Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-4rdrl Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-06-19T21:12:00.928Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

1 - Households

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 June 2023

Catriona Macleod
Affiliation:
University of Glasgow
Alexandra Shepard
Affiliation:
University of Glasgow
Maria Ågren
Affiliation:
Uppsala Universitet, Sweden
Get access

Summary

This chapter demonstrates the need for new and more precise concepts to make sense of early modern households. First, it questions the usefulness of the three-sector model with the argument that many households were active across sectors and their main employment can be hard to identify. Second, with the help of early modern letters, it shows that reliance on several sources of income was not necessarily a sign of vulnerability as it applied to both wealthy and less wealthy households. Third, using work activity data it indicates that the male breadwinner model does not fit with early modern realities. Married women and men were active in most types of work and their authority and responsibilities made them similar to each other and different from the unmarried. Fourth, it argues that it is misleading to conceptualize the household as a closed unit characterized by patriarchal hierarchies. Households had to be open to the surrounding society. Fifth, it demonstrates that, to take advantage of the many links to the outside world, household heads were prepared to delegate and deputize. As a result, economic agency was more dispersed in the population than is usually acknowledged.

Type
Chapter
Information
The Whole Economy
Work and Gender in Early Modern Europe
, pp. 26 - 52
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2023

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×