Childless Families in Languedoc in the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries

Nuptiality Rates

Nuptiality rates run high in late medieval European societies. Marriage was the sacrament par excellence of the laity and the only way to beget legitimate offspring. In Tuscany, where the 1427 catasto yields reliable and thorough demographic data, only 4 percent of Florentine and 2 percent of rural laywomen reached the age of fifty without marrying. ²² Languedocian testamentary sources are much less detailed than fifteenth-century Tuscan fiscal documents but show comparable results. Among the c. 1300–1500 urban and rural lay female testators, 4 percent had never married. ²³ High rates of marriage among women are tied to the fact that women usually waited until the reception of marital assigns or the inheritance of their husband to distribute their assets among family members. ²⁴

Masculine nuptiality rates appear quite low at first glance, with 14.5 percent of rural laymen and nearly 20 percent of urban men who do not seem to have married by the time they made their will. ²⁵ Ratios may be skewed by the way in which notaries identified their clients in the preamble of testaments. While women were named through the marital bond (Mary, wife or widow of John Smith), men tended to be identified by their first and last names as well as by their occupation in cities and towns (John Smith, carpenter). ²⁶ In rural areas, men’s first and last names usually sufficed to identify them, probably because communities were smaller. ²⁷

Knowledge of a man’s marital status thus comes from second-hand information, such as their desire to be buried with their late wife; a bequest toward their spouse; the mention of offspring. This gendered system of identification leads to the underrepresentation of widowers, and potentially of married men, in the corpus, especially if they were childless. ²⁸ In parallel, because women awaited their marriage to make a will, married and widowed women are overrepresented in the female corpus.

If nuptiality rates among men of the diocese were probably higher than what testaments suggest, this statement should be nuanced with regard to the age of the testators. Some 15 percent of urban masculine wills were made by young unmarried men—twice as many as in rural areas (7 percent). ²⁹ Wills of young men represent two-thirds of the unmarried wills in Montpellier (66 percent) and nearly half of the unmarried wills in rural areas. ³⁰

An example of such young and unmarried testator is Johan Veyssier, a ploughman from the diocese of Clermont, immigrant to Montpellier. ³¹ In his 1450 testament, Johan Veyssier made universal heirs his father and mother, who had stayed in his home town and left 5 sous to his unnamed brothers and sisters. ³² Johan bequeathed all his clothes to a baker and to his wife as a reward for their services—he was laying ill in their house when the will was drafted.

These young men, many of whom were immigrants like Johan, would certainly marry later on. Unless the rules of intestate inheritance suited them, they could then remake a will that would include their spouse and offspring. Instances of will redrafting are however rare. ³³

Widows and widowers who had not (yet) remarried represented more than a quarter of the married and once-married testators, both in Montpellier and in the small towns, villages, and hamlets of the diocese (respectively 28.5 percent and 26 percent). ³⁴ Remarriages may have been more frequent in Montpellier or were more frequently mentioned in urban wills (10.5 percent of the unions) than in rural areas (7 percent). ³⁵

In total, widows and widowers, remarried or not, amounted to nearly 40 percent of the married and once-married testators in Montpellier and to one-third of married and once-married testators in rural areas. Ratios of widowhood and remarriages in the diocese are comparable to testamentary data compiled for Mende (c. 1290–1470) and Alès (c. 1340–1460) by Cécile Béghin. ³⁶

In Montpellier, from c. 1300 to c. 1500, an average of 43 percent of married and once-married testators was childless; the ratio was lower in rural areas, at 25.5 percent. ³⁷ Testamentary data collected in southern French towns show rates of childless testators comparable to those in villages and towns of the diocese of Maguelone. ³⁸ In Alès, c. 1340–1460, about a quarter of married and once-married testators were childless; 20 percent were childless in the town of Mende (c. 1290–1470). ³⁹ Philippe Maurice’s research in testaments of small communities of Gévaudan yielded very few childless unions, usually below 10 percent. ⁴⁰ In big and populous cities, childlessness was more widespread than in rural areas, even in towns, where families were generally larger. ⁴¹

Childless Couples to the Black Death

From c. 1300 to c. 1325, about 20 percent of the Montpellier married and once-married testators had no child who were alive or about to be born (see Figure 2). ⁴² For the same period of time, all rural testators who had been and were married had children who were alive at the time they made their will. ⁴³ This does not signify that all rural married people had children but rather testifies to diverging attitudes toward testamentary practices in the city and in rural communities.

OPEN IN VIEWER

Figure 2.

Childless married and once-married testators in urban and rural wills (c. 1300–1500).

Rural testators tended to go to a notary to draft their will when they had legitimate heirs to whom they would transmit their estate, while the people of Montpellier did not wait as long. A testimony to that later age at will is the familial coefficient (the average number of living children per marriage). In rural areas of the diocese of Maguelone, the familial coefficient was high between 1300 and c. 1325, with an average of 3.8 children per couple. In comparison, the familial coefficient in Montpellier was at 2.2 children per family during that same period of time.

However, many wills preserved for the early fourteenth century had been produced for the social elite, usually more endowed with children than humble people. ⁴⁴ Members of the social elite were also underrepresented in the ranks of childless testators. Higher numbers of elite testators in the corpus half of century before the first plague might inflate the familial coefficient, with ratios of childless testators driven down by the same factor.

Ratios of childless couples rose noticeably in Montpellier during the twenty-five years preceding the Black Death, up to 36.5 percent (see Figure 2). ⁴⁵ The familial coefficient thus declined to 1.4 children, below the threshold of population renewal. In towns and villages too, the ratio of childless unions augmented after 1325, getting close to 20 percent. ⁴⁶ This augmentation was concomitant to a plummeting rural familial coefficient, with an average of 2.8 children per family between 1325 and 1348 (see Table 2).

OPEN IN VIEWER

Table 2.

Familial Coefficient (c. 1325–1400).

Time Period	Montpellier	Rural Areas (All)	Manosque	Mende
c. 1325–1350	1.4	2.8	1.7	3.6
c. 1350–1375	0.7	1.9	1.1	1.4
c. 1375–1400	1.2	1.5	n.a.	0.7

A telling example of these plummeting ratios comes from a series of wills pertaining to the Salendre family, who inhabited the village of Sauve, very close to the diocese of Maguelone. ⁴⁷ On June 10, 1347, Pierre Salendre, head of the family, drafted his will in a state of illness. ⁴⁸ He bequeathed to his two adult sons and to his son-in-law, widower of Pierre’s daughter. Pierre was then married to Garcende, the mother of their three children, and was the grandfather of two grandchildren. He died within twenty days of drafting his will.

