Planning for Death

Wills and Death-Related Property Arrangements in Europe, 1200-1600
Erscheinungsjahr 2018
ISBN: 978-90-04-36432-5
Verlag: Brill

Buch, Englisch, Band 23, 290 Seiten, Format (B × H): 162 mm x 245 mm, Gewicht: 559 g

Reihe: Medieval Law and Its Practice

The volume Planning for Death: Wills and Death-Related Property Arrangements in Europe, 1200-1600 analyses death-related property transfers in several European regions (England, Poland, Italy, South Tirol, and Sweden).

Laws and customary practice provided a legal framework for all post-mortem property devolution. However, personal preference and varied succession strategies meant that individuals could plan for death by various legal means. These individual legal acts could include matrimonial property arrangements (marriage contracts, morning gifts) and legal means of altering heirship by subtracting or adding heirs. Wills and testamentary practice are given special attention, while the volume also discusses the timing of the legal acts, suggesting that while some people made careful and timely arrangements, others only reacted to sudden events.

Contributors are Christian Hagen, R.H. Helmholz, Mia Korpiola, Anu Lahtinen, Marko Lamberg, Margareth Lanzinger, Janine Maegraith, Federica Masè, Anthony Musson, Tuula Rantala, Elsa Trolle Önnerfors, and Jakub Wysmulek.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Weitere Mitwirkende

Korpiola, Mia

Lahtinen, Anu

Fachgebiete

• Rechtswissenschaften Recht, Rechtswissenschaft Allgemein Rechtsgeschichte, Recht der Antike

Inhaltsverzeichnis

List of Illustrations and Figures
List of Contributors

1 Introduction
Mia Korpiola and Anu Lahtinen

Part 1: Range of Legal Options and Their Use

2 Inheritance Law, Wills, and Strategies of Heirship in Medieval Sweden
Mia Korpiola and Elsa Trolle Önnerfors

3 Monastic Donations by Widows: Morning Gifts as Assets in Planning for Old Age and Death in Fifteenth-Century Sweden
Tuula Rantala

4 Competing Interests in Death-Related Stipulations in South Tirol, c. 1350–1600
Christian Hagen, Margareth Lanzinger, and Janine Maegraith

Part 2: Wills, Property Strategies, and Testamentary Practice

5 Medieval English Lawyers’ Wills and Property Strategies
Anthony Musson

6 Men and Women Preparing for Death in Renaissance Venice (c. 1200–1600)
Federica Masè

7 Mutual Testaments in Late Medieval Stockholm, c. 1420–1520
Marko Lamberg

Part 3: Wills, Property, and Authority

8 Wills as Tools of Power: Development of Testamentary Practice in Krakow during the Late Middle Ages
Jakub Wysmulek

9 Deathbed Strife and the Law of Wills in Medieval and Early Modern England
R.H. Helmholz

10 The Will of Filippa Fleming (1578), Family Relations, and Swedish Inheritance Law
Anu Lahtinen

Index of Persons
General Index

Über Autor(innen)

Mia Korpiola, LL.D. (2004), University of Helsinki, is Professor of Legal History at the University of Turku. She had authored and edited several books, including Regional Variations in Matrimonial Law and Custom in Europe, 1150-1600 (Brill, 2011).
Anu Lahtinen, Ph.D. (2007), University of Turku, is Professor of Finnish and Nordic History at the University of Helsinki. She has published on medieval and early modern history, including Dying Prepared in Medieval and Early Modern Northern Europe (Brill, 2017).