Society for Comparative Studies in Society and History

Kinship and Contract: Property Transmission and Family Relations in Northwestern Portugal Author(s): Caroline B. Brettell Source: Comparative Studies in Society and History, Vol. 33, No. 3 (Jul., 1991), pp. 443-465 Published by: Cambridge University Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/179048 . Accessed: 21/04/2011 14:33
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Kinship and Contract:Property Transmissionand Family Relations in NorthwesternPortugal

CAROLINE B. BRETTELL SouthernMethodist University
Quem dd o que tem antes que morra, merece uma cachaporra If you give away what you have before you die you deserve a beating A quem Deus nao deu filhos, deu o Diabo sobrinhos To whom God has given no children the Devil has given nephews and nieces

In 1886 Emile Zola publishedLa Terre(The Earth),a novel aboutpeasantlife in nineteenth-centuryFrance. In that novel, the peasant-proprietor Fouan, aware that he has reached an age at which he can no longer farm his own property,decides to divide it among his threechildren.MonsieurBaillehache, the notarybefore whom they all appearto legalize the transaction,feels that it is his duty to "make the usual comments." He tells them: as Many right-thinking people condemnthis way of disposingof property being it the immoral because theyfeel thatit destroys bondsof family .... Indeed wouldbe children sometimes behavevery badly situations; possibleto cite most unfortunate of havedivestedthemselves theirproperty once theirparents (Zola 1980:39). Though the notary's remarks make Fouan, his wife Rose, and their three children uncomfortable,they proceed to haggle for two hours over the terms of transmission. Their disagreementspresage what is to come as the story unfolds. Partlyas a result of her son Buteau'sbrutality,Rose eventuallydies. Once widowed, Fouan, now totally dependentupon his children, lives with each of them in turn. The abuse to which he is subjected intensifies to the point where, as a feeble and ailing old man, he is eventually smotheredto death by his youngest son. of AlthoughZola's fictional portrait peasantlife is bleak andexaggerated,it neverthelessaddressesa significantand real historicaland ethnographicquestion-how propertyand its transmissionboth shapes and is shaped by social relations, particularlyrelationsof kinship. In this article, I explore this question through a close examinationof the way in which propertytransactions
The authorwould like to thankthe AmericanPhilosophicalSociety for supportingthe researchon which this article is based. 0010-4175/91/3162-0163 $5.00 ? 1991 Society for ComparativeStudy of Society and History

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mediated intergenerational,gender, and sibling relationshipsin the peasant communities of nineteenth-centurynorthwesternPortugal. I begin with a discussion and critique of some of the traditionalabstractionsand broad regional patternsthat have been formulatedor described to help us conceptualize the associationbetween family and property,suggesting that they tend to obscure crucial differencesand possibly even change over time. I concenon trate in particular the concept of dowry. I then propose an historicallyand culturally framed approach that focuses on the analysis of the rights and obligations that are negotiated among kin as they deal with propertyand its transmission.These rights and obligations form the basis of ongoing familial relations as well as the domestic structuresthat we label nuclear, stem, and I joint family households. Furthermore, suggest thatin the process of negotiations over property the cultural values that sustain a social and economic system are expressed.
THE LIMITATIONS OF UMBRELLA CONCEPTS AND BROAD REGIONAL PATTERNS

As the field of Europeanfamily history developed, systems of classification based on broad regional patternsin marriagepractices and household structures were formulated.Westernand EasternEurope were differentiated,the former characterizedby late marriageand high rates of permanentcelibacy, the latterby early marriagefor the majorityof the population(Hajnal 1965). Subsequently,as evidence for more internalvariationthan initially assumed patternof marriageand household formabegan to appear,a Mediterranean tion was delineated(Hajnal 1983; Laslett 1983; Wrigley 1982). In an effort at world-wide classification, Todd (1985) has outlined seven different family forms and linked them to particularsocial ideologies, such as communism, individualism, and totalitarianism. Such schemes of classificationalso emergedfrom researchon propertyand inheritance.In bothhistoricalandanthropological studies, systems of transmission were labeledeitherpartibleor impartible,the firstbasedon an assumption of equality among heirs and the second on one of inequality(Connell 1968; Goody, Thirsk, and Thompson 1976; Habakkuk1955; Lison-Tolosana1976; Eurasiawas described as a region Netting 1981; Wolf 1970). Furthermore, characterized dotal marriageby contrastwith Africa, in which bridewealth by prevailed(Goody 1973; Jacksonand Romney 1973). Dowry, in Goody's view, is a form of premorteminheritancewherebya daughterreceives her portionat marriageratherthan at the deathof her parents.It sets up a conjugalfund that ensures a women's support in widowhood. Later, Goody (1976) correlated bilateralkinship,the dowry with a rangeof otheraspectsof social organization: within society, in-marriage, delayed existence of distinct economic strata marriage for women, and patrivirilocalresidence after marriage. The link between types of family organizationanddifferentinheritance systemsbecame