On June 30, Pierre and Garcende’s son Guilhem drafted his will, he too in a state of illness. ⁴⁹ He died within four days. His brother Rufus died in the same time span. ⁵⁰ Having lost her husband and her two sons, Garcende drafted her will on July 3, 1347. ⁵¹ She made one of her grandchildren, named Garcende in her honor, her universal heir. ⁵² But one month later, on August 8, the testatrix drafted a second will, following the devastating death of her two grandchildren. ⁵³

In the course of two months, Garcende had lost her husband and all of her surviving descendants—her two sons and her two grandchildren. These dramatic events were not yet tied to the plague but strongly suggest that epidemics might have been running their course in Lower Languedoc before it began, wreaking havoc in the Languedocian families. ⁵⁴

The apparent reduction of the size of families between 1325 and 1348 results of overlapping factors. More frequent food shortages and a surge of epidemic diseases in the overpopulated cities and towns could have lowered the size of households before the first plague struck. ⁵⁵ But the social elite, still overrepresented in the corpus, was relatively sheltered from such catastrophic events. ⁵⁶

On the eve of the Black Death, while an average 36.5 percent of the married testators of Montpellier were childless, only 20 percent of couples from the merchant milieu were without offspring. ⁵⁷ On the other side of the social ladder, 40 percent of Montpellier artisanal and peasants families were without children. ⁵⁸ The inflation of childless families after 1325 reflects the dire familial situations of the humble inhabitants of the city at the eve of the Black Death. The precarious living conditions of the urban population laid the groundwork for the devastations of the first plague.

The First Plague and the Late Fourteenth Century

The Black Death struck Montpellier and the diocese of Maguelone in the early summer of 1348. From the years 1360s, several successive epidemics wreaked havoc in the diocese, challenging the demographic upturn. The plague became endemic in conjunction with recurring food shortages and attacks from companies of mercenaries of the Hundred Years’ War. ⁵⁹

Between c. 1351 and c. 1375, 55 percent of the Montpellier testators who were and had been married were childless (see Figure 2). ⁶⁰ The Montpellier familial coefficient plunged to 0.7 children per family, a minuscule number—although, admittedly, data are scarce with only 20 wills of married and once-married individuals. ⁶¹ Yet, in the populous city of Marseille, 56.5 percent of the c. 1340–1360 testators were childless, a ratio comparable to Montpellier. ⁶² In the towns of Mende or Alès, postplague wills also testify to an increase of childless testators right after the Black Death (Figure 2). ⁶³

Looking at comparable data for Pisa, where 55 percent of the c. 1340–1400 testators were childless, Sylvie Duval links the low ratio of testators with children to an implicit agreement with the intestate rules of succession. She wrote that “having descendants reduced the propension of drafting a will” although not completely eliminating it. ⁶⁴ Duval, therefore, contends that childless testators were more prone to will drafting because they did not adhere to the local intestate rules of succession framing the distribution of inheritance of childless individuals. The more transgressive a testator’s choice of universal heir was, the more necessary a will would become. ⁶⁵

Duval’s compelling hypothesis would explain the staggeringly high rates of childless testators in Montpellier or Marseille right after the plague, as well as in Montpellier during the early fifteenth century. But the towns and villages of the diocese of Maguelone reveal a very different picture. The ratio of childless testators lowered to 13.5 percent in the twenty-five years following the Black Death. ⁶⁶ This suggests that the rural people who drafted their will in these troubled times tended to do so only if they had children. After the 1375s, rural childless individuals finally turned to a notary and started drafting their wills. Then, childless individuals neared 40 percent of rural testators, a very strong increase from the low 13.5 percent that preceded (Figure 2). ⁶⁷

A clearer sign of the impact of the plague on the country of the diocese is a significant plunge of the rural familial coefficient (see Table 2). From 2.8 children per family before the Black Death (including 17 percent of childless couples), the familial coefficient dwindled to 1.9 children per family between c. 1350 and c. 1375 (in spite of a low rate of 13.5 percent of childless families). The familial coefficient continued to plummet toward the end of the fourteenth century, with an average of 1.5 children per couple between 1375 and c. 1400.

Despite the ratio of rural childless testators being puzzlingly low after the plague and suddenly rising after 1375, urban wills show the opposite trend (see Figure 2). Exceeding 50 percent right after the Black Death, the ratio of childless unions lost close to fifteen points between 1375 and c. 1400. ⁶⁸ It would gain twenty points between 1400 and c. 1425. The peculiar Montpellier 1375–1400 data set is quite difficult to interpret. Because the ratio of childless testators was on the rise since the early fourteenth century and continued expanding into the fifteenth century, it is doubtful that it plummeted that much between 1375 and 1400. Plagues and food shortages still wreaked havoc in the depopulated city. ⁶⁹

Overall, the archives of the diocese of Maguelone yield results that are relatively in tune with data collected in various areas of Southern France. Everywhere the average number of children per family declined brutally after the Black Death (Table 2). ⁷⁰

In the Provençal town of Manosque, the familial coefficient fell from 1.7 before the plague to 1.1 between c. 1350 and c. 1370. ⁷¹ In Mende, from 3.6 children per family before the plague, figures were down to 1.4 in the twenty years following the first epidemic; they plummeted at 0.7 between 1380 and 1390. ⁷² The Black Death and the subsequent epidemics had devastated the diocese of Maguelone and inflicted a serious blow on families, as they did in the rest of southern France.

A feature of postplague wills, however, is the democratization of testamentary practices. ⁷³ It is possible that the number of childless and married individuals also increased due to the larger presence, in the corpus, of poor and decimated families.

A Contrasted Fifteenth Century

While the rate of childless marriages remained high in rural areas between 1400 and c. 1425, at 37 percent, childless married and once-married testators in Montpellier were more numerous than ever, making 60 percent of the married and widowed cohort (see Figure 2). ⁷⁴ The familial coefficient plunged to 0.8 in the city (against 1.4 children per family in rural areas, see Table 3). ⁷⁵

OPEN IN VIEWER

Table 3.

Childless Testators and Familial Coefficient (Fifteenth Century).

