European Landed Elites in the Nineteenth Century

Dados Bibliográficos

ID4775422
AutoresRobert W Lougee, David Spring (State University of New York, autor correspondente), Robert Lougee, David R Spring (0000-0001-7355-2824, State University of New York)
Ano2019
Páginas162
Data de publicação2019-01-01
Open AccessSim
TipoBOOK
PeriódicoEuropean Landed Elites in the Nineteenth Century (SOURCE_BOOK)
EditoraJohns Hopkins University Press (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1353/book.72317
OpenAlexW2085293812
Open LibraryOL30201306M
ISBN9781421436807
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas25
Referências citadas7

percent held by the English landed elite.The latter figure would rise to 69 percent if elite status in England were attached to estates from 300 to 1,000 acres as \\•as the case in France and clse,\•here on the Continent. 1: 1 All this, of course, tells us nothing about the number of French landowners or about the range in size of their estates.As noted earlier, however, large French estates were not as conspicuous as the English-an impression shared by• that inveterate worshipper of aristocracies, Benjamin Disraeli, who chose to scorn the French: "\Vhere are their territories?I he sneered] ... Henry Hope and de Rothschild could bu,• them alJ."1-1In at least one important respect-in the proportion of the national territory owned-the pattern of Prussian land0\n1ership was more like the English than the French.Prussian landowners with estates of 3 7 5 acres and more-,,•hich Prussian statisticians in the 1850s defined as large estates and ,vhich contemporaries regarded as elite estates numbered about 15,000, in a countr_v that was about twice the size of England.In aggregate these Prussian landowners held about 40 percent of the land of Prussia in 1858, a proportion that increased in prime Junker provinces such as Pomerania and Posen to 62 percent and 57 percent respectively. 1" Although it does not seem possible to be pre cise about the number of estates over 10,000 acres, evidence suggests that they• ,,•ere less numerous than English estates of that size.In short, the Prussian landed elite ,ms a more homogeneous body than the English. 11;Prussian statistics, like the French, need a \\•ord of caution.The • provide certain figures on what are called Rittergiiter, that is, "privi leged" estates, or manorial jurisdictions. 17These figures show that among some 12,000 Rittergiiter from I 8 3 5 to 1864 there ,,•ere 14,400 sales, 1, 300 foreclosures, and 7,900 hereditary transmissions.Historians considering these figures ha,•e said that th.ey sho\\• "a t,vo-hundred percent turnover in the o\\•nership of some 12,000 large estates in the eastern provinces, " and that each estate "changed hands on average more than t,,•icc (2.14 times) during these thirty years." 18These arc misleading statements if, as would seem to be their purport, they are intended to suggest an unusual measure of social mobilit •, to indicate a marked weakening of traditional landed power in Prussia.First, they incl udc hereditary transmissions ,,•ith sales; but hereditary transmis sions are logicall • to be contrasted with sales, not lumped• with them.Moreover, even if sales arc considered separately, what is implied is uncertain.The figures tell nothing about the nature of the sales.How many of them, for example, were sales from small to large landowners, that is, were transfers ,vithin the land0\n1ing class?Finally, while the D ,\ \' I D SP RI :\ c

Ancient history · Economic history · Geography · Political science · Australian History and Society · European Political History Analysis · Historical Gender and Feminism Studies · History · 19th century · Elites · Europe · Ht647 .e84 · Landadel · Nobility · Platteland · Power (Social sciences)