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a subjectof intense investigation(Barthelemy1988;Bourdieu1976; Burguiere 1986; Khera 1981; Lison-Tolosana 1976; Martin 1984). Recently, dissatisfactionswith these broadclassificatory schemes and correlations have emerged. In a review article on Italian and Iberian family history, Kertzerand Brettell (1987) point to enormousintraregional diversity in household composition, patternsof postmaritalresidence, and life course transitions, thereby bringing into question a Mediterraneanpattern. Barthelemy (1988) rightlylabels the division between partibilityand impartibility as schematic at best. Berkner and Mendels (1978) and Bauer (1987) raise questions about the meaning of impartibilitywhen so-called non-heirs are bought out and partibility when some heirs are more equal than others. Lamaison (1988) demonstratesthat within the broad parametersof equality and inequality a country like Francedeveloped myriad systems for property transmission;and Augustins (1987, 1989) has deconstructedbilateraltransmission systems into three subcategories: those emphasizing the lineage, those emphasizing the kin group, and those emphasizingthe house.1 With regard to dowry in particular,not only has the concept itself come under some scrutiny(Bossen 1988; Comaroff 1980; Gaulin and Boster 1990; Harrell and Dickey 1985; Hirschon 1984; Tambiah1989), but localized ethnographicand historicalstudies have also documentedsignificantvariationin its meaning and practice (Bourdieu 1962; Herzfeld 1980; Hirschon 1983; McCreery 1976; Sharma 1983), as well as some dramaticchanges over time, including those that could be labeled as dowry inflation (Allen 1979; Davis 1973; Hughes 1978; Srinivas 1984). In some contexts the dowry is indeed a form of disinheritance,as Goody suggests, but in others it is not. Womenin RenaissanceItaly were dowered in orderto keep them from removing land or houses from the family patrimony (Klapisch-Zuber1985). Women in early moder Haute Provence received a dowry of clothes, cash, and personal effects and, in exchange, gave up all rights to the family estate (Collomp 1984). Similarly,Macedonianwomen in northernGreece receive an elaboratetrousseau(rouha) of clothing and linen at the time of their marriagebut must abrogate any furtherclaims to the property of their natal family (Rheubottom 1980). Conversely, in northern Spain the dote was a marriageportiondeductedfrom the inheritancethat each child was eligible to receive at the death of the parents (Behar 1986). If a of daughterin southernGermanychose to sharein the inheritance parentswho had died, she had to returnher dowry (Sabean 1984). This could be a lucrative move and sometimes worked to the advantageof grandchildren. The composition of dowries is also enormouslyvarious. Land may or may not be included. Greek peasants on the Aegean island of Nisi endow their daughterswith land and a house, both generally located on parentalholdings
I Though useful, this model also obscures importantvariations, and some systems, in northwestern Portugalfor example, do not fit neatly into one of the three categories.

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(Casselberryand Valavanes1976). The newly marriedcouple establish a new household but in the vicinity of the bride's family. Such residentialproximity also seems to have been the motive that guided wealthy families in colonial Brazil who dowered daughters with land (Metcalf 1990). In Sardinia, by contrast, women are excluded from the inheritanceof fixed assets, compensated instead by cash or, more commonly, a trousseau of movable goods (Mariottini 1987). The trousseauxof nonaristocratic girls in nineteenth-and were largely comprisedof embroideredwhiteearly twentieth-century Sicily wear. Immovable gifts were token by comparison with the value of linen goods that were transferredas a necessary part of marriage arrangements (Schneider 1980). A woman's rightsto her dotal assets can take severalforms. In Renaissance Italy, husbandscontrolledthe dowries of their wives (Hughes 1978). Among families of means in colonial Brazil the dowry became part of community propertythata wife sharedwith her husband(Metcalf 1990). In Greece (Friedl 1962) and Brittany(Segalen 1984), neitherthe bride'sdowry nor the assets of the father-in-lawbecame part of the joint propertyof the couple. In western Ireland, on the other hand, dowries were given to the new husband by the bride's father. "The new wife owned not so much as a teacup.And she owned no more when she was eighty" (Brody 1973:110). Finally, the family forms, maritalstrategies, and residencepatternsassociated with dowry,however locally defined, arequite distinct, may change, and are by no means implicitlypredictable.Forexample, Loizos (1975) has traced a change from virilocal to uxorilocal residence on the island of Cyprus as houses were increasinglyincludedin dowries in orderto lure bridegrooms.In Serbianew legislationin the 1870s thatlegalized the division of the traditional joint-family household(the zadruga) and introduceddotal land ownershipby women eventually led to the emergence of new family forms (Halpern 1967:192). In some culturalcontexts, the timing of inheritancehas changed dramaticallyfrom postmortemto premortem(Sant Cassia 1982). This is particularly true in Greece, where dowries are now the major mechanism by which wealth is transferredacross generations. Allen (1979) describes the of semi-impoverishment parentswho must amass bigger and better dowries for theirdaughters.Somethingsimilarseems to occuramongsome peasantsin southernItaly, thoughmore as a resultof each child receiving his or her share of the patrimonyat marriagethan of a process of dowry inflation. Because parentsdivide what little they have when each child sets up an independent household, the result is widespreadpoverty for all and abandonmentof elderly parents (Tentori 1976). Such variationshave generatedincreasingskepticismabout broadregional patternsand umbrellaconcepts that mask difference. This skepticismposes a challenge for scholars who remain interestedin comparativehistorical and

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ethnographicanalysis. Can we make theoreticalsense of this diversity and of the relationship between inheritancepractices on the one hand and social structureand social relationson the other in some new way? In this article, I take up this challenge. I do so by returningto the property transactions themselves and the way that they both shape and are shaped by relations between men and women, parents and children, brothersand sisters, aunts and uncles, and nephews and nieces. These transactionsconstitute moments when the rights and obligationsbetween people are negotiated.The materialI discuss in order to develop this transactionalapproachderives from nineteenth-centurynotarial records for the District of Viana do Castelo in the province of Minho in northwesternPortugal. I concentrateon documents of the nineteenth century because it is during this century that major legal changes defining property relations in Portugal occurred, as elsewhere in Europe. In the Portuguese case, however, though entailed estates were disand some common land privatized,tradimantled, churchland redistributed, tional forms for the transmissionof propertypersistedamong the small-scale peasantry.
PROPERTY TRANSACTIONS IN NORTHWESTERN PORTUGAL

Propertyin Portugalduring the latter nineteenthcentury and until the overthrow of the Salazar regime in the 1970s was transmittedaccording to a system that was promulgatedin the Civil Code of 1867. Foundedupon principles with great historical depth,2 this code called for the equal division of property among all heirs. However, a distinction was made between the legitima, two-thirdsof the assets (bens) that had to be divided equally among heirs in the direct line of ascent or descent (so-called herdeirosforeados or forced heirs), and the ter?o, the remainingthird that could be disposed of freely by the legator.3In a marriagewith a "communionof assets" whereby everything brought to it and all that was acquired during it was the joint propertyof the couple, the terqoof each spouse consisted of a third of their half (meadio) of the communalproperty.4 Alternatively,a couple could marry
2 Brandao(1985) dates them to at least the fifteenth century.See Brandaoand Rowland(1980) and Osswald (1990) for furtherdiscussion. Some parts of the 1867 Civil Code were revised during the first PortugueseRepublic (1910-26) and revised again towardthe end of the Salazar regime, culminatingin new version that was passed into law in 1966. In 1978, a new Civil Code was enacted. 3 If there were no direct lineal heirs, the Civil Code specified other categories of consanguineal kin to be considered. Bens were divided into bens de raiz (fixed assets) and bens moveis (movable assets). 4 When these assets includedprazos (long-termlease agreementsfor the rentalof propertythat generally enduredfor "threelives," and that allowed for subletting)or other propertiesinherited with certainrestrictionsor when there were complex relationshipsamong legal heirs (caused, for the See example, by remarriage), transmissionof assets was not quite so straightforward. Article 1109 and following of the 1867 C6digo Civil.

