This article examines the rate and causes of divorce among the elite households of late fifteenth-century Cairo. By using a unique contemporary chronicle, it is possible to estimate that a third of all marriages ended in divorce. Wives initiated divorces at least as often as their husbands. They did so by reaching a divorce settlement with their husbands for a financial compensation, or, in the case of desertion, by using the courts to impose a judicial divorce. In the vast majority of the cases, the causes for the divorce were grounded in marital relations. In spite of the importance of marriage alliances for the elite household, these marriages did eventually hinge on the mutual consent of the two individuals concerned.

In the early 1370s, when serfdom had all but disappeared in Flanders, Count Louis II resumed the collection of mortmain, a death fee usually paid only by those of servile status. In a region with a sophisticated financial system it is striking that rather than accepting payment in cash the Count's bailiffs secured personal items. In this paper it is argued that the Count was thereby taking advantage of a population dazed by the ravages of plague and by the on-going civil war between himself and a number of the towns within his territory. Traditional local bonds such as mortmain, extended and reinterpreted within a new constellation of power, enabled Flemish counts to turn a fee into a tax, highlighting their authority.

Twenty years have passed since Hans Eyvind Næss published what remains the only complete study of Norwegian witchcraft trials. This article considers the work done since that time, and surveys the state of research on witchcraft trials in Norway. Drawing on a recent registration of all known extant witchcraft trial records in Norway as well as recent research, I show how there was a much higher degree of regional differences within Norway than Næss allowed for, as well as a much greater degree of diabolism (the charge that witches took Satan as their lord) in Norwegian trials.

During the eighteenth century, Germans from the Hessian county of Hanau-Münzenberg emigrated westward to the American colonies, and east to Hungary, Russia, and other parts of Europe. Using new emigrant data, I examine their age, occupation, and emigration strategies. Those who settled in Pennsylvania were the richest of these emigrants, more likely to travel as intact families and the most networked. The poorest were the Hessians who went to Russia, mostly in 1766. A large percentage of the Hanau-Hessians settled in Pennsylvania, suggesting that eighteenth-century German emigration to Hungary and Russia has possibly been overestimated.

Early modern Portuguese women had the legal right to engage in a number of official transactions, including granting and receiving sureties and powers of attorney. This was not the case for women in many other parts of western Europe, making the Portuguese example worthy of scrutiny for comparative purposes. This article looks at the unique position of women in early modern Portugal, and shows that upon close examination of the archival sources, the evidence points to a significant gap between women's legal rights and the cultural limitations that were imposed on women.

This article represents an exercise in microhistory applied to early modern London. Deploying prosopographical methods, it reconstructs the life history of one John Bedford (1601–1667) from his birth in Huntingdon to his death in the West End of London. Much of his adult life was spent in the London parish of St Dionis Backchurch, with an interlude in the Irish town of Londonderry. Bedford fled from Ulster at the outbreak of the Irish Rebellion in 1641. His unusually detailed will provides the bedrock of this narrative, and his reconstructed life sheds important light on ties between London and Ulster, on debt and credit relations and on the methodological strengths and limitations of community studies that focus on a specific place.

This article contributes to debates over the ‘land–family bond’ in Early Modern England, in which social historians have engaged periodically during the past decade. It examines the work of Jane Whittle, Govind Sreenivasen and Alan Macfarlane and adds new archival evidence from my own study of three East Sussex villages, circa 1580–1770. Its focus is on the factors that influenced the land–family bond over time. It argues that a more nuanced understanding of individual tenant behaviour during this period cannot be reached without also charting the social, economic and demographic context in which such behaviour operated.

In 1974, Portugal's Carnation Revolution, initiated by the military, received huge popular support. Army officers, mostly of the rank of captain, started the Revolution, but then the politicians took over. While it was largely a ‘top down’ revolution, at the local government level ordinary people assumed control. In this article we consider those who made up the local elites before the Revolution, during the transition period that followed, and thereafter. We compare the local elites in Portugal during Salazar's dictatorship with those under the Democratic regime, using a database of 6,000 entries containing details of 3,102 mayors and deputy mayors and 402 civil governors who held office between 1936 and 2013. Our main conclusions are that during the transition period the elite who had ruled under Salazar were almost completely replaced. A new group, from different professions and social backgrounds, took up the reins of local government. The Revolution produced a population willing to participate in the new order and take on roles within local government, but they did not always retain their seats after the first democratic elections.

Over the last decades social scientists have alleged that violence has decreased in Europe since late medieval times. They consider homicide rates a valid indicator for this claim. Thorough source criticism, however, raises serious doubts about the decline thesis having any substantial empirical foundation. Forms and contents of the sources are immensely heterogeneous and a closer look at the alleged richness of the data uncovers remarkable gaps. Furthermore, medieval and early modern population estimates are highly unreliable. Thus, we argue that historical research on violence should return to focus on specific historical constellations, accept the need for painstaking source criticism and pay careful attention to the contexts of violence.

Philippe Ariès’s Centuries of Childhood is now over 50 years old, but it holds its place as a pioneering study of childhood, education and the family. Furthermore, Ariès’s use of images continues to attract comment. This article reflects on the role of visual material in Aries's narrative, subsequent criticism, and more recent work in the field by both historians and art historians. Building on an important discussion of the same subject by Anthony Burton, published in Continuity and Change in 1989, it explores ongoing issues around the role of images as evidence for the histories of children and childhood.

In nineteenth-century Europe, local and regional marriage markets turned into national marriage markets as a result of modernisation. However, the question is whether this applied also to Belgium, a nation that became increasingly divided over a language dispute between French-speaking Walloons and Dutch-speaking Flemings. To answer this question, this study examines trends and determinants of mixed marriages in municipalities in which Flemings and Walloons lived in close proximity of each other. The results show that marriages between Flemings and Walloons had always been rare and became even rarer over time, suggesting a strong and growing divide in the marriage market.

This article revalorises women's protest and popular political ideas in history. A case study focusing on three cities of the Low Countries shows that not only men, but also women were involved when it came to spreading subversive ideas, undermining the authority of urban governors, and mobilising discontent. The analysis of fifteenth-century records of repression from Antwerp, Mechelen and Leuven demonstrates that both male and female commoners permanently strove to change the governmental practices in town by using contentious speech.

This article explores the status of child as a relational one, defined by the power dynamics between parents and children rather than the young age of the individual. This approach complicates historiographical perspectives on the transition between childhood and adulthood, usually defined by historians as independence from parental regulation. Analysis of family correspondence from early modern England is used as a case study to explore conflicting patriarchal ideals that encouraged individuals to become independent householders, but also venerated filial obedience. It shows the broader application of this research to historians considering age as a category of analysis.