Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- List of tables
- Preface and acknowledgements
- 1 Introduction – belonging and local attachment
- 2 The culture of local xenophobia
- 3 Settlement, parochial belonging and entitlement
- 4 Rural societies and their marriage patterns
- 5 ‘A cruel kindness’: parish out-door relief and the new poor law
- 6 Nailed to the church door? Parish overseers and the new poor law
- 7 Three centuries of new parishes
- 8 ‘Of this parish’: gravestones, belonging and local attachment
- 9 Conclusion – belonging, parish and community
- Select bibliography
- Subject and persons index
- Places index
- References
4 - Rural societies and their marriage patterns
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 27 July 2009
Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- List of tables
- Preface and acknowledgements
- 1 Introduction – belonging and local attachment
- 2 The culture of local xenophobia
- 3 Settlement, parochial belonging and entitlement
- 4 Rural societies and their marriage patterns
- 5 ‘A cruel kindness’: parish out-door relief and the new poor law
- 6 Nailed to the church door? Parish overseers and the new poor law
- 7 Three centuries of new parishes
- 8 ‘Of this parish’: gravestones, belonging and local attachment
- 9 Conclusion – belonging, parish and community
- Select bibliography
- Subject and persons index
- Places index
- References
Summary
Better wed over the mixen, than over the moor.
The young man who left his village or town to seek a bride was considered to be nothing more than an outlaw against the rules of decency.
‘Of this parish’, I say, reading the banns. The future bride who, although resident here for years has made a courteous first visit to the church in order to hear them, starts at this mention of her parochiality. She had not seen herself so localized … Beneficially, we are united on paper and in our hearts, but not parochially. Who can be? It is asking too much … At the same time we know our place – especially those who have driven ten or more miles to it – and an inexpressible happiness fills us as our own tree-held tower looms at the end of the lane … Now we have those who are ‘of this parish' without knowing it.
Marriage choices reveal a great deal about local horizons, and where people felt that they belonged. In this chapter, I wish to explore features of marriage, and to track changes in parochial endogamy and exogamy. By those terms I respectively mean marriage with both partners from the parish, and marriage to someone from outside the parish. Despite the huge growth of demographic studies in England over recent decades – something that has been less true of Wales – little attention has been paid to these aspects of marital behaviour.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Parish and BelongingCommunity, Identity and Welfare in England and Wales, 1700–1950, pp. 162 - 206Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2006
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