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with a "separationof assets." Under this system, a spouse had the right to dispose freely of whateverhe or she had broughtto the marriagein additionto a third of half of the assets acquiredjointly duringmarriage.5 Although this presentsa rathersimplified view of the regulationsspecified in the PortugueseCivil Code of 1867, it does suggest a system of inheritance that was flexible enough to accommodatea varietyof strategiesfor the transmission of property.The peasants of northwestern Portugal,6who generally marriedaccordingto the system of communal assets, formalizedthese stratthe egies into four majortypes of legal transactionsthat structured transmission of property:Dotes de Casamento or marriagebequests, Doao6es or general bequests, Testamentosor wills, and Partilhas or land divisions.7 Though a doaqao could be made at any point in a donor's life course, these transactionspoint to two primarymoments at which wealth was transferred between generations:the marriageof the donee and the death of the donor. However, the process of transferitself was not quite so simple. Let us examine each of these transactionsand in conjunctiondiscuss the familial relations that are mediatedby them.8
The Dote de Casamento

The Dote de Casamentowas a bequest made by parentsto a child, frequently but not always to a daughter,just prior to a marriage.9Despite the literal translationof dote as dowry and the suggestionthatit was to facilitatea union, this was not a dowry like thatdescribedby historiansand anthropologistsfor other parts of southernEurope (Hirschon 1983; Hughes 1978; Pitkin 1960; Rheubottom 1980; Schneider 1980). Nor was it necessarily linked to the actual transferof property,though in some cases a partialtransferat marriage did occur. The dote de casamentowas generally a promise on the partof the senior generationand an expectationon the partof the junior generationthat
5 With a premaritalcontractmade in the presence of a notary,a couple could stipulate some variationbetween these two extremes. See Article 1096 and following of the 1867 C6digo Civil. For furtherdiscussion, see Brandaio (1985). 6 I use the word peasant to refer to the Portugueselavrador (fem: lavradeira). The lavrador farms land that he or she owns or rentson some long-termlease. A lavradoris to be distinguished from a jornaleiro or jornaleira (day laborer)who works somebody else's land for wages and a caseiro or caseira (sharecropper) who divides the output with a proprietor. 7 Limitationsof length make it impossible for me to discuss all the variationsin these transactions or to cover all the forms of transactions.Forexample, marriagecontractsbetween spouses were also common but will not be dealt with here. They were normally made to protect the inheritancerights of the children of a previous marriage. Such contracts were also the legal context for specifying a marriagewith a separationof assets or some variationthereof. 8 These transactionsare referencedas they are archivedby the name of the notary,the volume and page number. Where possible I have attemptedto link these legal documents to the family histories that I have compiled for a particular parish in this district(Brettell 1986), althoughmy discussion here pertainsto the region in general. 9 Some dotes were self-endowed. This generallyoccurredwhen a brideor groom alreadyhad a legal right to the legitima of a deceased parent,even when the survivingparentretainedusufruct rights.

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an actual transferof property(that included fixed assets) would occur at the death of one or both membersof the senior generation,dependingon how the contract was formulated. The dote as a mechanismfor the transferof wealth between generationsis still bestowed in some regions of northwesternPortugal(Pina-Cabral1986) and predates the 1867 Civil Code. An example of such a transaction is provided by the case of the dote given by Jose Afonso Castro and his wife TeresaAlves, both of the parishof Areosa, to theirdaughterMariaso that she could marryFranciscoAfonso Castro. The transactiontook place on 18 August 1842 (TabeliaoManuel Ant6nio Pinto de Andrade,5, Fl 85v). This dote consisted of the thirdsharesof theirfixed and movable property, half of it one in life and the rest at their death, and was to include the casa and lugar de vivenda.10In return,Mariaand Franciscowere obliged to live with Jose and Teresa, caring for them in sickness as in health. The formal agreementwent on to stipulatethat if Mariaand Francisoleft the company of Jose and Teresa without cause, they would retain that half of the third share that they had received in life but forfeit the half promised at death. As the notary was preparingthis contract, there must have been some discussion among the parties involved because it goes on to specify quite particularitems that were to be included in the third share, items that were clearly necessary for the continuityof the casa in the next generation.Parents and childrenagreedthatafterthe deathsof the former,the latterwould receive half of a grove of chestnuttrees (an importantstarchin the diet of the past, of little importancetoday), the threshing floor (eira), the plot on a long-term lease (prazo) from the Monasteryof Santa Ana, a grove of oaks, pines and underbrush(importantfor fuel, farm-animalbedding, and ultimately fertilat izer), and the bimonthlyturn-taking the village mill. " It was furtherstipulated in this contractthatwhat Mariaand Franciscopersonallyacquiredduring the time thatthey sharedtheir lives with Jose and Teresawould not be counted among the assets that would be divided at the death of Jose and Teresa. What does a transactionsuch as this tell us about negotiated rights and Porobligations and thereforeabout peasant family relationsin northwestern it is clear thatparentscould and did use the flexibility availableto tugal? First, them in the dispositionof theirterqosto guaranteethatat least one child would "marryinto the house" and therebyreproducethe casa in the next generation. Though sons did marry into the house, in this region of Portugal a strong
10 For the peasant families of northwesternPortugal, the casa is the focus of economic and social life. Though the word can be translatedas household, here the reference is to a physical piece of property.The casa in this sense is a one- or two-story building normally fronting on a courtyardshaded with vines and surroundedby other buildings that serve as additional living space or as sheds for the storage of farm equipmentand the shelter of animals. Adjacentto the casa there is generally a kitchengardenin which householdvegetables are grown. All these items together comprise the lugar de vivenda or dwelling place. 11 See Freeman(1987) for a discussion of turn-taking.

