https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1537-6679
![Sample our Humanities journals, sign in here to start your FREE access for 14 days]({"type":"image" , "src" : "/sda/5939/TOC-Subject-Sample-2021-Humanities.jpg"})
ABSTRACT
This article uses parish registers, libri status animarum, and notarial records from the 18th and 19th centuries to assess the extent to which the rates of remarriage of widows and widowers in the Azores were similar to those of mainland Portugal. We consider that, despite the clear obstacles to marriage on the islands (due especially to male emigration) remarriage was in fact frequent and created stepfamilies. Factors such as social tolerance, sexuality outside of marriage and the lack of stigmatization of remarriage may provide part of the explanation. The article shows that a high proportion of widows gave birth to children during their widowhood and out of wedlock. Further, widows frequently attracted men of a much younger age as spouses, which again was socially tolerated. After remarriage by a widowed parent, the general pattern was to raise stepchildren in the family home. Remarriage rarely led to the departure of a stepchild under 16 from the household. The article considers the life trajectories of children who suffered parental loss and the half-orphans whose parents subsequently remarried. Moreover, a significant number of stepfamilies were formed by single mothers, who later married a man who was not the biological father of their child(ren). Beyond the qualitative analysis of parental loss and remarriage, the article outlines the motives of the widowed parents who sought to remarry quickly and follows some stepfamily experiences to detail the moments of transition and living arrangements of stepfamilies. The parish records combined with documents from notaries allow a qualitative understanding of some of the remarried spousal partnerships as well as the stepparent-stepchild relationships developed over decades.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1. In 1776 these parishes had the following population: Pedro Miguel (1176), São Mateus (2470), Ribeira Seca (2226) and Agualva (912). (Madeira, Citation1997).
2. Of the 33 villages in the parish in 1875, the most populous (fajã dos Vimes) had 360 inhabitants, 11% of the total residents in that year.
3. Unfortunately, the marriage books only systematically register the canonical dispensations from 1860 up to 1910. In this period about 30% of the total marriages were either consanguineous or resulted from ‘affinity’ (De Matos, Citation2009, p. 368).
4. On the low levels of mortality in the islands of Pico and São Jorge see, Amorim (Citation2004) and De Matos (Citation2007).
5. With the exception of the period between 1766 and 1782, when the island was recovering demographically from the earthquake of 1757, which killed approximately 1,000 individuals (Meneses, Citation2013, p. 185), of which 442 were from this parish (reconstitution of the parish).
6. For example, in 1832, 9% of the residents of the city of Angra were from São Jorge, mostly women who worked as domestic servants (De Matos et al., Citation2018).
7. We thank the author for this data which is still in the publishing stage.
8. Permanent celibacy is a demographic measure and indicates the percentage of those who remain single for 50 or more years. Obviously permanent celibacy did not exclude non-marital fertility.
9. With the exception of the parish of Rebordãos (interior north), which had intriguingly high numbers for both genders, and of Eixo and Oliveirinha, where men had good opportunities to remarry.
10. The proportion of illegitimate children born in Portugal in the 19th varied between 10 and 13%, peaking at 25% in some districts (De Matos et al., Citation2014).
11. Arquivo Paroquial (parish archives) of Calheta (São Jorge), Ouvidoria Eclesiástica da Calheta, Dispensas matrimoniais (marital dispensations), mç. (1870–73), case from 28 June 1871.
12. Idem, case from 2 February 1872.
13. Idem, case from 10 October 1870.
14. Unfortunately, only after 1860 are the male professions identified systematically, while women were generally designated as ‘servants’. After the 19th century the location within the parish is registered with regularity.
15. For instance, the case of Joaquina Silveira, mother of 6, whose husband died in 1843. She then had illegitimate children and remarried with a man 8 years younger.
16. Only Maria do Rosário had two older children when she was widowed in 1819. They were very likely independent (or not even in the parish, since she married in 1831 at the age of 71).
17. With the exception of the aforementioned case of Maria Santa do Rosário and of Antão Pereira de Azevedo, a widower who had, at the time of his wife’s death, 11 children.
18. The average age of these men at the time of marriage was of 39.6.
19. Biblioteca Pública e Arquivo Regional Luís da Silva Ribeiro (Terceira Island, Azores), Notariado. Ilha de São Jorge, Tabelião Bartolomeu Silveira Machado, Livro de notas n° 15 (1776–1790), fl. 81.
20. Illegitimate children of unknown father at the moment of birth but that later were recognized by the husband of the mother were excluded of the analysis.
21. More than 1100 single mothers born between 1700 and 1829 were counted, and around 530 later married in the parish.
22. Following the line taken in the relevant literature, we consider an orphaned minor to be a child of up to 15 years old, one of whose parents was deceased.
23. Róis are lists of parishioners who confessed and made communion at Lent (libri status animarum), in line with the determinations of the Council of Trent. In the present case these lists include all the inhabitants, including the population under 7 years old known as minors of confession.
24. Civil registries were only introduced in Portugal in 1911. Prior to that, the recording of civil data was mainly the responsibility of the Church and the parish records did not contain any entry as to the marriage or death of former parishioners who had moved elsewhere.
25. Identification of minors is further complicated by the fact that when they lived away from the parental home their biological parents were not identified in the records. In the (civil or ecclesiastical) lists only the surnames of married adults were recorded.
26. There were many notaries in the islands during the period in question, for example, there were 17 notaries in the municipality of Calheta, a large territory with 8,000 inhabitants.
27. The total records of baptisms counted 4,908 individuals. However, we only took into consideration those for who the dates of birth and death of both parents are available (2,426 individuals).
28. This analysis takes into account only the single mothers who died without having married.
29. These orphans of single mothers appear to have entered marriages in which there was a significant age-gap between the spouses, which might be considered potentially unfavorable. Catarina do Rosário, who was born in 1767 and orphaned when she was 7, married a laborer who was 16 years her senior; João Machado de Sousa, born in 1781 (and orphaned at the age of 13), married Bárbara de Jesus, a widow who was 25 years older than him and who already had a son.
30. As was the rate of single mothers who later married, in many cases to an individual who was not the father of their child.
31. BPARLSR, Notariais, Calheta, Tabelião Ambrósio Silveira e Sousa, book 2, 10.11.1785
32. BPARLSR, Notariais, Calheta, Tabelião 24A, book 4, 21.5.1853
33. BPARSR, Notariais, concelho da Calheta, Tabelião Mateus José da Silveira, book 16, 16.6.1818.