Time Period	Montpellier		Rural Areas
	Childless Unions (Percent)	Familial Coefficient	Childless Unions (Percent)	Familial Coefficient
1400–1424	60.5	0.8	37	1.4
1425–1449	34.5	1.1	25.5	1.7
1450–1474	36	1.5	22	2.3
1475–1499	46.5	1.2	21.5	2.4

Similarly, in Mende and Alès, ratios of childless testators augmented in the early fifteenth century. Cécile Béghin found that 44 percent of the 1420–1430 Mende testators were childless—a 17 percentage point augmentation in comparison with c. 1350–1410—while in Alès, the ratio of childless testators increased from 18 percent in the late fourteenth century to 28 percent in the 1420s (Table 3). ⁷⁶

Such high ratios of childless testators and low rates of familial coefficients can only be explained by intertwined hypotheses. Plagues and food shortages continued the course they had started in the late fourteenth century, impacting negatively female fertility and killing children from humble and poor families in large numbers. ⁷⁷ The early fifteenth century was an enduring time of crises in the diocese, with the population of Montpellier declining until c. 1440. ⁷⁸

The early fifteenth century was also marked by important migratory movements in the diocese of Maguelone, with 41 percent of the 1400–1425 Montpellier testators who had moved to the city recently enough to be identified as migrants. ⁷⁹ Many of them seemed to have drafted their will shortly after their marriage and before having children, increasing the ratio of childless testators in the corpus. ⁸⁰

As soon as c. 1425, families everywhere grew considerably larger (Table 3). In Montpellier, childless couples were fewer until c. 1475, the familial coefficient augmented accordingly, “rising” to a still low 1.5 children per family between 1450 and 1475. In villages and towns of the diocese, the ratio of childless people lowered to the end of the fifteenth century, nearing 20 percent in its last quarter. ⁸¹

Therefore, demography may have gradually improved from 1425 onward. The rural familial coefficient rose from 1.8 children per couple between c. 1425 and c. 1450 to 2.4 children per couple at the end of the fifteenth century. In the small coastal towns of Mauguio, the late medieval familial coefficient was as bountiful as in the rest of the rural diocese. ⁸²

But, in Montpellier, the last quarter of the fifteenth century was typified by a swell in childless testators, up to 46.5 percent, and a parallel decline of the familial coefficient, down to 1.2 children per family (Table 3). ⁸³ Changes might have been connected to a new wave of epidemics and food shortages mentioned by a series of sources. ⁸⁴ Mende experienced a comparable situation, with a recession of the familial coefficient in the 1480s, attributed by Philippe Maurice to an upsurge of epidemics. ⁸⁵

Data suggest improving demographics from 1425 onward, with a “baby boom” from c. 1450 both in Montpellier (where the threshold for population renewal was not reached) and in rural areas (where it was c. 1450). This demographic upturn attested from the middle of the fifteenth century also concerned Provençal towns, such as Brignoles, the city of Lyon, or the Gévaudan region. ⁸⁶ Although data cannot be taken at face value, the trends we can extrapolate from the analysis of wills confirm broader population patterns observed both in local fiscal documents and in other areas of southern France. ⁸⁷

Infant and Child Mortality

Commenting on the dwindling familial coefficient of Manosque after the Black Death, Andrée Courtemanche wrote that infant mortality, more than declining birth rates (dénatalité), could explain the catastrophic demography of the provençal town in the late fourteenth century. ⁸⁸ But estimates of child mortality are elusive for the medieval era, ranging from 30 percent to 50 percent of births, with geographical, chronological, and socioeconomical variances. ⁸⁹

Dead children were sometimes mentioned in the preamble of testaments when a testator asked to be buried with their deceased offspring. In her 1476 will, Anthonia, the widow of a ploughman of Montpellier remarried with a leather currier of the city, asked to be buried with her two babies or young children (pueri), the only offspring she mentioned in the document. ⁹⁰ The peak of mortality for children usually occurred before the age of five. In late medieval Tuscany, books of death show that 40 percent to 50 percent of the deceased listed had not reached adolescence yet. ⁹¹

Unlike what the above example suggests, mentioning a dead child does not equate mortality during childhood. A number of childless testators had raised their children and brought them into adulthood before they died. Some testators were childless but had grandchildren. ⁹² Alamanda, the widow of Johan Louvier of Montpellier, had lost her daughter Petronilla at the time she made her will in September 1351; although childless, she had four grandchildren—two boys and two girls. ⁹³ Likewise, the testator Guilhem Salas the Elder, from the castrum of Laroque-Aynier, had lost his children but had three adult grandchildren to whom he passed down his estates in 1414. ⁹⁴

Regardless of the age at which children died, mentions of their past existence remain scarce in testaments. Testators were more likely to name the living than the dead, leaving much uncertainty concerning their offspring. I was only able to connect 14.5 percent of urban childless testators to the loss of their children and a higher ratio of 19.5 percent in the rural areas of the diocese. ⁹⁵ Figures represent a minimum of child mortality, mainly corresponding to burial requests with dead children. Given the nature of the sources, it is impossible to further set apart testators who had lost their children from testators who never had any.

The first epidemic of plague, c. 1348, did not affect children more than the others, but subsequent epidemics made more victims among the youth. ⁹⁶ The Montpellier chronicle, entitled Petit Thalamus, suggests that child and subadult mortality increased during epidemics. ⁹⁷ The late fourteenth and early fifteenth century were the theater of endless cycles of epidemics, attested continuously from 1396 to 1398, 1404 to 1409 and 1413 to 1415. ⁹⁸ The time frame of these epidemics matches the highest rates of burial requests with a dead child—or with dead children—in urban and rural wills alike.