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tendency to favordaughtershas enduredfrom the past into the present. Peasants today claim thatdaughtersare betterthandaughters-in-law, phrasethat a alludes to the strengthof female kinship ties in particular. However, the fact that women are most closely associated with the home and with the agriculturaleconomy of northwestern Portugaland thatmale emigrationhas been extensive for more than two centuriesshould also be consideredas important factors explaining this preference (Brettell 1986, 1988; Pina-Cabral1986). Whether given to a daughteror a son, the dote was clearly a mechanism stem family domestic group was established. whereby a three-generation The clause in the dote that specifies either partial(as in this case) or total revokabilityof the bequest, as well as the fact thatthe final transferwould not occur until the death of the senior generation,meantthat the parentsretained authorityover the householdduringtheirlifetime. The dispositionof the terqo as a dote de casamentowith all of its restrictionsserved as a powerful mechanism by which parentsensuredthat someone would care for them in their old age. In fact, though it could be arguedthat having one child marryat home was necessary for the reproductionof a labor force within the casa (and perhapsall thatwas necessary,given the averagesize of farmsin this region), in the Portuguesecase nurturance was an equally weighty concern. Some of these dotes include ratherblunt phrases about the duties of "good children" towardtheirparents.The dote, in short, was a marriage transaction that set up an obligation: It reinforced, ratherthan dispensed with, the relationshipbetween parents and children.12 Although the promise of the third share in a dote de casamento allowed parentsto bolster and sustaintheir parentalauthority,the transactionwas not totally one-sided. It offeredthe youngercouple a place to live, somethingthat made marriagepossible. As one elderly peasant explained it to me, "in the past, you could always find a plot of land to buy or rent; what was more difficult was to find a house." In northwestern Portugalwhere an unbalanced sex ratio caused by the extensive outmigrationof young men constrained maritalpossibilities for women, a dote thatincludedhousingclearly enhanced a woman's chances for finding a husband. Though not evident in the examplecited, the reciprocalnatureof the dote is evident in many documents that ensured the younger couple's right to the entire third share if they were badly treatedby parentsor asked to leave the householdagainsttheir will. Thereis a clear recognitionof the fact that abuse can work in both directionsand shouldthereforebe formallychecked. Finally, notions of both fairnessand independenceare embeddedin the admissionthat adult children who have "marriedin" frequentlymake contributionsto the casa and thatthese shouldbe consideredfully theirown. A similarrecognition emerges in those wills in which specific items, such as a team of oxen or a
12 In this capacity the Portuguesedote was similar to the retirementcontractsdescribed by Gaunt (1987) and Plakans (1989).

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plot of land purchasedby children, are listed to be excluded from the evaluation of assets at death. This is quite differentfrom the notion thatthe earnings of unmarriedchildren, especially unmarrieddaughterswho worked as day laborers, should be turned over to parents. Marriage obviously marked a majortransitionfor sons and daughters,even though some of them continued to live in their natal household. As promises ratherthan actual transfersof wealth, these dotes placed the peasants of northwesternPortugalin a much better position than Zola's old man Fouan because as promises they could be revoked if the conditions, especially that of good treatmentand care, were not met. This is precisely what a widower namedManuelFariadid in a "Reclamation" 20 April 1819 of in a dote that he had made to his daughterMariaLuisa threemonthsearlierso that she could marry Jose Antonio Goncalves (Tabeliao Francisco Jose de Oliveira Gomes, 171, Fl 22v). The dote consisted of a house with its appendages and a stable. According to Manuel, once his daughterand son-in-law were married,they began to abuse him verbally,in both his presence and his absence. They did not show the respect due a parent from his children. on Furthermore, April 2 duringa squabble,his son-in-law attackedhim with a stick and brokehis right arm, "puttinghim in a miserablestate." Labelinghis son-in-law impudentand impertinent,he retractedhis gift. Doaoes At the time that a dote was made by one set of parents,the otherset of parents frequently made a doacao to emphasize their equal pleasure with the union that was taking place (the phrasein the documentsis "por a grandegosta que tinhao deste casamento"). This is the clearest evidence that we have of the balance between husbandand wife that is at the foundationof the Portuguese casa. In Portugal, as Pina-Cabral(1986:48) has observed, it is common to speak of the head couple (os donos da casa) ratherthanof a head of household or of o patrdo (the boss) and a patroa (female boss) collectively. Though such doaq6es sometimes involved the actual transferof property (houses, parts of houses, land or cash), very often usufruct rights were retained by the bestower(s).13If an actual transferwas made, it was generally againstthe legitima to which the child would be entitled at the deathof one or both parents. At the time of propertydivision (partilhas), this gift would be assessed. An example is provided by the doaqao made by the lavradores Manuel Barbosa and Ana Francaof Lanheses, on 12 February1881 to their son Ant6nio Jose Barbosa (Tabeliao Ant6nio Jose Alves, 63, Fl 3). The doaqao was made on the day that Ant6nio, a tailor, marriedJosefa Rocha Lima, a jornaleira (day laborer)and the eldest (and first to marry)of the nine children of Jose da Silva and Maria Rocha Lima, potters living in a nearby
13 Sometimes a distinction was made between a "doacao intervivos"and a "doaqaoa causa mortis".

