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A Loveless Economy? Intergenerational Altruism and the Marriage Market in a Tuscan Town, 1415–1436

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 March 2009

Maristella Botticini
Maristella Botticini
Affiliation:
Maristella Botticini is Assistant Professor, Department of Economics, Boston University, 270 Bay State Road, Boston, MA 02215. E-mail: maristel@bu.edu.
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Abstract

This article examines the role of dowries and highlights the variables that affected the size of dowries in fifteenth-century Tuscany. The estimation, which matches the households found in the marriage contrascts with the corresponding households in the Florentine Catasto of 1427, offers support for the present net value hypothesis and for the altruism model. Results indicate a positive correlation between a bride's dowry size and her age when used as peoxy for her contribution to the marital household. Parents also provided their daughters with larger dowries when they married “down” into relatively less wealthy or socially prominent households.

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The Journal of Economic History , Volume 59 , Issue 1 , March 1999 , pp. 104 - 121
Copyright
Copyright © The Economic History Association 1999

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