In 1384, for instance, the Thalamus scribe reported an “epidemic of bumps” (empedimia de bossas, maybe the bubonic plague) during which died “children small and big, many notable old men, and women, young especially, of this city.” ⁹⁹ In 1391, a “pestilence of bumps, fevers and death” killed “numberless children and young people and some older people.” ¹⁰⁰ In 1396, an epidemic of “picota” (perhaps smallpox) spread in the entire province of Languedoc, causing the death of many children and adults of Montpellier, the scribe wrote. ¹⁰¹

Archeological diggings of the cemetery St. Côme and St. Damien in Montpellier have yielded proof of the presence of Yersinia Pestis in medieval human remains. ¹⁰² The plague bacterium was identified in a burial where two adults—a man and a woman—had been simultaneously buried with a child aged around eight to ten. ¹⁰³ However, archeologists working on St-Côme and St-Damien did not recover enough infants’ and children’s complete skeletons to conduct precise assessments of rates of early age mortality in the city. ¹⁰⁴

Burial records from Siena show a steady increase of victims of plagues age twelve and less in the late fourteenth century, rising to a staggering 88 percent during the 1383 epidemic. ¹⁰⁵ At the turn of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, underage victims still represented nearly two-thirds of the Sienese burials. ¹⁰⁶

Children also “faced disproportionate risks of mortality during famines” in particular in the years following their weaning, when their immune system was still weak. ¹⁰⁷ Food shortages were a recurrent concern in Languedoc from the early fourteenth century onward, with province-wide famines attested in 1374–1375, 1419–1420, 1430–1433, 1456–1458, and 1480–1483, on top of local food shortages. ¹⁰⁸

Infant and child mortality was thus exacerbated at times of epidemics and famines, endemic in the diocese of Maguelone since the beginning of the fourteenth century. When the cycle of crises was the most intense, it is reasonable to assume that infant and child mortality rose drastically. ¹⁰⁹

Medieval sources usually describe epidemics as socially undiscriminating—killing the rich and the poor alike. But scientific evidence has shown that physical frailty, caused by malnutrition, prior infections and traumas, increased risks of mortality, especially during epidemics and famines. ¹¹⁰ As a result, poor populations had a much shorter life expectancy than the wealthy. The poor died in larger numbers when a plague or a famine struck. ¹¹¹ Ultimately, young victims of plague and famines were primarily (but not exclusively) the children of nonelite families.

Another social differential is that mortality risks were probably higher in medieval urban centers than in rural areas. Compared to rural inhabitants, urban dwellers in England had a shorter life expectancy and faced higher risks of mortality. ¹¹² Women, in particular, were more at risk in urban settings. ¹¹³ Urban centers were characterized by what bioarcheologists call the “urban pathogen load,” enhanced by insalubrity and promiscuity. ¹¹⁴ Yet, life in rural environments was also harsh and came with its own risks. ¹¹⁵

Bioarcheologists therefore suggest that infant and child mortality was higher in cities than in the country due to inherent risks of urban living—malnutrition, overpopulation, and low hygiene. Poor populations, who faced higher risks of mortality, also concentrated in cities where epidemics spread faster. Infant and child mortality were certainly important factors explaining the high rates of childless families in the second half of the fourteenth century and in the early fifteenth century. However, it remains impossible to assess how many.

The Elusive Age at Marriage

A later age at marriage in the city than in rural areas could also explain the higher rates of childlessness and smaller familial coefficient in Montpellier. If women married in their mid-twenties, for instance, they would have fewer pregnancies than women marrying in their late teens. ¹¹⁶ It is worth noting that young women marrying in their teens probably weren’t fertile enough to carry out healthy pregnancies; fertility occurred in late medieval women around the age of twenty. ¹¹⁷

But sources informing on the age at marriage in Montpellier are limited in number and in scope. ¹¹⁸ Rural data are even more scarce and do not enable us to assess whether rural marriages occurred earlier, later, or at the same period of time than in Montpellier. ¹¹⁹ Two factors, however, could have delayed marriage in the city and deferred the age at which urban women bore their first child. ¹²⁰

First, the “life cycle service,” that kept the youth away from marriage, was probably more common in the city than in rural areas. ¹²¹ Second, the immigration of young workers, known to have delayed marriage, was more prevalent in cities. ¹²² The “life cycle service” refers to the custom of placing children and teenagers in service outside of the family home. ¹²³

In England, correlations between youth service and later age at marriage go back to the late thirteenth and early fourteenth century. ¹²⁴ In Mediterranean cities, youth service and apprenticeship were as widespread as in England. ¹²⁵ There, the life cycle service could have also deferred marriage, as it did in Florence for young women of the middling milieu. ¹²⁶

Montpellier work and apprenticeship contracts suggest that tradesmen of the city were ready to marry in their early or mid-twenties, after the completion of their professional training and once they had started earning a living. ¹²⁷ In wills, fathers and mothers who made the inheritance conditional to having reached a certain age held that their sons would inherit once they reached twenty-five years old; others placed their sons under guardianship until they turned twenty-five. ¹²⁸

Information on the female average age at marriage is even more elusive. ¹²⁹ Young women from Montpellier, who worked as servants or apprentices, may have married at around age twenty, give or take a few years. ¹³⁰ However, well-off young women married at a younger age than humble and middle-class women. ¹³¹ Comparable to Montpellier, the Dijon, Burgundy, age at marriage for working-class women was at twenty to twenty-one years old in the late fifteenth century; similarly, in Gévaudan, most marriages occurred after women had reached twenty years of age. ¹³²

Evidently, artisanal work and patterns of service are attested in villages and towns of the diocese of Maguelone, where they also might have pushed back marriage. ¹³³ But apprenticeship and service work were more widespread in Montpellier, a city that still counted more than 10,000 souls in the late fourteenth and fifteenth centuries and where more than a hundred different craft guilds offered training and work opportunities. ¹³⁴

Immigration, more prevalent in cities than in rural settings, was another factor deferring marriage for the youth. ¹³⁵ Because it took migrants more time to establish themselves in life than locals, immigrants to Montpellier exhibited much higher rates of (premarital) celibacy than testators who were natives to the city. On average, 27 percent of immigrants were not yet married when they drafted their will, against less than 10 percent of the city’s natives. ¹³⁶

Higher rates of celibacy suggest the migrants’ relative youth, who probably drafted their will earlier in life than the Montpellier natives. Among the newcomers to Montpellier, about a third came from the diocese of Maguelone. ¹³⁷ It remains unclear as to how migration patterns impacted the rural demography. However, these young men and women were especially numerous in the early fifteenth century, when immigration to Montpellier was at its apex. ¹³⁸

Fertility Patterns

Low fertility rates are another explanation to the large numbers of childless families in Montpellier. But fertility and infertility are “virtually unapproachable, other than by indulging in a series of hypotheses,” warns Christiane Klapisch-Zuber. ¹³⁹ However, environmental factors, such as repeated episodes of epidemics and food shortages, are known to have a detrimental effect on female fertility. ¹⁴⁰ Low fertility and delayed puberty testified to harsh living conditions, malnutrition especially, exacerbated in urban settings. ¹⁴¹

Herlihy and Klapisch-Zuber have observed differences in fertility between Tuscan rural and urban women. ¹⁴² From their mid-twenties onward, Florentine women experienced a gradual decline in fertility while rural women still bore numerous children. ¹⁴³ The gap between urban and rural women grew as the years passed. If most Florentine women had their children between the ages of twenty and thirty-four, the window of fertility of rural women extended to their late thirties. ¹⁴⁴ As in Tuscany, rural women of the diocese of Maguelone might have been more fertile than urban women and for a longer period of time.