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householdof the same parish.The doacao consisted of a half of the house and land and fruit trees in Manuel and Ana's lugar de vivenda. The surrounding eldest of six childrenand first to marry,Ana had inheritedthis propertyas part of the terco bestowed on her by her parentsat the time of their marriagein 1832. The half of the house was to include half of the sala (parlor) and the rooms adjacentto it as well as half of the covered shed.14 Ana and Manuel had six children, but three died in early childhood. Ant6nio, who was born in 1850, was the youngest but the first to marry.When the household was divided at Ant6nio's marriage,his two surviving sisters, Joaquinaand Margarida,continued to live in the half that remained in the hands of his parents. His mother died shortly afterwards,in September of 1881, and his sister Joaquinain August of 1886. At age thirty-six,Margarida had marrieda young man from a neighboringfamily in Decemberof 1884 and had set up an adjacenthousehold. Ant6nio was left to take care of his widowed father, and when his fatherdied in 1892, Antonio became the head of the casa. Ant6nio and Josefa had ten children, though only five (a son and four daughters)lived into adulthood.Antonio died in 1904 and Josefa in 1921. In 1920, Josefa was living in the casa with her fourdaughters,two of whom later marriedand threeof whom were absent(presumablyin domestic service) for some partof the year. After Josefa'sdeathand until theirown in 1975 (within a week of one another),two of the spinster daughters,as heirs of the third shares of both their parents, continuedto live in the casa. A thirdmarriedin Lisbon, a fourth in the parish, and the surviving son left the parish as an emigrant. to Over its history from the mid-nineteenth the lattertwentiethcentury,the from an eldest daughterand the first to marry,to Barbosacasa was transmitted the youngest child but only son and first to marry, then to two spinster daughters. It provides an excellent example of the absence of hard and fast rules for the transmissionof the terqoand the casa (by sex, birthorder,and so forth) and serves to emphasize a flexibility of strategiesthat were adaptedto familial circumstances.It also indicates that whereas a household containing childrenwas acceptable, some sort of one marriedchild and other unmarried division within the physical structurewas deemed necessary. This was an accommodation, perhaps, to the general principle that some present-day northwestern Portuguesepeasantsmaintainthatit is not a good thing to marry into a casa when there are several spinstersstill at home. However, based on
14 The division of that these documentsallude to raises specific problems physical structures for the ethnohistorianor historianworking with household lists. Is this still a single household, and was it represented that way in householdlists? In 1881 parentsand son were listed as separate though successive households on the Rol da Desobriga (a list kept by parish priests to monitor confession; see Brettell 1988) for that year. In 1887, the widowed father headed a household and made up of his surviving spinsterdaughter,his son, his daughter-in-law, his grandchildren. What meaning do we assign to this change within six years?

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this principle I can suggest something further.Had Antonio marriedinto his wife's household, where space must have been at a premium(therewere eight sisters young children),he would have been living with threeof her unmarried who were still at home. In his own home therewere two spinsters,but to them In he was a brothernot a brother-in-law. additionto birthorder,maritalorder, and sex of offspring, the composition of natal households also needs to be consideredas a factor influencingpostmarital residencechoices and therefore transactions. property On occasion, kin other than parents were involved in the bestowing of men or women doacqes. With no forced heirs, childless couples or unmarried could make a doaqco of some or all of their propertyto a nephew or niece marryinginto the household in which they were residing. This was done with the same set of stipulationsabout care and respect that parentsoutlined for their offspring. By this process, propertydivided in one generationcould be recombined in the next. A good example is provided by the doacao that Antonio Rodrigues Paris and his sister Franciscamade to their nephew Antonio on 16 April 1815 (TabeliaoJose Manuel PereiraMendes, 5, Fl 97v). They had raised their nephew as if he were their own son and now wished to treat him as such by bestowing on him all their fixed and movable property. They reserved usufructrights and furtherstipulatedthat when he marriedhe was to bring his bride into the household and was to continue to treat them with love and respect. If the popularadage cited at the outset of this article suggests that the self-interestof nephews and nieces could be trouble for the unmarriedand the childless, trouble could be turnedinto advantagethrough the mechanism of property. that such practicessurvived Along similarlines, and if only to demonstrate well into the twentiethcentury,a marriedcouple from Perremade a doaiao in of February 1949 to a brotherof the woman and his new brideon the occasion of their marriage(TabeliaoAbflio de Menezes Lopes de Carvalho, 168, Fl 38). This doaqao consisted of one half of a two-story house, the land in the surroundinglugar, and five other cultivated plots. They retained usufruct rights and stipulatedthat if the newly marriedcouple had no descendents, this doacao would revertto the givers. Though not clearly specified in this document, it is probably safe to assume that the brotherand his new wife shared the house with the bestowing couple, who were most likely childless. Althoughdotes were time-specific in the sense of being linked to marriage, doaq6es could be made at any time. Parentscould make a doaqaolater in life to a child, whethermarriedor single. Frequentlythis occurredwhen the terco had not previously been committed througha dote. Associated with it were the same kind of obligationsaboutliving with the parentsand caringfor them. could bequeathto grandchildren often did so when a son or and Grandparents who had marriedinto their household had alreadydied. Some peasdaughter ants also used doag6es to recognize an illegitimate child or grandchildas a

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legal heir, a wise action in a region characterized high ratesof illegitimacy, by especially duringthe latter half of the nineteenthcentury (Brettell 1986). A common form of nonmarital doaqaowas thatbestowedon a son studying to be a priest. What the parentssecuredin returnwas the prestige of having a son in the Church. Therefore, when such a bequest (called a doaado de patrimonio) was made, it was usually on the condition that the son actually become ordained, and was revokableif he did not. If this doacao (as cash, land, a house) was given outright,it was usually discountedagainstthe future inheritancethat this son could expect after his parents'death. A second form of nonmarital doaqaooccurredwhen parentsreleasedpropertiesthey could no farm themselves. Instead of using the privilege of usufruct they relonger quested annualpayments in kind of a portionof the harvest. Such payments stoppedat the deathof both parentsbut clearlyensuredeconomic supportuntil that time. Brothersmade them to Finally, doaq6es were not always intergenerational. sisters and vice versa. For example, a bachelor named FranciscoPereirada Silva made a doacao "intervivos"to his marriedbrotherDomingos on March 16, 1879 (TabeliaoJoao Felipe de Castro 16, Fl 56). The doacao, given in gratitudefor all the services he had received from his brotherto this point, consisted of all his property.He reservedthe right of usufructand stipulated that his brotherlive with him, treathim well, sustain him, clothe him, shod him, and take care of his burialand his soul at his death. This latterobligation was, in fact, extremely important.People worriedabout their spiritualwellbeing as much as about their physical well-being. A second example is providedby the doacao of threeprazos (plots of land on long-term lease) made in Januaryof 1801 by Luiz FernandesRamos, a bachelor of Afife, to his unmarriedsister Ant6nia and his bachelor brother Joao Francisco,both of whom sharedhis household(TabeliaoJoaoAnt6nio de Sousa Gama, 26, Fl 71v). Luiz had received the items he was bequeathing from his fatheras a resultof a legal transaction 1799. He made the bequest of with the stipulationthat Ant6nia care for his sister Teresa, a cripple who was unable to earn her own living. If Ant6nia eventually married and left the household, the bequeathedprazoswere to become the propertyof the crippled sister. Otherpropertieswere left to his brother,also on the condition that he keep his sisters in his company and live with them "in harmony and partnership."A few other referencesin this documentallow us to reconstructthe full story. Luiz was going off to Brazil and had inheritedthese items from his parentswith the stipulationthathe care for the crippledsister. He was passing on this obligation to his sister Ant6nia, and yet he did not sever his ties completely because he also specified that should he return, his brotherand sister would be obliged to accept him into their company and care for him in sickness and in health.

