Criteria of Partner Selection and Factors Influencing the Age at Marriage in the Poznań Province in the 19th and Early 20th Centuries
Criteria of Partner Selection and Factors Influencing the Age at Marriage in the Poznań Province in the 19th and Early 20th Centuries

Summary/Abstract: The aim of this paper is to investigate the criteria of the selection of marriage partners in 19th- and early 20th-century Polish lands, focusing on the example of the Poznań province. Individual information about partners was derived from parish and civil marriage registers for 1840-1919 (8,780 couples). In the Poznań province the criteria of partner selection were age, religious denomination, occupational status of spouses and the size of their place of residence. Men with a higher social position married relatively young women. The social and economic position of women were less important in partner selection than those of men. Factors of socio-economic nature influenced the age of spouses entering into matrimony for the first time.

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