans•The New Cambridge Medieval History•1998

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• Medieval Monogamy

  Open Access•L Betzig•Journal of Family History•1995

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• The demography of the British peerage.

  Thomas Henry Hollingsworth•The demography of the British…•1965

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• Marriage Litigation in Medieval England

  Open Access•R H Helmholz•Marriage Litigation in Medieval…•1975

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• The clandestine marriages of the Fair Maid of Kent

  Karl P Wentersdorf•Journal of Medieval History•1979

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• The Pastons and their England

  John E Weakland•History of European Ideas•1992

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• Consanguinity and Noble Marriages in the Tenth and Eleventh Centuries

  Constance B Bouchard•Speculum•1981

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• Incomes from Land in England in 1436

  H L Gray•The English Historical Review•1934

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• Calendar of Patent Rolls

  E E Rich•The Economic History Review•1938

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• The social origins of marriage partners of the British Peerage in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries

  David Thomas•Population Studies•1972

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• The Rise of the Egalitarian Family

  Henry Horwitz, Randolph Trumbach•The Journal of Interdisciplinary…•1979

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• The Queen's Wards. Wardship and Marriage under Elizabeth I

  Richard Ashton, Joel Hurstfield•The Economic History Review•1959

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