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Testamentos If propertywas not promisedat marriagein the form of a dote de casamentoor if not promisedor transferred marriageor at some otherpoint duringthe life at in course in the form of a doanao, it remainedto be transferred the context of a will preparedbefore death. Althoughnot all Portuguesepeasantswrote wills, to it was theirfinal opportunity take advantageof theirability to favorone heir left the free disposal of the thirdshare. Many apparently a decision to through this point. Testamentscould be used to revoke earliertransactionsand, in the case of unmarried individualsor childless couples, to designateor add an heir Some individualsformulatedthese documentsin the presence (Goody 1976). of notaries, who in the past traveled aroundthe countrysidein conjunction with the weekly, biweekly, or monthlyfeiras (regionalmarkets).Otherswaited until they were close to the end and the priest or some other village scribe was summoned to a death bed to record a last will and testament. Some wills were brief, leaving a full evaluationof assets andthe designation of recipientsof particularitems to the process of partilhas.Otherswere quite specific in defining which fields, items of farmequipment,pieces of clothing, household furniture domestic goods, strandsof jewelry, or sums of money and were to go to which individual. For example, Maria Alves, a spinster and lavradeirafromthe village of Nogueiralisted variousplots of landin herwill of April 23, 1871 (TabeliaoFranciscoVelho Barreto, 20, Fl 18). To her niece Rosa, daughterof her sister Rosa, she left her lugarand casas de vivenda and the field adjacent to it; to her nephew Manuel, son of Rosa, a field in the "Bouca de Decima" with a well;15to her sisterRosa, a field in the lugarof Jose Ant6nio Vieira; to her niece Ines, daughterof her brotherJose, a field in the Bouca de Cima;to her niece Maria,daughterof her nephewManuel, a field of underbrush with usufructto her parents;to her niece Ant6nia, daughterof her of brotherJose, a field in Bougano Pe; to herniece Maria,daughter Jose, a field of underbrushin Alto; to her nephew Francisco, son of Jose, a field of to underbrush; her niece Maria, daughterof Rosa, a field of underbrushin to Lagoa;to hercousin Manuel,a field of underbrush; her sisterJoana,a field of underbrush.Anything remainingwas to be divided equally among her nieces and nephews, childrenof her sistersJoanaand Rosa and her brotherJose, with usufructrights to her surviving siblings. In the context of wills, husbandsand wives took care of each others' wellbeing. The spouse makingthe will often bequeathedhis or her terco to a wife or husband, thereby leaving the survivorin control of two-thirdsof the communal assets. Such an action generallydeterredthe final division of property
15 Plots of land in the village are located by the name of particular sites that were familiarto it everyone residing in the village as well as by the owners of plots surrounding to the north, east, south, and west.

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until afterthe survivor'sdeath. If this choice was not followed, it was customary to clearly designateusufructrightsto the survivor.A transferwas made in name but not in fact. The position of the widow, who was often the survivor, was clearly bolsteredby this guaranteeof usufruct. Her right to remain was protected.Anotherstrategywas for a spouse to leave the thirdshareto the son or daughterwho remainedin the house with the survivingspouse. This was a often before any of the strategyfollowed by husbandswho died prematurely, children were of marriageable All of these strategiesagain substantiate age. the relative equality of spouses within the casa and of their joint headship. widows generally continued in headship after their husband's Furthermore, death even if they had a married son or son-in-law residing in the casa (Brettell 1988; Dias 1981). A transferof headshipprior to the death of the widow could and did occur when the aging widow no longer felt able to manage the affairs of the casa. However, the force of usufructremained in effect until her death. children Parentsalso used wills to protectthe well-being of theirunmarried and particularlyof their spinsterdaughters.Numerous wills leave the casa, some portionof it, or anotherstructure that is partof the assets to an unmarried daughter(s)so that she (or they) has a roof over her head until her own death. This is precisely what a widow named Maria Alves of the parish of Anha did in her testamentof 1846 (TabeliaoManuel Ant6nio Pinto de Andrade, 8, Fl 28v). She had five children whom she recognized as her legal heirs, two marriedsons (AntonioandJose), two married daughters(Mariaand Ana), and a spinsterdaughter(Teresa).She bequeathedher thirdshare to her daughters Teresa and Ana but specified that the house and lugar that she bought from Antonio Rodriguesshouldbe partof the half of the thirdshareof her daughterTeresa. Her husbandhad clearly left her his thirdshare because she goes on to bequeath that as well to Teresa and Ana. The numerous bequests that mention spinster daughters generally state that the action is made in gratitudefor the service and care thatthese daughtershave given their parents in their old age and that they hope will continue until their death. Nurturance the children who remain at home is the most valued gift for by which a transferof the major share of propertyis the valued reward. What is most apparent, however, and worth reemphasizing, is that the in legacies or otherobligationsformulated wills were often used to bolsterthe situationof individualswho may have had a more precariousposition within a household-the elderly, the unmarried. Thus, JoanaCastroRocha, a spinster from the village of Meixedo, made a public testamenton 19 June 1891, in which she named her nephew Manuel, son of her brotherManuel, as her majorheir (TabeliaoJoao Caetanoda Silva Campos, Testamentos1, Fl 9). In returnhe was to accept in his house those of his three sisters who wished to live with him as long as they remainedunmarried.In additionshe designated particularpieces of propertyfor each of these nieces.