But not all rural women or urban women were equally infertile. In Florence and, more broadly, in Tuscany, wealthy women were more fertile and for a longer period of time than humble and poor women. ¹⁴⁵ Anemia and frailty hampered women’s fertility by causing amenorrhea and ovulatory failure while augmenting risks of miscarriage and lowering women’s chances of carrying healthy pregnancies. ¹⁴⁶ Problems of fertility were probably also more widespread for poor and humble women of the diocese of Maguelone, who suffered more from episodes of hunger and diseases than elite women.

In theory, medieval female fertility could have extended, like today, to the women’s late forties. Indeed, medieval physicians observed that menopause occurred when women were about fifty. ¹⁴⁷ But the five years leading to menopause are usually marked by a strong decline in fertility, due to irregular ovulation and menstruation, with a loss of reproductive capabilities from the age of forty years old. ¹⁴⁸ Rampant malnutrition could have, however, pushed down that age. ¹⁴⁹

Breastfeeding is another factor that reduced fertility by spacing out births. ¹⁵⁰ In the diocese of Maguelone, the hiring of wet nurses residing with their employer seems to have been limited to elite families who could afford the hefty salaries wet nurses received. ¹⁵¹ Externalizing breastfeeding enabled elite families to accumulate more pregnancies during the wife’s fertile years. ¹⁵² Assumedly, most nonelite mothers able to breastfeed their children did so, hence limiting the number of children they could bear.

Sources from Montpellier and the neighboring communities indicate that maternal breastfeeding usually spanned eighteen to twenty-four months. ¹⁵³ Guilhem Cornut, for instance, an inhabitant of the village of Cournonterral, provided in his 1490 will that if his wife was pregnant, she should breastfeed their child for two years and would receive 15 livres tournois for her milk. If she refused, she would only get 2 livres tournois. ¹⁵⁴

A number of archival-based and bioarcheological-based evidence concur to say that urban testators may have had fewer children than rural testators because of harsher living conditions in the city and delayed age at marriage due to immigration and work patterns. Environmental and social factors that had a detrimental effect on fertility and on children’s life expectancy piled up in urban settings, explaining the Montpellier higher rate of childless couples and the lower familial coefficient. ¹⁵⁵

The Typical Childless Individual

Whether in Montpellier or in rural areas, the typical childless testator was an artisan or a ploughman. While some 40 percent of the city’s artisanal and farming families were childless, the ratio was the lowest for the nobility and the commercial elite, at 23.5 percent. ¹⁵⁶ Likewise, in rural areas, only 11.5 percent of the elite families were childless, against more than a quarter of artisans, farmers, and ploughmen. ¹⁵⁷ In wills, elite families also counted more children than humble households. ¹⁵⁸

Members of the commercial elite of Montpellier were overrepresented in families of five and more children; while in rural areas, the nobility had an edge in families of six and more children. ¹⁵⁹ As established, better living conditions in wealthy households increased life expectancy and fertility. Wealth lowered infant and child mortality, while the hiring of wet nurses enabled couples to have closer-in-age children. ¹⁶⁰

In Montpellier, one of the testators with the most children was the money changer Jean Palmier, who drafted his will in 1324. He had five sons and two daughters. ¹⁶¹ Among the largest rural families was Helis de Rupperie Livida’s, a lady married to the nobleman Pierre Daurioli. ¹⁶² She lived in the town of Ganges where she had raised four sons and two daughters.

The typical Montpellier female childless testator was from the middle- or working-class. She was widowed between c. 1300 and c. 1400. In the first half of the fifteenth century, she was a married woman. ¹⁶³ In the towns and villages of the diocese, the typical childless woman was married when she made her will. ¹⁶⁴ Childlessness was indeed a feminine testamentary feature.

In rural towns and villages, data go back and forth between childless men and women, with a fifty-fifty gross total—although women only represented 39 percent of the testators. ¹⁶⁵ In Montpellier, more than half of the married and once-married childless testators were women (55.5 percent on average, with a peak at 62 percent between c. 1350 and c. 1400). ¹⁶⁶ However, women only made up 42.5 percent of the testators. Women were overrepresented in the ranks of childless testators.

Female testators were also more likely than male testators to be childless. In Montpellier, half of the c. 1300–1500 married and once-married female testators were childless, as opposed to 36 percent of male testators. ¹⁶⁷ In rural areas, 31 percent of the married and once married female testators were childless, against 21 percent of the rural male testators. ¹⁶⁸ Female testamentary practices diverged from male insofar that women drafted a will once married or, preferably, once widowed, regardless of whether they had children or not. ¹⁶⁹

In rural areas, the typical male childless testator was a widower, who may have lost his wife and newborn during childbirth or shortly after. ¹⁷⁰ In some English cemeteries, female peak mortality coincided with their window of fertility. Most female remains belonged to women who died in their twenties to mid-thirties, maybe due to complications at childbirth. ¹⁷¹ But, in the city of Montpellier, the typical childless man was married when he drafted his will. ¹⁷² He might have been relatively young and only recently married, as the next section contends.

