Widowed noblewomen had to remarry instantly to hold their land
Evidence
Like the Greek epikleros, woman is the instrument and not the bearer through which the domain is transmitted; that does not emancipate her; in a way she is absorbed by the fief, she is part of the real property. The domain is no longer the family’s thing as it was for Roman gens: it is the lord’s property, and the woman also belongs to the lord. He is the one who chooses a spouse for her; when she has children, she gives them to him rather than to her husband: they will be vassals who will defend his property. She is therefore a slave of the domain and of its master through the “protection” of a husband who was imposed on her: few periods of history seem harsher for woman’s lot. — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 207 (
#expands, via linked claim)
I do not mean merely the inheritance and sale of private property in land in the usual sense. More important was the European practice of political transfers of lands, with their populations, via dynastic marriages. Princesses, on marriage, brought their husbands duchies and petty principalities, and these transfers were formally negotiated and ‘signed.’ The tag Bella gerant alii, tu, felix Austria, nube! would have been inconceivable for any state in precolonial Asia. — Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities, 696 (
#expands, via linked claim)
Categorization
- XREF: connects to: Feudal marriage rules let men repudiate wives repeatedly to gain land — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 207; In feudalism woman functioned as property transmitting land to men — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 207; European dynastic marriage made whole populations transferable like property. — Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on…, 696
Broader Connections
- In feudalism woman functioned as property transmitting land to men
#expands(0.78) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 207 - European dynastic marriage made whole populations transferable like property.
#expands(0.72) — Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities, 696