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Several members of the Martinsfamily, residents of the village of Perre, came together at the office of notary in March 1871 to make their last wills and testaments (TabeliaoFranciscoAntonio Velho Barreto 17, Fl 6ff). Two were spinsters, one a bachelor, and the other a widowed sister-in-lawnamed JoanaFerandes who had six children(four sons and two daughters).They all lived together in one household. Three of these adults left their respective shares of the propertyto those sons or daughtersof Joana Fernandeswho remained in the household after marriage. However, one of the spinsters designatedone niece (her namesakeand possibly a godchild) as her universal heir if she was not marriedat the time of her aunt's death, thereby making special provisions for a woman of the next generationwho might find herself in a similar position of spinsterhood.Though these individualslived in what looks like a stem-familyhousehold, clearly the unmarried memberswere not had a full share in the family property-both powerless appendages. They movable and immovable-and were not necessarily obligated to act fully in concert with regardto its ultimatedispersal. One final example demonstrateshow difficult it is to isolate issues of interest from those of kinship. MariaFrancaof the parish of Ancora made a will in 1881 (TabeliaoAnt6nio Jose Alves, 65, Fl 32v). In it she mentions a niece named Maria Angelina who came to live with her at fourteen and "remainsin her company."She claimed to owe wages to this niece and asked thatthese wages (the sum of fourteenthousandfourhundredmilreis annually) should be paid. In addition, she willed her dwelling to this same niece. This layering of a kinship relationshipwith an economic relationshipis certainly not unique and indicates that in this region, as in other regions of Europe (Netting 1981), the position of servant and relative were occasionally commingled.16 In the absence of a marriagecontract, a differentkind of contract was made to establish what has been classified by family historians as a nonsolitaryhousehold. Partilhas The usufructrights or third shares that husbandsextendedto wives and vice versa in their wills normallyserved to delay the final division of propertythe partilhas-until afterthe deathof the survivingspouse. However, in some cases, whether because neither of these testamentaryactions was taken or because a widow or widower gave way to the pressuresimposed by children anxious to have full controlover the propertyto which they were entitled (the legitima of the dead spouse), the division could occur duringthe lifetime of the surviving spouse. The continuingauthorityof a widow or widower, who
16 Although Netting suggests thatthis comminglingcan stem from list makers, it may actually reflect the ambiguityof social relations. Tilly and Scott (1978:20) have observed that the terms servant and lad or maid-a young, unmarried,and thereforedependentperson-are often synonymous. See also Chaytor (1980).

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generally retained all or half of the casa de vivenda and its surrounding properties, either in usufructor outright, has to be seen in this context. The Portuguese words that denote these transactionsare Escriptura de partilhas amigdveis (document of amicable partition), a phraseology that provides an appearanceof accord and no doubt leaves discord largely buried in the unwrittenhistorical record. Ethnographic data from the contemporary period provide evidence of the conflicts that can be associated with divisions of property in Portugal (Riegelhaupt 1967) and elsewhere in the Europe (Davis 1977; Herzfeld 1980; Segalen 1985). The legal document'7 is only drawnup after an agreement(presumablyamicable)has been reached, hence the sometimes long delay between death and legal partition.Wills nevertheless hint at the potentialfor conflict as heirs strive to achieve equality.Parents express a hope that theirchildrenwill "behavethemselves," "conservepeace and friendship," "act without discord," or "conductthe apportionment amito God's law." Pina-Cabral commentson the claim (1986:67) cably according made by northwestern Portuguesepeasantsthat all childrenare equal. Yet he observes that "this does not mean that they will inheritthe same amountand the same thing." Examinationof a specific case will provide a clearer understanding of how an equitable outcome was achieved. The children of Maria Franco Marinho of Lanheses appeared before a notary in Februaryof 1891 to divide the propertyof their widowed mother who had died in April of 1889 (TabeliaoAnt6nioJose Alves, 111, Fl 14). The four childrenwere the lavrador Manuelda Silva and his wife MariaJosefa, the widowed lavradorLourenqoda Silva, the lavradorJose Ant6nio da Silva and his wife Rosa, and Ant6nio Lourenqo, an unmarriedshoemaker living in Brazil who was representedby proxy. Manuel and his wife had been sharinga householdwith his motheruntil her death, and they were the recipientsof the thirdshare, which includeda half of the lugarand casa de vivenda. At deaththey received the otherhalf consisting of one- and two-story houses, animal sheds, a kitchengarden, a corn storage bin, other sheds, a well, and arableland with vines and fruit trees. They also received threeadditionalarablefields in theirown parish,one arablefield and one field of underbrush a neighboringparish, and the turnat the mill every in fifteen days. Among the movable goods includedin theirsharewere ten boxes of pine, a barrel,a saltingtrough,a mallet, a hay rake, a pickaxe, an irontool, and a cleaver. Lourencoreceived a field of underbrush, arablefield and a one share of tillable land in a locality called Bouca Velha that he divided with his brothersAnt6nio and Jose Ant6nio. In additionto this share, he also received a field of underbrush, half of an arablefield, and a box of pine. Jose received
17 Priorto 1867 notarialdocumentsof partilhaswere much less common thanafterthatdate. It seems that the Civil Code effectuated a more rigorous observation of legal propertydivision, though until quite recently some peasant families attemptedto delay it for as long as possible.

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in a field of tillable land with underbrush additionto his share of the Bouca Velha field. In this case, final partitionoccurredalmost two years afterthe deathof both spouses. The materialinequalityresulting from the larger share given to the recipientof the terco is quite apparent.If no heir was namedas the recipientof the thirdshare, it was customaryto divide everythingequally among all legal heirs. In either case, monetaryvalues were assigned to all items, both mov18 able and immovable, and apportionment proceededaccordingly. Sometimes the result was the actual division of a house. When Ant6nia Domingues dos Santos, a spinster, and her sister-in-lawMaria MartinsRuiva, a widow, apof pearedbefore the notaryin January 1879, they agreedto split their sharein the casa as follows: Ant6niareceived the sala (parlor)andthe fourrooms near to it, half the veranda, the shed underthis half of the verandawith the room off it, and a portion of the land adjacent to the house; Maria received the kitchen, a sala adjacentto it, half the veranda, the kitchen garden, a shed in this gardenand three sheds for the animalslocated underthe kitchen and sala, and another shed in the garden (TabeliaoJoao Felipe de Castro, 16, Fl 9). Presumablythese sisters-in-lawcontinuedto lived together,though we do not know from the documents the extent to which they really shared domestic space and other domestic tasks. As the extended case discussed above illustrates, fields were also subdivided to create equal shares, a process that clearly stands behind the minifundia that characterizesnorthernPortugal. However, if a water source was located on only one of these subdivided plots, provisions were made for cooperationand sharingdespite the independentownershipof the land itself. In some cases, individualsappearto have felt it necessaryto legally specify in for an "Escriptura partilhad'agua" (the order and durationof turn-taking de water)-a fact that clearly indicates the value of this particularresource. Finally, the principlesof equality and sharingnot only affectedassets but also debts. Whateverthe deceased owed to privatecitizens or religious institutions was totalled, deducted from the portion of each legitimate heir, and settled with the lender. A Summary Though the discussion of legal transactions in northwesternPortugal has indicated variationsin the timing and natureof intergenerational transfersof wealth, there are a numberof basic principlesthatprovide the foundationfor the entire system. First, property,a form of old age security,was dispensed in such a way as to guaranteethe care of the older generation. The reciprocal rights and obligations between parentsand children were clearly negotiated
18 See Behar (1986) for a parallel discussion of this process in northernSpain.