Young Testators and Established Families

Looking at the composition of families in the seneschalsy of Beaucaire, Cécile Béghin noted that among the Montpellier testators who had an offspring, roughly 50 percent had immature children (either in pupillari etate or not married yet) and another 50 percent had adult children. ¹⁷³ In Mende and Alès, however, only one-third of the children mentioned in wills were immature or not yet married, the two other thirds being adult (married) children. ¹⁷⁴

Béghin concludes that the Montpellier testators were younger than testators living in less urban settings at the time they made their will. In accordance with Béghin’s findings, wills show that rural testators were older than the Montpellier testators. ¹⁷⁵ Ratios of testators who had grandchildren were much higher in rural communities than in Montpellier (18 percent of married and once-married testators in rural areas, against 8 percent in the city). ¹⁷⁶

In parallel, young testators made up 23.5 percent of male testators in Montpellier against 11 percent of male testators in rural areas. ¹⁷⁷ Likewise, young women represented 11.5 percent of the female urban testators and 6 percent of the rural female testators. ¹⁷⁸ Figures rose in the early fifteenth century, at a time when immigration of young workers became more prevalent in sources. ¹⁷⁹

In other words, families were larger in rural communities than in the city. In rural areas, families of six or more children represented 8.5 percent of families with children but only 4 percent of their urban counterparts. In a mirror effect, more than 40 percent of the fruitful testators of Montpellier had only one child alive at the time they made their will, against 27 percent of rural testators, whose families counted many more children. ¹⁸⁰

The largest family was Johan de Cortesio’s, inhabitant of the parish of St. Étienne de Cazevieille in the 1430s. ¹⁸¹ Cortesio had ten living children: four adults (Johan, Petronilla, Raymond, and Catherine), four teenagers (Pierre, Bernard, Agnès, and Magdalena), and two underage children (Johanna and Étienne). Probably married at least twice, Cortesio also had a stepdaughter and a baby on the way. His wife, Yssela, was pregnant at the time Johan made his will; this was her second marriage, and she had a daughter named Mongeta from a prior union. ¹⁸²

While higher child mortality risks in cities partially explain the data presented above, testamentary sources also point in the direction of a later age at will in rural towns and villages than in Montpellier, pushing the rural ratio of childless unions down and the familial coefficient up. Reciprocally, the relative youth of the Montpellier testators, when compared to rural areas, drove the ratio of childless unions up and the urban familial coefficient down.

These observations serve as a reminder that wills only provide a snapshot of a person’s life and of a given population, a snapshot influenced by local customs governing testamentary practices. The data we, as historians, collect depend on the nature of the sources we examine and, ultimately, reflect the traditions fueling their production.

Mutable Households

Families expanded and reduced with years passing. The plasticity of medieval households largely escapes testamentary sources, characterized by their stillness in time. ¹⁸³ A childless married couple might beget children after the drafting of a will; a widow or a widower might remarry and have offspring. Unfortunately, evidence of will-remaking is scarce in the corpus. ¹⁸⁴

A telling example of the mutable nature of households comes from accounts drafted between 1441 and 1444 for Bernard Thomas, a merchant of Montpellier. ¹⁸⁵ In 1441, Bernard lost his father, his mother, his wife, and his son, assumedly from an epidemic. Sometime later, Bernard married off his surviving daughter with a lofty dowry of 400 livres tournois. He then remarried to an unnamed woman (“the daughter of Johan Bastier”), who died shortly after leaving behind “a young girl, age one month,” for whom the merchant hired a wet-nurse during two years. ¹⁸⁶ Bernard quickly moved on with his life and had married his third wife by 1444.

Despite their limitations, wills suggest that the more a testator contracted marriages, the more chances they had of having children. In Montpellier, while only 56 percent of married testators had children, the ratio jumped to 73 percent in the case of remarried testators. ¹⁸⁷ In rural areas, the increase was less dramatic but still noticeable, going from 75.5 percent of married testators having children to 78.5 percent in the case of remarried testators. ¹⁸⁸

Likewise, a couple with a child might become childless at some point in their life. Anthonia Maurania’s two successive wills perfectly illustrate this. In 1396, the inhabitant of the town of Lunel distributed her goods to her sister-in-law, her stepdaughter from her husband’s first marriage, and to her friends. Anthonia made her daughter, Margarita, her universal heir. ¹⁸⁹

Twenty years later, Anthonia drafted a second will. ¹⁹⁰ All her bequests, but one, were directed toward religious and charitable institutions. The only personal bequest she made was to her husband, who would receive a vineyard. Anthonia made universal heir the “basin” of the souls of the purgatory of the church Notre-Dame du Lac. In between the two wills, Anthonia’s daughter had seemingly died. ¹⁹¹

What wills tell about childlessness depends in a large part on the testators’ demographic profile and on the stage in life they had reached when they drafted a testament. Local testamentary practices and customs, framing the transmission of the estate and what testators were the most inclined to say to a notary, impact the content of these documents.

Wills reaffirm a number of conclusions made by bioarcheologists: urban life was detrimental to children’s life expectancy and women’s fertility; and poor individuals were more likely to be deprived of children than the wealthy. But the rather dramatic data collected for the city of Montpellier also result from the overrepresentation of young testators and of childless widows in the corpus.

Likewise, rural data might be skewed by a later age at will and a tendency, up to the late fourteenth century, of drafting a will preferably when one had children. In that context, the inflated rural familial coefficient contrasts even more with the staggeringly low urban numbers.

Spouses as Universal Heirs

The universal heir receives the bulk of the testator’s estates, minus other bequests enumerated in the will. Several individuals at once or even the Church could be named universal heirs. If they had children, they would often be the ones chosen by testators to be their heir (or heirs). The custom was overwhelmingly followed in rural areas (96.5 percent) but a little less in Montpellier (90.5 percent). ¹⁹⁷ In the absence of children, testators had to make other choices.

On average, spouses represented half of the childless testators’ universal heirs. ¹⁹⁸ But that average includes widows and widowers who had no spouse to bequeath to. If married (or remarried), testators tended to make their spouse their universal heir, as did three-quarters of married and remarried childless testators from Montpellier, as well as 60 percent of the married and remarried rural testators (see Table 4).

OPEN IN VIEWER

Table 4.

Married and Childless Testators’ Universal Heirs (c. 1300–1500).^a

Montpellier		Rural
Women (69 Wills)	Men (92 Wills)	Women (33 Wills)	Men (39 Wills)
Spouse (83%)	Spouse (70%)	Spouse (58%)	Spouse (62%)
Blood kin (14%)	Blood kin (29%)	Blood kin (24%)	Blood kin (28%)
Church, charity (6%)	Church, charity (5%)	Unrelated individual (9%)	Unrelated individual (13%)
Unrelated individual (3%)	Unrelated individual (5%)	Church, charity (6%)	Church, charity (8%)
In-laws, stepfamily (1%)	In-laws, stepfamily (1%)	In-laws, stepfamily (3%)

^a Total exceeds 100 percent because testators could name several universal heirs at once.

