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#1
09-07-22, 07:44
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Women and Property
1882 Married Women's Property Act
But what happened before that? A friend was saying that before 1700, married women were transacting land deals in their own right. Can this be so? I can see that women like Margaret Paston might be entrusted with running affairs in their husbands' absence, or Bess of Hardwick overwhelming objections by force of personality, but with marriage being an economic unit rather more than an idyllic love match, I find it hard to imagine married women setting out to create empires independent of (and possibly in opposition to) their husbands. Does anybody know?
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The chestnuts cast their flambeaux 
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#2
09-07-22, 07:54
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I'm not sure what the law was, but I do have a couple of instances where married women (as opposed to widows) carried out property transactions. I think they could do this with the permission of an indulgent husband! I assume the property ultimately belonged to the husband, if he wished.
Property transactions - land, in my family - are such a useful tool in genealogy. The three lives system in Lancashire often means I can trace a family for hundreds of years, especially where other records no longer exist. OC
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#3
09-07-22, 08:06
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Thanks, OC. That would be my understanding of the matter. In a good relationship, a competent woman might well be trusted to do things. After all, I assume a steward might be delegated to deal with minor matters, possibly using his master's seal.
But if push came to shove, I imagine a man might assert his authority. I suppose one would need to find a legal case where a court decided against a husband to prove a woman's autonomy. And of course manorial custom varied hugely across the country.
__________________
The chestnuts cast their flambeaux
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#4
09-07-22, 12:41
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Something which still amazes me when I think of it, is a marriage settlement in about 1201 which lists a dower house for the perpetual benefit of Cicely Townsend (married Robert Holden). The rent was to be a red rose and a glove on Michelmas Day. I was astonished to find this rent mentioned in a land transaction in the mid 1800s! Families vanish, but property is always recorded. Follow the money, as they say.
OC
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#5
09-07-22, 13:11
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I don't think anyone on this board can equal that, OC, though I do have land acquired in the Tudor period, named in land tax in the early 1800s, proving the line.
As a side issue, I recently heard mention of a genuine pepper-corn rent. What intrigues me about a rose rent in September: what would happen if you could not obtain said rose?
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The chestnuts cast their flambeaux
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#6
09-07-22, 13:29
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Lol, no idea! But of course, it doesn't specify a fresh rose, or even a real one. I'd be more worried about the glove personally. That wouldn't have been a cheap thing in the 1200s, I don't suppose.
OC
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#7
09-07-22, 14:00
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#8
09-07-22, 18:41
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That's interesting, Kate, but I'm quite surprised they didn't know! I knew about peppercorn rents long before I started family research.
OC
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