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and the fact that these transactionsoften constituted promises rather than actualtransfersmeantthatparentscould maintaincontrolover at least some of their childrenthroughouttheir lifetime. A second principle(not always realized however) was to marryone child into the casa, therebycreating in each householdat least for some period of time. For generationa three-generation whatever reasons, not all households successfully marrieda child into the casa. Unmarriedoffspring, especially spinsterdaughters,could become the majorbeneficiariesof theirparents'property.Despite this materialinequality, Portuguese peasants did not see the bestowing of the third share as real inequality because it was to compensate a child who had contributedmore laborand services to them in theiradvancingage. 19However,law and custom tended to approximateone anotherwith regardto the equal division of the legitima among all offspringafterthe deathof one or both parents.Finally,the principleof usufructrights was used to protectthe survivingspouse. Widows retainedauthoritybecause in Portugueseterms they were full partnersin the economic activities of the peasant family.
DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION

of The relationshipbetween propertytransmissionand the structure domestic and has been of interestto both anthropologists historians.They have groups compareddifferentsystems of inheritance(partible, impartible,dowry) and the correspondingfamily types (nuclear, stem, joint) associated with them. But underlyingthe process by which materialwealth flows from one generation to the next are fundamentalnotions about kinship and gender that influence decisions aboutwho is to be designatedas the heir or heirs, whetherthey are to be treatedequally, and when and how the actualtransferof wealth is to be made. In other words, cultural values are embedded in and expressed throughthis process. An analysis of the mechanisms of propertytransmission in nineteenthcentury northwesternPortugalreveals ideas about the relationshipsbetween consanguinealand affinal relatives, the young and the old, brothersand sisters, and between men and women. If children have certain inherent filial obligations towards their parents, these must be reinforcedby a culturally specified contractualagreement.Blood is not necessarilythickerthan water, and kinship must be constantlyconstructedand reinforced.Thus, in another realm, Portuguese parentsgenerally choose kin as godparentsto their children, thereby layering a blood or naturalrelationshipwith a culturalor spiritual relationship. Wealthtransfers-whether in the form of dotes, doaq6es, or testamentosare gifts. There is a debate within social science aboutthe alienabilityof gifts (Cheal 1988; Goody 1983; Gregory 1982). Those who view gifts as being
19 Delphy (1974) and Salitot-Dion (1977) tend to regardthis as a kind of subjective equality subject to manipulation.

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inalienable argue that the rights of the donor to the gift are never fully extinguished because an obligation to return is established. In Gregory's (1982) words, individuals are united in "reciprocalbondage." Though it is evident that the issue of alienabilityis a matterof cultural,social, and historical circumstances,it needs to be more fully explored in association with the question of propertytransmission.Reciprocity,as I have suggested at several points in this essay is fundamentalto the northwesternPortuguese system. if Furthermore, a study of notarialrecords such as that outlined here necessarily presents an image of accord, there is no doubt that, as among the offspring of the old peasant Fouan in Zola's novel, discord can often both precede and succeed the formulationof a legal agreementfor the transferof property.Interestand emotion, gift and contract,cooperationand conflict are all characteristicof the relations among kin. The analyticaland theoreticalapproachto kinship and propertythat I have developed here, an approachthat focuses on individualchoice, familial strategies, and a range of options and obligations within a particularcultural context, provides an alternativeto one thatemphasizesneat categoricallabels like partible, impartible,and dowry when referringto inheritance.The categorical approach,I have suggested, obscures significant variationand, more the importantly, fluidity of social life. An emphasison the transactionsthemselves allows for the possibility that some propertyis transmittedneither at marriagenor at death but at some other moment of the life course and that strategies for the transferof wealth can be altered over time, depending on changing familial circumstancesor other exogenous factors. This analysisbegins with social relationshipsand culturalvalues ratherthan with the identificationof systems of inheritance.Such an approachmay help us to formulatenew and more sophisticatedcross-culturalcomparisons. For example, if we move far afield from northwestern Portugal, we find that the Indians of southwestern Guatemala (Gross and Kendall 1983) also Maya emphasize the fulfillment of filial obligationsduringthe parent'slifetime as a prerequisitefor the right of heirship. Mayan daughtersare not simply disinherited with a dowry when they marryand go to live with their husbandand his family. Rather,parentsclaim thatthey cut off theirdaughtersbecause they had "forgottentheir parents, or their husbandswere hostile or disrespectful" (Gross and Kendall 1983:209). Here too reciprocityand respectfor the elderly are primary guiding principles. Conversely, where young people can find alternativesourcesof wealth and thereforeindependencefrom parentalinheritance, the status of the elderly may be eroded. This is precisely what Allen (1979:149) alludes to in his description of the retirementof aged Greek parents to "mere hovels." Finally, although exchange and contract are also characteristic the intergenerational of wealth flows within the Taiwanesefamilies described by Greenhalgh(1988), a distinctionis made between sons and daughters.Daughters,not sons, areexpectedto make immediateor equivalent

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repayment. This suggests that an understanding of cultural constructions of gender difference are of utmost importance to an interpretation of systems of property transmission. Such constructions influence subjective equality as well as the way in which unmarried or widowed women are treated.
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