“Without children, the nuclear family remained a fragile, temporary construct,” writes Francine Michaud concerning burial requests in preplague Marseille. ¹⁹⁹ Michaud’s observation applies to the transmission of estate in rural areas of the diocese of Maguelone, where the surviving spouse of a childless testator was far from systematically chosen to be the universal heir.

In Montpellier, the situation was different and the conjugal bond prevailed. But, if the living spouse of childless testators had greater chances to inherit in Montpellier than in rural areas, it was especially the case when the spouse at the receiving end was a man (Table 4). ²⁰⁰ Montpellier childless wives were more likely to make their spouse universal heir (83 percent) than childless husbands (70 percent). ²⁰¹

The wives, who were not named universal heirs, were still included in their husbands’ will, both in Montpellier and rural areas. Besides giving back the dowry to their wives, most husbands, concerned for their wives’ sustenance, left them either an extra sum of money or alimonies. ²⁰²

Married but childless men from Montpellier and from rural areas were more prone than female testators to return their estates to their kin (although rural women did so at twice the rate of urban women). Men were careful to bring back their wealth to their original family, more so than women whose dowries, especially in towns and cities, were less estates-based than men’s marital assigns. ²⁰³

Urban and rural testators, whose children had died in adulthood, usually favored their grandchildren over their surviving spouse to be their universal heir. ²⁰⁴ By passing on the bulk of their estates to their second-generation descendants, these testators respected the customary paths of estates transmission, down the lines of descent.

Childless testators, married and widowed as we shall see, also gave more importance to their affine—their sons- and daughters-in-law, their siblings-in-law, but also their stepparents and stepchildren. Across the diocese, all lay testators considered, between 1.5 percent and 2 percent of them, made an in-law or a step-kin their universal heir. ²⁰⁵ The ratio doubled for childless testators and reached 6.5 percent to 7 percent when testators were both childless and widowed.

Heirs of Childless and Widowed Testators

A common feature of urban and rural childless testators is that of greater diversity in the choice of the universal heir when their spouses died. Widowed and childless testators still preferred to pass on their possessions to their blood kin, either horizontally (to their siblings, a choice predominantly made by men) or downward (to their nephews and nieces, usually women’s choice). ²⁰⁶

Both men and women sent back their estates to their blood family, though at much different rates in the city and in the countryside (Table 4). Only one-third of the urban testators chose their universal heir among their blood kin, against half of the rural testators. It is possible that ancestry and the agnatic line of descent had a greater weight in rural testamentary practices than in the city, maybe because wealth relied more on land property in the countryside. ²⁰⁷

But it is also possible that many urban testators experienced a greater degree of estrangement from their kin—one-quarter of the Montpellier testators were newcomers to the city—which complicated the remittance of the inheritance. Finally, higher rates of mortality in Montpellier could also have played an important role, reducing the size of families and diverting the transmission of estates away from what remained of the testators’ blood kin.

Individual circumstances also could have trumped well-established testamentary customs. Johanna, the daughter of a late notary of Montpellier and the widow of a man from the coastal town of Frontignan, is a perfect example of this. In her 1378 will, she enumerated a long list of religious and charitable bequests and gave small sums of money to various women of Frontignan, probably friends of hers. ²⁰⁸

Johanna had a brother in Montpellier who received some money as well as a niece to whom she bequeathed a substantial sum for her marriage. Yet, maybe because she was at odds with her brother, Johanna dug farther away in her family tree to find her universal heir, her cousin’s son named Jacob.

A clear feature of childless and widowed individuals’ testamentary choices is the importance they gave to unrelated individuals and to the Church when choosing their universal heir (see Table 5). Childless and widowed urban testators, men and women alike, put their kin on equal footing with the Church when it came to passing on their estates.

Churchmen, religious, and charitable institutions saw their chances of inheriting the bulk of one’s estates rising when a testator was childless and even more so when testators were childless and widowed (except maybe for rural men, but data are scarce). ²⁰⁹ Urban widows and widowers without children were the most prone to name the Church or a churchman their universal heir, at rates four times higher than the city’s average (Table 5). ²¹⁰

OPEN IN VIEWER

Table 5.

Widowed and Childless Testators’ Universal Heirs (c. 1300–1500).^a

Montpellier		Rural
Women (61 Wills)	Men (12 Wills)	Women (20 Wills)	Men (10 Wills)
Church, charity (36%)	Blood kin (33%)	Blood kin (50%)	Blood kin (60%)
Blood kin (33%)	Church, charity (33%)	Church, charity (25%)	In-laws, stepfamily (30%)
Unrelated individual (21%)	Unrelated individual (17%)	Unrelated individual (25%)	Unrelated individual (10%)
In-laws, stepfamily (10%)	Spiritual kin (17%)

^a Total exceeds 100 percent because testators could name several universal heirs who would share or collectively own the estates.

In Montpellier, the ratio of clerical, religious, and charitable universal heirs goes from an average of 8.5 percent when considering all lay testators, to 15 percent for childless testators in general, and to 35.5 percent for childless and widowed testators (Table 5). ²¹¹ In parallel, if only 4 percent of lay rural testators made the Church their universal heir, 10 percent of childless testators did so, a ratio increasing to a relatively low 16.5 percent in the case of childless and widowed individuals. ²¹² Testators turned to the Church and focused on their salvation once the conjugal unit had completely disintegrated. ²¹³

Finally, childless testators were more likely than the average to transmit the bulk of their possessions to unrelated people (Table 5). In Montpellier, all lay wills considered, only 6.5 percent to 7 percent of universal heirs were unrelated to the testators. ²¹⁴ In the case of widowed and childless testators, the ratio climbed to 20 percent both in Montpellier and in rural areas. ²¹⁵ Unfortunately, next to nothing is known about these people’s relationship to the testators. Notaries only wrote down their names and sometimes their occupations.

Ermessende, the widow of Guilhem Boneri from the village Les Matelles, drafted her will in 1430, the day after Christmas. ²¹⁶ Her only personal bequest was the institution of an heir. In all appearance poor and isolated, Ermessende gave her meagre goods to Johan Boqueti and his wife, Catherine, two inhabitants of Les Matelles. Ermessende was not related to them. However, she was ill when she drafted her will, which she did in the couple’s house. It is possible that Ermessende was living with them.

Another example comes from a donation causa mortis, contracted by Johannetta, the widow of Bernard Ricard, a gardener in Montpellier. ²¹⁷ A contract similar to a testament, a donation causa mortis had similar outcomes. ²¹⁸ Johannetta donated all her possessions to Rixenda, the wife of a butcher, except for 6 livres tournois she set aside to draft her will. The donation continued with the content of the will. Johanetta assigned the 6 livres for her burial and the salvation of her soul. She gave some of that money, “for the love of God,” to a young unrelated woman and made her universal heir the said Rixenda.

The donation itself yields details about the relationship these women shared and incorporates a number of conditions Rixenda should fulfill to receive the promised inheritance. First, Johanetta had to explain the donation. In a formulaic sentence, the notary wrote that the donatrix gave her estates to Rixenda because of the “intimate love and cordial affection” she felt for her; the donation was also a reward for the “numerous and diverse services” Rixenda had rendered and was still rendering. ²¹⁹ Although standard, these sentences reflected an existing bond between the two women, where Rixenda was offering support to Johannetta.

In order to receive the donation upon Johannetta’s death, Rixenda had to provide for Johannetta’s needs whether in good health or ill. ²²⁰ The contract was drafted in Rixenda’s house where Johannetta would move into if she was not already living there. As shown in this example, some of the unrelated universal heirs seemed to substitute for the absence of adult children, living with the testators, and caring for them while elderly or sick.

Adoption, Fosterage, and Living Arrangements

According to the archives of the diocese of Maguelone, individuals deprived of children actively seeked out the presence of substitute heirs in their house. Childless testators, for instance, would make more room in their will for the children born of the precedent union of their spouse. ²²¹ Stepdaughters and stepsons only appeared as universal heirs of childless stepparents.

Johan Costa, inhabitant of Lattes, only made religious bequests in his 1457 will, before transmitting all his estates to Johan Aymeri, his stepson (fillastrum meum). ²²² The testator’s wife, also the stepson’s mother, was not mentioned in the will. Despite her certainly having passed away, the bond between the childless stepfather and the orphaned stepson had remained strong.

Evidence shows that childless testators and people estranged from their children invested in children of their kin. ²²³ In Montpellier, as we shall see, some took in foundlings, promising to raise them as if they were their own children. ²²⁴ Others, across the diocese, looked for support and care as soon as old age came, striving to convince younger people to come live with them. ²²⁵

The city of Montpellier funded the care of foundlings and orphans through a threefold system. ²²⁶ Infants and young children were given away to salaried wet nurses. Toddlers and children were entrusted to male and female “nurses” (i.e., foster families) who cared and fed the children usually for a lower salary. ²²⁷ Finally, some children—maybe awaiting to be placed in a foster home or too old to be placed—were kept at the Montpellier hospitals, particularly at Notre-Dame St. Éloi. ²²⁸ Some foundlings were later placed in apprenticeship and married off at the city’s expenses. ²²⁹

Some foster families may have taken in foundlings for financial reasons—although the pay was low, it was an opportunity to have an extra pair of hands working around the house. But others, I have argued, may have longed for a child and accepted a foundling with gratitude and joy. ²³⁰ Such families went insofar as to keep the child and put an end to the financial transaction with the consulate. ²³¹

The squire and stock maker, Johan Champene, is an example of a foster parent who may have longed for a child. In March 1456, the consuls of Montpellier placed a foundling boy under his care and without any compensation. ²³² Champene promised the consuls that he and his wife would raise the boy; send him to school so that he would learn to read and write; and, later, teach him the trade of stock making. ²³³ If the child were to behave “as a son should toward his father and mother,” Champene would reciprocate “as a father toward a son,” ultimately giving him a portion of his estates.

Examples informing on the voluntary fosterage of children are, however, scarce in the diocese of Maguelone, unlike notarial contracts framing adoption-like procedures. Medieval adoption—usually called affiliatio or receptio in filium—did not create true familial bonds between the adoptive parents and the adoptee—only God could. ²³⁴ Therefore, medieval adoption created a fiction of filiation, framed by extremely complex rules that jurists and canonists had elaborated. ²³⁵

Notarial practices readily and easily circumvented that legislation. ²³⁶ Archives for the diocese of Maguelone, as in the rest of the Mediterranean area, are wealthy of contracts that had comparable effects to an adoption. ²³⁷ But because notarial contracts could only involve individuals with legal capacity, adoption-like contracts only occurred between adults.

In adoption-like contracts of the diocese of Maguelone, all the adoptive parents were childless; some of them were widowed and childless women. ²³⁸ The nature of their childlessness is unknown, but, in Italy, adoption seems to have been more widespread among infertile couples than couples whose children had died. ²³⁹

The adoption of adult children, filling the void of childlessness, translated anxieties related to isolation and old age. ²⁴⁰ Being childless was especially problematic when people grew old and could no longer look after themselves. ²⁴¹ With adult children traditionally taking care of their older parents, finding a dotting caregiver could be challenging for childless older individuals. In some cases, familial solidarities were strong enough to alleviate one’s concern about old age. ²⁴²

Many testators, like the Frontignan merchant, Jacob Luc, made caring arrangements for potentially isolated relatives. Jacob Luc specified in his 1414 will that if his brother-in-law predeceased his sister, Jacoba, the said Jacoba was to move into his house. ²⁴³ At her brother’s home, Jacoba would receive everything she needed, in health or illness, until her death. Jacoba was seemingly childless; her brother did not mention any nephews or nieces in his will.

For childless and isolated individuals, a number of legal mechanisms were available to secure support in their old age. Among these legal tools were the donation of goods (donation inter vivos or donation causa mortis), contracts known as affrèrements, and the testamentary institution of universal heirs. ²⁴⁴ However, most implied that the elderly had enough resources to make the living arrangements appealing enough to the caregiver.

Bernard Verveti, an inhabitant of the parish St. Martial d’Assas, was a childless man when he made his will in 1462. ²⁴⁵ His son, Arnaud, had died in adulthood, leaving behind a young daughter, Bernard’s granddaughter. Bernard and his wife, Mengeta, were growing old and concerned about their future. Bernard made universal heir his nephew, Stéphane, who lived in a nearby parish, but the inheritance was conditional to Stéphane moving in with his uncle and providing to all his needs so long as he lived. ²⁴⁶

Financial means and the reliance on familial solidarities were essential to cure the issues childlessness created for the elderly. For those longing for the laughters and concerns that come with children, fosterage may have been a solution.